WI: No King Leopold of Belgium

For the current TL I'm working, Leopold isn't given the throne of Belgium, it instead being taken by the Duke of Leuchtenburg. What I'm wondering is what butterflies this would create in Britain and how it would change the future Queen Victoria. Given that Leopold was her main father figure, would him remaining in Britain make her less isolated and more confident and domineering as a young queen ( i.e. in her struggle against John Conroy and her mother and in her response to Lord Melbourne)? Also, with Leopold continuing to sponge off of Britain, would there be more pressure for Victoria to not marry another Coburg?
 
For the current TL I'm working, Leopold isn't given the throne of Belgium, it instead being taken by the Duke of Leuchtenburg. What I'm wondering is what butterflies this would create in Britain and how it would change the future Queen Victoria. Given that Leopold was her main father figure, would him remaining in Britain make her less isolated and more confident and domineering as a young queen ( i.e. in her struggle against John Conroy and her mother and in her response to Lord Melbourne)? Also, with Leopold continuing to sponge off of Britain, would there be more pressure for Victoria to not marry another Coburg?

I don't think Albert can be butterflied away so easily. For one thing, Victoria's eventual spouse will cost the same no matter who he is, so there's little impetus for Melbourne, et al., to protest too strongly when Victoria falls in love with him; for another, Victoria chose Albert for the most part because she loved him, but also because Leopold approved of the match. Why would that approval matter less if Leopold lived closer?

If he remains in Britain, Leopold might end up formally named by Parliament as the potential Regent should William die before Victoria reaches 18. Without the fear of the Duchess of Kent and Sir John seizing power in a regency, perhaps William doesn't struggle so hard to survive to Victoria's majority?

Of course, all this pales in comparison to the possibility that by butterflying Leopold II out of existence you might just have done the same to HIV, thereby saving tens of millions of lives in Africa and worldwide.
 
Of course, all this pales in comparison to the possibility that by butterflying Leopold II out of existence you might just have done the same to HIV, thereby saving tens of millions of lives in Africa and worldwide.

I've heard about the supposed Leopold/HIV connection but it seems like a real stretch. The first documented human case of HIV was in 1959, 51 years after the end of the Congo Free State. Not that he wasn't a despicable ruler in other ways, of course.
 
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