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There's two big advantages for the Rhineland going to a major power: If the point is to contain French expansionism, putting the Rhineland directly in the hands of a major power makes it a more effective tripwire. Invade an independent German duchy, and maybe the other major powers intervene...

I think the issue is that a wartime blockade must be effective to be legal. If you aren't actually closing the ports with your blockade, then neutral-flagged shipping has no obligation to stay away from the ports, and you have no right to stop, search, or seize any neutral shipping in and out of...

Kansas probably doesn't change much: same borders, but date of admission a year or two later. The statehood petition was already well underway when South Carolina seceded (submitted in 1859, approved by the House in 1860), and the supporters of the anti-slavery Wyandotte Constitution were firmly...

Most of the northern "free" states that abolished slavery in the antebellum period did something like this. The usual pattern was: Children born to slave parents after the effective date of the legislation would become "apprentices" or "indentured servants" instead of slaves and would be freed...

His two younger children would definitely not have been present. Charles would have been at Whitehall Palace, and Elizabeth would have at Coombe Abbey in Warwickshire. The plotters had planned to kidnap or kill Charles in the immediate aftermath of the bombing (they'd originally assumed he'd be...

My understanding is that Germany did put a fair amount of effort into adding motorized capability to their logistics corps in the years leading up to WW1. They could have done more with more resources, of course, but my read is that they were already past the point of diminishing returns. The...

The same thing occurred to me, but I think it could go either way: the Ottomans were a lot stronger than the Byzantines, but they'd be fighting a stronger and more united enemy as well. The Byzantines were fighting just the Lombards (and later the Sicilian Normans), but the Ottomans would be...

It's almost impossible that even a decision in Scott's favor would go that far. The Constitution explicitly provides for the return of runaway slaves, even if they escape to free states (Article IV, Section 2): Scott's claim was based on his owner living in a free state (Illinois) and later a...

This really hinges on Turkish support. If Turkey and Saudi Arabia both say no, I don't think a direct amphibious attack (or even an amphibious attack with airborne support) is viable. OTL, the coalition attacked with about 15 divisions and the main attack came in a direction the Iraqi army was...

There are three big problems with carving out a chunk of Germany to make *Israel: One of the big motivators for Zionism was the desire to set up somewhere reasonably safe from European antisemitism. If I were looking for somewhere reasonably safe from European antisemitism in or shortly after...

A stronger republican faction in the 1848 revolutions in German could have done it: OTL, the Frankfurt Constitution featured a hereditary constitutional monarchy (the "Gutter Crown" offered to and rejected by Frederick William IV of Prussia, effectively killing the proposed government), but...

There's a few things going on. First, for most of the period in question it's a mistake to think of HRE member estates as independent nations. While the HRE usually had a very weak central government, it was still a government of sorts. One of the perks of Imperial Immediacy was a claim on the...

The problem is that the only constitutionally guaranteed power of the "President of the Senate" is a tie-breaking vote. Anything else comes from the Senate rules, which are set by the Senate itself, so the VP's powers in the Senate are dependent on the consent of a majority of the Senate. Pretty...

That's what I remember, too. Specifically, Massie describes that after the March 18 attempt to force the straits, the Ottoman forts were almost out of ammunition, most of the telephone lines were cut by shellfire, and many of their artillery crews were demoralized and scattered. He concludes (or...

Not much, I think. The surrender came after the 6th Army had been cut off from resupply for months, forced to use almost all of its remaining ammunition, and had most of their defensive positions (and something like 90% of the city) overrun by a much larger and better-equipped Soviet force. The...

Yes, Sealion is not viable, even later in the war with the Soviets knocked out early. The US and UK have a huge head-start in naval strength, and they've got plenty of industry to match whatever fleet Germany could build with plenty left over for the strategic bombing campaign and for building...

Willkie was almost as interventionist as FDR. He'd run his primary campaign largely on interventionist themes, and after the election he publicly supported Lend-Lease and lobbied Congressional Republicans in favor of it. He did adopt some mildly isolationist positions late in the General...

Why Henry instead of Elizabeth? Albert, Duke of York (OTL George VI) would probably still have predeceased his older brother, but I'm pretty sure his daughters and their respective issue would still have been in the line of succession before Albert's younger brothers and their issue. It's the...

An interesting wrinkle here is that under the Treason Felony Act of 1848, any effort by Baldwin or anyone else to "compass, imagine, invent, devise, or intend to deprive or depose [the King], from the style, honour, or royal name of the imperial crown" would be a felony punishable by...

During a similar discussion a few years back, I came across a political science journal article attempting to answer this very question using W-NOMINATE scores. The short version is that the House (the lame duck House, as Anarch mentioned) would pick the President between the top three electoral...