AHC : British Colonial Parliament

Right, so the challenge is pretty much the title. When Britain enters the colonial game, have it try and keep the (Edit: AMERICAN) colonies in some what organised. They can try and wrestle the colonies into line if required, but in essence have the various communities have a representative on a council/proto-Parliament that governs under the Crown. This means one code of law, at most one governor/appointee to represent the monarch.

Bonus Points if
1) It happens before 1700.
2) No army needs to come and stomp the colonies
3) The Parliament begins to accept local native communities as members with representatives
4) It doesn't consider itself something other than British
5) It doesn't rebel

Super Bonus Points that are completely unrelated to above
6) Slavery is never accepted as legal.
 
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ASB. Slavery has been a tradition in Western culture since the days of Greece. It is only incredibly recent that it has been seen as a bad thing.

Apart from laws that prevented the trade in slaves from the Normans and France making slavery in France illegal in 1315. Hence the super-bonus-points bit.

I suppose I should say that it is never legally practised.
 
Right, so the challenge is pretty much the title. When Britain enters the colonial game, have it try and keep the colonies in some what organised. They can try and wrestle the colonies into line if required, but in essence have the various communities have a representative on a council/proto-Parliament that governs under the Crown. This means one code of law, at most one governor/appointee to represent the monarch.

Bonus Points if
1) It happens before 1700.
2) No army needs to come and stomp the colonies
3) The Parliament begins to accept local native communities as members with representatives
4) It doesn't consider itself something other than British
5) It doesn't rebel

Super Bonus Points that are completely unrelated to above
6) Slavery is never accepted as legal.

The problem is that as long as Parliament's in charge, you're going to have issues with representation -- either the colonists won't get much/any, which will annoy them, or their MPs will end up swamping Britain proper's as demographics shift in favour of the colonies. The best solution would probably be to have the monarch retain more real power (probably in the fields of war-waging and foreign policy, which would also most likely be the main competences of any central imperial government); the colonial legislatures could then maintain ambassadors in the UK to make the King aware of any issues in the colonies that he needs to fix, make sure colonial interests are represented, etc. Maybe also have each colony liable to maintain a certain number of regiments and ships, based on their wealth and population, or else make them pay a sum (perhaps a certain percentage of their GDP) to a common imperial defence fund. Avoid imposing direct taxation, as this would inevitably lead to demands for representation, in turn leading to the problems outlined in the first sentence.

ETA: As for your bonus points:

(1) Not sure if the colonies were large/important enough yet before 1700 for Britain to really care all that much about how they're administered. If they aren't, maybe push the start date of large-scale British colonisation forward a bit (IOTL I don't think it started in earnest until the Jacobean period) so that the colonies are bigger and more important.

(2) If the British government doesn't overplay its hand and try and interfere too much in the day-to-day running of the colonies, and if it doesn't try and screw the colonies over for the benefit of the motherland (earlier *Adam Smith, perhaps?), the colonies have no reason to rebel and good reason to stay (being able to rely on the rest of the empire to help defend them from potential enemies). Hence, no need to keep them down with military force.

(3) Unlikely to work, for reasons outlined above, although you might be able to set up some sort of imperial council to make it easier for colonies to represent their interests to the Crown.

(4) The US colonists considered themselves British until the Revolution (and indeed, part of their legal case for independence was that the Crown was abrogating their rights as Englishmen). So, this shouldn't be impossible.

(5) See point (2), above.

(6) Erm, let's see... there was some anti-slavery sentiment around (there had been Papal Bulls condemning the Spanish and Portuguese slave trades as early as the 15th century), but the institution was so profitable that there was a huge vested interest in keeping it going. Maybe have abolition become more popular earlier, when the slave trade wasn't yet as big a business as it would later become and you could potentially nip it in the bud?
 
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BlondieBC

Banned
I think you are asking for Federalism, so we should look at where it was consider. Several times the UK consider giving Ireland a parliament, and except for one issue it might have passed. Does England also get a parliament? Then England goes from "the elite that runs the British Empire" back to a more Norman type view of "my most important territory." Sort of the difference in our modern pope and the true "first among equals" position. And from the perspective of the elite, this is not a good thing. Of the millions of Brits, probably under 5% could vote or some other small %. I would hazard a guess that if 2/3 of the right 10,000 Brits supported your position, you could be PM. I forget which one, but one PM was elected in a district with under 10 votes (3 comes to mind). And then we can get to the House of Lords. And the King has real power back then.

So against a backdrop of easy to justify electoral reform where we can give rich Anglos near London a wee bit more power. Or cement the relationship between Ireland and England, we get to the issue of colonial parliaments. I can't see the will to do it. It is really ASB, but then so is the cubs winning, a media star becoming President, and 19 men causing the USA to wage a generational war. So once we have the will, the details are easy.

  • We already saw local parliaments in the American colonies. Easy to expand.
  • The House of Lords is easy, since one men makes Lords. The King can start a slow program of naming Lords of the colonies. I guess like the old days, they can have duties, so you can have some rich Virginian required to field a battalion of men. Or some rich ship owner in Boston required to have ships ready to serve the King. Or you can appoint life time lords to things like retired colonial governors. Probably a pace of a 300 year catchup would be fine with the various colonies. Now there is the issue of the House of Lords being ok with this, and this may be impossible, but I kind of think a slow plan works. We are probably talking a Lord every 2-3 years being created. They are probably rich and married into the English elite before they went to the colonies. Maybe they won some big battle. American X takes a French port and wins a 2 season campaign, now is minor nobility. Things like an American Army fighting ITTL wars with France can easily create Lords.
  • Then you either form a English Parliament, and allow a few elected officials from the colonies to join the House. OR You form a new "House of the Empire" with new rules. Not hard, just don't see the desire. Kinds of reminds me of discussion of changes to the US Senate. Make sense, hard to see happening.



Note: When you know it will not pass, it is hard to tell soft support from real support. Clear out the issue, and another one might well pop up.
 
The problem is that as long as Parliament's in charge, you're going to have issues with representation -- either the colonists won't get much/any, which will annoy them, or their MPs will end up swamping Britain proper's as demographics shift in favour of the colonies. The best solution would probably be to have the monarch retain more real power (probably in the fields of war-waging and foreign policy, which would also most likely be the main competences of any central imperial government); the colonial legislatures could then maintain ambassadors in the UK to make the King aware of any issues in the colonies that he needs to fix, make sure colonial interests are represented, etc. Maybe also have each colony liable to maintain a certain number of regiments and ships, based on their wealth and population, or else make them pay a sum (perhaps a certain percentage of their GDP) to a common imperial defence fund. Avoid imposing direct taxation, as this would inevitably lead to demands for representation, in turn leading to the problems outlined in the first sentence.

Well, this is why I specified A Parliament. Not Westminster. If it is based in the colonies, their MPs and Westminsters MPs aren't in any way related (legally, I suppose there would be political relationships/alliances). The Crown is the common link, much as Scotland had its own Parliament, so would the Americas. Now, I imagine there might be objections to that, so there are a number of appointed reps (Westminster, Scotland and America each having one? *shrug*) on a Privy Council, or Imperial Council, that have to vote to go to war.

@BlondieBC - you pretty much have a working model, me gusta. The House of the Empire is pretty much what I was thinking of, a certain number of Imperial Seats are assigned to each Parliament (which gets increasingly American over time) roughly proportional to populations with probably a leaning towards the English, and boom.

I'd love to see that, and since we're looking at pre-union of the Parliaments, the English (and Welsh) have a Parliament - Westminster.
 

It's

Banned
Right, so the challenge is pretty much the title. When Britain enters the colonial game, have it try and keep the colonies in some what organised. They can try and wrestle the colonies into line if required, but in essence have the various communities have a representative on a council/proto-Parliament that governs under the Crown. This means one code of law, at most one governor/appointee to represent the monarch.

Bonus Points if
1) It happens before 1700.
2) No army needs to come and stomp the colonies
3) The Parliament begins to accept local native communities as members with representatives
4) It doesn't consider itself something other than British
5) It doesn't rebel

Super Bonus Points that are completely unrelated to above
6) Slavery is never accepted as legal.
Sooo...you're only talking about the American colonies?
 
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