September 17, 2015

What if Britain had won?

Here's a subject historians and sci-fi authors have written about:

What if Britain had won the Revolutionary War?

By James Giago DaviesFor the first half of the 19th Century Britain was a brutal power, but by the start of the 20th Century, slavery had been outlawed, the monarchy lost actual power to Parliament, and became just a figurehead, and social reform resulted in better education, better working conditions, for the White population in Britain.

Likely these reforms would have taken place in America.
The outcome for Indians:The big question becomes, by the 1870’s, would the British Army have treated the Lakota better than the U.S. Army did?

Given how they were acting in South Africa and India at the time, the answer is probably no. The reserve system in Canada gives a fair indication of how reserves would have been set up in British controlled America. It’s not a great improvement.
The present-day situation:There would be a much more robust infrastructure, and modernized electrical grid, better public transportation, high speed rail crisscrossing the nation, making for far less dependence on fossil fuels. Health care would be free. Education would be free.

Money would not dominate politics to the degree it does now, corrupting Congress, subverting democracy. The Lakota would have received fair restitution for the Black Hills, and the badly implemented BIA programs, would run much more efficiently because many of these programs would be a right of every citizen.
Comment:  For more on alternate histories, see Reivew of Aquila in the New World and Native Stereotypes in Life of Brian.

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