England 1640

[Patine]

This is just kind of a fringe idea. I don't know if I'll do it, and I don't know if it will actually work. There will be two parties: the Whigs (very early precursor to the Liberals; those who oppose the King) under the John Pym or Oliver Cromwell as de facto leader (as there were no formal party leaders as the office of PM didn't yet exist), and the Tories (very early precursor to the Conservatives; those who support the King) under the Earl of Stafford as de facto leader (though he won't be running in the Commons, as he has a guaranteed seat in the Lords, but he essentially led that faction). I will have a 98% alienation rate, as only 4% of males in the country could vote, thus 2% of what we today would call eligible voters. Ads will be a 'word-of-mouth' ad, posters, pamphlets, and newspaers (I want somehow the last unavailable to the Whigs, as they're Puritan majority denounced newspapers; I might have to make a house rule). Issues will include:

-Illegal taxation by the Crown

-Illegal 'special courts' of the Crown

-Rights of the gentry

-Powers of the Crown (likely divided into several issues)

-War with Scotland

-Anglican sacraments

-Religious freedom for non-Anglican protestants

-The King's proposed budget

If anyone has any ideas on this, let me know.

[EGaffney]

To be honest, I doubt you'd have enough contested seats to make the election work. I've done some work on 1892 and even then, there were plenty of uncontested seats.

[Kauai]

Is this fictional or not? If so, you could always bend the rules and add more contested seats, better a more or less fictional scene than an unplayable one.

Also...

New World Colonialism

Enfranchisement

[extreme_right]

The powers of the Crown matter of course came to a head in 1689 with the Glorious Revolution which led to the Bill of Rights. So there is essentially a full breakdown of the "sub issues" within this heading there

Freedom from royal interference with the law. Though the sovereign remains the fount of justice, he or she cannot unilaterally establish new courts or act as a judge.

Freedom from taxation by Royal Prerogative. The agreement of parliament became necessary for the implementation of any new taxes.

Freedom to petition the monarch.

Freedom from the standing army during a time of peace. The agreement of parliament became necessary before the army could be moved against the populace when not at war.

Freedom for Protestants to bear arms for their own defence, as suitable to their class and as allowed by law.

Freedom to elect members of parliament without interference from the sovereign.

Freedom of speech in parliament. This means that the proceedings of parliament can not be questioned in a court of law or any other body outside of parliament itself; this forms the basis of modern parliamentary privilege.

Freedom from cruel and unusual punishment, as well as excessive bail.

Freedom from fine and forfeiture without a trial.

[Patine]

I do agree that a lot of seats would likely be uncontested unless fictitious candidates from the opposing party were inserted. Those two new issues are good additions, BTW, Kauai. As for your suggestion, Extreme_Right, I hadn't planned to divide Powers of the Crown into quite so many issues (I'd certainly run out of slots with the other issues); I'd likely merge some with each other and/or other issues.

[extreme_right]

I wasn't suggesting that you did use all of them, I just posted it to give you ideas. But this looks very interesting, I look forward to playing it.

[CCA]

How about a 'radical' leveller kinda party led by John Lilburne?

[Patine]

I think that may be a good idea. In fact, I may need not one, but two more parties of some description. I've never seen a PM4E (British, Canadian, Australain, Albertan, or British Columbian) that had less than four parties, save one, a District of Columbia council one that had three parties, and it crashed right after starting. Can the game even work with less than four parties?

[Patine]

In 1640, was England yet using the pound sterling, or were they still using the old Medieval gold mark (and if the latter, what symbol would I use for it)?

[Patine]

Anyone know the answer to the above two questions?

[Kauai]

I'm pretty sure they were using the pound sterling, not sure if the symbol has changed, though.

[Patine]

I think the four parties will be, in the end, the Whigs under John Pym, the Tories under the Earl of Stafford, the radical levellers suggested by CCA under John Lilburne, and a party moving to preserve the reforms of Henry VIII and Elizabeth I that made the Church of England from Charles I's thinly-veiled re-Romanization, but without siding directly with the Puritan-dominated Whigs (leader or name of this one uncertain). Any comments?

[CCA]

PRetty good, maybe instead of having that preservation party you should have an *army party* consisting of the grandees?

[Guest]

@Patine I'd like to see this one.

[Patine]

11 minutes ago, NYrepublican said:

@Patine I'd like to see this one.

I may actually take it up at some point, though the large number of contested ridings, the fact that many MP's didn't declare a party allegiance (as loosely as parties existed back then) until after they were elected, and, where an election was contested, all candidates were completely running and funding their own campaigns entirely - there were no party campaign infrastructures, machines, or funding, no party platforms or official party leaders even. Plus, the value of money back then was problematic. One of those huge country manors you see in pictures of rural England with almost 100 rooms and a huge piece of good, arable land attached could sell for £20 000 by 1640 money - that's less than the monthly rent for a flat in some parts of London today in modern British money...

[Guest]

3 minutes ago, Patine said:

I may actually take it up at some point, though the large number of contested ridings, the fact that many MP's didn't declare a party allegiance (as loosely as parties existed back then) until after they were elected, and, where an election was contested, all candidates were completely running and funding their own campaigns entirely - there were no party campaign infrastructures, machines, or funding, no party platforms or official party leaders even. Plus, the value of money back then was problematic. One of those huge country manors you see in pictures of rural England with almost 100 rooms and a huge piece of good, arable land attached could sell for £20 000 by 1640 money - that's less than the monthly rent for a flat in some parts of London today in modern British money...

That being said how's the Reichstag scenario going?

[vcczar]

On 9/25/2008 at 1:18 AM, Patine said:

This is just kind of a fringe idea. I don't know if I'll do it, and I don't know if it will actually work. There will be two parties: the Whigs (very early precursor to the Liberals; those who oppose the King) under the John Pym or Oliver Cromwell as de facto leader (as there were no formal party leaders as the office of PM didn't yet exist), and the Tories (very early precursor to the Conservatives; those who support the King) under the Earl of Stafford as de facto leader (though he won't be running in the Commons, as he has a guaranteed seat in the Lords, but he essentially led that faction). I will have a 98% alienation rate, as only 4% of males in the country could vote, thus 2% of what we today would call eligible voters. Ads will be a 'word-of-mouth' ad, posters, pamphlets, and newspaers (I want somehow the last unavailable to the Whigs, as they're Puritan majority denounced newspapers; I might have to make a house rule). Issues will include:

-Illegal taxation by the Crown

-Illegal 'special courts' of the Crown

-Rights of the gentry

-Powers of the Crown (likely divided into several issues)

-War with Scotland

-Anglican sacraments

-Religious freedom for non-Anglican protestants

-The King's proposed budget

If anyone has any ideas on this, let me know.

I'd definitely play this one if it's made well. Colonial policy, and public entertainment could be issues. Relation w/ France, 30 years war, Irish policy, rights of Catholics, relations w/ spain

[Patine]

1 minute ago, NYrepublican said:

That being said how's the Reichstag scenario going?

Right now, although I have a list of everyone who was elected, I'm trying to dig up information about their unsuccessful opponents in each constituency, or, at the very least what parties unsuccessfully ran against them. A number of parties are predictable in where they ran (the Polish Party, the Danish Party, the German Hanoverian Party, and the two separate workers party that merged in 1874 to form the Social Democratic Party of Germany), but ones with a broader electoral scope may not have run in every constituency they didn't win in.

[Patine]

1 minute ago, vcczar said:

I'd definitely play this one if it's made well. Colonial policy, and public entertainment could be issues. Relation w/ France, 30 years war, Irish policy, rights of Catholics, relations w/ spain

If I'm not mistaken, the colonial holdings of England at that time came down to Newfoundland, several New England Colonies, Virginia, possibly New Jersey (I can't remember on that one), Bermuda, Barbados, and the East India Company (under Crown charter, not colonial rule) - so much smaller that it was it's height in 1914 with a quarter of the world's land area and a quarter of the world's population.

[vcczar]

13 minutes ago, Patine said:

If I'm not mistaken, the colonial holdings of England at that time came down to Newfoundland, several New England Colonies, Virginia, possibly New Jersey (I can't remember on that one), Bermuda, Barbados, and the East India Company (under Crown charter, not colonial rule) - so much smaller that it was it's height in 1914 with a quarter of the world's land area and a quarter of the world's population.

That's true, but it was still a major issue. So many people migrated from 1620-1640 ("The Great Migration"), that the country was considering efforts to discourage people from leaving. Colonial policy would be based on how much autonomy these places should have, in the realm of defense, religion, and economics/trade.