The Grand Duchy of
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Overview

The Grand Duchy of Saxmere
The Grand Duchy of Saxmere


Motto: Saorsa, Creideamh agus Ceartas



Geological Location


Population

15 Million (as RP’d)

Capital

Umbra

Largest City

Cambera



Official Language

English

National Language

English, Cavenemi

Demonym

Saxmerean



Ethnic Groups

Cavenemi (70%)
Anglo-Lanerian (10%)
Balto-Nordic (8%)
Afro-Epheronian (4%)
Other (8%)



Religion

Roman Catholic Church (49%)
Church of Excalbia (12%)
Reformed Church of Saxmere (5%)
Other Christians (13%)
Judaism (4%)
Other (6%)
Nones (11%)



Government

Constitutional Monarchy

Grand Duke

James I Kennan

Prime Minister

Paul Mardan

Legislature

House of Parliament



Currency

Atlantic Ducat (∂)

GDP

59,468 (∂) (Per Capita) #



Calling Code

(+799)

Drives on the

Right

ISO Code

SAX

Internet LTD

.sx

The Grand Duchy of Saxmere gained independence from the Confederation of Sovereign States on November 1, 2018. For most of the last two centuries, Saxmere was one of several states of the republican Confederation.

Saxmere is an advanced nation with extensive protections for individual rights. While it generally follows a free enterprise economic model, it favours a greater degree of state intervention in the economy than did the Confederation central government. Also, while the citizens of Confederation have grown increasingly apathetic towards religion and extremely libertarian on matters of personal conduct, the citizens of Saxmere remain fairly devote and morally conservative.


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Geography


The Excalbian Isles rise from the Mid-Atlantic Ridge in the Northern Atlantic, northeast of Knootoss and north of Pantocratoria. The location of the islands and prevailing ocean currents ensure mild summers with long days and cold winters with long, dark nights.

The main island – known as Excalbia – is subcontinental in size. The Borodea Mountains split the island from north to south along the path of Mid-Atlantic Ridge. Highlands and foothills extend from the range to the west across much of the island. To the north of the highlands are plains and tundra; to the south are grasslands and forests. East of the mountain range, the terrain drops rapidly to foothills, pine forests, and rugged coastline.

Saxmere lies east of the Borodea Mountains along the northeastern coast. There are a few mountains along the western border with the Confederation of Sovereign States, forests in the east and a rugged coastline on the eastern shore.

History


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Early Settlers


Although there is evidence of Inuit settlements in the Excalbian Isles as early as the 8th century BCE those settlements appeared to be sporadic and sparsely settled until the 1st century BCE, when large permanent settlements appeared. As early as the late 5th century Camveni - a Celtic people from the British Isles - began migrating to the eastern coast of the Excalbian Isles. As they crossed the Borodea Mountains, they encountered the native Inuit and kept them west of the mountains. By the early 8th century, a number of other Celtic peoples had arrived in the Excalbian Isles and together they established a number of stable, agrarian-based duchies, located mostly in the Southwestern grasslands and along the rugged eastern coast. These "Lowlanders" were followed in the 9th century by Balto-Nordic settlers, who migrated into the highlands west of the mountains.

Celtic monks reintroduced Christianity among the Lowlanders on the Eastern coast in the 11th century. The Lowland duchies quickly renewed their ties to Catholicism and, with the encouragement of the monks, eventually joined together to form several strong duchies in the 14th century. The duchies experienced sporadic conflict with the pagan Highland baronies.

Highland Dominance


Internecine warfare prevailed among the Highlanders in the 13th and 14th, as highland nobles made war on each other to honour blood oaths and to satisfy vengeance, life became more difficult in the Highlands. In the 16th century, Alsgood, Lord of Valmiera, emerged as the Highland King, also known as the King of the Upper Lands. Once united, the Highland Kingdom, when not preoccupied with civil war and rival claimants to the Sword of Alsgood, conducted a policy of raiding and extracting tribute from the Lowland duchies.

Founding of the Grand Duchy


Before the rise of the Highland Kingdom, the Catholic eastern Lowlanders lived a largely pastoral life with no central government. Their villages centered around the Church and were ruled by town councils and local barons and dukes. The ongoing conflict with the Excalbians, however, led to a desire for a strong leader. In 1652, after months of negotiation, the Bishop of Umbra crowned John Patrick Kennan, Baron Cambera, Grand Duke of the newly proclaimed Grand Duchy of Saxmere.

Grand Duke John I managed to hold off the attacks of King Sweyn II of Excalbia, who then made peace with Saxmere in 1653. The peace held for 20 years until a group of Lowlanders in the territory of Trondgard attacked the King’s tax collectors in 1673 reigniting the war. A rebellion against Queen Hildegaard of Excalbia in 1674 gave Saxmere the opportunity to again make peace with the Highland Kingdom.

Establishment of a Republic


Peace continued until the mid-18th century. When war resumed, Saxmere suffered a crushing defeat, making the Grand Duchy a tributary of Excalbia. In the early 19th century when a Protestant Christian confederation of Lanerian immigrants and Lowland tribes made war against King Ragarth, Saxmerean leaders wish to join the confederation. The last Grand Duke, Patrick II, opposed doing so as a betrayal of the nation’s treaties with Excalbia. He was deposed by his own Council of State and driven from Saxmere on 5 September 1806. The Republic of Saxmere was proclaimed on 9 September 1806.

In 1807, King Ragarth made peace with the Lowlanders and the Lanerian settlers, leaving Saxmere’s status undefined. When Ragarth’s recently converted Christian son, Joshua, succeeded his father and proclaimed the Holy Empire of Excalbia in 1809, Saxmere was left in that nebulous status as an autonomous, though not fully independent republic.

Establishment of the Confederation of Sovereign States


In 1817, a group of Lanerian settlers and Lowlanders demanded a republican government. To avoid violence, the Excalbian Emperor extended a land grant to the republicans east of the Borodea Mountains and patents to establish autonomous republican governments. In 1829, New Virginia, along with the later colonies of Southland and Deandra, joined with the Republic of Saxmere and the former Highland baronies of Alud and Trondgard, to declare themselves independent states and to form a Confederation of Sovereign States.

An Uneasy Union


Despite its incorporation into the Confederation of Sovereign States, in many ways Saxmere was never a good fit for the CSS. Following the Caldan-Lanerian War, many Anglo-Lanerian immigrants moved to the CSS, particularly to the State of New Virginia. This raised tensions as Saxmereans had generally been sympathetic to the Caldan Union, with whom they shared a religion and ethnicity. In 1856, Peter Courtland, Commander of the New Virginia Militia, attempted to seize control of the government of New Virginia with the backing of Lanerian immigrants. Courtland has aspired to led New Virginian forces against Saxmere, which was aligned with the Caldan Union, and then take a unified Confederation force into battle to “liberate” occupied portions of Laneria. Courtland’s coup failed and he and his supporters fled across the Borodea Mountains to what is now Upper Virginia.

In 1916, the Upper Virginia, founded by Courtland’s pro-Lanerian followers, declared war on the Caldan Union and entered the Great War on the side of Laneria. Although the Confederation of Sovereign States attempted to remain neutral, Saxmere heavily favored the Caldan Union and its allies and may Saxmereans fought as volunteers for the Caldan Union. When the CSS rejected Upper Virginia’s demands to restrain Saxmere, it invaded, in early 1917, which lead the Holy Empire of Excalbia to declare war on the Dominion. Excalbian forces defeated the Upper Virginians at the Battle of Rujiene on 12 April 1917, driving them out of the CSS. Despite this victory, many Confederals in the other states blamed Saxmere for instigating the invasion by its support of the Caldan Union.

The Caine Administration


In 2004, businessman Thomas Caine of the Liberty Party won a hotly contested election, unseating former President Ilmar Alderson. Alderson had been running as a write-in candidate after earlier unexpectedly losing the Liberty Party nomination to Caine.

Following the Free Republic of Knootoss’ intervention in Tanah Burung against radical international terrorists, Excalbia declared a boycot of Knootian goods. The Empire also attempted to bar Knootian-flagged ships from the waters of the Excalbian Isles, including those belonging to the other nations of the Isles.

President Caine, in a gesture of independence from Excalbian domination, traveled to Knootoss shortly after his inauguration to sign the Knootian International Stabilisation Treaty (KIST). This has caused Excalbia to nullify the Treaty of Jefferson, a long-standing mutual defense pact between the Empire and the Confederation.

At the same time, Caine took a libertarian approach to social issues, endorsing a liberalization of abortion laws, recognition of same-sex marriage and the secularization of society. Church leaders criticized the Caine administration suggested that he was acting under the influence of the so-called Order of the Invisible Hand – a widely conjectured but unconfirmed Knootian-based libertarian and atheist philosophy.

The Secession Crisis and the Treaty of Courtland


Opposition to the Caine administration and the presumed influence of the Order in Confederation politics, led the state parliament of Saxmere to enact a provisional declaration of independence. Meanwhile, in New Rome, Pantocratoria, James Kennan, the Baron of Cambera and heir to the title of Grand Duke, began forming a government-in-exile in preparation for his return to an independent Saxmere. The Confederation government denounced the move as a ploy by Excalbia and its ally Pantocratoria to weaken the Confederation and create another puppet monarchy in the Excalbian Isles.

In response to the secession, the Caine administration sealed the borders around Saxmere and closed its airspace. This, in turn, led Excalbia to declare a naval blockade of the Confederation. When Knootoss came to the defense of the C.S.S., the crisis nearly escalated to war.

War was averted through negotiations facilitated by the Teutonic Empire of Lavenrunz. These negotiations quickly reached an agreement to resolve the secession crisis through a three-part referendum that would allow the people of Saxmere to choose between full independence, greater autonomy or the status quo, as well as between a republican government or a constitutional monarchy. All parties finally agreed to the Treaty of Courtland.

When the referenda were held a few weeks following the signing of the treaty, the people narrowly defeated full independence and overwhelmingly approved a new relationship of greater autonomy within the Confederation. Somewhat unexectedly, the people also narrowly approved the reinstallation of the Grand Duke as a constitutional monarch.

Election of Sean Collins and Saxmerean Secession


In 2016, Democratic Labour Party leader Sean Collins of Saxmere was elected President, succeeding Tom Caine. Collins laid out an ambitious plan to rollback many of Caine’s initiatives and expand social welfare protections. However, he was largely thwarted by a right-leaning Congress. Ahead of the 2018 midterm elections, Liberal Party leaders began to suggest that Collins’ Saxmerean-oriented policies - and Saxmere itself - were out-of-step with the Confederation. With the admission of former Northern Territories as the State of Northland as the seventh state of the Confederation, many wags suggested that Saxmere could secede without requiring the C.S.S. to alter its six-star flag.

Seemingly out of nowhere, the notion of Saxmerean secession recaptured public imagination and was placed on the ballot in the 2018 elections. The secession initiative passed in Saxmere with over 71% of the vote. With support from the Liberty Party, secession negotiations proceeded rapidly and on 1 November 2018 the Grand Duchy of Saxmere became an independent country.

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People and Culture


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Government


Saxmere is a constitutional monarchy with a hereditary Grand Duke and a unicarmeral parliament that elects the Prime Minister, who appoints the cabinet.

Executive

The Grand Duke is the Head of State and nominally appoints the Prime Minister and gives assent to all legislation. There is, however, no precedent or constitutional provision for the Grand Duke to not appoint the Prime Minister elected by a majority of parliament or to withhold assent from legislation.

The Prime Minister is the Head of Government, elected by a majority in Parliament. The Prime Minister appoints a Cabinet with the advice and consent of the legislature. The Cabinet includes 11 executive departments, each headed a minister and a permanent civil service deputy secretary.

Legislative

A unicameral body known as the House of Parliament. The House is composed of 265 members, directly elected in single member ranked choice districts. Currently, the government is composed of a coalition between the Christian Democratic Party (CDP) with 98 seats, the Democratic Labour Party (DLP) with seats 64, and the Renewal Party of Saxmere (RPS) with 21 seats. The opposition consists of the Saxmere Liberal Party (SLP) on the right with 32 seats and the Social Democratic Party (SDP) on the left with 50 seats.

Judicial

The Saxmerean Supreme Court, consisting of 11 justices appointed to 15-year renewable terms by the Grand Duke and confirmed by parliament, is the nation's highest court. District Courts serve as courts of first instance for felonies and civil cases The Courts of Appeal considers appeals in felony and civil cases. Decision of the Appeals Court are appealable solely to the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court also hears cases based on constitutional disputes.

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Quick Facts

Official Name: Grand Duchy of Saxmere

Short Name: Saxmere

Founded: As the Grand Duchy of Saxmere - 21 May 1652; as the Republic of Saxmere – 9 September 1806; as the State of Saxmere – 16 June 1829; as the Autonomous Grand Duchy of Saxmere (part of the CSS) - 12 February 2006; the Grand Duchy of Saxmere - 1 November 2018.

Type of Government: Constitutional Monarchy.

Constitution: Written constitution adopted in 2006 at a Constitutional Convention in Umbra.

Head of State: Grand Duke James I Kennan

Head of Government: Prime Minister Abigail O’Neil of the Democratic Labour Party

The Executive: Head of State and Head of Government


The Grand Duke is the Head of State and nominally appoints the Prime Minister and gives assent to all legislation. There is, however, no precedent or constitutional provision for the Grand Duke to not appoint the Prime Minister elected by a majority of parliament or to withhold assent from legislation.

The Prime Minister is the Head of Government, elected by a majority in Parliament. The Prime Minister appoints a Cabinet with the advice and consent of the legislature. The Cabinet includes 11 executive departments, each headed a minister and a permanent civil service deputy secretary.

The Executive: The Cabinet


Minister of Foreign Affairs: John Flynn (CDP)

Minister of Defence: Franklin Keaton, (not a Member of Parliament [M.P.])

Minister of Treasury: Conner Quinn (DLP)

Minister of Home Affairs: Angela Dunne (CDP)

Attorney General: Evelyn Coleman (DLP)

Minister of Labour and Industry: Henry "Hank" Quinn (DLP)

Minister of Education: Dr. Robert Fraiser, PhD (CDP)

Minister of Health and Social Services: Rodney Wallis (DLP)

Minister of Transportation: George Shea (CDP)

Minister of Housing and Urban Affairs: Angela Repse (DLP)

Minister of Technological Development: Trevor Byrne (CDP)

The Legislature: The House of Parliament


A unicameral body known as the House of Parliament. The House is composed of 265 members, directly elected in single member ranked choice districts. Currently, the government is composed of a coalition between the Democratic Labour Party (DLP) with 80 seats and the Christian Democratic Party (CDP) with 77 seats. There is a center-right opposition composed of the Renewal Party of Saxmere (RPS) with 37 seats and a liberatrian opposition consisting of the Saxmere Liberal Party (SLP) with 47 seats. The left opposition is formed by the Social Democratic Party (SDP) with 24 seats.

Parliament is led by the Lord Speaker. The current Lord Speaker if Richard Butler of the DLP.

The Courts


The Saxmerean Supreme Court, consisting of 11 justices appointed to 15-year renewable terms by the Grand Duke and confirmed by parliament, is the nation's highest court. District Courts serve as courts of first instance for felonies and civil cases The Courts of Appeal considers appeals in felony and civil cases. Decision of the Appeals Court are appealable solely to the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court also hears cases based on constitutional disputes.

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Foreign Relations

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Economy


The Saxmerean economy is dominated by the information technology, health care, transportation, and tourism sectors with significant contributions from the media and agricultural sectors. Many of the largest companies are local affiliates of Confederal and Excalbian companies. Major local companies include Saxmere AgroSales, Royal Healthcare Systems, and the Saxmere Group.

Exports and Imports

Leading Exports:

Information technology, software, entertainment and media, and agricultural products.

Leading Imports:

Automobiles, machinery, low-tech electronics and textiles.

Trade Agreements

Saxmere is a party to the Knootian International Stabilisation Treaty and the Reichsburg Free Trade Agreement. It also maintains bilateral trade agreements with the Upper Virginia, the CSS and Excalbia.

Main Ports

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The Grand Duchy of Saxmere

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