Difference between revisions of "The Lowland Clans"

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The Allied States of the Lowland Clans
The Alliance of the Nine States

Flag of the Alliance of the Nine States
Motto (English): One Nation, Under God, Loyal to the Flag, and All For Which It Stands
Anthem: Glory of the Stars On High
Political Map
Capital	Graham City (310,891,145)
Five largest cities	Graham City, London, Edinbrough, Glasgow, Dublin
Spoken languages  - Official  - Unofficial	English French, Greek, Portugese, Croatian, Serbian, Albanian, Slovenian,
Government  - President-Elect  - Governing political party	· Federal Presidential Republic · Capitalist constitutional republic John Patrick Kingsley Alliance Party
Establishment  - as original Alliance  - as Empire of Isles  - as Second Alliance	AD 1652 AD 1734 AD 1842
Area  - Total  - % water	3,898,290 km² 22.8%
Population  - Total (2085)	7,540,000,000 (AO: 2nd)
GDP (FY2085/86)   - Total (USD)   - GDP/capita (USD)	$247,752,790,215,240.19 $32,858.46 (AO: 14th)
National animal English name	Ovis aries Wild Ram
National flower English name	Thistle Centaurea Cyanus Blue Star Thistle
National tree English name	Quercus robur Pedunculate Oak or English Oak
Currency	1 Clan Dollar (Đ) = 100 (cents)
Time Zone	AOTC +0100
National charter of rights	The Rights and Freedoms Amendments
International abbreviations  - sport  - government	TLC ASN, TLC
Naval craft classification   - Military   - Civilian	ASS ACS
Internet TLD	.tlc, .ans
Calling code	+19

The Allied States of the Lowland Clans, or the Alliance of the Nine States, the official name, is a conservative federal republic and technologically advanced nation in the region of Atlantian Oceania. It is composed of a large stretch of land that borders the Crystil Channel and Lake Bekk. The Alliance of the Nine States operates as a centralized federation of individual nation-states. Currently, there are 9 member states in the Alliance. Four of them have their roots in the British Isles, which were abandoned when the Allied States fled to SGN. They are the Kingdom of England, the Scottish Republic, The Free Republic of Ireland, and the Dominion of Wales. The fifth member state is the Confederation of Canada, formed with a pact between the native Five Nations alliance and the Allied settlers. The Mediterranean Coalition is a nationstate formed by the former Yugoslavian republics and Albania, taken during the Meditterranean Conflicts with Abu Dhabi Khristatata. The second republic to be formed from the Mediterranean Conflicts was the United Mediterranean Alliance, composed of Greece and the island of Cyprus. The third state to come out of the Mediterranean Conflicts is the Free Republic of Portugal. The only State to be included since the move to Atlantian Oceania is the Legal Republic.

The Political system in the Alliance is a strange kind of centralized Federation, similar to the real life United States of America, though the relation between the national federal government and the state governments is very different. The State governments are given jurisdiction over a number of areas, ranging from there own police forces, health care systems, educational systems, and many other things. The Federal government though, maintains a significant level of authority over the States, closer to what is praticed in the United States of America. The lines of authority are clearly laid out in the Federal-State Relations Act, though the Constitution of Alliance leaves things open ended, and says very little in the manner of separation of specific responsibilities between the levels of government. There are currently 7 active political parties, though most of the parties tend towards the right wing of the political scale.

Politics play an important role in life, and while the government is officially secular, the Alliance has a very religious society and thus religion plays a great importance in the source of much of governmental legislation. The Alliance is very conservative in both economy and social structure. The tax system in the Allied States is very interesting, as it uses what is called a SpendTax, or a national sales tax. The social structure is rather conservative, but equal. Affirmative action has been ruled against by the Supreme Court of Alliance several times, abortion is illegal as well as homosexual marriage, and racism is limited to subjective opinion, and very little of it exists with in the institutions of the Federal government. Certain state governments however, especially the newer member states, tend to have a slight problem with it. Sports are incredibly popular in the Alliance, and one cannot go far without running into some kind of sports facility, be it football of both kinds, baseball, swimming, track, basketball, ice hockey, lacrosse, or anything else.

Population

The last census in 2085 pegged the population at approximately 7,540,000,000 people. Data from the census has been collected and stored here for imformational purposes. In this number, about 780 million expatriates and non-naturalized citizens are residences. This figure has shot up in recent years, as Alliance companies have been investing in and bringing in foreign talent with the Alliance. More statistics are posted in the ethnicity section about immigrants and emigrants living in foreign countries.

Gender

The Alliance currently has a ration of 1.035 women to every man. The current swing is expected to reverse in the next decade or two, but no one is quite sure when that will happen.

Same-sex marriage is not recognized by government or most religions within the Allied States, despite persistent lobbying of the Congress by LGBT groups and the United Nations, though UN involvement has created a sense of illegitimacy about the movement. Also, the general weakness of the movement is highlighted by the fact that only two parties support only the highlighting off the issue in the Congress, the Green Party and the Libertarians. Those two parties tend to be the weakest in the political system.

Ethnicity

The Alliance with the recent influx of Mediterranean states has created a significantly diverse ethinc population. The largest ethnic group in the Alliance are considered Britanno-Clannic, which include residents of the four founding states and the Confederation of Canada. They represent 46.4% of the population. The next smallest group are the Greco-Clannic residents of the UMA, whom clock in at 21.8% of the population. Then come the ethnic Serbo-Clannic peoples, referring to the mostly Christian Serbo-Croatian people group in the Mediterranean Coalition, at 17.6% of the population. About 9% of the population are Portuguese, and the remaining 5.2% are a mix of Turko-Clannic and Albano-Clannic Muslim population in Northern Cyprus and the Mediterranean Coalition.

In terms of foreign expatriates, a large amount of them originate from somewhere around Atlantian Oceania. The main immigrant nations are Vilita and Turori, Pacitalia, Khazaron, though there are relatively quite a few immigrant communities around the Alliance. There also is a fairly large Dutch contingent among the four founding nation-states of the Alliance. After the coalition with the Dutch during the Political Conflicts and the Great Exodus from the Netherlands after the slaughter in Amsterdam by French, Spanish, and Catholic German forces, they remain a fairly large minority that most foreigners know nothing about. The hard numbers for expatriates is listed below.

• Vilita: 163.7 Million
• Turori: 138.1 Million
• Bedistan: 117.5 Million
• Pacitalia: 90.6 Million
• Khazaron: 78.3 Million
• Bazalonia: 57.9 Million
• Casari: 46.8 Million

Religion

The Alliance of the Nine States is a very religious nation, with only 5% of the population marking themselves as atheist, and another 7% who marked themselves agnostic. An interesting note in these statistics, is that the majority of atheists are located in the Legal Republic, which have drastically increased the nation's percentage of atheists. Generally a very peaceful place in terms of religion, the influx of the Catholic Portugese and Orthodox Greeks have created some religious tension, but it has been reduced to simmering feelings. The statistics collected by the Census Bureau are below:

• Baptists: 21.5%
• Orthodox: 17.1%
• Anglicans: 15.3%
• Presbyterians: 9.8%
• Catholicism: 9.1%
• Agnoticism: 6.4%
• Atheism: 4.7%
• Muslim: 4.3%
• Judaism: 3.9%
• Fam'dai: 1.6%
• Others: 6.3%

Rural-Urban Distribution

The Alliance is a heavily urbanized nations with 79.4% of the population living in an urban area. an urban area is defined as having a population density of 136 people per square kilometer. The make up of each individual city tends to differ within each member-state, with British cities tending to have many flats and tall skyscrapers that give way to older sections of the cities and are generally separated into boroughs, while Canadian and the Mediterranean cities tend to have more near-suburban areas. The cities of the Legal Republic are metropolises in every sense of the word, with huge modern skyscrapers and carefully planned transportation systems that avoid many hassles seen in the older British cities not built originally for automobile transportation.

Economy

The Allied States of the Lowland Clans has always had an incredibly strong economy. Through a combination of tarrifs, subsidies and a strong manufacturing base the Allied States have some of the strongest economies in Atlantian Oceania. The Allied States has a massive auto-manufacturing industry, whose cars dominate the landscape thanks to huge tarriffs and the high quality of the cars. The industry also doubles as a military manufacturing sector, that's the required equipment being dual-use, meaning that the Allied States can put out huge numbers of tanks, ships and airplanes at a moments notice.

Key Companies

Auto-Manufacturing

• McIntyre Motors
• Lowland Manufacturing
• Sieland Motor-Manufacturer

Fast-Food Reetaurants

• Fast Joe's
• Pappy's Burgers
• Drive-Thru Food
• Over The Isle Pizza

Convience Stores

• In-and-Out
• 24/7

Coffee Shops

• Starbucks

Arms Manufacturing

• Guardian Manufacturing
• Keller Arms Manufacturing

Airlines

• Allied Sates Air
• Isle Airways
• Mediterranean Airlines (local carrier)
• North by Northwest (local carrier)

Department Stores

• Shopping Mart
• Matthew's Grocer's
• Isle 9

Book Stores

• McNally-Robinsons
• Passages

Brief Historical Overview

The Allied States of the Lowland Clans has its origins within the wars that wracked the British Isles in 1642. With the Civil War underway, the Cavaliers managed to defeated the Roundheads in several key battles, seizing control of London and burning down Parliament. The choas of the crown allowed oppressed Irishmen to overthrow the Protestant English ruling over Ireland, and with the Cavaliers and Roundheads more concerned with fighting the Civil War that had become bogged down during the harsh winter and plague that wrecked the fighting forces of both sides, the Irish were able to drive out the unfriendly Englishmen. In Scotland, the Highland clans were itching to strike back at the more cosmopolitan Lowland Clans, who controlled much of the power in Scotland at the time, rose up and with the said goals of reverting back to true Scottish was and to remove un purified forces from Scottish culture.

The Lowlands with their advanced weaponry and higher technology, but significantly small numbers, were unable to beat back the original advanced of the Highlanders, but evetually used those to win control over all of Scotland. Both the Scots and Irish formed an alliance of convienance against the advancing Cavaliers and to support the Roundheads, both never wanting to return to British domination again. With the Welsh uprising, the Irish sent troops to support them and the Roundheads operating in England. With the overwhelming force arrayed against an increasingly unpopular government led to the Cavaliers to come to the table. The commander of the anti-Cavalier forces, Lord-General Graham, was a far-seeing Renaissance man, interested in philosophy and government who determined that there needed to be a long term solution to government on the British Isles. After a long, brutal constitutional convention in Dundee, each nation on the British Isles signed the Constitution of Alliance, creating a new federal nation.

Current International Relations

The Civics of the Allied States

The Allied States is a Federal Presidential Republic, with a bicameral legislature, seperate executive and judicial branch. The government is seperated on a state and national level. The state level government is independant of the National Federal Government. Each member state has its own system of government. England has a constitutional monarchy with a parliament, while Ireland and Protugal have presidential systems. The UMA and MC both have semi-parliamentary systems, while the Legal Republic has an intricate federal semi-presidential system. State governments usually have much more ground level control, while the federal government irons out irreconcilible differences between state laws.

The National Federal Government

The national level of the federal government is charged with administering government policy on a firmly national level. While policy lines continue to blur between the states and the national government, there has yet to be a serious dispute in between the two branches of government over the issue of jurisdiciton. Separated into the three branches, legislative, executive, and judicial, the word of the national government in the supreme law of the land.

Legislative Branch

The legislative branch, refered to collectively as the Congress of the Alliance, is a bicameral branch in which the populist Chamber of Representatives and party-centered State Senate have seperate powers.

Chamber of Representatives

The Chamber of Representatives was designed to primarily represent the will of the people. The Representatives elected are elected for their personal beliefs, values and performance rather than their party of affiliation. The Chamber has a total of 5000 seats and each seat represents a riding of about 1.29 million people. The Chamber is organized into specialized committees, which generally have the power to pass legislation with the approval of the whole. Parties have little control over their Representatives, but party leaders have a small number of 'party line' votes in which all Reps affiliated with their party must vote with the leader. Committees may refer important bills to the whole. Reps are elected for three year terms, with no term limits.

State Senate

The State Senate is designed to be a chamber of sober second thought, where the moderating forces of partisan compromise tend to counter the more populist trends in the Chamber of Reps. The Senate consists of 910 seats, with each member state receiving 100 seats, while the remaining ten are elected from the Federal Municipality of Graham City. State Senators are elected by closed primaries from within the political parties, with each political party being given an certain amount of seats to fill based on percentage of vote received from an intrastate election. With this method of election, members are much more faithful to party principles than representatives, and because of the usual lack of majority, partisan compromise helps water down bills. This is generally the more efficient body. State Senators are elected to seven year terms with no term limits.

Executive Branch

The executive branch of the national government is charged with admistering policy legislated by the Congress of the Alliance. The head of state and government is the President-Elect, or more simply as President or PE. The official residence and headquarters of the executive branch is 16 Canford Street in east central Graham City. The President is aided by his cabinet, who administer the various departments. The cabinet has quite a lot of power to administer their respective departments, but receive their orders from the President. The President-Elect is the guiding force of the cabinet, and usually heavily influences the running of each department. Below is a list of current departments and some of the important sub-departments and their responsibilities.

Cabinet Positions

• President-Elect: John Patrick Kingsley
• Secretary of State (SecState): James C. Keller
• Secretary of Defense (SecDef): Terrance K. MacLeod
• Secretary of Justice (SecJus): Aidan Oppel
  • National Bureau of Investigation - The police force of the national government, brought into a situation only when the crime involved takes place in or involves more than one member state.
  • Office of Accounting Oversight - The so-called white collar crime branch of the Department of Justice, it deals with economic crimes such as bad bookkeeping, fraud, and other monetary crimes.
• Secretary of the Reserve (SecRes): Jason Yelith (While a cabinet level posting, the Department of the reserve sets monetary policy of the Alliance. In order to provide stability to that policy, the SecRes, is appointed to a 15 year term and does not fall under Presidential authority, but is required to present regular reports and inform the President of any changes that may affect fiscal policy.
• Secretary of the Treasury (SecTres): Paulo Desmundel (The SecTres administrates the fiscal policy of the national government, and is responsible for the national budget)
  • Budget Prepartory Office - Responsible for preparing the annual national budget
  • Department of Budget Oversight - Responsible for assuring that national budget money is spent the way it is proportioned.
• Secretary of Education (SecEd): Jamie Helling
• Secretary of Infrastructure (SecInf): Graham Kelting
• Secretary of Research and Technology (SecRet): David Mackingley
• Secretary of Homeland Security (SecHes): George Macintyre
  • Allied States Intelligence Service - ASIS is the human intelligence gathering operation within the the DepHes. ASIS bureaus (activities within given nation, such as the Bureau of Bedistan) must be opened by the President-Elect, and he is given free purview to all information gathered
  • Alliance Security Institute - Informally known as the Institute, the ASI is in charge of all electronic surveillance executed by the Allied States.
  • Black Arrows - The covert operation branch of Alliance Intelligence, all Black Arrow missions must be approved by the President-Elect, SecDef and SecHes

Judicial Branch

The Federal Judiciary is the national courts. Federal courts are mainly an appellate judiciary body, but have original jurisdiction over military courts or suits involving interstate issues or organizations. The highest court in the land is the Alliance Supreme Court. Justices are appointed for lifetime terms by the President-Elect with a hearing before the State Senate judiciary committee and the advise of that committee, but they have no say in the final appointment.

Political Parties

Green Party – Far-left, pro-environmental party, supports heavy government regulation especially on the issue of pollution control and other environmental issues, and in order to facilitate this process the ability to nationalize industries at will. Very small party, support concentrated in urban areas and extreme rural areas.

The Green Party has be struggling of late to find a reason to exist, and many of the party's conservative members have deserted to the Confederation party. Its support has been dwindling as the increasing skepticism towards the party's main issues. Rebellion has been growing in the ranks and an increasing amount of hardline supporters are willing to open negotiations with the Confederation Party for a merger to ensure Green issues are brought to the table

Confederation Party – Left leaning, supports increase in direct democracy, increased regulation and benefits from the economy go directly through the government to the people, they also support a more isolationist stance, closing the borders and being reducing the number of immigrants. The second largest party in the Allied States, their support is concentrated in the ultra-urban areas of the original members of the Alliance, as well as the majority of the intelligentsia and students. On social issues they tow the center, which many talking heads say helps steal votes from potential Libertarian voters.

The Confederation Party supporters have been seething under the hood for the last decade, seeing their once mighty party take a hit in several key areas. After former party leader Hosea Kiriakos and his inner cadre misplayed several key issues during their last stint in power, the party has been trying to regroup its traditional support base and steal seats from both the Greens and Libertarians. With widespread accusations of corruption against the leadership of the Alliance Party, your supporters are now smelling blood and a chance to regain the President-Elect and the plurality in both the Chamber and State Senate.

Libertarian Coalition - A middle-of-the-pack centrist party, the Libertarians often hold the balance of power in the both houses of the legislature. Rarely is there a coalition without a libertarian presence. The libertarians support both economic and social freedom, and many pundits suspect that the reason the libertarians have failed to go over the hump into a major party is precisely because of relatively radical social beliefs.

Alliance Party – Right-leaning, supports increase in the powers of the state governments and wants private citizens to take responsibility for helping increase infrastructure and benefits, wants government to serve as a arbitrator between the public and the employers, very anti-union. The largest party in the Allied States, this party is especially popular among the newer states that have joined the Alliance. About half of the business sector supports the Alliance party, as well as most of the state governments.

The Alliance Party has been trading places with the Confederation party since the beginning of post-isolationist period, and are coming up upon the traditional changing of the guard period. Struck by a series of corruption scandals recently, the Alliance Party has begun to slip in the opinion polls. The party leadership has already undergone a purge, and the new leadership hopes to solidify the base and retain control of the legislative and executive.

National Unity Party – a middle-extreme right party, supports increase in national federal government power and separate government facilities for key services for use in emergencies. They also support the power of the government to take over private facilities on command, and more restrictions on things such as gun ownership, marriage licenses, information and privacy. A pseudo-fascist party, they are very popular for their tough stance on justice and defense policies, but because of their unitary government and economic policies, are kept from achieving real power as part of the government.

Unionist Block – Essentially a fascist party, they support a strong unitary national government, an incredibly powerful military, an active international participation by the means of ‘peacekeeping’ forces and lengthening of term lengths. While they won’t come straight out and indicate their desire to impose an authoritarian strain of government, it is considered common knowledge. A breakaway faction of the National Unity Party.

Popular Pragmatics – A purely pragmatic (obviously) party, they just want what works. This may mean supporting government facilities in some places, while in others total non-intervention on the part of the government. Their support has stayed pretty much level throughout the century, but don't run any President-elect candidates. They are usually not part of an executive cabinet because of their fluctuating opinions, but are highly respected by most other parties and voters because of their principles.

The Armed Forces of the Allied States: AFAS (A-fus)

Allied States Army

Main article(s): Allied States Army

The Allied States Army, abbreviated the ASA, was once one of the most powerful branches of the military, but recently thanks to the advances in space-faring technology and the preference to deal with the more elite TIS Marines as well and the EASOP employed by the Orbital Command, the Army has seen it's prestige decline of late. Still the primary ground fighting branch, many legislators are wishing to see that the army be folded into the Orbital Command, or abolished all together and rely on an increased TIS Marine branch to provide the main fighting force for the Allied States.

Allied States Navy

Main article(s): Allied States Navy

The Allied States Navy was established during the Glorious Time under the presidency of the Lord-General Graham. It's headquarters are located in the Pentagon, and the main naval base is located in the city of Gresham on the southern coast, about 175 miles up the coast from the Pedrianan border. Based there is about twenty-seven percent of the Allied States fleet, including one of the massive Graham-class Command Carriers. The navy is currently subdivided into twenty-two fleets, each with a number of ships ranging from thirty three to fourty one (including supply and support ships, actual comabt strenght approx. 15-17 ships/fleet). Ten fleets are currently stationed in Allied States territorial waters, while the remaining twelve patrol international waters in the Crystilakere and Nemyan Channels, as well as the Vilitan Cove and Salmantic Seas.

Allied States Air Force

Main article(s): Allied States Air Force

The Allied States Air Force was establish on January 23, 1914 as a response to growing interest in air power. It had since evolved into one of the most state-of-the-art modern warfare divisions. It's headquarters are in the Pentagon, the location of all the major headquarters for the ASAF. Its service academy is located in the small town of Howard, England. The current head of the Air Force is General Winston Germaine, having served in the airforce of over fifty years. The ASAF has been one of the most active branches of the military, serving in nearly every conflict and developing some of the most important advances in military technology such as the combat-integrate network, low-orbital atmosplanes, and the military space program.

Allied States Orbital Command

Main article(s): Allied States Orbital Command

The Allied States Orbital Command (AA-sock) is in command of the Allied States' space forces. Within this branch of the services, there are the Elite Advance Squad Orbital Paradroppers, or EASOPs. ASOC also commands the new christened Allied States orbital navy, currently in progress of exploring the space surrounding the Sol system. The ASOC also has recently begun construction on planetary headquarters and training facility.

Atlantian Oceania on NSwiki

Main articles: Atlantian Oceania, AO QuickInfo

Nation pages: 95X, Acarionne, Amarenthe, Atheistic Right, Az-cz, Bazalonia, Bettia, Bostopia, Chacor, Crystilakere, Delesa, Demot, Falcania, Fmjphoenix, Geisenfried, Hypocria, Iizaarland, Khazaron, Kura-Pelland, Lamoni, Lontorika, Manhattan Prime, Maraque, Milchama, Morgrugyn, Nedalia, New Montreal States, Nojika, Northern Bettia, Nova Britannicus, NSWC Signups, Oliverry, Pacitalia, Quakmybush, Sarzonia, Schiavonia, Spruitland, Starblaydia, Tempalhiyon, The Islands of Qutar, The Lowland Clans, Turori, Ubundi, Unified Capitalizt States, Vephrall, Vilita, Walsallia, Western Afghanistan, Wulaishen

Regional info: Atlantian Oceania Regional Defence Organisation, Atlantian Oceania Regional Free Trade Organisation, Atlantian Oceania UN Voting, Lake Bekk, Major airports in Atlantian Oceania

Sports-related: AO Bowl, AO Champions League, Atlantian Oceania Cup of Association Football (AOCAF)

For more information or to see non-listed pages, please see Category:Atlantian Oceania.