Part 12: His terrible swift sword

Chapter 5: His terrible swift sword



On December 21, 1858, South Carolina seceded from the United States of America, citing transgressions by President Fremont against the South and fears that his government would abolish slavery.



President Fremont would not stand for this, and asked Congress to declare war on the Confederate States, as South Carolina had decided to call itself.



Shortly afterward we received an envoy from the US, asking that we honor the recently signed alliance and declare war on their rebellious brethren. We obliged.



After the declaration of war, South Carolina was able to convince its fellow southern states to join with them, and on December 30th Florida, Mississippi, Oklahoma, North Carolina and Louisiana joined the Confederacy.



We rush to declare mobilization. Texas is not going to sit this war out. But when the orders are given to get ready to ship out, we are told there are no men ready, and we will have to make do with what we have. Perhaps we should not have let General Houston be in charge of the mobilization process. (the game bugged on me and didn't give me mobilization troops for some reason)



In the next week the rest of the southern states join the Confederacy. Georgia is the last state to secede, on January 7 1859.



General Houston is ordered to cross the Red River and join American troops for operations in Oklahoma.



The Union was much more prepared for this war than the Confederacy was, but the Confederates are beginning to rally troops to the defense of Richmond, their capital.



The South does not have enough men to guard all their land though, and American troops, many veterans of the last war against Mexico, have are cutting through the interior of the CSA.



General Houston and his men have been ordered to capture the Oklahoman city of Beaver, following the capture of the rest of Oklahoma.



Research continues into economic matters, and the pollster return with the latest party voting trends. The Nationalists have a slight edge over the Radicals, but public opinion of the Nationalists is going to go hand-in-hand with opinion of Texan involvement in the war.



And the war is an unpopular one. In every city but El Paso and Corpus Christi there is discontent brewing about the war and the current government. They do not appreciate resources being strained for a war that we will make little difference in.



The Confederacy is beginning to collapse. The US is successfully splitting the South into peices, the southerners unable to raise a sizeable army in time.



The paper mill in Texas is completed, but overlooked for the time being.



General Houston captures Beaver, raises the Texan flag over the city, and marches to Louisiana. There he begins to seize the city of Alexandria.



With the Nationalists distracted by the war, their hero busy in Louisiana, and public discontent with the war growing, the Radicals win the fifth election of the Republic of Texas. The President was now Samuel Walker, former Texas Ranger, veteran of Honolulu, and inventor of the Walker Colt six-shooter. He was also insane, and more than a little creepy. He vowed to end Texas's involvement in frivolous wars and to raise the position of the minorities in Texas while doing away with the "unconstitutional progressive tax" as the Radicals put it. Though the Radical party was official neutral in regards to Mexico, Walker hates Mexico very much, and vowed to avoid any furhter trade negotians with the "menace from the south".



The Radicals spent the next month planning something big, and it came to fruition on September 1st. They passed a new, revised constitution, under the guise of protecting our interests in this war and all future ones.



The New Texas Constitution proposed many drastic changes in the structure of Texan government. The President was given near limitless power and could serve indefinitely. The Radicals dissallowed the existence of other political parties, and instituted a new "free" press that was technically independent of the government but was run entirely by party officials. The President was allowed to submit additions, and from that came the privatization of all the Republic's fire stations, the illegalization of Mexico, and the last clause of the new constitution, which made the official title of the President of the Republic "Texas Ranger".

After the Constitution was passed in Congress, Radical Party officials, honoring a provision in the new document, raised the the new flag of the Republic over the capitol in Austin.



Article 78 of the Radical Constitution declared that the Republic shall have a new flag, one with a longhorn and yellow star representing the natural resources of Texas and a rife and hammer representing "the old revolutionary army and our new revolutionary industry".



During the political upheaval in Texas, the US had been making great progress in the south. Louisiana, Florida, North Carolina and Virginia are all that remain of the Confederacy.



Americans have sighted Russian troops seizing Fort William and a few lounging on the shores of Lake Superior. The Russians will soon be reaching the more civilized part of Canada.



Alexandria is liberated from the Confederates, and our flag now flies over that city. General Houston, who has been away for all the political changes, is in for a surprise when he returns.



The Confederacy, having lost everything else, is making a last stand in North Carolina and Virginia, with battles going on in Manassas, Richmond, Haleigh and Wilmington. The Southern troops are outnumbered in the latter three, but look to be turning the tide at Manassas. The victory that comes there will be too little too late.



Under protest by many members of the Democrats and Nationalists, the Radicals amend the Radical Constitution to allow other political parties but gives the President the ability to ban parties or set a new ruling party.



Study of cultural ideas that draw the interest of the Radicals begins.



On January 30th, 1860, the American Civil War ends with the reannexation of the Confederacy. General Houston, master drunken negotiator that he is, works out an agreement with his friend US President Fremont, who wins the US Presidential election by a landslide a week from this day, for the Texan annexation of Beaver and Alexandria as reward for Texas's loyalty and support during the war.



The American government then sends a delegation to meet with our new government and is greatly pleased with the Republic. Nervous about what the US would think of the Radical Constitution, this settles much anxiety for Walker, Texas Ranger.