George Washington freed all his slaves on his deathbed. If he were King, it could be that George Washington freed all the slaves before the cotton gin was invented and the “slave labor” economy never took hold in America.
It would be intriguing - wouldn’t it?
Of course, no slavery doesn’t mean no racism, as the racial landscape of today’s America makes plain. Likewise, the end of the slave economy hardly erases the discrimination faced by other ethnicities and religious groups.
That being said, I can imagine the House of Hamilton being abolitionists. Maybe emancipation was one of their mandates once it became clear that slave economy was too inefficient to function anyways?
The racism’s different though.
We’ve not the same history of slavery in the UK. (There are a bundle of other issues in regards to the British Empire though and our hands are hardly clean on anything.) The racism here seems to be different from that in the US.
Definitely. Chattel slavery was almost non-existent in Canada, but we still have our own poisonous attitudes towards race to worry about, they just happen to be different enough for us wits north of the border to sneer down our noses at the Americans (while ignoring the First Nations Peoples we have stowed away in destitute reservations and urban wastelands, usually).
@Cataphrak and @FairyGodfeather, thank you for expanding on the scenario presented. I agree with you both that racism was not a slave exclusive thing and that there is more to explore then that - the exploitation of Chinese labor on the Railroads out West is but a low-fruit example …
I was mostly trying to show @wittyblather that the beginning of change could start with the beginning of his American Monarchy. She doesn’t need to wait until the mid-19th century to experience the emancipation - that’s the beauty of this type of story - we can all learn from dreaming the possibilities.
Much the same as it was different again here, being one of the major slave-trading nations together with Portugal and many of the Islamic nations.
You’ll note that we were just as late with formally abolishing the thing as the US was (1863 as well).
@Cataphrak Oooh, thank you for all this info! I do admit that I’m operating based on a high school level history knowledge and some cursory research, so the added insight is very helpful. You’re right – it would probably make more sense to hold republicanism at the same level as our communism. France could even be the example everyone points to for why it doesn’t work, akin to the USSR in the real world.
In regards to the role that slavery played in this past America, I’m of two minds. My first instinct had been to have Phillip Hamilton II abolish slavery after the civil war, since the Hamiltons were against that from the beginning. The Ministry of Noble Outreach/the Outreach program itself was part of what I’m calling the Hamilton Reforms, which changed some facets of government and law on a fundamental level. Other such reforms are the formal separation of church and state, the criminalization of armed conflict between noble families, and overall, a much stronger central government. Until that point, counts and dukes had much freer reign over their lands, and that sense of disunity was one of the factors that led to the civil war in the first place.
That model would lead to the slave state/free state model we saw in the antebellum period, though slavery was not the major issue in this version of the Civil War. It would also place race relations more or less where they are today, albeit I would have to think of a facsimile for the Civil Rights Movement that could happen in an absolute monarchy. The other option would be to have slavery abolished at the founding of the country, likely on Washington’s orders (deathbed or otherwise.) That would give precedent for a more accepting racial climate, for both black and non-black PoC. Still, I would hate for that to come across as a handwave reason not to tackle the historically terrible actions of white people, especially with Britain and Spain continuing their colonialism.
So much to consider! I’d like to create an accurate alternate world for my game, of course, but I so don’t want to offend anybody or ruin a nice escape from reality. Thanks, everyone, for weighing in so far. You’ve given me much to think about.
(Also, just for future reference, I’m a girl, she/her pronouns. I know it’s harder to tell over the internet, since I didn’t give a name on here and still don’t have an avatar up, lol.)
The easiest way I could think of doing that is by using the fact that Louisiana had a large population of Gens de couleur libres (which is probably where the modern term “People of Colour” comes from): free black or mixed-race individuals who were a prominent part of the Franco-American middle class. This group had a long history of fighting for the right to become fully enfranchised citizens of France, and later the US (although it should be noted that not all of them supported abolition). This, combined with a (I’d imagine) relatively liberal house in charge of Louisiana (His role in the French Revolution aside, Lafayette was a vocal abolitionist) could lead to some sort of alliance between the Free People of Colour and the Ducal house. I could easily see that leading to some of the gains our own Civil Rights movement made: perhaps a Duke of Louisiana chose a black or mixed-race woman for a consort.
The thing about absolute power is that legal change can be enforced very quickly when the matter in question is very close to the heart of one of the ruling elite. If the Duke of Louisiana had a personal stake in guaranteeing blacks the vote or overturning this world’s equivalent of Jim Crow, then he’d probably ram it through, popular opinion be damned, leading to something like our own situation of a nominally post-racial state floating on top of a sea of latent and implicit bigotry.
You can even have the Duke be from the Wallace family … so after the confrontation they could be stripped of their title (title revocation) and given to the current family holding it.
Its really nice sharing a passion for this type of story with @wittyblather - 
Hey, that’s a very interesting idea. Count me in!
I’ll throw this around, but how about using the personality metrics to influence how your character perceives the world? I doubt a very cruel character (if that’s the metric you’re going for) could turn their cruel-ness on and off, it’s bound to rub off and make people notice it one day.
And, I know the worldbuilding is still new, but how is South America in the middle of all this? Is Brazil independent of Portugal, and how are the Spanish colonies?
Aaaaaa I love The Selection, I’ve always wanted to play a game in that style because I remember being quite annoyed with some of America’s choices, now I can be in her shoes c:
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