Balance of Power

Nice flags.

So I have decided to do a small bit of retconning with respect to North America.

First, I've decided that Chiapas, which seceded on it's own and not just as part of the Viceroyalty of New Spain - like how the Captaincy of Guatemala (Central America) did so as well - was important enough to show on the maps even OTL it didn't amount to much. Chiapas had three main factions - Mexican Union, Central American/Guatemalan Union, and sovereigntists. When the provisional government in Guatemala City decided to join with the Mexican Empire in 1822, that was acceptable with the unionist factions in Chiapas though there was much opposition from the sovereigntist factions. Depending on whom you asked, Chiapas was either independent or part of Mexico with the government in Ciudad Real seeming unable to make definitive statement either way. In this ATL, de Iturbide never makes the proclamation that Chiapas is part of Mexico. When pressed to do so by the highland factions that had been Mexican Unionists, de Iturbide's response was "Chiapas quien?". As a result, when de Iturbide abdicates and Guatemala City once again declares independence in 1823, Ciudad Real also declares Chipanecan independence, but by this time the highland factions had mostly switch allegiance to the sovereigntists or Guatemalan Unionists.

Second, because a prime difference of this ATL is Britain and France being more internationally activist and interventionalist, I decided that their actions in South America which resulted in Greater Peru and Riograndense mean it would be very odd if they didn't also stick their hands into the pie in Central America since this era was the beginning of export-oriented phase of the hacienda/estancia system all across Latin America, whether it was coffee, bananas, guano, or whatever. Not only that, but Britain has direct interests in Belize and Miskito Coast to protect and that makes no intervention doubly out of character. So the carrot & stick "be stable so we can trade with you or else" that got applied to Peru-Bolivia will happen here, too, but I haven't worked out the exact details. Central America as a country will survive, probably including Chiapas, but I need to do more reading on the exact issues of why Central America fell apart beyond the Wikipedia entries.

Provincial flag of Cape Breton, of of the 5 founding provinces of Canada on July 1st, 1867.

The provincial shield is the old Scottish royal arms as an escutcheon on a St Andrews cross, both modified with the traditional green and gold of Cape Breton seen in OTL flags and the Cape Breton tartan.

The Opening of Western Canada, Part II, The Expansion of Manitobah

President Louis Riel had always been an engaging and charismatic speaker and these attributes made him a popular first president of the new Province of Manitobah, even in the Anglophone parishes, though that didn’t seem to help much in the early days of negotiating how Manitobah’s borders would be expanded from the preliminary postage stamp that was used to quickly end the Red River Rebellion crisis. The Métis were a widely spread out people, like their Native cousins, and it was difficult getting recognition of their status by the federal government which waffled back and forth between refusing to use the name at all and only referring to the “Government of the Province of Manitobah”, and wanting to deal as if the Province did not exist and this was just another Native treaty negotiation.

For the first year or two, Riel, Ambroise-Dydime Lépine, John Bruce and others worked on establishing the mechanisms of government in the new province. There were no political parties yet in the initial assembly of the 24 parishes, but there were always three or four representatives who espoused either appreciation or alliances with the so-called Canadian Party. Because the parishes chose their representatives on no fixed schedule, the vote challenges and simple recalls meant a constantly shifting set of members for Riel and the government to negotiate with to pass any laws. Thomas Scott’s election in one of the wholly anglophone parishes generated a lot of headlines back in Ontario, but his openly racist attitudes effectively limited his ability to form a coherent bloc. Most residents of the anglophone parishes viewed Riel as a president who was willing to be open and inclusive thanks to his actions early on in the rebellion.

Things came to a head in the summer of 1873 when the government survey teams that were supposed to work with the Métis coureurs du bois arrived in Fort Garry while the legislature was debating whether the capital needed to be incorporated as a city and renamed something different. (The two leading contenders were “Gibraltar” from the old fort of the North West Company, and “Winnipeg”, proposed by Métis legislator James McKay.) At first, there was no problem with the Métis leading the teams to survey the watersheds south of the lakes region but there were issues with anything north of Lakes Winnipeg and Cedar or very far east or west. Riel’s orations on the subject in the legislature helped the people on his side, and the Province of Quebec was generally supportive of another francophone province being able to grow and become more powerful. Over time, however, Riel’s speeches became more extravagant, some said more “religious”, and his claims for Manitobah and the Métis became ever more expansive. In 1874, as the provincial legislature was coming close to settling a deal where all parishes would elect their representatives at the same time, instead of haphazardly nominating them when they chose, Riel made a speech where he claimed “The Thlewiaza River of the Chippewa in the North to the source of the Keiskatchewan river in the foothills of the Stony Mountains to west is the natural range of Manitobah and her people the Métis as our forefathers that travelled to guide the Euopeans throughout that wide land for centuries!” When word of the speech reached Ontario and the East, there was great public outcry and consternation in Ottawa. A province that large, everybody thought, would be incredibly politically powerful because of all the voters who would live there and the resources of the lands. Even Quebec was wary of supporting the growth of another province that might overshadow itself, no matter how francophone it was.

Riel easily led the Métis and allies bloc in the 1874 election under the new system designed to replace the rather chaotic original system with a common date for all parishes, as was found in other provinces. Shortly after this, however as Riel’s speeches became less legislative and more like that of a bombastic preacher from the Confederate States of America to the south he was quietly forced out office by the Métis National Committee in the fall of 1875 and he announced that he was heading to Montreal, where he had studied in his youth, for a sabbatical. His mental state deteriorated, and following a violent outburst he was taken under the care of his uncle, John Lee, for a few months. But after Riel disrupted a religious service, Lee arranged to have him committed to an asylum in Longue Pointe in the spring of 1876. In this time, Lépine became the new president of the Manitobah legislature

Riel leaving politics seemed to make things easier, a little, for the negotiations about the size of Manitbah, but when the bill that would eventually become the “Keewatin and Manitobah Act of 1876” was tabled in the House of Commons in Ottawa in early 1876, its proposed definition of Manitobah was “the river watersheds that extend no further east than the western perimeter of Lake of the Woods, that exist wholly west of the western tip of Lake Winnipegosis, and south of Lakes Winnipeg and Manitobah to the border with the United States”. Most Manitobans were incensed as this was barely 70% larger, and only one quarter the size of Ontario. The economic spread of their original Red River Colony into the North-West Territories was much broader, they said, but Oliver Mowat, Premier of the province of Cape Breton scoffed at them publicly. The Candian Party and its anti-francophone affiliates in Ontario felt they had won the day in Parliament as they had been lobbying their Ontario MPs and writing editorial after editorial in their newspapers on the “unsuitability of Half-breeds and French folk running something so important as a Provincial Government”. The bill was passed and given Royal Assent in the fall on October the 7th, over the opposition of Quebec, whose ministers denounced it as pitiful, and the objections of Alexander Morris, Lieutenant-Governor of Manitobah, who felt that province would be in a far better position to administer the areas to the east and north of Lake Winnipeg than the government of the North-West Territories, of which he was also the Lieutenant-Governor of.

At this time, the District of Keewatin was created, based on Morris’s opinions, and he was also made it’s Lieutenant-Governor as it was separate from the North-West Territories. The major settlement was Icelanders who due to volcanic eruptions and shortage of grasslands, as well as a population that had increased to the limit of resources. The Dominion Government granted free transportation within Canada and settlement rights for a reserve known as New Iceland (Nýja Ísland), established by an Order in Council. 27,000 acres was set aside for the New Iceland territory, which comprised 36mi astride the western shore of Lake Winnipeg between Boundary Creek and White Mud River (Icelandic River) inclusive of Big Island (Hecla Island). The Canadian government also promised the Icelanders local self-government, laws and judicial system and maintenance of their own school system. A smallpox epidemic, originating in the Iclandice settler’s town of Gimli spread out across Keewatin and was the major impetus in the creation of the district. Their local council was dissolved on October 7th, 1876, when the District of Keewatin was established by the Dominion Government. At this same time the territory of New Iceland underwent an official transfer to the District of Keewatin. This emergency was the only time that members were actually appointed to the Council of Keewatin for its administration. A quarantine zone was established around Gimli and a hospital was built there, as well as several Hudson’s bay outposts being commanded for the duration as specific hospitals or quarantine sites. By the time the quarantine ended, more than 100 Icelanders and 200 natives died because of the epidemic, and Hudson’s Bay Company lost a full year in the northern fur trade. The Council was dissolved that autumn though the district was not abolished. The laws passed for the quarantine situation remained in force past the end of the council until 1878, and Keewatin, over it’s varying extents, was managed by the Department of the Interior until 1895 when it was merged back into the North-West Territories.

New Iceland elected administrators again on February 13, 1877. Under the provisional constitution, the colony was named Vatnsthing (Lake assembly). It was divided into four districts each with its own administration: Vidinesbyggd (Willow Point District), Arnesbyggd (Arnes District), Flotsbyggd (River District) and Mikleyjarbyggd (Big Island District). When the quarantine ended in July 1877, it was too late to seed. The Federal government voted to survey a road in the colony and to employ the Icelanders to build it. This monetary income enabled settlers to remain at New Iceland until the following agricultural season of 1878.

During this time, negotiations started up again for the expansion of Manitobah thanks to pressure from Quebec on behalf of Manitobah after the 1878 federal election. The syndicates gathering to build the trans-continental railroad added their voices to the mix after the first railroad in Manitobah opened on December 3rd, 1878, from St. Boniface to St. Paul, Minnesota. The syndicates were angling for land grants along their routes as payment for the job of building the promised railroad to Columbia and New Caledonia on Pacific shores, and they didn’t want to be caught in federal-provincial squabbles about whom the land belonged to.

As a result, New Iceland became a part of the province of Manitobah when it was enlarged to its current size on December the 23rd, 1881 and added 4 representatives to the original 24 parishes of the provincial legislature. This regional Icelandic government continued until 1887 when all of Manitobah was redistricted to take account of the settlement of the prior 17 years. Much land was promised to the railroad syndicates, but Manitobah was relieved that off the direct railroads rights of way, at least, the land given to the syndicates would still fall under provincial authority.

The States of the Republic of Alta California

During the 1848 rebellion against Mexican central authority and the declaration of independence, the Mormons sent a militia south to help fend off Mexican soldiers as they had been given permission to settle around the Salty Lakes by Governor Pio Pico. In addition to that land, they demanded a level of autonomy in their settlements and surrounding area to be negotiated later. It turned out that the militia was barely needed as the armies sent north by Mexico City were the usual lacklustre convict army that deserted at the first opportunity, but Governor, now Interim President Pico was a man of his word.

At first the new government was formed by the old territorial assembly plus the owners of the Ranchos, the alcaldes of the Pueblos, and the commandantes of the Presidios, but as news of the discovery of gold spreads around the world and tens of thousands people arrived and stayed, they demanded democratic elections either had or wished for back home. In 1849, on the anniversary of the declaration of independence, the Constitution of the Republic of Alta California was proclaimed, based on the 1824 federal constitution of the United Mexican States with influences from Europe, especially France. The first elections were held that fall with the new legislators and the first president taking the oath on the first Monday of December. One of the articles of the constitution was the power of the government to divide the lands of the new nation into states and territories with more or fewer devolved powers. Another article proclaimed that the first states had to be proclaimed within three years to replace the temporary senate of formed of, alcaldes, commandantes, and Rancho grantees. In negotiations between the Rancho owners and the alcaldes of the Pueblos, the capital which had been moved to Los Angeles by Pio Pico when he became territorial governor in 1844 was moved back to Monterey as it was much closer to Johann Sutter’s ranch and the centre of the gold rush.

Over the next 3 years, the new Republic surveyed its lands, sometimes accurately, often times not, and on Monday, March 1st, 1852, the Law of the New States was passed, creating seven states encompassing most of the old Ranchos, Missions, Pueblos, and Presidios, the special autonomous state of Deseret, and the remainder as federally administered territory to divided as deemed necessary through the establishment of pueblos by indigenous tribes of through land grants to settlers.

Because that early government of Alta California was dominated by the Rancho grantees who viewed the land through the lens of the water-constrained ranching practices that dominated much formerly northern Mexican territories, the borders decided upon were defined by river drainage basins, and the imprecision of many of the surveys came to be the cause of much political turmoil between the states. Especially volatile was that involving the state of Deseret. It was nearly in insurrection twice in the decades from independence until to the Great War that wracked the globe early in the 20th century due to different beliefs between Salt Lake City and Monterey as what was included in «al sur de la frontera con los Estados Unidos de América, al oeste desde el Río Oso hasta las tierras aledañas al Gran Lago Salado».

The First Indigenous State​
As the influx of people coming for the gold rush continued, pueblos were established in the Federally Administered Territories, or Territorios Administrados Federalmente (TAF), when settlements of 100 or greater voting residents elected a town council or ayuntamiento and petitioned the TAF governor for a charter. It was expected that as pueblos were established, the settlement patterns would guide the creation of new states and the governor would advise the federal government on this.

As U.S. settlement of its western territories proceeded after the establishment of Nibraska and Kansez territories in 1854 and conflict between indigenous peoples and European settlers became more common, Shoshone and related tribes started to filter across the border to join their brethren in northern and northeastern Alta California where there were more plentiful resources not plundered by settlers. After the the start of what the Americans called the “Snake War” in 1863, conflicts also became more common between the non-Mormom settlers of Deseret, who had many ties, both familial and economic, to the settlers across the border, and the local members of the Shoshone and Paiute tribes in the areas around the remote state.

Wirasuap, a Shoshone chief from what would become Idaho Territory, and his band had fled their camping grounds along the Bear River in Idaho because of threats from the U.S. Army, and along the way heard of the pueblo system of Alta California from Mormon missionaries who had given them assistance and how it was open to all citizens and residents. Wirasuap initially planned to settle his people on the other side of the Río Oso, but they soon found out that not all settlers of that state were as sympathetic as the Mormons who had helped them. Wirasuap, also known as Espíritu de Oso or Bear Hunter in English, established an encampment past the Río Verde which he called Ogwaiden, a Shoshone word for the spring around which the encampment was made. Buildings were constructed, resembling a cross between settler shanties and native tents. Wirasuap then sent messengers to the Shoshone, Bannock and Paitue to invite them to Ogwaiden.

When the first of the other bands fleeing U.S. Army and settler violence against them started arriving in Ogwaiden a few months later, Wirasuap set up a council of chiefs to govern the village. He then organised a travelling party and headed to Sacramento in Nueva Helvetia where the Administración Territorial was located. Wirasuap obtained a pueblo charter for Ogwaiden from the governor with understandings that a permanent encampment must be maintained, that missionaries would not guaranteed safety, and that trib-appointed magistrates would be sent to Sacramento within a year for legal instruction as the Apache and Nabajoa peoples in the southeast had been doing for their pueblos.

By the time Wirasuap had returned to Ogwaiden in late September it had grown to multiple encampments with over 500 people, and by next summer it was over 1,000 with many satellite encampments down the stream to the Arroyo Amargo, which the Mormon missionaries called Bitter Creek. By the autumn of 1866 more than a dozen other pueblos had been chartered, including ones by Paiute Chiefs Pahninee and Wahveveh. Those had been the indirect cause of a diplomatic incident when it was found out that the U.S. Army had followed them more than 170 millas across the border before the fleeing Paiute bands had escaped by fording the Río Pantanoso, and would continue to be a thorn in side of Wirasuap and the elders for many years to come.

It was at this time that respected Chief Washakie, who had gone to Sacramento for the required legal instructions as well as Spanish literacy training for himself and several younger sons of band chiefs, realised that the Shoshone and Paiute peoples were in danger of starving themselves out of a home, as had happened to Pahninee’s people when they were imprisoned in Oregon. In a council with the elders and other chiefs, Washakie and Wirasuap said that they should ask the Mormon missionaries on how to become farmers. Pahninee and Wahveveh, who had been fighting the settlers for many years before coming south and were well known for their hatred of them, opposed this scheme and called it traitorous to their traditional ways. Some of the elders agreed with them, having lost loved ones of their own to settler depredation in the USA, but most agreed that they were far safer here in Alta California, even if it meant they had to adopt some settler ways to feed themselves and their children as the land could not support as many with the traditional ways as had congregated here.

As word spread in the USA, the Shohone and Paiutes continued to filter into northeastern Alta California with dozens of pueblos being chartered based on the precedent set by Wirasuap in 1863. Many of these northeastern pueblos eventually became known for their farms producing not only the wheat of the settlers and corn native brethren in the south and east, but also many plants favoured in Shoshone and Paiute cuisines, like sourberries and serviceberries. Others became known for their fox or rabbit farms, set up so as to not deplete the wild animals the way they had seen the settlers do. Ranching also became popular, including antelopes, bighorn sheep, and bison in preference over settler cattle and sheep. The eastern turkey also became popular, as did various native duck species.

On July 1st, 1872, Pio Pico, President of Alta California for his final time, signed into the law the act that created the state of Yuta, the Spanish name for the Shoshones and their allied tribes. Its extent was proclaimed as “everything east of the Río Verde to the borders with Mexico, Texas and the United States”.

It was not much known by the residents of Yuta at the time, but in some ways they were a pawn of the Alta California government. Many of the gold rush immigrants from the U.S.A. did not assimilate into Hispanic Californio culture as well as their Sonoran, Chilean, and Peruvian counterparts did, or even as well as the European and Chinese gold seekers and they pushed for closer economic ties with the USA. Governmental policies tended to favour British and French foreign economic ties, and the U.S. Army had occasionally, if usually unintentionally, crossed the 42nd parallel chasing indigenous bands seeking safety in Alta California who had then rebuffed demands for extradition of infamous war chiefs, such as Pahninee and Wahveveh. So when the opportunity arose to both thumb the nation’s collective nose at the U.S.A. and the recalcitrant minority within their own borders by creating an indigenous-administered state, the Alta Californian legislature jumped at the chance.

The First Indigenous state