Conservatives of Rio Blanco
| Conservatives of Rio Blanco | |
|---|---|
| President |
Daniel Harnes Russell Gamkrelidze (honorary) |
| Secretary-General | Ted Gozner |
| Founder |
Edwin Lanceton Montrose Garner Daniel Bergmann |
| Speaker for the Senate | Leonard Ammarsen (SA) |
| Speaker for the Rep's Chamber | Travis DiLeo (MO-Larimer) |
| Founded |
4 October 1875 (as Rioblancoan Independence Congress) 1 August 1876 |
| Headquarters | Denver, CC |
| Membership | 152,092 (2016) |
| Ideology |
Conservatism Christian democracy Agrarianism Anti-communism (formerly; during the Cold War) |
| International affiliation | International Democrat Union |
| European affiliation | Alliance of Conservatives and Reformists in Europe (Regional partner) |
| Official colors | Deep red |
| Seats in the Senate |
14 / 51 |
| Seats in the House of Reps. |
17 / 100 |
| State governorships |
4 / 11 |
| Website | |
| http://www.conservatives.rb | |
The Conservatives of Rio Blanco (also called Gallant Old Party (GOP) or Cons; Spanish: Conservadores de Río Blanco), until 1971 called Home Guard Party, are one of the two major parties in Rio Blanco, along with the Progressives. Originally representing the Democratic Party of the United States, it is now linked with the GOP since 1968.
There have been 11 Home Guard/Conservative presidents, the first being Edwin Lanceton, General of the RBAF, serving from 1876 to 1880, and the most recent being Russell Gamkrelidze, from 1984 to 1988.
History
Early activity
Their foundation can be traced back to 4 October 1875, as the Rioblancoan Independence Congress, the main movement for Rioblancoan independence, strongly stoked by President Johnson's decision to veto the Colorado statehood proposal. After independence, the RIC was renamed Home Guard Party and contested at the first presidential election, with Edwin Lanceton as their candidate. Days after the election, the party's first major rupture happened: some dissenting members, of which Henry Campbell Coss was the most prominent, left the party and founded the Constitution Party; it would actively battle the Conservatives until the early 2000's. Despite the secession, the Home Guard Party and the Progressives went on to become the main parties in Rio Blanco, contesting in almost every election.
Civil War and after
In the late 1880's, the HG was in favor of creating new states and a federalist model, while the Pence administration rejected both; the divergence would contribute to the three-month Rioblancoan Civil War, with the Progressives supporting the Government and calling for an American aid, and Home Guard partially supporting the Northerners' Front and the Honookee Republic. While the Honookee rebels were defeated, Rio Blanco would also be obliged to grant home rule to its states, as per the Treaty of Fort Mitchell; this was seen as a partial Home Guard victory. The increasing popularity of the Guardians made the party win in 1892; they fielded former Governor of Baynice Hugh Carlson and Senator from Uinta Anthony Craigford.
After an eight-year break from presidency, Philip Coxbourne reached the office and made education mandatory and free of charge; he also nourished the relationship with the states by working on housing and education plans. During his term, the party took a slight agrarianist stance, focusing on the area encompassing the former Honookee Republic and the southern states, rather than Denver and Salt Lake.
During the Wars
In 1914, following the wave of migration to Rio Blanco, President Warren Thornton declared abstension from the war, a move which did not please the Home Guard; the party insisted that the President send soldiers to fight, but the Presidency rejected their demands. This deadlock lasted for more than a year, when finally, the President sent some combat medics to aid the Allies. History repeated itself in 1940, but the Home Guard managed to have the Presidency send some troops to Europe; however, the same outcome as for WWI happened again during the last year of the Korean War, with President Giannizzari sending combat medics to aid South Koreans and Americans, behind an agreement between the Home Guard and the Progressives.
In 1955, the HG pressured the government for the fourth time, during the Vietnam War. This time, President Giannizzari declared total Rioblancoan neutrality, a move that would be respected by his successor, Home Guardian Bruce Carlson, much to his party's dismay. The Home Guard Party also agreed to expand civil liberties to African Americans, Asians and other minorities, but opposed the abolition of anti-miscegenation laws and fines.
The party pushed for the ban on Communist parties in Rio Blanco, later changed into a forced enrollment in President Delia Roughton's XPDOL (Extreme or otherwise Potentially Dangerous Organizations Log).
Renaming and the Communist conflict
In 1971, three years after being linked to the Republicans, the party was renamed Conservatives of Rio Blanco and, for some years, focused on the small but growing minorities.
Another important issue of theirs during the 1970's was the reinstatement of the XPDOL, which was shortly revived from 1966 to 1972 and included left-wing parties, such as the Communists and the Socialists; when the Log was abolished by Larry Rutkowski, the Conservatives strongly attacked him and accused him of being a "Communist spy", thus starting a conflict between them and the Progressives. During the debacle, some anarchists and Communist activists placed a bomb in front of the office, but the plan was foiled before the bomb could be detonated.
The Communist conflict died out during 1976, when Rutkowski's term was over.
Radigan and the Memorable Coalition
Upon Lawrence Radigan's election to the Presidency, the Conservatives were divided on the issues marked by him; he proposed to ban abortion and marijuana, as well as allow the President and the Vice President to be reelected indefinitely. The Conservatives were ready to support those proposals, but they condemned the way he tried to apply them, comparing it to that of a dictator; the party split up during his term, with the anti-Radiganists being the stronger faction.
On January 1983, the Conservatives seemed to be united again, when top-secret report effectively authorizing the Chilean, Uruguayan and Argentine authorities to search for political opponents who fled to Rio Blanco was released, but the unity didn't last very long, for when Radigan resigned on 23 September 1983, the pro-Radigan Conservatives joined the RBPF, founded by the former President.
The anti-Radiganists, with President Russell Gamkrelidze as their leader, went on and created a major coalition with the Johnson-led Progressives, called the Memorable Coalition. The Coalition would last for about fifteen years, when the Conservatives decided not to field any presidential candidates, but rather, they endorsed Liberal candidate Darryl Colston. The decision came off as a surprise by both ends of the Rioblancoan political spectrum, with the Progressives looking forward to build treaties with the Liberals.
After the Coalition was disbanded, the Conservatives began regular contacts with the Liberals and the Dead Center Party, managing to bring them to the Opposition for the next fourteen years.
D14 and after
On 13 October 2016, Rio Blanco First, into which Rioblancoans for Hope had flowed about a month earlier, merged into the Conservatives. Former Secretary Will Hoplin, although accepting the merger, was not happy about the majority of Conservatives complaining over Donald Trump's nomination for President of the United States in 2016; this contributed to the second major rift among the party, thus breaking years of internal apparent peace.
On February 2016, the leader of the pro-Trump faction (dubbed "Rioblancoans for Trump"), Representative Quintilius Hoxner (Weber County, SL), said that he and his colleagues (forming the so-called Dissenting Fourteen) would leave the Conservatives and either create a self-standing party or join Andrew Cobb, who was already an open Trump supporter.
The Dissenting Fourteen (D14) are composed by:
- Senator Shane Gorman (Baynice)
- Senator Keith Wallsey (Salt Lake)
- Representative Robert Torelli (Goshen County, Baynice)
- Representative Gordon Foxhill (Cheyenne County, El Paso)
- Representative Bob Werner (Crowley County, El Paso)
- Representative Wilson Parr (El Paso County, El Paso)
- Representative Nelson Springer (Kit Carson County, El Paso)
- Representative Larry Norman (Fremont County, Sawatch)
- Representative Diane Heffler (Daggett County, Salt Lake)
- Representative Nicholas Knox (Morgan County, Salt Lake)
- Representative Vivian Jacker (Summit County, Salt Lake)
- Representative Quintilius Hoxner (Weber County, Salt Lake)
- Representative Max Ahler (Deuel County, Sioux)
- Representative Herbert Rutherford (Sheridan County, Sioux)
The D14 eventually decided to join Andrew Cobb's party.
Secretary Ted Gozner stated that he would accept internal divisions, but not "futile secessions" which, according to him, "would destroy the perfect union for the people", while President of the Party Daniel Harnes accused the D14 of "killing the centre-right unity". Andrew Cobb, on the other hand, showed open-mindedness about the transfer.
In an interview about the future of the party, Gozner also added that, unless something is rapidly done to stop the "voter hemorrhage", he does not exclude the possibility for this party to split even further.
Rupture with New Choice
Some Conservative politicians, such as Walter D'Ambrogio and William Sulley, were reported thinking about either joining the Dead Center Party or forming a similar party, with the second option being supported by the talks between Lionel Hutts and Ted Gozner; should either option take place, major political theorists and politicians, such as Representative Matt Auray (EP-Ahlstrom), say that the Conservatives wouldn't pass much time before ending their activities.
On March 15, 2017, after extended talks with Secretary Ted Gozner and Lionel Hutts, Walter D'Ambrogio, William Sulley, Hutts and Matt Auray announced the formation of New Choice (NC), which would comprise 20 Conservatives (13 Representatives and 7 Senators), 4 Progressives (3 Reps and 1 Senator), as well as absorb the DC. The secession sparked an additional two-faction conflict, with the single-righters, encompassing about half of the Conservatives, believing that the right wing should be united under one symbol, and the multi-righters, including New Choice and Cobb, claiming that uniting all the right wing under a big tent without internal factions is virtually impossible.