Elliot Schultz
| Elliot Merle Schultz Elias Myrlæn Sooltarias | ||||||||
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Contents
Biographical Information
The eighth Central Director of Schultaria Prime, Elliot Schultz is the tenth member of the Schultz family to hold a national office and the third to hold a position as head of state. His personal policies, considered as some of the most aggressive and greatest promotions of science and industry in the Nation's history, have garnered him the nickname "The Teknate" by the National Assembly and the Schultarian Press. The longest serving head of state in Schultaria Prime's history, Elliot Schultz has formed one of the most diplomatically and economically progressive national administrations in recent Schultarian memory.
Personal History
Brief Family Tree
Background
In the year 5 bSDC Elliot Schultz's grandfather Merle Schultz, the first Central Director of Schultaria Prime, became the focal point of a popular but contreversial revolution to which the Schultz family was seen as its instrumental actors. Seldom few members of the immediate family have shied away from the stage of national politics following the popular success of this action and subsequent acclaim of his leadership; a fact which has come to have serious repercussions on Elliot's private life and childhood decades later. The son of Michael Merle Schultz, the sixth Central Director of Schultaria Prime, and Joan Kathleen Steiner, a landmark professor in comparative education, Elliot has lived in the mystique of the Schultz family lineage for the entirety of his life.
Family Life
Despite being born on the fifty-fifth anniversary of Schultaria's independence, Elliot's own interests appeared to be the first major divergence from politics within the Schultz family in nearly three generations. A child of fairly permissive but ambitious parents, Elliot's interests focused on the discipline of history and scholarship in the Haarvekord school of logic which were readily accepted by his family as admirable intellectual pursuits. Despite his father's highly publicized administration, Elliot was able to enjoy a relatively private life during his elementary through high school years. His teachers considered him a well-read and likable student, earning consistently high marks in most of his studies and earning the respect of his peers through his low key, self-humbling, mannerisms.
Passing into the Political Background
At the age of 18, while the majority of the nation was mourning the loss of his grandfather, Elliot enrolled at the University of Schultaria Prime- Schultaria Prime rather than exploring political office at the insistence of his extended family. When quoted as to how he felt about the passing of his grandfather, and his plans to follow the family tradition of national office, Elliot replied, "[Merle Schultz] followed what he enjoyed doing: helping other people... when people ask me whether or not I will follow in his example I can not tell them with any honesty what I could do for them that my grandfather, father, or this nation can not already do admirably without my 'assistance'."
When his father retired from the directorship to pursue a career as a public advocate in the Schultarian Federal Court System two years later, Elliot's public unwillingness to follow his father and grandfather on a rise to national politics had become an accepted fact of his family. Following the election of Harlen Damien as Central Director in SDC 75, the media attention that had showered him with so much publicity quietly shifted focus to the Damien administration and other members of his family serving in the National Assembly.
Ignoring the opportunities of politics during his twenties, he pursued his passion of becoming a professor of historical studies. By the age of 26, Elliot had earned his PhD in Modern British Political History and began to teach seminars in a full time capacity by age 28. At the age of 32 he became the youngest professor to head any academic college, establishing tenure at the University of Schultaria Prime - Schultaria Prime. Many of his older colleagues in the department considered the jovial and open-minded Schultz to be the next great practitioner of the Schultarian School of historical investigation. At the same time, it appeared that Elliot's social life was beginning to settle down and take shape. After nearly six years of long and wishful courtship, the tenured professor finally married his first college love and mathematics professor Renee Mai in a subdued ceremony on March 30, 87 SDC attended by some ninety-five members of the National Assembly and all three members of the Schultarian Central Directorate.
Political Developments
A Nation Reels
While Elliot made a niche for himself in the University of Schultaria Prime System, the nation at large was facing numerous fiscal and trade crises following the Damenite business reforms of SDC 83. The legislation, originally intended to serve as a promoter of private small business while retracting Draconian and arbitrary personnel caps imposed by the State, had the undue effect of paralyzing Schultaria Prime's state-run industries as skilled workers left for private enterprise by the thousands. Critical sectors such as food relief, medical care, transport shipping, and basic utilities were severely depleted as competent, qualified, administrators relieved themselves from their jobs to compete in the private sector. As a result the cost of Schultarian welfare programs skyrocketed while the nation scrambled to train qualified personnel and bolster its incentive packages to promote quality and efficiency without sacrificing high volume service. An unfortunate side effect of this realignment in the economy was the added strain on the state to maintain its competitiveness, and the costs to compensate for the flux of jobs produced record-setting deficits for the nation.
Stepping onto the National Stage
In the face of disastrous financial predictions, the Schultz family lineage could not be ignored so easily by the reluctant Professor as national news media called for the "Sons of Schultz" to restore the nation's economic health. By December 88 SDC, at the persistent insistence of his family and several friends prominent in the University System, Elliot announced his intentions to run for one of the three positions in the Directorate of Schultaria Prime. Although personally content not to run for national office, Elliot had become worried about the state of decline in the nation's internal welfare policies and the stress that a government in economic default would have on internal social order. During his abbreviated, but aggressive, campaign Elliot lauded Central Director Damien for his willingness to start a "new revolution of individual liberalism", and noted the last ten years under Central Director Harlen Damien had produced exceptional growth for Schultaria Prime's economy. In all of Elliot's campaign materials, nearly ninety percent of them noted Damien as a respected leader in business and an economic hero, but at the expense of nearly bankrupting the nation's budget which would have devastating results should he continue in office.
In a heated election race, Elliot Schultz made a break with family tradition and severed all formal political ties to the Democracy in Action League (DiAL Party), and ran on a platform championing the government as a "responsible actor" for welfare and an "agent of liberalizing progressivism" for small private businesses. When the election of 89 SDC was finished, Elliot had earned the position of Central Director by the biggest landslide since his grandfather, Merle Schultz, acquired the office. With nearly 80% of the electorate Elliot Schultz had established a solid mandate to the position of Central Director, and his plans for the office would be the most ambitious for the nation to date.
First Term
His early policies met with unusually welcomed general acceptance from a political nation normally accustomed to the status quo. Seeking to build consensus amongst both the mandate and the vocal minority still supportive of the now Director Damien (i.e. Damienites), Schultz offered numerous compromise plans seeking to rebuild the indebted Schultarian treasury while increasing industrial development and heighten the nation's technical sophistication. Relying on his Doctorate in history, a well attuned set of Directorate bureaucratic administrators, and extensive knowledge of Schultarian economic precedents, Elliot set forth on what was been lauded by his supporters as "The Great Advancement" designed to rehabilitate the state's lagging budget while promoting liberal democracy on the international stage.
One of his first, and perhaps most significant, acts from "The Great Advancement" initiative passed the Schultarian National Assembly just thirty days into his first year in office. Known as the "Open Arms - Open Economies" Act, this legislation paved the way for Schultaria Prime to actively seek amiable international relations for the purposes of economic and cultural exchange. The body of this legislation allowed for The State Industries of Schultaria Prime - Designwerks to serve alongside the National Assembly, Central Directorate, and the respective foreign services of both branches as an direct actor of Schultarian diplomacy through favorable trade agreements to politically similar, economically progressive, states.
