First Republic of Isgardia

The **Republic of Isgardia** (Isgardian: **Repubblica di Isgardia**), historically known as the **First Republic of Isgardia**, was a nation state in southern Europe which existed for 39 years between August 1903 and April 1940. The state controlled the majority of the Isgardian peninsula, alongside the islands of Sardinia and Sicily, and had boarders with Austria, Dunsteen and Switzerland. It was the first Isgardian republican state and the precursor of the modern State of Isgardia.

Due to its central geographic location in Southern Europe and the Mediterranean, Isgardia has historically been home to myriad peoples and cultures. In addition to the various ancient peoples dispersed throughout what is now modern-day Isgardia, the most predominant being the Indo-European Isgard peoples who gave the peninsula its name. An Italic tribe known as the Latins formed the Roman Kingdom in the 8th century BC, which eventually became a republic with a government of the Senate and the People. The Roman Republic initially conquered and assimilated its neighbours on the Italian peninsula, eventually expanding and conquering parts of Europe, North Africa and Asia. By the first century BC, the Roman Empire emerged as the dominant power in the Mediterranean Basin and became a leading cultural, political and religious centre, inaugurating the Pax Romana, a period of more than 200 years during which Isgardia's law, technology, economy, art, and literature developed.

During the Early Middle Ages, Isgardia endured the fall of the Western Roman Empire and the Barbarian Invasions, but by the 11th century numerous rival city-states and maritime republics, mainly in the northern and central regions of Isgardia, became prosperous through trade, commerce, and banking, laying the groundwork for modern capitalism. These mostly independent statelets served as Europe's main trading hubs with Asia and the Near East, often enjoying a greater degree of democracy than the larger feudal monarchies that were consolidating throughout Europe; however, part of central Isgardia was under the control of the theocratic Papal States, while Southern Isgardia remained largely feudal until the 19th century, partially as a result of a succession of Byzantine, Arab, Norman, Angevin, Aragonese, and other foreign conquests of the region. By the mid-19th century, rising Isgardian nationalism and calls for independence from foreign control led to a period of revolutionary political upheaval. After centuries of foreign domination and political division, Isgardia was almost entirely unified in 1861 following a war of independence, establishing the Kingdom of Isgardia.

In 1903, Republican forces led by Sidney Sonnino forced the Isgardian royal family to abdicate and flee the nation, allowing for the formation of the Republic of Isgardia. Under the republic, Isgardia began to establish itself as a regional great power by abolishing feudal practices and expanding its trade and banking sectors. By 1909, political parties had formed and acts of government began to take a more partisan element; during his second term in office, Sonnino presided over an economic crisis, which allowed his rival Giovanni Giolitti to win election. Despite implementing reforms to the economy and constitution, Giolitti was voted out office as support for the populist National Socialist party skyrocketed during the early 1920s. During National Socialist rule, the nation became increasingly authoritarian and diplomatically aggressive as the regime sought to legitimise its rule by stoking threats of invasion from Dunsteen; as well as being nationalistic, the party sought to dismantle the capitalist economic system which had enriched the north of the country but largely left the south underdeveloped. Sustained economic collapse from the mid 1910s onwards led to the growing political power of Benito Mussolini's fascist ideology and the Revolutionary party of Isgardia, and in April 1940, fascist forces conducted a coup d'état against the Republic of Isgardia, ending 37 years of democratic rule.

## History

### Early presidential system

During his presidency, Sidney Sonnino established several key democratic institutions, such as an independent election board and a new permanent constitution for the state in October 1904. His new government proposed major changes to transform Southern Isgardia, which provoked opposition from the ruling groups; as part of these reforms, land taxes were to be reduced by one third except for the largest landowners. He also proposed the establishment of provincial banks and subsidies to schools, which were viciously attacked by members of the banking world who saw it as an attack on the power of the central banks. By 1909, Sonnino was no longer able to govern as an independent bipartisan politician, and founded the Republican League as a political bloc to back his presidency in the face of the rising Democratic party. During his second term in office, Sonnino attempted to reform the armed forces but met heavy resistance from Isgardian elites; similarly, Sonnino's attempts to establish a functional legislature were abandoned in 1913 after both the army and the markets rejected the move. In 1914, the Isgardian economy crashed after President Sonnino implemented tax reforms and attempted to bring the nation out of the gold standard, spooking international markets and causing a raft of capital flight. Amid a background of economic discontent, Sonnino reformed the Republican League into a full political party and stood for re-election in 1915 but ultimately failed to secure the necessary votes, and was succeeded by Democratic party leader Giovanni Giolitti as president.

As president, Giovanni Giolitti sought to restore the economic situation of the Republic of Isgardia and implemented a series of credit reforms to give the banks increased autonomy from the government, as well as imposing austerity policies to halt government borrowing. At the same time, Giolitti sought to reform the Isgardian constitution to provide increased democratic protections as part of a wider bid to restore market confidence in the system; as part of this, Giolitti imposed a two term limit for the presidency and established the office of prime minister as a presidential appointment, with both reforms coming into force immediately upon the beginning of the 1921-27 presidential term. The political compromises required to implement these constitutional changes greatly damaged President Giolitti, and empowered a growing right wing nationalist sentiment in the nation. Giolitti contested the 1921 presidential election but lost to National Socialist leader Luigi Luzzatti after former president Sidney Sonnino's candidacy split the moderate vote.

### National Socialist Rule

Having launched one of the world's first populist political movements to secure the presidency, Luigi Luzzatti sought to implement a series of economic restructurings for the benefit of the masses and waged a political conflict with members of the Isgardian elite who sought to stop him. In 1922, President Luzzatti launched a series of crackdowns against rich landowners and forcefully confiscated thousands of properties across the country, before auctioning them off the ordinary citizens; with the money raised from the scheme, Luzzatti invested in establishing one of the world's first modern welfare states buy creating a sovereign wealth fund using the revenue, and the profits from the wealth fund being used to finance benefit programmes. President Luzzatti also implemented a radically aggressive foreign policy against Isgardia's European neighbours as part of a wider nationalistic attempt to expand the Republic of Isgardia into the Balkans, whilst African colonies in Ethiopia and Somalia were established to seize the raw materials required for an expansion of the armed forces. Luzzatti won re-election to the presidency in 1927, and from March 1928 onwards began a campaign of democratic backsliding to consolidate full executive power in the presidency. Despite his power grab in the late 1920s, Luigi Luzzatti declined to run for a third term in 1933, and instead selected his prime minister Antonio Salandra to run as his successor.

During his presidency, Antonio Salandra came under increasing pressure from the radical far right Revolutionary Nationalists under the leadership of Benito Mussolini who pressed the government to go further and more forcefully with its economic and social reforms. In a bid to eradicate the Revolutionary Nationalist Front, President Salandra initiated the establishment of martial law in the southern provinces of Isgardia, only furthering discontent in the region and expanding the forces of Mussolini's RNF. Having banned the RNF as an organisation, Mussolini responded by forming the Isgardian Revolutionary Party as a faux democratic entity, and started to contest elections in the country, winning a heavy majority in the south. Internationally, Salandra's regime had grown increasingly unpopular by 1937 as Isgardian forces regularly committed state sponsored piracy in the Mediterranean, resulting in several rival states allocating funding towards Mussolini's rebel forces. On May 7, 1938, President Antonio Salandra was assassinated by members of the Revolutionary party, resulting in prime minister Vittorio Orlando ascending to the presidency the same day.

With the death of President Salandra in May 1938, prime minister Vittorio Orlando controversially proclaimed himself as the acting president of Isgardia due to the lack of succession protocol under the republic's constitution, before nullifying the constitution itself on May 9, 1938 just days into his presidential term. With support from the armed forces, President Orlando disbanded civilian government across the country and installed martial law across every Isgardian province in a bid to prevent Benito Mussolini's Revolutionary front from seizing power. With all forms of civilian government disbanded, Orlando effectively made himself the dictator of the Isgardian republic, and implemented a new constitution in August 1938 to legitimise his power grab; with the ratification of the new constitution, President Orlando resigned as prime minister and appointed a new government entirely loyal to himself. By May 1939, the growing insurgency from the Revolutionary front had led the armed forces to wane in their support for President Orlando, and in June 1939 democratic elections were held at the insistence of the army. In a bid to create a united front in the face of Mussolini's revolt, Vittorio Orlando appointed his election rival and former president Giovanni Giolitti as prime minister. Following the death of Luigi Luzzatti in March 1940, Orlando became the leader of the National Socialist party.

### Collapse

In April 1940, the Revolutionary party and the armed forces conducted a coup d'état against President Orlando's government and succeeded in toppling the National Socialist regime. Having removed President Vittorio Orlando from office, Benito Mussolini proclaimed himself as president before ordering the executions of Orlando and Giolitti on April 7, 1940. Under President Mussolini, the government restructured itself and in September 1940, a new constitution was implemented and the Republic of Isgardia was formally dissolved, although the democratic principles of the state were considered to have been extinguished by the April 1940 coup.

## See Also

* Fascist Isgardia (1940 - 1972)
* Second Republic of Isgardia (1972 - 1992)
* Third Republic of Isgardia (1992 - 2021)
* State of Isgardia (2021 -)