Union and Liberty: An American TL

[wilcoxchar]

And here's the next update. More footnotes will come later today.

Part Eighty-Seven: The Election of 1896

Election of 1896: Once the United States economy began recovering from the Silver Depression, the amount of strikes and labor disputes died down for the most part during Grover Cleveland's second term. In 1895 the Democratic members of Congress tried yet again to pass a bill on the gold standard. Representatives William Breckenridge of Kentucky and Thomas Merriwether of North Carolina proposed the bill. With a slim margin, the Merriwether-Breckenridge Act succeeded in the House of Representatives and the Senate. Despite Republicans and Progressives acting as a united force against the act, the recovering economy had led to a Democratic majority in both houses of Congress after the 1894 midterm elections. However, many inside and outside Congress greatly opposed the act and created a national uproar over the bill. The most notable opponents were those from the West and included Populist governor Henry Teller of Colorado, and within the House, Populist Richard Pettigrew of Pembina and Republican William Jennings Bryan of Kearney who spoke vehemently against the bill. This opposisition of the Merriwether-Breckenridge Act propelled these politicians to national fame in the next years.

After the passage of the Merriwether-Breckenridge Act, the Bourbon Democrats had finally achieved their most prized policy goal. However, the Democratic Convention of 1896 in New York made it evident that in many areas of public policy, the Democrats were nowhere near as united. The Eagle Democrats were continuing their growth as a power bloc within the party. Other Democratic Party leaders attempted to minimize the Eagle Democrats' influence at the Convention. This led to the Democratic Chairman Calvin Brice urging the pragmatic Cleveland to run for the nomination again. Cleveland reluctantly accepted and won the nomination after fifteen ballots. The Vice Presidential nomination, on the other hand, was out in the open after Thomas Bayard's death in 1895[1]. The main contenders for the Vice Presidential nomination were William McKinley of Ohio, Robert Pattison of Pennsylvania, John Carlisle of Kentucky, and William Vilas of Wisconsin. After five ballots, Pattison was named the Vice Presidential nominee.

The Republican National Convention took advantage of the outrage over the passage of the Merriwether-Breckenridge Act when choosing the Republican candidates. William Jennings Bryan had made an outstanding appearance on the national stage in his opposition of the act, and it propelled him to become the frontrunner for the presidential nomination at the convention. However, a number of Republicans at the convention were worried about Bryan's youth and how it would affect his chances in the general election. As a compromise, Bryan was nominated as the Republican Vice Presidential candidate. For the Presidential nomination, the Republicans chose Levi Morton of New York. The choice of Morton would balance out the choice of Bryan geographically and give President Cleveland competition in his home state. Morton was also chosen in a way to give Bryan an experienced teacher. In his memoirs, Speaker of the House Thomas Beckett Reed wrote that "Bryan was clearly the Republican star. However in the eyes of many of us, he needed a little more molding before he was ready for the duties of the President. Levi Morton was chosen to groom [Bryan] for the Presidency." Morton was nominated at the age of 72, becoming one of the oldest candidates for national office in United States history. This made the Republican candidacy one of great contrast, attempting to bridge the old post-National War thought of the party with the ideas of the coming century.

After Cleveland won the Democratic nomination, many Eagle Democrats were furious and were dissatisfied with the lack of a viewpoint in favor of imperialism and protectionism in either of the political parties at the time. Several Eagle Democrats broke off from the main party to form the National Democratic Party. The National Democrats nominated Henry Cabot Lodge of Massachusetts and businessman Nelson Dingley Jr. of Maine for their presidential ticket. The appearance of the National Democratic Party exhibits the beginning of a political shift from a focus on the gold standard and other post-National War issues to a greater focus on foreign policy and the place of the United States in world affairs. During the campaign, many Populists were supportive of the Republican campaign because of Bryan, and many campaigners in the South emphasized the links between the Republicans and Bryan to minimize the Democratic vote. In some states like North Carolina and Georgia, Bryan was even on the ballot as the Vice Presidential candidate alongside James Weaver. With the divisions within the Democratic Party and the Populist support for the Republican ticket, the Republicans took the White House in 1896 by a wide majority.

[1] There is now a "Vice Presidential Curse" according to the family. If you're a Bayard and you get elected Vice President, you will die in office.

 

[wilcoxchar]

Update time!

Part Eighty-Eight: Levi Morton, the Republican Folly

The Corporate President: As the election of Levi Morton was more about the nurturing of William Jennings Bryan into the presidency than Morton himself, few people had paid attention to Morton's political positions during the 1896 general campaign. Morton had become successful as a New York businessman before entering politics, and he carried his business savvy and sentiment with him into Congress and the White House. In the Senate, Morton had sided with several other pro-business politicians including Democrats, and vigorously promoted New York's financial interests. Morton was a big proponent of the Tariff of 1882, which raised tariff rates on many finished goods to help Northeastern businesses, and sided with Democrats in getting the act passed.

When he entered the White House, he continued his pro-business stance against the free trade platform of most Republicans. However, he received more criticism for refusing to consider any bill that would repeal the Merriwether-Breckenridge Act. To this criticism, Morton responded by saying that the gold standard was necessary to stabilize the United States economy. "Silver has proven to be the ruin of empires. It ruined Spain, it is ruining China, and it is led the United States to depression. It is destroying the middle class and turning us into a country millionaires and peasants, like the Mexican states and Japan."[1] Morton's skillful speeches[2] calmed most Republicans as the President assured the country that economic stability was what was needed at the time and that removing the gold standard so soon would only destabilize the economy further.

Morton had a busy term as president considering his death later in his term. One of Morton's biggest successes during his presidency was the passage of the Mesoamerican Trade Act. Put forward by Cuba Representative Antonio Maceo Grajales, the act gave incentives to American businesses dealing with Mesoamerica. The act reduced tariffs on agricultural resources such as coffee, sugar, and rubber from Mesoamerica, and improved the port of Veracruz which by now had become essential an outpost of the United States in the region. It also gave funds for improving the ports at Tampa Bay, New Orleans, and Havana for improving the country's southern trade routes. The act marked the beginning of American involvement in the Caribbean and Ibero-American affairs.


From People to Progress: The Presidency of Levi Morton drove many ordinary people away from the Republican Party as it made it seem like the party on a national level had abandoned its working class platform. The 1898 midterm elections resulted in a wave of support for the Populist Party. Most of the gains by the Populist Party were in the South, where the Populists already had a modest amount of support. Some politicians ran on Populist and Republican fusion tickets, or switched parties to join the Populists. Among these were Representative Thomas Watson of Georgia who changed his primary affiliation from the Republican to the Populist parties and William Lowe of Alabama switched from the Democratic to the Populist party. They joined Marion Butler of North Carolina and Terencio Sierra[3] of Jackson as the only Populist senators from the former Confederate states.

However, the most surprising gains that the Populist Party made in 1898 were in the Northeast. For most of the end of the 19th century, the Populist Party had achieved little success in the Northeast. Much of the politics in the region was dominated by political machines, and was fought between the Democrats as representatives of business and corporate interests, and Republicans representing the working class. However, dissatisfaction with the Republican Party in 1898 led to some upsets in the electoral races in the region that year. The biggest gain in 1898 was the victory of former New York City mayor Theodore Roosevelt for the governorship of New York. Roosevelt was a popular figure among many New Yorkers, and his leadership of New York and later the Populist Party would continue the party's rise. Roosevelt would in the next decade transform the Populist Party into the Progressive Party that exists today, and become the first Progressive candidate to be elected President of the United States.

[1] Paraphrased Ron Paul to come up with this quote.
[2] Cartoons of the time ITTL referred to Morton as "Wit the Elder" and Bryan as "Wit the Younger".
[3] OTL president of Nicaragua, ITTL came to the US during his time in the shipping industry.

 

[wilcoxchar]

Got another update done!

Part Eighty-Nine: South of the Border

Mesoamerican Business:
The United States has long had interests in Ibero-America. The purchase of Cuba and early filibusters like William Walker represented the majority of American involvement in the Caribbean prior to the National War. However, later in the century, the US started seeking greater economic involvement and trade relations with Ibero-American countries. Of particular interest was the Mesoamerican Union. Many American corporations had set up plantations in Mesoamerica to cheaply bring goods like coffee, sugar, and rubber into the United States. After the formation of the Mesoamerican Union, American interests in the region grew as its first leader, Porfirio Diaz, was very friendly to American business.

During the presidencies of Grover Cleveland and Levi Morton, the United States established many treaties with Mesoamerica under Porfirio Diaz that guaranteed and greatly strengthened American businesses' operations in the country. In 1892, the United States and Mesoamerica entered an agreement greatly reducing the tariffs for goods produced in Mesoamerica and imported into the United States. Morton furthered the connections between Mesoamerica and the United States in 1897 when he signed a treaty that established a naval base on the island of Cozumel and authorized a railroad to be constructed by American companies across the Isthmus of Tehuantepec. Diaz also enacted domestic policies to attract American businesses, signing laws creating lax regulations and granting American companies better treatment with regard to labor and government projects.

The operations by American companies and their support by the United States government created vocal opposition in both the United States and in Mesoamerica. In the United States, socialist activists decried the conditions that they said the United States was enabling in Mesoamerica. Isolationists and anti-imperialists claimed the treaties were a sign of nascent American colonialism and that the United States was becoming no better than the British Empire. Interestingly, there was also opposition from Cuban and Floridan sugar planters, who feared the loss of profits to cheaper imported sugar. In Mesoamerica, the Diaz regime escalated class tensions and lent support to a growing agrarian and labor movement. After the election of the liberal Justo Rufino Barrios, the government attempted to negate some of the laws passed by Diaz, but in 1903 a coup against Barrios returned Diaz to the presidency.

Shortly after the coup, a rebellion was launched in Nicaragua led by Jose Santos Zelaya[1]. The rebellion was only partially due to opposition to Diaz' regime. It was also fueled by the perceived dominance of the western regions of Mesoamerica in the union. The states of Oaxaca, Yucatan, and Guatemala dominated the federation in terms of population, and most of the executive branch of the Diaz and Barrios governments had been from those states. Many Nicaraguans felt neglected in the federation, and were especially concerned that the government had refused to press the Nicaraguan claim to the strip of land taken by Costa Rica earlier in the century. The Zelaya rebellion gained control over Leon and Granada for a few months, but by the end of 1903 it had been crushed by the government.


The First Mexican War:
The most prominent event during Morton's term was the American intervention in the First Mexican War. The war began in 1896 when the government of Chihuahua rebelled against the government of Rio Bravo. As a recently incorporated and sparsely populated province, Chihuahua was neglected by the Republic of Rio Bravo and not given an equal voice in the legislature as Coahuila, Nuevo Leon, and Tamaulipas were. The Chihuahuan rebels, led by Ramiro Salazar[2], gained support from the governments of Durango and Granidalgo, who each claimed land from Rio Bravo. By the spring of 1897, Salazar's forces had captured the city of Chihuahua and much of the land surrounding it.

At this time, Durango and Granidalgo, who had singed an alliance, invaded the Republic of Rio Bravo. Granidalgo defeated a Riobravense army at the battle of Tampico and occupied the city in mid-May. Durango moved its army up the coast to defend its claimed territory from any overzealous Chihuahuans. In June, the American filibuster Jack Garner[3] crossed into Riobravense territory and raided the town of Col[FONT=&quot]ó[/FONT]n in the far north of Chihuahua[4]. The Chihuahuan guerrillas attempted to capture Garner, but before they reached Col[FONT=&quot]ó[/FONT]n he had fled back across the Rio Bravo into United States territory. In late June, the Chihuahuans demanded that Garner be extradited to Chihuahua to receive punishment. Morton refused to extradite Garner and after outcries by the news media and Congress claimed that the violence in Rio Bravo was destabilizing the region. From then, Morton authorized military intervention in the first modern major involvement of United States forces in Ibero-America.

After Morton's authorization, United States forces stationed in western Tejas crossed the Rio Bravo and occupied several border towns including Piedras Negras and Guadalupe[5]. In September after further movements by American troops, all the parties involved agreed to American arbitration in a resolution to the war. In the negotiations for the 1897 Washington Treaty, Morton and Secretary of State Elihu Root worked to dismantle British influence in the region by granting large concessions to the parties fighting against Rio Bravo. Most of the province of Chihuahua became independent under American protection, while the far north was incorporated into the Unorganized Territory in the Trans-Pecos and the Pacific coast was ceded to Durango. Granidalgo gained the port of Tampico and other small concessions along the Rio Tamesí. Despite protests from the British and Riobravense governments of unfair treatments to Rio Bravo in the negotiations, France, Germany, and other great powers endorsed the treaty as needed to promote stability in the Mexican states. The intervention of the United States, however, did not stabilize the area as more countries in the region began contemplating territorial expansion of their own.

[1] OTL President of Nicaragua.
[2] Ramiro Salazar is fictional. I would've used Pancho Villa but he's too young at this point.
[3] Yes, that's Cactus Jack. And yes, he was that old.
[4] Columbus, New Mexico.
[5] OTL Manuel Ojinaga, Mexico. Guadalupe is a nearby municipality.

 

[wilcoxchar]

I ended up getting the normal update done before the Teddy Roosevelt story. The TR story will probably be done by Wednesday, since the amount of schoolwork I have is dying down a bit. I'll add footnotes tomorrow.

Part Ninety: The Ascendance of William Jennings Bryan

The Passing of Wit[1]:
While Morton's presidency was eventful, it was also short. In December of 1898, Morton came down with pneumonia and died on the 11th of January, 1899 at the age of 74. Bryan succeeded him at the age of 38, becoming the youngest person to ever accede to the presidency of the United States. In the following months, Bryan's ascension to the presidency gave the Republican Party a jump in popularity as Morton had become disliked by many in the Republican Party during the previous two years. Bryan's first actions as president were to replace two cabinet members. Bryan replaced Jay Gould as Secretary of the Treasury with George Cortelyou, replaced Orville Platt as Secretary of War with William Howard Taft, and replaced Edmund Morrill with Thomas Edward Watson as Secretary of Agriculture[2].

After Bryan succeeded to the presidency, the first item on his agenda was to push for the repeal of the Merriwether-Breckenridge Act. Bryan's commitment to the free silver cause was astounding, and in his first months in office, Bryan gave several speeches advocating a return to free silver. The speeches worked to a great effect. Support for bimetallism even among Republicans and Progressives had been waning in the recent decade as the recovering economy lessened the importance of the issue. But as Bryan tirelessly pushed the issue, a renewed support for bimetallism grew and a bill to repeal the act passed the House of Representatives with support from the West and much of the South. However, speculation on the American economy led to a recession in the middle of 1899 as the bill was gaining support. This recession led to the Senate tabling the bill, with Ohio senator William McKinley leading the opposition to the bill saying that Bryan's stubbornness on the issue would lead to ruin.


Butting Heads:
The failure to repeal the Merriwether-Breckenridge Act did not deter Bryan from attempting to push further legislation through Congress. Between Bryan's inauguration and the end of 1899, Congress initiated bills to establish a federal minimum wages, a bill to establish a federal department of commerce, and legislation to regulate food transport costs. Of these, only the Interstate Commerce Act which established the Department of Commerce was passed[3]. It had the support of the West and the urban centers in the Old Northwest and the Northeast. The Agricultural Transportation Act only had the true support of members from rural districts. While it had gained support from much of the West, many southern representatives were against the bill and along with opposition from the Northeast, voted it down.

While Bryan failed in Washington, he was largely successful in the rest of the country. During his presidency, Bryan made an unprecedented number of trips around the country. Bryan traveled extensively by rail, and these trips made him known as a successor of Andrew Jackson as a hero of the common man[4]. Bryan's speeches aroused much support from the American public about one more issue, which was Bryan's other major success in his presidency. In 1900, a constitutional amendment was proposed in Congress to directly elect Senators. The amendment passed the House in May of 1900, and was passed by the Senate in September.

Next came the passage of the amendment by the states. The New England states, which had already established statewide election of Senators, were the first to ratify the Sixteenth Amendment in June and July of 1900. States in the West ratified the amendment through the rest of 1900 along with New Jersey, Winfield, and Wisconsin. States in the Old Northwest ratified the amendment in the early months of 1901. New York, Pennsylvania, and Maryland joined the ratification in April of 1901. It finally reached the two thirds requirement with ratification by North Carolina and Cuba in August of 1901. The midterm elections of 1902 were the first with the Sixteenth Amendment in force.

[1] This section is named for the nicknames Morton and Bryan received during the 1890s as "Wit the Elder" and "Wit the Younger".
[2] All the cabinet members here are real people.
[3] The Interstate Commerce Act is passed ten years later than OTL. The first Secretary of Commerce is Missouri Congressman William Hatch.
[4] Bryan's reputation mostly came from his advocacy for better labor conditions for urban workers, and his accomplishments for farmers. Modern historians are much more critical of Bryan during his administrations.

 

[wilcoxchar]

Finally done with the TR story! I feel the ending is a little rushed but I need to get started on schoolwork and I really wanted to finish it today. It also ended up being much longer than I expected.


The Undisclosed Adventures of Theodore Roosevelt, Episode 5: Airship One

The bright midday sun shined over Lake Michigan and the Chicago waterfront. President Roosevelt stepped out of the car and waved at the crowds lined along Michigan Avenue. "Mister President, we really need to be going if we are to return to Washington before nightfall," John Muir whispered in Roosevelt's ear. The President nodded but waved at the crowd for another moment before moving toward the waiting airship. The crowds cheered as the President stepped up the stairs into the official presidential airship, known as Airship One.

As the remainder of the launch preparations were being made, seven men emerge from Lake Michigan on the other side of the park. They removed their diving dress while the lead man motioned them toward the airship. The seven men ran over directly beneath the airship at the center, a far way behind the gondola. The bottom of the airship still loomed ten feet above their heads as it hovered, tethered to the mooring mast. "How are we going to get up there, John?" one of the men said looking up at the airship.

John Flemming, the leader of the anarchist group known as the Black Hawk League, turned to one of the others in the group. "Frank, did you remember to repack the grapple after we got out of the water?" Frank nodded. "Give it here," John said. Frank got the rope and hook out of his pack and handed it to John. John twirled the hook above his head and tossed it up at the airship. The sharpened hook tore a hold through the airship's cotton skin, and John pulled the rope taut as the hook slid and caught on the interior metal frame. "Everyone climb up quickly," John said and they quietly boarded the airship. John wast he last one inside the airship, and retrieved the hook and the rope. The only trace of their entrance was now the small rip in the airship's skin.


The President walked out of his cabin and peered out the window. The ridges of the Appalachian Mountains were laid neatly across the ground far below. Roosevelt walked along the deck toward the bridge of the airship. The pilot was at the wheel when Roosevelt entered the bridge. "Out for a stoll, mister President?" the pilot asked when he heard Roosevelt's footsteps on the wooden floor.

"Yes," Roosevelt replied. "I always enjoy the view from up here." Roosevelt stopped and looked down from the airship as the mountains slowly passed by.

In the hull above the bridge, the seven members of the Black Hawk League peered through a hatch at Roosevelt and the pilot. "There he is!" Frank whispered with excitement. "And he's alone with the pilot."

"Excellent," John replied. They opened the hatch slightly and tossed a small smoke bomb into the cabin. As smoke filled the room, the men dropped down into the cabin. Roosevelt and the pilot turned around in confusion and started stumbling. Suddenly, a baseball bat came into Roosevelt's field of view and collided with his head. Roosevelt and the pilot fell to the floor. The last thing Roosevelt heard before blacking out was a muffled voice yelling, "go secure the rest of..."


When Roosevelt came to, he found himself seated in a chair, still on the bridge of the airship. When he tried to move, he found that his hands were tied together with rope to the back of the chair. Looking around, Roosevelt saw two men standing near him and another standing at the wheel. They were wearing factory workers' overalls. One wore a black bandana around his head. "What is going on here?" Roosevelt yelled.

The man in the bandana turned to face Roosevelt. "Ah good, you've come to. Allow me to introduce myself. I am John Flammang, leader of the Black Hawk League. We have captured you and commandeered your airship."

Roosevelt struggled at his bonds. He heard a voice from behind him. It was the pilot. "Black Hawk League? What are they, pirates?"

Roosevelt glared at Flemming and growled in a tone two octaves deeper than his usual. "Worse. Anarachists."


"Wilhelm, what's the plan for our course?" Flemming yelled as he went to the anarchist who was now piloting the airship. Wilhelm pointed to the northeast, but he could not hear the man's answer to Flemming. Flemming gave Wilhelm an approving nod. Roosevelt could hear the engines louder and felt the airship picking up speed as it banked slowly to the left.

Flemming passed by Roosevelt and the pilot again as he went back toward the cabins of the airship. "What are you planning? Where are you taking us?" Roosevelt asked. Flemming stopped and turned to look back at the President.

"Oh, you'll find out soon enough. Let's just say you won't be making it back to the White House." Flemming walked out of the bridge, leaving Roosevelt and pilot alone with two guards and Wilhelm.

"What are they doing? Does that mean they're going to kill us?" the pilot whispered feverishly to Roosevelt.

"Not if I can help it," the President whispered back. "Luckily I always keep a knife on hand, just for such occasions."

"You plan for these sorts of things?" the pilot said shocked.

"Nope. But it sure does help." The President wiggled his hands within the restraints and reached into the back of his belt. Slowly, he unsheathed the knife and sawed through the rope around his hands. As the rope fell to the floor, Roosevelt caught it. "We need to wait for an opportune moment," he whispered to the pilot.


Minutes passed. Roosevelt could feel the airship moving slowly through the skies. Clouds drifted by the windows. After another ten minutes, the door opened and Flemming reentered the bridge. "How are we doing Wilhelm?"

"I've just set us on the final course, mister Flemming," Wilhelm replied.

"Good. Now come with me Wilhelm." The lead anarchist leered at Roosevelt. "I suppose this is where we part. Farewell, mister Roosevelt." With a flourish of his hand, Flemming waved to the President as he opened the door of the bridge. "You two! Come to the middle stairwell in another five minutes. We don't want the President to pull any tricks."

When Flemming and Wilhelm left the bridge, the guards turned to face Roosevelt. "You've been pretty quiet so far," one of the guards said. "No last words? You'd think being president that would be important."

Roosevelt smiled. "Hmmm. You're right. You want to hear my last words? Come closer so you can hear them clearly." The guard laughed as he leaned in toward the President. "Get off my airship." In a single movement, Roosevelt let the rope drop to the floor and brought his balled fist around. It impacted the guard's face and sent him sprawling to the floor.

The other guard grabbed for a pistol at his hip but before he could pull it out of the holster the President had leapt up out of the chair and tackled the guard to the ground. Rolling to the side, Roosevelt slashed the ropes around his feet and stood up. He rushed over to the pilot and untied him. As the pilot ran to the wheel, the guards rose to their feet.

The president brandished the knife as the guards edged closer. The guard Roosevelt had tackled sprinted toward the President with his fist ready for a punch. Roosevelt deftly sidestepped the guard and dealt an elbow to the man's back. The guard slid along the wooden floor.

The other guard had regained his footing and had loaded his pistol. He fired three shots in quick succession. The first two bullets missed and shattered two of the windows. Roosevelt picked up a chair and held it out in front of him. The final bullet embedded itself in the seat of the chair.

The first guard had stood up again and now both were running at the President. Roosevelt whipped the chair around and it collided with both guards as they launched themselves at him. The guards fell unconscious into a heap. Roosevelt turned to the pilot. "How's it going over there?"

The pilot turned back to the President, flustered. "It's bad. The wheel isn't doing anything. I think they cut the rudder cables."


Roosevelt thought and looked out the window. The mountains were still far below them, but their path was now almost parallel to one of the ridges. A breeze blew through the cabin. "You keep things under control up here," Roosevelt told the pilot. "I'm going to free the rest of the crew." The President went to the cabin door and pushed. The door didn't budge. He pushed harder, but it still wouldn't budge. "Well, shoot," he said to the pilot, "the door's locked."

The pilot stood on one of the chairs and tugged at the hatch in the ceiling that the anarchists had entered through. "I can't get the hatch open either."

Roosevelt looked around the bridge trying to figure another way out. The breeze continued to blow through the bridge. "Wait, I've got it!" Roosevelt snapped his fingers and pointed at one of the open windows. "I should be able to climb on the outside of the gonola and get to the rest of the crew!" Before the pilot could reply, Roosevelt was leaning out the broken window.


The President looked along the side of the gondola. Stepping out slowly, he inched along the gondola using the window slats as footholds. After a while, Roosevelt looked up at the tail of the airship and noticed a figure on the elevator fin. Roosevelt took the grappling hook out of a suit pocket and fired it at the fin. Roosevelt propelled himself from the gondola and swung himself up into the air, shouting "BUUUULLYYYY!" as he flew. Flemming looked up in surprise as Roosevelt landed and steadied himself on the fin.

"What? You thought you could stop this bull moose with a little rope?"

Flemming stood up and Roosevelt noticed a black box at the anarchist's feet. "Ha! So what if you escaped? My plan is already in motion. When these bombs I have placed on the tail explode, you will be sent into a burning hellfire where all men who support government belong! The ultimate triumph of the individual over the collective is now, mister Roosevelt, and the revolution shall revere me as its instigator and leader!" Flemming sneered. "You two, get him! I need to set the timer on this bomb before we go."

The other two anarchists ran at Roosevelt, but he dodged and rolled to avoid their punches. A few more rounds of attacks and the President had backed up the trailing edge of the fin. One of the anarchists took a flying kick on the President, but Roosevelt turned and dodged it and sent the man flying off the edge of the fin. With Roosevelt distacted, the other man jumped onto the President's back. Roosevelt stumbled for a moment, but soon regained his balance. The man clawed at the President to try and force them both off the edge, but Roosevelt remained steady.

Suddenly, Roosevelt reached up and grabbed the man's flailing arms. "I've gotten pretty tired of you boys. Like I told your colleagues back on the bridge, GET OFF MY AIRSHIP!" With one burst of energy, the President hurled the man over his shoulders and sent him free-falling. Roosevelt stood for a moment at the edge of the fin watching the man fall before turning to face Flemming.

Flemming closed the bomb shut. "There, everything's finished. And it looks like I'm just in time too." Roosevelt charged at Flemming and hit him in the back. The two went tumbling on the fin. Flemming stood up and glared at Roosevelt. "You're too late. The bombs are already rigged to explode. Even if you kill me, you'll still die."

Roosevelt looked down at the bomb. The small clock on the bomb was ticking down from a minute. "I don't know if I can stop the bombs, but I can sure stop you from getting away!" Roosevelt charged Flemming again and this time they both bowled over the edge of the fin and began to fall to the ground.

Flemming struggled free of Roosevelt's grip. "Not the way I was expecting to kill you or for me to get off the airship but it will do."

"What are you-" Roosevelt began. Flemming pulled a cord on his pack and a rigid wing setup popped out of it. Flemming glided away while Roosevelt continued to fall. "Damnit!" Roosevelt yelled as he maneuvered his body to face upward. "How do I get back to the airship? I have to save everyone?" Roosevelt thought.

Thinking quickly, the President took out the grappling gun again and aimed. "Got to get this just right..." he said and fired. The rope coiled around one of the engines and went taut. "Perfect!" Roosevelt reeled himself back toward the airship. He took a last look at Flemming gliding away before being jarred back into the situation by a powerful explosion.


Roosevelt crashed through a window into the passenger deck just as the bombs went off. "What the devil was that!" he heard Muir yelling from one of the passenger cabins. Roosevelt shouldered the door open. Muir and two other crew members were tied up in the cabin, just like Roosevelt and the pilot were. "Sir!" Muir cried. "See James, I told you he'd save us," he smirked and whispered to the other man.

"Come on," Roosevelt yelled as he untied the two men. "We have to get to the bridge." The three men ran toward the bow of the airship. It began to tilt forward as smoke poured in through the window. Roosevelt managed to keep from stumbling and braced his shoulder to smash the door open. The door splintered as Roosevelt burst through it, startling the pilot even more. "Ow," Roosevelt yelped as his lumbering figure came to a stop.

"Mister President, we're losing altitude fast," the pilot said.

"I know. Those damned anarchists blew off the entire tail section of the airship!" Roosevelt yelled. "We need to get out of hear fast." Looking out the front windows, the men saw the treetops fast approaching.

"What do we do? We can't simply jump out, and the plane in the hangar only seats two people?" the pilot wondered.

Roosevelt thought. "I have an idea. We don't actually need to fly the plane, so even if we have to squeeze in it should work out." The others gave the President a quizzical expression, but Roosevelt was already heading for the hangar. "Come on everybody, we can't waste any time! I'll explain along the way."

The four men ran to the hangar and got in the biplane. Roosevelt sat in the front seat, while the pilot sat in the back. Muir and the other man stood on the lower wing just to the side of the plane's body, clinging to the crossbeams.

"Alright, now we just need to open the hangar," the President said. An explosion ripped through the back of the hangar as the fire reached the midsection of the airship. A crashing sound of splintering wood came from behind them as the airsihp's nose hit the trees. "Or we can just wing it." Roosevelt started up the plane's engine and it started rolling forward. As it picked up speed, it sped through the smoke. "Brace yourselves!" The plane crashed through the floor as it burned and dropped out of the hangar onto the forest floor. The President quickly turned the engine off, but the plane kept sliding down the hill. As it picked up speed, the right wing was shorn off by a passing tree and the plane turned and skidded to a halt. The four men jupmed out of the plane as it kept sliding. It finally stopped after sliding sideways into another tree, sending a shower of needles onto everyone. The airship continued to burn and collapse behind them.


Roosevelt brushed off his suit and looked around amid the wreckage of the airship. "Now where has my hat gotten to?" Finding his stetson laying in the leaves and branches near his feet. He picked it up and put it on. "Well, that was a bit of a close call," he turned to the others standing around. "Anyone know where the nearest road is?"

"I think I saw a road a mile or so to the northwest," the pilot said. The president nodded and the group started walking.

The group stumbled out of the woods onto the dirt path half an hour later. Walking along the road, they quickly found a crowd of people with cars parked and horses hitched nearby. As they neared, the crowd saw them and began running toward them. "What happened?" an older woman asked frightfully.

"Our airship just ran into a little accident," Roosevelt said and smiled. Upon recognizing the President, the woman let out a high pitch gasp.

One of the crew leaned over to Muir and whispered, "The airship exploding and crashing into a mountainside is a 'little accident'?"

"For him, yes," Muir whispered back.

Roosevelt continued talking with the crowd and arranged for everyone to be taken to the nearest town. Secretary Muir and the President rode in the back of one of the cars as the impromptu motorcade made its way down the dirt road.

The group was lodged in a hotel once they arrived back in the town, The next day, Muir telephoned Washington and arranged for the airship crew to take a train back to the capital.

 

[wilcoxchar]

Got the next update finished!

Part Ninety-One: The Fall of William Jennings Bryan

Give Me That New World Religion:
As the 19th century drew to a close, the United States began to undergo a third Great Awakening. During the third Great Awakening in the United States, religious revival in both Protestant and Catholic churches shifted church issues from a focus on the salvation of the individual to a focus on the salvation of society at large. Problems such as poverty and the plight of the worker were no longer a sign of individual sin, but of societal sin that could be rectified by the state. The third Great Awakening marked a rise in the popularity of Christian socialism in the United States during the early 20th century.

The general rise in popularity of progressive and socialist movements led to the beginning of Christian socialist movements in the United States. Some organizations such as the Salvation Army operated charities to the urban poor. Begun in London in 1865, the Salvation Army grew in Great Britain and North America during the latter half of the 19th century as they provided the urban poor with "soup, soap, and salvation". Around the turn of the 20th century, more political organizations arose in the United States such as the Christian Workers' League founded by Francis Bellamy and the Nesbitine Society[1]. The Nesbitine Society is notable for advocating women's suffrage and for being actively founded by a woman, Edith Nesbit.

Meanwhile, the Catholic Church in the Americas continued to be divided by the Modern Papal Schism. During the papacy of Anti-Pope Gregory XVII[2], the Temporalist Catholic Church attempted to gain support in the United States. The Temporalist Church gained a following in small parts of the former Confederacy among African and Ibero-Americans, but its following remained small. The Roman Catholic Church also placed a minor focus on the United states during this period with the promotion of Archbishop of Baltimore James Gibbons to a cardinal, the first American to be appointed such. Afro-Cuban migration to the mainland South after the Civil War as well as African-American religious figures like Patrick Francis Healy[3], Archbishop of Mobile, the Roman Catholic following among African-Americans in the former Confederacy grew in the decades between the National War and the Great War.


Election of 1900:
At the Republican National convention in Chicago, Bryan was renominated for President without much opposition. The Republicans wanted to capitalize on the support that Bryan had drawn from the Populist Party in the South in the 1896 election and use it to maintain their hold on the White House. For Vice President, the Republicans nominated governor William O. Bradley of Kentucky, who had advocated for the protection of rights for African-Americans in Kentucky after the influx of former slaves into his state.

By 1900, the National Democratic Party had folded as a political party and the members had rejoined the mainstream Democratic Party. The old guard of the Bourbon Democrats had lost their sway over the party and the Eagle Democrats had become the new dominant wing of the party. At the 1900 Democratic National Convention in Buffalo, William McKinley was the obvious choice for the presidential nomination after he had gained national notoriety in the past decade. However, many Bourbon Democrats were still opposed to McKinley's nomination and put up a few other candidates to stop McKinley from gaining a full majority. In order to push support for McKinley to a majority, it was agreed that a Bourbon Democrat would be nominated for Vice President. The Vice Presidential nomination went to William Vilas of Marquette.

With the divide in the Populist Party, 1900 the National Convention was very tumultuous. Founding member James Weaver did not stand for the presidential nomination. The Populists had split into three visible wings; those with support in the West who wanted to maintain the party's focus on economic issues that appealed to rural Western voters like free silver, and those in the South and Northeast who wanted to advocate more progressive social legislation including the creation of an income tax and the public ownership of key industries. While New York governor Theodore Roosevelt made a speech supporting the progressive legislation, there was still much opposition from the key delegates from Western states. A compromise was finally reached after the ninth ballot, and Congressman Caldwell Edwards of Kearney was nominated for president with Thomas E. Watson of Georgia as his running mate[4].

As the 1900 general campaign got started, Bryan and the Republican Party took a different approach to the usual campaign strategies of the other parties at the time. Bryan toured the country much as he had in the previous year when he was drumming up support for his various agendas. The Democrats and Populists, meanwhile, continued the strategy of working mostly with local party organizations and not getting the candidate too directly involved in the campaign. The media and other parties capitalized on Bryan's vigorous campaigning to show how inexperienced and stubborn the president really was, and many cartoons of the time portrayed Bryan as a child pushed into the White House by an overeager Republican Party. Also hurting the Republicans were that their vote was now almost equally split with that of the Populists in many states. These factors allowed the Democrats to win the 1900 election by a landslide and launched William McKinley into the presidency.

McKinley/Vilas: 219
Bryan/Bradley: 132
Edwards/Watson: 41


[1] Founded by OTL author Edith Nesbit.
[2] Anti-Pope Gregory XVII is Joseph-Hippolyte Guibert, OTL Archbishop of Tours.
[3] OTL Healy became president of Georgetown.
[4] The first Southern candidate for executive office nominated by a major party since the National War.

 

[wilcoxchar]

First part of the world review is done! Not much new information here, but I wanted to try my hand at the style of an old geography textbook. Having a turn-of-the-century geography textbook helped a lot when writing this.

The World in a New Century, Section I: The Regions of the United States
Published by the McNally Corporation in Chicago, 1901.

New England:

New England has a population of approximately 9 million people and is comprised of the states of Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island, Vermont, New Hampshire, and Maine. The major economic activities in the region are lumbering, fishing, and quarrying of stone. The great forests of northern Vermont, New Hampshire, and Maine provide much of the region's lumber. However, because of the danger of extensive logging, the states have begun creating forest reserves to protect some forested areas. The fishing industry in New England is the most prized in the United States and primarily operates out of two harbors: Gloucester, Massachusetts and Bucksport, Maine. Fishermen catch all sorts of fish and lobster off the New England coast but sometimes venture as far as Greenland or Iceland for their catch. Recently, disputes with Acadia have disrupted some of the fishing in the region.

The major cities in New England are also the main cities in the region for the manufacturing and shipping of goods. Boston is the largest in the region and it, along with nearby cities such as Chelsea and Cambridge, form the economic center of New England. Boston's harbor is one of the busiest in the naiton and goods from all over the country and the world are shipped in and out of the city every day. Other large cities in New England include Portland and Bucksport in Maine, Manchester in New Hampshire, Hartford and New Haven in Connecticut, and Providence in Rhode Island.


Mid-Atlantic:

The Mid-Atlantic region has a population of almost 24 and a half million people, and is the most densely populated region in the United States. The Mid-Atlantic is home to the two most populous states in the Union, New York and Pennsylvania, as well as four of the country's ten largest cities (New York, Brooklyn, Philadelphia, and Baltimore). The main economic activities of the Mid-Atlantic are mining and manufacturing. The region is very rich in minerals and the extraction of coal, petroleum, salt, and other minerals make up a large part of the wealth that the Mid-Atlantic produces. The petroleum resources in western Pennsylvania deserve special mention as they contain the largest oil fields ever discovered so far. While the recent discovery of oil in Tejas has come close to that of Pennsylvania, the only other place in the world that currently produces as much petroleum is on the western edge of the Caspian Sea around the Russian city of Baku.

The Mid-Atlantic is one of the two main regions along with the Old Northwest that produce most of the manufacturing output in the United States. The Mid-Atlantic is an ideal location for factories due to the closeness of raw materials such as coal from the Appalachian Mountains and the ease of shipment of goods from the Great Lakes to the Atlantic Ocean. Numerous cities in the region have thrived because of the boost in manufacturing. Buffalo, Pittsburgh, and Allegheny in the west produce much of the countries iron and steel using shipments of iron from further west in the Great Lakes and coal from Vandalia and central Pennsylvania. Further east, New York, Philadelphia and Baltimore have developed into the most important ports in the nation. Almost all the goods that are exported by the United States go out of either these ports or New Orleans at the mouth of the Mississippi River.


Old Northwest:

The Old Northwest has a population of over 23 and a half million people. It is the second most urbanized region in the United States after the Mid-Altantic. With the multitude of rivers crisscrossing the Old Northwest and the connections to the Missouri River, the Mississippi River, and the Great Lakes, the region is now the transportation hub of the country. Goods produced in the farms and mines of the western United States are shipped along the rivers or railroads through the Old Northwest to reach the factories, ports, and markets in the Lower Mississippi or the states on the Atlantic Ocean.

The region itself also has a number of large cities and manufacturing centers, which take advantage of the central location of the Old Northwest within the United States. Chicago and Saint Louis are major centers of the meat packing industry as cattle is brought in from the ranches on the Great Plains. Along the Great Lakes, cities like Detroit and Cleveland are home to steel companies where iron from Marquette and Itasca are brought in. Indianapolis and other cities in Indiana are quickly becoming centers of manufacturing as well thanks to their central location, and Indianapolis has become the center of the nation's new automobile industry.


South:

The South is the largest region of the United States in both area and population. Overall, 27 and a half million people live in the South. The South is made up of those states that seceded to form the Confederate States of America during the National War, plus Tennessee and Missouri. Due to the slow recovery from the devastation to the region in the National War, the South is very diverse economically. The cities and states along the Mississippi River have for the most part recovered and have a bustling shipping industry of goods flowing down the river. New Orleans at the mouth of the Mississippi is the largest port on the Gulf of Mexico and one of the largest in the United States. Other important ports in the South are located at Tampa, Pensacola, and Havana.

There is little manufacturing in the interior of the mainland South, and much of its economic activity is devoted to agriculture. Cotton, rice, and other plants suited to the region's lush and humid climate are the main crops that are grown in the interior of the South. The little manufacturing in the interior of the South is concentrated in a strip spanning from Birmingham, Alabama to Atlanta, Georgia. This area has the benefit of access to the coal of the Appalachian Mountains, and so a number of factories have been built in the area.

Culturally, the South is the most racially diverse region in the United States. Because of the institution of slavery, there are millions of negroes living in the South. The coastal towns along the Gulf of Mexico, and Jackson, Louisiana and Cuba in particular, also have a large Ibero-American population. Cuba's Ibero population is a remnant of Spanish colonization of the island. The state of Cuba is the most racially diverse in the country, having a large population of whites including Iberos, negroes, Mongols, Indians, and many people of mixed race.


Southwest:

The Southwest has a population of almost 6 million people. Over one third of the people in the Southwest live in Tejas, which has grown much in the past decades thanks to the oil that was recently discovered there. Much of the remainder of the Southwest is not very densely populated. Most of the Southwest's economy is agricultural, with wheat and corn being the principal crops grown in the region. There is also a large amount of land devoted to raising livestock. The states of Houston and Calhoun are the top two cattle producing states in the United States, while Kearny produces the fifth most cattle. While most of the region is employed in agriculture, the two western states, Colorado and New Mexico, also have a large mining sector. These two states produce much of the gold and silver in the country, and owe much of their population growth to mineral rushes in the 1870s and 1880s.


Oregon:

Oregon is the least populated region of the United States and is home to only 900 thousand people. Part of the reason for this is that Oregon is the furthest from the Atlantic coast where most of the immigrants to the United States arrive, and therefore does not receive much migration from Europe. However, the increasing number of population arriving from Asia and the discovery of gold in the Oregon region are causing the population of the region to increase rapidly. Despite this, there are few large cities in the region and they are mostly concentrated along the coast or along the Columbia River.


Territories:

Along with the states, the United States also possesses a number of territories. Most of these territories are located in the northern Great Plains. These are Shoshone, Washington, Dakhota, and Pahsapa. These territories are sparsely settled by the white man and outside some smaller towns and the railroads are home to many Indians. The settled towns in the Great Plains territories are mostly in Pahsapa and Shoshone along the railroads that connect the Pacific coastal states with the rest of the country. However, recently the discovery of gold and silver in western Washington Territory has led to an increase of population there. With the population growth, these territories are likely to be fully admitted as states soon.

The other territories that the United States possesses are the Trans-Pecos Territory and the Congo Territory. The Trans-Pecos Territory is south of New Mexico and is populated mostly by Iberos. Most of the population of the territory lives in the city of El Paso, as the surrounding land is too arid for proper agriculture. The Congo Territory is an overseas possession in Central Africa that the United States gained in the Congo Conference less than a decade ago. The natives of the Congo Territory are uncivilized negroes, but the land is good for cultivating rubber and other tropical resources and so it is profitable for many American companies to operate here. The Congo Territory also handles some of the shipping along the Congo River, although the largest navigable stretch of the river is blocked from the ocean by a series of falls.

 

[wilcoxchar]

Next part of the world overview is done! It's a short one for now.

The World in a New Century, Section II: The Laurentine Countries
Published by the McNally Corporation in Chicago, 1901.

Much of the land north of the United States is held by Great Britain. While Newfoundland and the Labrador coast are governed directly by Parliament, the other British possessions in the Laurentine region are dominions. This means that they have a degree of self-government, but still hold Queen Victoria as their head of state and are under the sovereignty of the British Empire. The British dominions north of the United States are the Acadian Union, Canada, Deseret and the Hudson Bay Company. Aside from these countries, Russia also possesses the Alyeska colony in the far northwest of the North American continent.

The governments and cultures of the different British dominions are all very different. The Acadian Union is the furthest to the east, and is a collection of the smaller provinces of New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, and Prince Edward Island. Due to the great number of Irish migrants in Acadia, Gaelic has replaced English as the main tongue spoken there. Canada, meanwhile, is mostly divided between French and English speakers. Canada has a bicameral Parliament similar to that in London, but peculiarly, the two houses are in separate cities. The Senate of Canada serves in Kingston, Ontario, while the House of Commons is located in Montreal in Quebec[1].

Continuing west from Canada, the other two British colonies north of the United States are Deseret and New Caledonia. Deseret was settled by Mormons after they left the United States and has a bicameral legislature similar to the United States and Great Britain. Deseret has become very rich as a vital transportation link between the resources of the Hudson Bay Company's operations to the west and the major cities to the east. The Hudson Bay Company operates over all of the Dominion of New Caledonia and has a great influence in affairs there, approaching the authority the East India Company has in the Indian subcontinent. The few English settlements in New Caledonia are on the coasts of either Hudson Bay or the Pacific Ocean, or along the railroad that connects the two. While the region is rich in mining and agricultural wealth, it is still mostly settled by Indians, similar to the Great Plains territories in the United States.

Besides the British, the Russians also possess a colony in North America. The colony, called Alyeska, has recently become very wealthy for the Russian Empire with the discovery of abundant resources of gold and silver in the mountains and rivers. The cities of Sitka and Rodagrad[2] are the main cities in Alyeska. The gold in Alyeska is easily found by panning the Yukon and other rivers, but most of this gold goes to the Tsar in Saint Petersburg. The ore mining has attracted many settlers not just from the Russian Empire but also from California, and the United States in the past decade, but few Americans and Californians have stayed due to the horrific winter climate.

[1] No repeal of the Corn Laws means no movement from Kingston, but the French get uppity about where the Parliament is located eventually.
[2] OTL Nome, at one point the largest city in Alaska. Rodagrad means "ore city".

 

[wilcoxchar]

Next update for the overview is done! We're finishing off North America. Be warned: casual racism ahead. Some of what I've written is almost verbatim from the old textbook I have. I'll add some footnotes later.

The World in a New Century, Section II: Ibero North America
Published by the McNally Corporation in Chicago, 1901.

California:
The Republic of California lies west of the Rio Bravo and south of the Oregon Country. A fairly wealthy state, California has received much of its progress from the gold and silver found in the Sierra Nevada and other mountain ranges of the country. Because of this, large cities like San Diego, San Francisco, and the capital at Monterey have arisen along the coast. The cities around San Francisco Bay have grown to become some of the largest in California. The city of San Francisco itself has become the major port and commercial center in the country, and is often known as the "Valparaiso of North America". In the interior, the majority of the population of California lives in the fertile San Joaquin Valley or along the Sacramento River. However, there are some settlements in the far interior, particularly those of the Mormons around the Great Salt Lake.

California is one of the most diverse countries in all of the Americas. Like Cuba in the United States, the people are mainly Ibero and mestizo. California, however, has been a destination for much of the immigration of Asians to North America. In fact, the cities in California have the largest population of Mongolians in the entire continent. These immigrants primarily come from the Philippines and China, and are concentrated in the coastal cities. Many Mongolians also inhabit the portion of the Hawaiian archipelago that is owned by California. Further east, the Mormons are the dominant people and their church remains the dominant religion there. The more remote desert regions of the country are populated by Indian tribes and do not receive much attention from the local authorities so stick to their barbarous ways.

While California claims to be a republic, the actual practice of the government is rather bad. The people are given some representation, but often the President will go against the wishes of the people with few consequences. The Mormons have recently been barred from representation within the Californian Senate. The country has also been subject to many coups in the past decades as generals or political opponents of the ruling president can easily gather enough support to oust whoever is in power.


Mexican States:
South of California and the state of Tejas are several small countries. These countries used to be united as the country of Mexico. In the 1830s, the United States fought a war with Mexico to free the Republic of Texas, which later joined the United States. Mexico suffered further political instability and collapsed into a number of countries in the late 1850s. Since then, the countries have been led by warlords though they claim to be republics. This is partially due to the ignorance of the people after breeding with the local Indians for centuries, and partly due to the ease at which such governments have been overthrown.

Of the Mexican states, Veracruz, Chihuahua, and Rio Bravo are the most important to the United States. Veracruz is a thriving port city-state and is the main point of entry and exit for goods going between the United States and Mexico. Recently, the United States has been getting more involved in the Mexican states. Just in the last decade, the United States freed Chihuahua from Rio Bravo. The other countries in the region are Durango, Granidalgo, Tlaxcala, the Mexican Republic, Queretaro, and Jalisco. Tlaxcala is of particular interest because it is governed by a splinter group from the Catholic Church known as the Anti-Papacy.


Mesoamerican Union:
The Mesoamerican Union is a collection of formerly independent countries that formed a unified government only in the last two decades. The component republics of the Mesoamerican Union are Oaxaca, Guatemala, Yucatan, Honduras, Salvador, and Nicaragua. Each republic has its own government but is subservient to the federal Mesoamerican government, much like our own states. The federal government of Mesoamerica contains a unicameral legislature and is led by a president elected by the legislature. The Mesoamerican legislature is peculiar in that it not only includes seats for each constituent republic, but also for certain Indian tribes. No other republican government in the world has been so accommodating to the uncivilized races in its country.

The Mesoamerican Union is a very important trading partner to the United States. From here, we import many agricultural goods that are unable to be produced in the United States except perhaps in Cuba. The principal goods that the United States imports from Mesoamerica are rubber, sugar, and fruit. The United Fruit Company has many land holdings in Mesoamerica and thanks to the support of the Mesoamerican government, tariffs have been reduced between our two nations and have allowed for American companies to prosper in the region.

There is one other nation in the region that has a significant importance to the United States. This is the small nation of Costa Rica, which lies south of Mesoamerica. While Costa Rica is small, its significance lies in its location as a strategic transportation route between the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. Here is where the plans have been drawn up for a canal to connect the two oceans. The canal is planned to be dug through the northern part of Costa Rica, from the Atlantic Ocean along the San Juan River up to Lake Cocibolca, then through the narrow isthmus on the other side of the lake to connect with the Pacific. The canal has the potential to greatly influence American trade and interests in the Pacific and throughout Ibero-America.

Aside from these independent nations, the colony of British Honduras is the last possession of the Europeans in Central America.


Caribbean:
Unlike the other areas discussed in this section, most of the Caribbean has failed to become independent of Europe and the majority of the islands remain colonies. The reason for this are geographical and cultural. The geographical reason is that the warm tropical climate causes people to become lazy as food and agriculture is so easily accessible in the islands of the Caribbean, the people are not compelled to work hard in order to better themselves. The cultural reason is that the abundance of uncivilized negroes and Indians as well as half breeds has prevented the islands from recognizing the benefits of independence.

The only independent nation in the Caribbean thus far is Haiti on the island of Hispanola. Haiti achieved its independence from the French almost a century ago after the negro slaves overthrew their French masters. Sixty years prior to the abolition of slavery in the United States, Haiti became the only country in the Americas to be led by negroes. However, the Haitians remained savages for the most part and their government has become very bad. Haiti is led by a brutal emperor who does not allow his people a voice in the affairs of government and punishes them for objecting to his rule.

The rest of the Caribbean is mostly governed by European colonies, with the exception being our own state of Cuba. These colonies produce much of the world's sugar and the sugar planters on the islands have become very rich. Great Britain has several colonies near Cuba such as the Bahamian Islands and the isle of Jamaica. France, Britain, and the Netherlands also possess a number of islands in the Lesser Antilles in the eastern Caribbean. Between Haiti and the Lesser Antilles, Spain and Denmark also have minor colonies. After selling Cuba to the United States in 1848, the only Spanish possession in the Caribbean is now Porto Rico. The Danes also retain a small number of islands east of Porto Rico. All of the European colonies are mostly populated by negroes or Indians, and it will be a while before they can become civilized enough before they can be trusted to govern themselves.

 

[wilcoxchar]

Update's done. EDIT: Reordering the sections a bit.

The World in a New Century, Section III: South America
Published by the McNally Corporation in Chicago, 1901.

Brazil:
The largest nation in South America is the Empire of Brazil. Brazil is governed by an imperial monarchy currently led by Emperor Pedro II. Pedro II has for the most part been a benevolent monarch. The people do have a say in state-level affairs and the monarchy is currently considering movements toward a republic. However, Pedro is getting old and Prince Imperial Afonso, the heir to the Brazilian throne, has shown that he is against giving up the powers that the emperor has in the governing of Brazil.

While Brazil is for the most part one of the few benevolent empires in the world today, the country's retention of slavery has been a major stain on Brazil's government. However, the monarchy is not entirely to blame. Pedro II has made attempts to slowly phase out slavery in Brazil in recent decades, but much of the Brazilian higher classes opposed this. This is partly because of the major agricultural crops of Brazil - coffee, sugar, and rubber - are labor intensive crops which slavery lends itself well to. The other reason is that while slavery seemed to be on its way out for the beginning of the 19th century, the migration of Southern plantation owners to Brazil after the National War revived slavery in the country. Because of these factors, Brazil has become the last remaining country in the Americas to keep people as slaves.

The culture of Brazil is extremely varied because, like the United States, Brazil is a very large country that covers a wide range of climactic regions. The white population of Brazil is descended from the Portuguese colonization of the country and is concentrated mostly on the coastal strip in the eastern and southern parts of Brazil. Here you can find the most densely populated regions in the country and the largest cities, including Rio de Janeiro, Sao Paulo, Salvador, and Recife. Brazil also has a large Indian population. They are mostly savages and live in the interior of the Amazon rainforest, far away from where the white men live[1].

Northern South America:
The countries in the northern part of South America are Colombia, the small country of Ecuador, and the three major European colonies known as the Guianas. 'Gran' or Greater Colombia as it is sometimes called, is the dominant country in the region. Originally, Gran Colombia had encompassed the current states of Colombia and Ecuador. However, the countries of Venezuela and Ecuador had split off from Colombia in the 1830s soon after gaining independence from Spain. In the 1850s, Colombia fought a war with Venezuela to regain its lost territory and annexed Venezuela. This caused a shock in the rest of Ibero-America and especially Ecuador, but later that decade Colombia agreed to cede its claims on Ecuador in exchange for Brazil making some concessions in the Amazon.

For the most part, Colombia and Ecuador have had good governments since independence. While there have been some coups in both countries, for the most part the two countries have run proper republican systems. The culture of the two countries is primarily mestizo, with Indian populations living in the more remote areas of the Amazon jungle. To the east of Colombia lie the Guianas, the only European possessions remaining on the South American mainland. They are owned by Great Britain, the Netherlands, and France. Aside from the coast, they are almost entirely covered in dense tropical forest.


Andean States:
The Andes Mountains which run along the western edge of South America are the backbones of several countries of the continent. The Viceroyalty of Peru was the heart of the Spanish colonies in South America, and Lima became one of the wealthiest cities on the continent during the height of the Spanish Empire. However, in the 19th century after the colonies gained their independence from Spain, Peru's importance has fallen. In the 1830s, southern Peru elected to join Bolivia after the collapse of the Peru-Bolivia Confederation. Since then, the country has gone through several autocratic governments and retains many territorial claims on its neighbors. Peru has little manufacturing aside from a small area around Lima, though a railroad has recently been built across the Andes to the interior city of Huanuco.

The largest and most important country in the Andes is Bolivia. Bolivia occupies the land that was the heart of the Inca Empire, one of the more civilized states in the Americas prior to the arrival of Europeans. Cuzco, the former capital of the Inca Empire, is still a cultural and economic center in Bolivia[2]. The country is a wealthy and rather progressive nation, with some representation given to all men including the many Indians and mestizos in the country. The economy of Bolivia is largely made up of mining. The abundance of metals in the Andes have allowed for a large manufacturing sector in the western half of the country, particularly in cities such as Tacna and Cochabamba. There is also a large supply of nitrates in the Atacama Desert in southern Bolivia, which has recently led to a population rush and mining boom in the region.

Lastly, the small landlocked nation of Tucuman lies to the south of Bolivia in the eastern shadow of the Andes. The country was founded after grievances with Argentina led to the local vaqueros, cow-herders similar to those of the Great Plains, from separating to form their own nation. The economy of Tucuman is largely agricultural with tobacco, cattle, and sugarcane being the most important industries. Tucuman is reliant on Bolivia for its exports as it is easier to transport goods west to the Pacific than east to the Atlantic, and has become politically influenced by Bolivia as well in recent years.


Southern Cone:
Much of Chile lies on the western slope of the Andes south of Bolivia. It is a thin but long country, and has a varied climate thanks to stretching from the Tropic of Capricorn to the southernmost point in South America. The economy of Chile is very reliant on mining. Chile is one of the world's largest exporters of copper, with most of the mines being located in the north of the country. A small manufacturing sector has been propelled by the mineral presence in the Andes and Valparaiso has become one of the largest cities in terms of shipping in South America. Recently, Chile has also begun colonization of the southern reaches of Patagonia. While the area is disputed between Chile and Argentina, towns of Chilean settlers such as Fuerte Bulnes, Punta Arenas, and the settlement of Porvenir on the island of Tierra del Fuego have staked a claim for Chilean possession of the area. Chile has also attempted to claim the Malvinas or Falkland Islands[3], a British possession east of Tierra del Fuego.

The country of Argentina, unlike Chile, is far less progressive than Chile and has not been blessed with much success in its history. Throughout its existence, Argentina has had an unstable government. The struggle between the two sides of a centralized government in Buenos Aires and a more federal system such as we have has led to numerous civil wars and coups in the past century in Argentina. The country has also, like Peru, lost much of its original territory to its neighbors. The economy is very dependent on agriculture, and the plains or pampas are home to many cattle ranches. Like Chile, Argentina has laid a claim to the southern tip of the continent, causing disputes between settlers in Patagonia.

Lying between Argentina and Brazil is Mokoguay, a federal republic that was created by the union of the countries of Paraguay, Rio Grande, and Uruguay in the 1870s. Blessed with a wealth of resources and easy transportation links from the Parana and Uruguay Rivers, Mokoguay has become a wealthy and fairly industrialized country for its small size in the past few decades. Mokoguay's government is set up similarly to the Mesoamerican Union with each state having a large amount of autonomy. The culture of Mokoguay is also of note as it has the least number of Indians out of all South American countries.

[1] This sentence is almost verbatim from the turn-of-the-century textbook I'm using as a reference.
[2] I realized that the Republic of South Peru actually included Cuzco.
[3] Usually referred to as the Malvinas in the US.

 

[wilcoxchar]

Next world overview section is done. The rankings are estimated from the data I could find, so the nations by area and some of the rankings for the cities and countries might be a bit off.

The World in a New Century, Section IV: General Facts
Published by the McNally Corporation in Chicago, 1901.

Largest Nations by area:
1. British Empire
2. Russian Empire
3. France and Possessions
4. Chinese Empire
5. Brazilian Empire
6. United States and Possessions
7. German Empire

Largest Nations by population:
1. Chinese Empire
2. British Empire
3. Russian Empire
4. France and Possessions
5. German Empire
6. United States and Possessions
7. Turkish Empire

Largest Cities in the World:
1. London, England
2. Paris, France
3. New York City, US
4. Berlin, Germany
5. Tokyo, Japan
6. Saint Petersburg, Russia
7. Brooklyn, US
8. Canton, China
9. Vienna, Germany
10. Philadelphia, US
11. Moscow, Russia
12. Constantinople, Turkey
13. Calcutta, India
14. Hamburg, Germany
15. Chicago, US
16. Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
17. Manchester, England
18. Osaka, Japan
19. Bombay, India
20. Glasgow, Scotland
21. Barcelona, Spain
22. Saint Louis, US
23. Marseille, France
24. Budapest, Hungary
25. Seoul, Korea

Largest Cities in the United States:
1. New York City, New York
2. Brooklyn, New York
3. Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
4. Chicago, Illinois
5. Saint Louis, Missouri
6. Baltimore, Maryland
7. Indianapolis, Indiana
8. New Orleans, Louisiana
9. Boston, Massachusetts
10. Cleveland, Ohio
11. Havana, Cuba
12. Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
13. Detroit, Michigan
14. Buffalo, New York
15. Louisville, Kentucky
16. Washington, DC
17. Jersey City, New Jersey
18. Cincinnati, Ohio
19. Newark, New Jersey
20. New Haven, Connecticut
21. Milwaukee, Marquette
22. Syracuse, New York
23. Allegheny, Pennsylvania
24. Mobile, Alabama
25. Evansville, Indiana


Populations and General Facts About the States [1]

Alabama
Population: 1,978,000
Capital: Montgomery
Largest City: Mobile

Arkansaw
Population: 951,000
Capital: Little Rock
Largest City: Little Rock

Calhoun
Population: 818,000
Capital: Orangetown (Fort Gibson)
Largest City: Stuyvesant (McAlester)

Champoeg
Population: 476,000
Capital: Norfolk (Portland)
Largest City: Norfolk

Chickasaw
Population: 872,000
Capital: Memphis
Largest City: Memphis

Colorado
Population: 899,000
Capital: Ferroplano (Boulder)
Largest City: Ferroplano

Connecticut
Population: 1,271,000
Capital: Hartford
Largest City: New Haven

Cuba
Population: 3,785,000
Capital: Havana
Largest City: Havana

Delaware
Population: 432,000
Capital: Dover
Largest City: Wilmington

Demoine
Population: 1,244,000
Capital: Waterloo
Largest City: Decatur (approx. Humboldt)

Florida
Population: 980,000
Capital: Jacksonville
Largest City: Gadsden (Tampa)

Georgia
Population: 1,982,000
Capital: Athens
Largest City: Atlanta

Houston
Population: 1,211,000
Capital: Austin (Washington-on-the-Brazos)
Largest City: Galveston

Illinois
Population: 4,657,000
Capital: Springfield
Largest City: Chicago

Indiana
Population: 4,736,000
Capital: Indianapolis
Largest City: Indianapolis

Itasca
Population: 1,061,000
Capital: Duluth
Largest City: Saint Paul

Jackson
Population: 1,297,000
Capital: Pensacola
Largest City: Pensacola

Kearney
Population: 522,000
Capital: Kearney City
Largest City: Kearney City

Kentucky
Population: 3,309,000
Capital: Frankfort
Largest City: Louisville

Kootenay
Population: 182,000
Capital: Colville
Largest City: New Belfast (Kelowna)

Louisiana
Population: 3,015,000
Capital: Baton Rouge
Largest City: New Orleans

Maine
Population: 1,206,000
Capital: Augusta
Largest City: Portland

Marquette
Population: 1,139,000
Capital: Green Bay
Largest City: Milwaukee

Maryland
Population: 3,221,000
Capital: Annapolis
Largest City: Baltimore

Massachusetts
Population: 4,207,000
Capital: Boston
Largest City: Boston

Michigan
Population: 1,707,000
Capital: Saginaw
Largest City: Detroit

Mississippi
Population: 1,372,000
Capital: Jackson
Largest City: Natchez

Missouri
Population: 4,234,000
Capital: Jefferson City
Largest City: Saint Louis

New Hampshire
Population: 897,000
Capital: Concord
Largest City: Portsmouth

New Jersey
Population: 2,579,000
Capital: Trenton
Largest City: Jersey City

New Mexico
Population: 313,000
Capital: Santa Fe
Largest City: Santa Fe

New York
Population: 8,637,000
Capital: Albany
Largest City: New York City

North Carolina
Population: 2,057,000
Capital: Raleigh
Largest City: Wilmington

Ohio
Population: 5,329,000
Capital: Columbus
Largest City: Cleveland

Oregon
Population: 238,000
Capital: Lewiston (Everrett)
Largest City: Tacoma

Pembina
Population: 441,000
Capital: Yankton
Largest City: Anselm (Chamberlain)

Pennsylvania
Population: 7,155,000
Capital: Harrisburg
Largest City: Philadelphia

Rhode Island
Population: 633,000
Capital: Providence
Largest City: Newport

South Carolina
Population: 1,280,000
Capital: Columbia
Largest City: Charleston

Tennessee
Population: 1,991,000
Capital: Nashville
Largest City: Chattanooga

Tejas
Population: 2,050,000
Capital: San Antonio
Largest City: San Antonio

Vandalia
Population: 1,117,000
Capital: Wheeling
Largest City: Huntington

Vermont
Population: 894,000
Capital: Montpelier
Largest City: Burlington

Virginia
Population: 1,604,000
Capital: Richmond
Largest City: Norfolk

Winfield
Population: 1,261,000
Capital: Culpepper
Largest City: Fredericksburg

[1] Populations are rounded to the nearest thousand. Parentheses contain the OTL city, or the closest to the location.

 

[wilcoxchar]

Alright, I ended up getting distracted a lot and wasn't able to get the last section for the update finished tonight. So I'll post the two that I have done now and will add the other one tomorrow, as well as more footnotes.

The World in a New Century, Section V: Western Europe
Published by the McNally Corporation in Chicago, 1901.

British Isles:
As the political, economic, and industrial center of the largest empire in the world today, the British Isles play a very important role in world affairs. London is the most populous city on Earth and is the home of the British Parliament and the seat of the monarchy. While the monarchy does not hold much ultimate sway over affairs in Great Britain, neither is the British government very democratic. In order to have the right to vote, a British man must own property. As a result, the urban working classes and other poorer peoples cannot participate in government. Parliament also has an unelected body in the House of Lords, which is similar to our Senate but the lords are appointed by the monarch.

While London is the political center of the British Isles, its position on the islands away from the major coal and iron fields makes it a poor center for manufacturing. Instead, cities around the coal fields such as Manchester and Newcastle in England and Glasgow in Scotland became centers of British industrial growth. British ports also grew in order to accommodate the growth of the empire and the import and export of goods around the globe. Liverpool, Glasgow and Swansea are the largest ports on the western coast of Great Britain.

The cultural makeup of Great Britain has grown increasingly English over the past century. With measures taken by the British government, Gaels in Scotland and Ireland have been pushed out as the British government encouraged the Anglicization of Ireland and the Highlands of Scotland. Successive parliaments have passed various coercion acts after riots in Scottish and Irish cities over the absentee ownership of land in those two areas. The British government has also enacted laws against Catholics in Ireland, resulting in a further decline of the local Irish population. Many of the people who left Ireland in the 19th century have come to the United States, giving many American cities prominent Irish minorities.


France:
France is one of the four great powers on the European continent. Its central position has given France a good strategic position that has allowed the country to rise as a power over the past two centuries. Now, over a century after the revolution that first overthrew the French monarchy, France has become one of the most republican governments in Europe. The French voting franchise has been extended to all males in the past decades through several acts[1], the last being passed in 1890. The French legislature is bicameral similar to our own Congress, with the French Senate as the upper house and the Chamber of Deputies as the lower house. The Prime Minister heads the legislature while a directly elected president holds most of the power within the executive branch.

The government of France has been largely dominated by the legacy of the French Revolution and the Bonaparte dynasty. Not only has a party dedicated to the ideals of Bonapartism become one of the major parties in France, but in the century since the First Napoleonic War, France has been headed by no less than three members of the Bonaparte family. The first, of course, was Napoleon during the First Napoleonic War. The second member of the Bonaparte family to lead France was Louis Napoleon, who became President of France after the Mid-century Revolutions ousted the Orleanist monarchy. The third Bonaparte to lead France is Charles Joseph Bonaparte[2], a grand-nephew of Emperor Napoleon.

During the past century, France has become one of the largest nations in the world and has gained extensive colonies on the African continent. The most prosperous of these has been the Algerian coast, which has grown much over the decades of French ownership. There have been some movements to create full departments out of the Algerian coast and bring the region under complete French administration, but many of the local Mohammedan population has opposed such measures despite the clear benefits. The newfound French dominance of the Mediterranean has also revived France as one of the leading naval powers in the world, rivaling that of Great Britain. Because of this, the friendship between the United states and France has become one of the closest foreign ties the United States has made, and has been a great boon to American trade and influence.


Iberia:
The nations of the Iberian Peninsula, Spain and Portugal, were once great colonial empires but have now become relative backwaters after their American colonies gained independence and in the intervening century. Spain is a monarchy ruled by the Bourbon dynasty, currently headed by Alfonso XII. Alfonso has greatly improved the country in the last decades, delegating some of his responsibilities to the Cortes Generales, the Spanish parliament. Spain has also developed some manufacturing centers with much assistance by the royal crown, mostly based around the country's two major cities: the capital city of Madrid and Barcelona in the northeast.

Because of the federal structure of the Spanish state, the country has become one of the most successful centers of the growing labor movement in Europe. Because many factories were financed by King Alfonso and the Spanish crown, a lot of the factories in Spain are owned and managed by the state. This has led to a large growth in socialism in the urban centers of Spain, with branches both supporting and opposing royal ownership of factories. In Andalucia, there is also small areas of support for cantonalism[3]. Cantonalism is a Spanish variety of anarchism which would create a larger number of smaller federal regions within the Spanish state. While cantonalism and some socialists support abolishing the monarchy, the people of Spain still have much support for the king.

To the west of Spain lies the small country of Portugal on the Atlantic coast. Portugal also possesses a monarchical form of government, but it is more backward than that of Spain and the Portuguese king attempts to keep more powers in his grasp rather than delegating it to the people. For this reason, there is a larger republican movement in Portugal than there is in Spain. Portugal also has not developed any centers of manufacturing leading it to rely on imports from other countries for manufactured goods. Aside from Portugal, two other countries control territory in Iberia. The United Kingdom controls the small peninsula of Gibraltar at the entrance to the Mediterranean Sea, and France controls the island of Minorca in the Balearic island chain.

Spain and Portugal both possess several colonies which will be more deeply discussed in other sections. Spain has the colony of Porto Rico in North America, and in Africa they possess the Canary Islands, a portion of southern Morocco known as Rio de Oro, and the small territory of Camaroon in central Africa. Spain's most prized overseas possession, however, are the Philippine Islands in east Asia. Portugal's colonial empire is mostly in Africa. Portugal controls Cabo Verde, a portion of the Guinea coast, the islands of Sao Tome, and the two large southern African colonies of Angola and Mozambique. Portugal also possesses the island of Timor in the East Indies and the city of Goa on the Indian subcontinent.

[1] France had universal male suffrage in OTL by 1892 from what I've found. With a stronger republican tradition in the country, this would probably come earlier.
[2] After the Mid-century Revolutions, Jerome Napoleon Bonaparte I goes back to France and Charles Joseph Bonaparte is born in France. The Bonapartes are kind of becoming the Kennedys of 19th century France.
[3] An interesting variant of anarchism that existed in OTL Spain. Here's the wiki entry

 

[wilcoxchar]

Update's finished!

The World in a New Century, Section VI: Central Europe
Published by the McNally Corporation in Chicago, 1901.

Germany:
Besides France, the other major power on the European continent is the German Empire. The German Empire is currently led by Emperor Frederick III. The emperor is the ultimate authority in the German government, but the German parliament or Reichstag plays the main role in proposing laws. The members of the Reichstag are elected giving the people some representation in their government, but voting is restricted primarily to the landed or wealthy. On the level of the provinces of Germany, the electoral franchise is more varied. In some provinces like Austria, there is universal suffrage and a large workers' presence in local government. However, in other provinces, the voting franchise is restricted to the ruling aristocracy. This is particularly present in Bavaria and Hanover, which have a special autonomous status within the German Empire.

Germany owes much of its industrial and military prowess to the vast riches of coal and iron that lie within its borders. The coal fields of the Rhineland and Silesia have been mined for much of the century and are the main driver behind German industrial growth. As such, it is easy to see why most German industry is concentrated in the valley of the Rhine and in eastern Germany around Saxony and Silesia. Recently with the incorporation of some former Habsburg lands into Germany, industrial growth has shifted from northeastern Germany around Berlin to Bohemia. The industry has propelled the German railway network to be one of the most extensive in Europe, with over 25,000 miles of railway in the country at the present time.

In the past decades since its unification, the German Empire has continued to expand. At first, German expansion was primarily in the form of acquiring colonies. German efforts to gain footholds in eastern Africa bore fruit first in Zanzibar and Mogadischu. In the past decade, the German colonial efforts have blossomed to cover a large portion of the east African coast, the island of Madagaskar, and a section of the Arabian Peninsula. However, in the past years German has also pursued territorial acquisition on the European continent. With the annexation of Moravia and the Workers' Republic of Austria, the German Empire seems to have shifted its hunger for land to along its own borders. This is undoubtedly spurred on by the country's aristocracy including the remnants of the Habsburg dynasty, itching to return to their former glory. Nonetheless, the German Empire appears to be slowly rejecting the influence of the nobility and may become a republic given enough time.


The Low Countries:
Centered around the mouth of the Rhine, the countries of Belgium and the Netherlands were home to large centers of shipping in the past. However, with the coming of industrialization this century, they have declined in relative importance. Both countries are monarchies. The leader of the Netherlands holds several titles: king of the Netherlands, Duke of Limburg, and Grand Duke of Luxembourg. Both countries are relatively backward politically, with their monarchs holding almost absolute rule over the affairs of their respective countries. While the Netherlands has a constitution that grants the various provinces some power in local affairs, the people have little say in the governing of the country at a national level.

Both the Netherlands and Belgium possess vast colonial empires in Asia and the East Indies. These are primarily remnants of the Dutch Empire at its height, as the colonies in the East Indies were divided after Belgium won its independence in the 1830s. The Dutch control the islands of Sumatra, Java, the Moluccas, part of New Guinea, and several other islands in the East Indian archipelago. Belgium controls the island of Borneo, but has also gained part of Indochina and small ports along the African coast. These colonies still bring in several exotic goods, making the cities in these two countries still somewhat rich despite the countries' declining economic importance.


Baden and Switzerland:
To the south west of Germany are the two smaller nations of Baden and Switzerland. Baden is ruled by a grand duke, and has made little attempts to reform toward a constitutional form of government. While there has been more movement toward a republican system than either of the Low Countries, much of the reform took place in the aftermath of the Mid-Century Revolutions. Baden still allows voting only for the wealthy in the country's Congress and the grand duke retains supreme authority over Baden's laws. Baden itself lies primarily on the left bank of the Rhine, and so is largely an agricultural nation. Unlike the other nations of the German Confederation, Baden refused to join the German Empire in the 1860s and has maintained its neutrality ever since.

Switzerland lies south of Baden in the highest peaks of the Alps. For the past century, the small federal republic has remained for the most part unbothered by its neighbors. The Swiss government operates similar to our Congress, but on a much more direct level of operation. The smaller divisions in Switzerland allow for a more direction participation by the people in the lawmaking process. While an overall federal council was formally established after a short civil war in the 1850s, the individual cantons, as the Swiss administrative divisions are called, still retain a largely autonomous status within the country.

Both of these countries are perceived in international relations as guaranteed neutral states within the European system. This has led to international conferences often being hosted in these two countries. The most prestigious of these in recent decades was the meeting in Rastatt, Baden in 1877 that established the International Olympic Committee.

 

[wilcoxchar]

Finally got most of the update done. I still need to do the section on the Ottomans and Greece, but I have one more final tomorrow morning that needs studying for so that takes precedent. Here's the first two sections of the next update. Last section and footnotes will be added tomorrow.

The World in a New Century, Section VII: Southern Europe
Published by the McNally Corporation in Chicago, 1901.

Italy:
Italy, like France, is one of the few republics in Europe that are not presided over by a reigning monarch. Italy has a president and a Congress modeled closely after the one in the United States. The founder of Italian unification, Giuseppe Garibaldi, was an admirer of the American system of government and lived in the United States for a portion of his life prior to leading Italian unification in the 1860s. The president yields more power in Italy that his counterpart in the United States. However, the Congress of Italy, made up of a Senate and Chamber of Deputies, still holds some legislative power.

Italy's significance and power in Europe is rather mediocre. Italy's primary zone of influence is over the Adriatic League, a federation of smaller city-states along the east coast of the Adriatic Sea. However, Italy's power in the remainder of the Mediterranean is dwarfed by that of France, though the Italians keep a small navy in the sea. Economically, Italy is very divided. The south of the country is much less advanced than the north, and as a result many southern Italians have left the country for the Americas. The north has developed a large manufacturing sector primarily in the Po Valley.

One unique aspect of the Italian government is the presence of the Pope of the Catholic Church in Rome. For centuries, the Pope had ruled territory including Rome and its surroundings while also serving as leader of the Catholic Church. But after the unification of Italy, the Papacy gave up its land to the Italian government in exchange for being allowed to return to Rome. Some members of the College of Cardinals refused to give up the Pope's physical authority and broke off from the Church, beginning the current schism. This anti-Papacy now resides in the city of Puebla in Tlaxcala.


The Danubian States:
In the south of Europe between Italy and the Turkish Empire, there are several countries in the region that until recently was the possession of the Habsburg dynasty and the Austrian Empire. The majority of the former Habsburg lands is now in Hungary, one of the former kingdom in the Austrian imperial lands. Now, Hungary is ruled by a chancellor elected by a Diet, but the people have very little say in how the government is run. The country is very tyrannous in nature and has enacted many laws promoting the migration of non-Hungarians from various parts of the country. The main area where this has occurred is Slavonia, including the city of Zagrab, where many Croatians have been forcefully moved to Dalmatia or have left the country to the United States and other countries. Economically, Hungary is very backward and plays little part in international trade. Part of this is due to its lack of viable port cities on the Adriatic Sea. Hungary's main port city is Zeng on the Adriatic Sea, but much of Hungary's trade runs through either the cities of the Adriatic League or through Germany via railroad.

The Adriatic League is a confederation of small city-states along the east coast of the Adriatic Sea. The league is made up of the cities of Trieste, Fiume, Zadar, Split, Dubrovnik, and Kotor. It was formed during the collapse of the Austrian Empire in the 1870s and largely exists under the protection of Italy. Each city within the league is autonomous as to local rules, with the national Senate formed by representatives from each of the six cities as well as members sent by the Italian government. The league is largely reliant on Italy for its resource, though the cities in the league have recently become popular seaside leisure destinations for many Europeans.

Lastly, the kingdom of Illyria is a small country that lies between the eastern stretch of the Alps and the Adriatic Sea. The small country is a monarchy currently headed by Adolf Anton von Auersperg. The monarchy is subject to a constitution and the Illyrian Senate is the voice of the people. The Kingdom of Illyria is of little import in the affairs of the region, though it is of note as it is the only country to arise out of the fall of the Austrian Empire that has chosen to keep a king. The capital is in the city of Ljubljana near the geographic center of Illyria.


The Balkan Peninsula:
Much of the Balkan Peninsula to the south of Hungary is dominated by the Turkish Empire. The Turkish Empire is under absolute rule by the Sultan, and the government of the country is very backward compared to the rest of Europe. The Turks have long ruled the Balkans along with their territories in Asia, but at the beginning of the last century the grip of the Sultan has begun to falter. In the early part of the last century, the Greeks and Egyptians rose up against the Sultan and with the help of the great powers of Europe, gained their independence and self-governance. Since then, the Turks have become still more backward as the Sultan has failed to embrace industrialization or granting the people a voice in the government.

The Turkish Empire as a whole straddles the link between Europe and the western portion of the Asian continent. The capital, Constantinople, is situated at a strategic position between the two continents and at the straits between the Mediterranean Sea and the Black Sea. The remainder of the Turkish lands in Europe are a motley assortment of Slavic peoples. After uprisings and petty conflicts between these groups, the Turkish Empire has granted Serbia and Rumania autonomy in order to improve the government in those areas. These countries are nominally part of Turkey but have their own local governments and are largely independent.

At the very southern tip of the Balkan Peninsula is Greece. Greece gained its independence during the 1820s and is now ruled by a constitutional monarchy. The country is notable as it is the home of the ancient city-states of Athens and Sparta as well as of thinkers such as Plato and Socrates, and is also the birthplace of the republic. While Greece is small, it has gained the protection of both Italy and Russia to ensure the Turks do not make an attempt at reconquering Greece. Greece was also the home of the first revival of the Olympic Games in 1882, which took place in Athens.

 

[wilcoxchar]

Has it really been almost a week since I last posted an update? Wow. Time for another one! And we're now done with Europe!

The World in a New Century, Section VIII: Northern Europe
Published by the McNally Corporation in Chicago, 1901.

Scandinavia:
The two nations of Denmark lie to the north of Germany and west of the Russian Empire, and Sweden are relatively minor on the world stage. Denmark is a tiny nation occupying the peninsula and islands just to the north of Germany. Denmark is led by a constitutional monarchy with a national Parliament. The monarchy has little bearing on the laws of the country and serves for the most part as a figurehead. Denmark is a rather efficiently run country, owing this it its small size. However, despite being such a small country, Denmark does have a few colonies. The Faeroe Islands as well as the islands of Iceland and Greenland in the far north of the Atlantic Ocean are administered by Denmark. The country also has small colonies in the Caribbean, on the coast of west Africa, and in the Indian Ocean.

The kingdom of Sweden is the larger country of the two in Scandinavia, and is one of the least densely populated countries in Europe. Because of its small population and the cold climate the people endure, Sweden is not a very industrialized country. The only large manufacturing sector is centered around the capital city of Stockholm, and in the far south of the country. However, despite its lack of industry, Sweden is one of the most important producers of iron and timber in the world. Indeed, most of Sweden's industrial production comes from lumber processing.

Sweden is governed by monarchy that maintains many powers over the laws, but still does obey the whims of the Riksdag, the Swedish parliament. For the most part, however, the Riksdag has been fairly conservative in the latter half of the century and there is only a small franchise among the lower classes. What is curious about the governing of Sweden is that while the monarch is king of both Sweden and Norway, the Norwegians retain a large amount of self-governance for their domestic affairs. The Norwegians even have their own separate parliament, and in fact have a wider suffrage than in Sweden.


Russian Empire:
The Russian Empire is the second largest nation in the world by land area and the third largest by population, but it is governed by a very backward country. The Tsar maintains his absolute rule with few reforms toward a constitutional or democratic rule having taken place during the past century. The only significant reform that has been made was the abolition of serfdom by the previous Tsar, Alexander II, in 1863. However, after his son Nicholas II succeeded to the throne, the government has neglected further reforms and remains an absolute monarchy.

Diplomatically, the Russian Empire has engaged little in European affairs over the past century, instead focusing its attention on siberia and Central Asia. Expansion into Siberia has been encouraged both by the government's forceful movement of people to the Far East and by the natural attraction of gold rushes in the Pacific coast and in Alyeska. Russia has also been steadily expanding into the steppes of Central Asia east of the Caspian Sea over the past half century. After the conquest of the uncivilized tribes in the Trans-Caspian steppes, the Russians continued their expansion up to the Hindu Kush mountains. There, the Russians have so far ceased their southward expansion as part of increased cooperation with Great Britain.

The expansion of the Russian frontier into Central Asia has spurred the growth of the manufacturing sector in Russia as well as the Russian railway system. While there is a significant amount of railway mileage through European Russia, the extent of the country and its cold climate has prevented much development of a manufacturing sector. The only areas with large amounts of modern industry are Saint Petersburg and Moscow. Recently, there has been an effort to extend the railways to cities east of the Caspain Sea to bring in minerals from Asia easier, and there has been some support from the government for development of industry along the Black Sea coast. However, the Russian Empire remains backward in terms of industry and lies far behind Germany and the rest of the major European powers.

Galicia:
The Republic of Galicia is a small country between Hungary and Russia, and another country to arise out of the remnants of the Austrian Empire after the fall of the Habsburg dynasty. At first, Galicia appeared like it would embrace constitutional reforms and become a republic, but Russian meddling on the country soon led to Galicia becoming a tyrannous state. Russian interference in Galicia continues as the country is largely populated by Poles, and there is worry that an independent Polish state will give the Poles in Russia a desire for more autonomy. While the country remains largely influenced by Russia, German investment in the city of Krakow near the German border have brought some minimal industry to Galicia.

 

[wilcoxchar]

Update's done! It's a lot bigger than I thought it would be for only having two sections.

The World in a New Century, Section IX: Northern Africa
Published by the McNally Corporation in Chicago, 1901.

Mediterranean North Africa:
The Mediterranean coast of Africa is the most civilized region of Africa, as it has had the most prolonged contact with Europe and other advanced countries on the continent. Unlike much of the remainder of Africa, the people of North Africa are primarily Mohammedans. This is partly the reason why some of the countries in northern Africa have been able to resist colonization by Europeans, despite being so close to Europe. The cities of the Mediterranean coast were formerly host to fierce pirates who preyed on Mediterranean shipping, but in the past century this piracy has waned. These pirates were the cause of the United States' first international action, in which the Union defeated the pirates of Tripoli.

The two independent countries on the northern coast of Africa are Morocco and Egypt. Morocco, at the northwestern tip of the African continent, is ruled by a Sultan, and like most of the rulers of Mohammedan countries, governs with absolute power. Historically, Morocco has been invaded by the Spanish and Portuguese many times. However, the Sultan has played the colonizing powers off of each other to maintain the country's independence. Egypt, like Morocco, has retained its independence, but the Egyptians have been more friendly to Europe and are more civilized. After gaining independence from the Turks, the Egyptian rulers have used French assistance to modernize the country. Textile manufacturing in Cairo and Alexandria using the large domestic cotton production drive what industry there is in Egypt. The construction of the Suez Canal with French financing has also led to the modernization of Egypt in the past few decades, and has increased Egypt's importance on the world stage as the canal drastically cuts the distance to travel by sea between Europe and the ports in the Indian Ocean.

Besides the kingdoms of Morocco and Egypt, the remainder of the Mediterranean coast of Africa is controlled by foreign powers. The coast of Algeria has been controlled by the French since the 1830s. Since then, many Frenchmen have moved to the Algerian coast and settled in the bustling cities. A large majority of the population of Algeria are native Muslims. These people are concentrated near the coasts, however, and the interior is a sparse desert inhabited only by nomadic tribesmen. Recently, France has integrated Algeria fully into the French government under four departments centered in the cities of Oran, Alger, Bougie, and Bone. Citizenship has been extended to Europeans living in Algeria and those natives who have fully accepted French authority.

Aside from France, the Turks also control a portion of the northern African coastline between Algeria and Egypt. The Turks true control over the area is lacking, however, and local tribes dominate the system. Only a few modernized cities exist in the Turkish lands. Among these are primarily the cities of Tunis and Tripoli on the coast, which provide much of the economic activity of the area. Much of the interior is still uncivilized and very few of the local population is literate.


Colonial North Africa:
South of the Mediterranean coast of Africa, the remainder of the continent has been almost fully colonized by Europeans in the past century. While there had been numerous trading posts on the west African coast, colonization in earnest only began recently as technological innovations diminished the danger of tropical diseases and allowed penetration further into the continent. North of the equator, the colonization of Africa has been dominated by the French. While France had a few outposts on the Guinea coast prior to the 1800s, including the major colonial center in Senegal, the push into the interior of Africa did not begin until the presidency of Louis Napoleon. Louis Napoleon and his successors encouraged expansion into the interior with exploratory and military expeditions, conquering the empires of the Niger River and Abyssinia and establishing protectorates over smaller tribes. After the Congo Conference, the French lands in Africa below the Sahara were consolidated into large districts, though native protectorates still retained some sovereignty within the French colonial system.

The French African colonies are very backward aside from the colonial administrative centers, owing to the tropical climate and the uncivilized nature of the African natives. Some attempts to civilize the locals have been made through education in French and the granting of French citizenship to natives who fully adopted French customs. However, many of the tribal protectorates have forbidden their people from doing so, and these civilizing efforts have only marginally succeeded in a few locations. Other attempts at investment in the colonies has come via steamer routes and railroad construction. These have been more successful, and steamships run regularly along the Niger and Congo Rivers, but railroad efforts have stalled. Grand plans to construct a railway connecting Dakar to Grand Bassam and Massawa to Khartoum and Libreville have been slow going due to disease and difficulties in surmounting the thick jungles of the continent.

While the French dominate the region, a number of other countries have also established colonies in west and central Africa. The Portuguese maintain small territory of Bissao in western Guinea and various islands in Cabo Verde and Sao Tome. The Spanish control the Canary Islands and smaller mainland forts in Morocco and the Rio Muni colony in the Congo region. The Danes have a small amount of territory on the Guinea coast, while Liberia keeps its independence under the protection of the United States. The main competitor with France in west Africa is the British. Great Britain controls the territory along the coast north of Liberia, a colony in the Gold Coast, and the large colony of British Cameroon east of the Niger Delta.

 

[wilcoxchar]

Update's done!

The World in a New Century, Section X: Southern Africa
Published by the McNally Corporation in Chicago, 1901.

Central Africa: Most of equatorial Africa is made up of a dense jungle centered around the Congo River basin. The Congo has become an important trading route in recent decades as it has opened up the dark interior of the African continent to European colonization. Particularly, the Congo serves as the main route for raw rubber production in the interior of the country. In the past decade, the Congo basin was divided between Great Britain, France, and Germany, with the Belgians and the United States receiving small pieces of the coastline near the river mouth. South of the Congo basin, the Portuguese have claimed land further inland from their coastal territory in Angola and Mozambique. There have been recent tensions between the British and Portuguese over competing claims for the upper Zambezi River in Portuguese efforts to create a continuous territory to join their two colonies[1].

In eastern Africa, German colonization efforts have made it the dominant colonial power on the Indian Ocean coast of the continent. The Germans have laid claim to much of the eastern highlands of the continent, stretching from Abyssinia to the border of Mozambique in the south, as well as the island of Madagaskar. The German colonial administration is the most centralized of the European powers on the continent, with the entire mainland territory being governed from the island of Zanzibar. Ostafrika, as the colony is called, is the most developed of all the colonial possessions on the continent except the British Cape Colony. The more temperate climate of Ostafrika and the recent discovery of gold in the mountains have spurred the construction of railroads connecting the major cities of the colony.


The Cape: The area at the southern tip of the African continent is the most advanced part of the continent. The British control the area around the Cape of Good Hope and much of the western half of southern Africa. The eastern half of the region was settled by the Voortrekkers, descendants of Dutch colonists of the Cape who went east to escape the British after they took the Cape of Good Hope. The British Cape Colony has a fair manufacturing base and plays an important role in the British Empire. Because so little British shipping runs through the Suez Canal[2], the city of Cape Town serves as the main halfway point for transportation between the British Isles and India. The importance of Cape Town has led to several heavy industries starting in the city. The primary industry is in textiles and the processing of Indian cotton before it arrives in Britain.

The South African or Voortrekker Republic is a federation of the Voortrekker republics that were created by the Dutch settlers in the 1830s and 1840s. The hardiness and good character of the Voortrekkers, much like those pioneers who have settled in the western United States, have led them to success in the rugged region of southeastern Africa and have allowed the Voortrekkers to remain independent from encroaching British influence. Recently, the discovery of gold and diamonds in South Africa has led to an economic boom and an influx of settlers. However, tensions have arisen with the Cape Colony over competing claims to the mining lands and there have been clashes in the border region in the past few years.

[1] While the Congo Conference mostly settled it, Portugal still grumbles about not getting the Pink Map.
[2] The British government does not support the use of the canal controlled by the French puppet in Egypt!

 

[wilcoxchar]

Update's finished!

The World in a New Century, Section XI: The Near East[1]
Published by the McNally Corporation in Chicago, 1901.

Turkey in Asia:
The Turkish Empire in Asia is even more backward than the parts on the European continent. While Serbia and Rumania have at least some autonomy in their local affairs, the rest of Turkey is controlled directly by the Sultan and his viziers, or advisers. While Constantinople is very important strategically, the region of Anatolia across the sea is largely agricultural and has not progressed much. Only a few cities on the Aegean coast have grown large, including the port city of Smyrna. The interior of Anatolia remains primarily nomadic with livestock production as the main force in its economy.

Southeast of Anatolia, the Tigris and Euphrates rivers create the floodplains of Mesopotamia, the other major region of the Ottoman territories on the Asian continent. Mesopotamia had a very important role in the early history of civilization as the site of ancient Babylon, but it has recently waned in importance as the great empires of the region have crumbled and fallen behind European civilization. The area around the two rivers is largely agricultural like the rest of the Turkish Empire. Steamboats do run up the rivers from the Persian Gulf as far as the city of Bagdad. Also, with talks of construction of a railroad to connect Bagdad to Constantinople, the region could develop quickly within the next decades.


The Holy Land:
One of the most important regions of the Near East is the Holy Land or Levant. The region is called the Holy Land because it is the site of some of the most important places in the Christian, Jewish, and Mohammedan faiths. These include the cities of Jerusalem and Bethlehem, as well as the River Jordan and the Sea of Galilee. The Holy Land is currently divided between Turkey and Egypt. The Turks own the northern half, centered around Damascus and Beirut. The Egyptians own the southern half extending north from the Sinai Peninsula, and include Jerusalem and Gaza. The region has grown more slowly in the past century compared to previous centuries because of the political division and instability[2], but despite this thousands of people flock to the Holy Land every year on a pilgrimage to the many sites.


Arabia:
The Arabian Peninsula is the last civilized part of the Near East, partially owing to its geography. The peninsula is largely made up of a vast desert, so the only areas productive enough for sizable cities are on the coasts or in the high mountains in the south of the peninsula. Because of this, the majority of the peninsula is still populated by nomadic tribes and are not worth examination. The most well off part of the peninsula is in the western highlands and on the coast of the Red Sea. This section of Arabia is owned by Egypt. This region contains the cities of Mecca and Medina, the two holiest cities of the Mohammedan faith.

The remainder of the coasts of the Arabian Peninsula have been colonized by various European powers. These coasts are important in controlling the route between Europe and the Indies. France has colonized a territory on the southwest coast of the peninsula around the port of Mocha, giving the French control over both sides of the Bab el-Mendeb. The British have expanded from their base in the city of Aden along the southern coast of the peninsula. The German Empire controls Oman on the eastern end of the peninsula, as well as the southern cost of the Strait of Ormuz. Oman was one of Germany's first colonial enterprises and has been part of the German Empire for a few decades now. Further up the coast of the Persian Gulf, the British have recently created protectorates out of the emirates there, and has establish direct administration over the island of Bahrain.

[1] Interesting fact: the term 'Near East' and 'Middle East' didn't really have a definite geographical meaning until the Crimean War. I tried to come up with an alternate name for the region, but couldn't think of any I liked.
[2] OTL population of Palestine in 1900 was 600-700k, in TTL it's probably closer to 500k.

 

[wilcoxchar]

Here we go.

The World in a New Century, Section XII: Persia and India
Published by the McNally Corporation in Chicago, 1901.

Persia:
The country of Persia covers much of the land between the Turkish Empire in the west and British India to the east. Like the Turkish Empire, the people of Persia practice the Mohammedan religion. However, in many ways, Persia is more uncivilized than the Turks. The country is governed by the absolute ruler known as the shah and like the other countries in the region, the people are given no say in how the government functions. Persia, however, has been unable to prevent foreign influence from the great powers of Europe from filtering into the country.

The two countries that have put the most effort into influencing the Persian government are Great Britain and the Russian Empire. During the last century, Russia launched several wars against Persia. Along with taking land around the Caspian Sea from Persia, Russia gained exclusive rights over parts of the northwest Persia and around the rest of the Caspian Sea. In the past decade, Great Britain also invaded Persia and enforced their interests in the country. Great Britain took the region of Baluchistan in southeastern Persia as well as the island of Ormuz. The control of Ormuz allows Great Britain to control the entrance to the Persian Gulf.

Because Persia is a backward yet diverse nation, there are many people who are being oppressed by the rule of the shah. Nationalist sentiment has recently risen in Persia among many peoples in the country. So far, the Baluchis have been most successful. With the British invasion of Persia, Baluchistan was established as an autonomous state under British protection. In the northwest, the Azeris and Kurds have undertaken nationalist uprisings against the Persian government. While these have not had much success thus far, the mountainous regions have made them difficult for the Persian government to completely suppress. Possible assistance by the Turks or Russians have also contributed to the survival of these smaller movements. To the east of Persia, Afghanistan has also survived as an independent country under British influence.


India:
The Indian subcontinent is almost entirely owned by the British government. Like the Hudson Bay Company in New Caledonia, the British East India Company performs many of the functions of the colonial government in India. The cities of Delhi, Calcutta, Bombay, and Madras serve simultaneously as the colonial administrative capitals and as the regional offices for the British East India Company. The BEIC also has several autonomous powers within the subcontinent, similar to the Hudson Bay Company in New Caledonia. While the viceroys are nominally appointed by the British government, the BEIC has great influence over the actual affairs of the colonial government and the viceroys have little true power.

Aside from the areas directly controlled by the British government and the BEIC, there are several autonomous states within British India known as the princely states. The princely states are remnants of the pre-colonial countries in India and are headed by local Indian rulers. However, they do not have complete autonomy and are still British protectorates, and in the half century since the Ganges Revolt, the powers of the princely states has been gradually removed in favor of direct control by the British viceroys. The primary princely states are Rajputana, Hyderabad, and Mysore. Recently, the northwestern frontier of British India has also been carved into the princely states of Baluchistan and Kashmir.

The population of British India is very large, at over three hundred million people. This is over three times the population of the United States, and almost seven times the population of the British Isles. The population of British India mostly practices Brahmanism, though there is a large Mohammedan minority. Within the Indian social hierarchy there is a strict caste system that largely prevents the poorer underclasses from bettering themselves economically.

While Great Britain dominates the Indian subcontinent, there are a few small areas that are not owned by the British. The largest of these is the country of Afghanistan. It is located in the Hindu Kush mountains northwest of British India, and serves as a buffer state between the British and Russian territories in the region. There are also some minor cities on the coast of the Indian subcontinent that remain out of British control. These are the Portuguese possession of Goa, and the French possession of Pondicherry.

 

[wilcoxchar]

Update time! I'm trying to balance more historical development and current overview in this update.

The World in a New Century, Section XIII: Eastern Asia
Published by the McNally Corporation in Chicago, 1901.

China:
The Chinese Empire is the largest nation in the world today and covers much of the eastern half of the Asian continent. Like the United States, the geography of China is very diverse. While China covers such a large area, it has been held back from becoming more successful for several reasons. China's population, like much of the rest of Asia, is uneducated and largely made up of peasants. The government itself has also held back the development of the nation. For centuries China has kept up a policy of isolation from the Western world. This has only changed in the last century, when the Western powers forced the Chinese to open up their country to trade with Europe.

More recently, the Chinese government has faced increasing difficulties from both inside and outside the country. Throughout the century, China has had to deal with numerous uprisings by its Mohammedan population. In 1879, a great flood of the Yang-tze River, the major river that runs through the center of the country, decimated the region around the city of Jiangning[1] and is estimated to have led to the deaths of over 200,000 people. Fourteen years later in 1893, the northern regions of the country faced a very cold winter and a flood of the Yellow River the following spring. These have been recorded as some of the worst natural disasters of the past century. Additionally, the growing influence of Russia in the far northern reaches of China and the recent defeat by the French and Coreans has further damaged the stability of the Chinese government.

As part of the opening of China to trade in the past decades, the great powers have gained concessions in territory and trade from the Qing to finally break the country's isolation and allow trade with the rest of the world. Corea, France, the United Kingdom, and Portugal have possessions along the Chinese coast that Chinese citizens are allowed to trade in. Additionally, the cities of Shanghai, Canton, Hangzhou, Weihai, Tsingtao, and Tianjin have been opened to foreign traders and companies within their city limits.


Japan and Corea:
The two most modernized countries in eastern Asia are Japan and Corea. With the help of the British and French, these two countries have lifted their societies into the modern world and have established small manufacturing and urban sectors. After Great Britain opened up relations with Japan in 1861, the Japanese began to build up their industry, but still remained locked in the feudalistic system of the Shogunate. However, in the 1880s, a revolution assisted by the British restored some powers to the emperor[2]. However, the shogun, Tokugawa Yoshinobu, has still retained much influence for the past thirty years. In the past decade, Japan has begun expanding outside its home islands and has arranged treaties to acquire the Bonin island chain and Saito Island[3].

Meanwhile, Corea has taken a quicker and more radical approach to modernization. While Corea has also kept its monarchy, the government has allowed more western advisers from France and other powers to modernize the country. With the help of the French, Corea renounced their vassalage to China in 1885 and defeated the Qing, fully establishing themselves as an independent country. Since then, the Corean Empire[4] has been vigorously building up its industry using the large coal reserves in the peninsula. The Coreans have quickly become a regional power in eastern Asia, though they are still leagues behind the great powers of Europe in influence.

[1] Qing era name for Nanjing.
[2] Less drastic than the OTL Meiji Restoration.
[3] OTL Marcus Island.
[4] Korea was declared an empire by Gojong in 1890 after the victory in the Sino-Korean War.