The Greatest Man in the World: An American History

Have you ever thought about an American monarchy? Well, here's a take on the idea. I've tried to be more plausible than some other ideas (the title of Empire will be a title *America will have, but not immediately, as that's insane) and this will be fairly epistolary, written mostly in-universe. So, without further ado, here's:


The Greatest Man in the World: An American History

And what shall he do after his revolution is over?

They say he will return to his farm.

If he does that, he will be the greatest man in the world.


-King George III of Great Britain, and painter Benjamin West

CHAPTER ONE: WE THE PEOPLE


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SPQCFA: Senatus Populusque Civitatum Foederatarum Americae​

From The Populist’s [1] History of the American Empire, 1781-1976, Howard Zinn, New Tiber Press

The rise of the American empire, or, at least, the more autarchic American state, was inevitable. Following the War of Independence, the provisional Articles of Confederation, the only real bonds which held the country together, were weak and ineffectual. While devised to protects states’ rights, in actuality, they only weakened these self-same states. They provided no real structure for American governance….

The failings of the Articles, which seem so obvious to us today, were most clearly shown in Shays’ Rebellion. Daniel Shays, a veteran of the War of Independence, was a Massachusetts farmer angered by the economic policies of his home state. He and a group of other farmers petitioned the state assembly for fiscal amnesty, and they were denied. This rising flood of anger ultimately led to the outbreak of the Rebellion. Shays and his men, some 1500 in all, began to march on the Springfield armory. There was no question that the rebels could be defeated, but the thing to consider was who…

Ultimately, Secretary of War Henry Knox chose James Bowdoin, a sort of typical oberklasser [2], who, while wealthy enough to defeat the rebels with privately-funded militiae, was more compelled to personally defeating them, a move which proved disastrous. His rather ineffectual leadership enabled Shays to take the armory; Bowdoin was wounded in a subsequent fight to retake it….

Washington, not yet Governor-General, nor emperor, was called upon to seize the armory once more from the rebels. He complied, sighing; in his martial company, he brought with him Alexander Hamilton, his old lieutenant from the War of Independence.


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Alexander Hamilton, Founder of this Empire, Premier (1788-1800) and Quaestor

From The Memoirs of Alexander Hamilton, First Premier of this Empire and its States

(Note: This book, written by Premier Alexander Hamilton (1755-1840), is one of the few primary sources historians have when telling the story of the rise of the American Empire. Hamilton, while a political genius, was not exactly an impartial writer, and as such, his word should not be taken verbatim.)

The General [George Washington] and I had often feuded personally regarding the position of the central power in what the American system might become. The weak and fragile Articles of Federation had nothing of this sort; it is towards this, that, in truth, I must aver that this lack of an authority was precisely what caused the thing’s downfall. The General and I first agreed about this on campaign. To be precise, it was during Shays’ Rebellion. That fool Bowdoin had not the faintest idea how to lead an army, and this was his undoing, at least for us, when Shays came and conquered. I recall my exact words to the General on this front at the time. I said to him, "Have you still your faith in the Confederation?" and he, in quite the state of vexation, replied "I do not know. Truly, Hamilton, I do not. The men are weak if their general is feeble; strengthen the leader, and you shall, I suppose, strengthen the men." I do not wish to self-aggrandize, but I think this conversation to perhaps be one of those of the most importance in world history.

From A History of Empire in the New World, Thomas Baker, New Rangoon Press

Following the defeat of Shays' men at the Battle of Springfield, the nation agreed with George Washington and Alexander Hamilton. A stronger government that could defend both federal interests and those of the individual states was clearly necessary. Thus, the Constitutional Convention of 1787 began, but it quickly disintegrated into bickering and barbarism. As James Madison's notes tell us, a number of hastily constructed "plans" were proposed, such as the Virginia Plan, which proposed a bicameral legislature based proportionally on a state's population, with the executive solely beholden to the legislature, the New Jersey Plan, which served as the Virginia Plan's mirror image; each state had an equal number of legislators, and there was to be a panel for the executive. The only others recorded were Pinckney's Plan, proposed by South Carolina governor Charles Pinckney, which described a strange federation of states, and Hamilton's Plan, the Executive Plan, or the New York Plan, as it was called at the time...[3]

The Executive Plan was thus: there would be a bicameral legislature, as the other delegates had proposed. Its lower house would be elected by the people, and serve terms of three years, and its upper house would be elected by chosen popular representatives; the legislators of the upper house would serve for life. A moderator would be elected from these two bodies, called the Governor. He would have an ultimate veto over the actions of the legislature.

While the Executive Plan was lauded for its well-conceivedness, it was not ultimately adopted, as it tended too much towards monarchy. However, with the failure of any and all compromises to resolve the issue of a constitution (slavery was particularly contentious) the Convention was recessed on July 23rd. [4] Seeing this inability to proceed, Hamilton and Washington resolved to act...

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Footnotes:
1. Populism, or Weberism, is the dominant "leftist" philosophy in the world. Created by Max Weber, it is a sort of cross between socialist and libertarian ideals.
2. Oberklasser is German, meaning "upper class," used in populist terms to describe the bourgeois, who "prevent the government from fulfilling its limited amount of good work; instead, they swell it up to a gross leviathan." This is a direct quote from Die Menschen, Weber's manifesto, which details the ideals of populism.
3. All of these are OTL.
4. IOTL, this was the date that the ultimate Constitution was finalized.
 
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Why thank you sir. I love the idea of an American monarchy, but they're all so ASB. My one problem is this: how do I make a signature link that is text? I can't figure it out. Do you know?
 
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