Union National Conscription Act

"The simple fact, gentlemen, is that we need conscription! If we do not introduce conscription then I'm afraid our Union has already lost this war, and we might as well surrender to the Confederacy right now. Yes, the people will not like it, but we cannot let any chance of turning the tide of this war slip through our fingers!"

- Union President Richard Williams, trying to persuade the senators of the Union Senate to support his new conscription act

The Union National Conscription Act was an act written by President Richard Williams and passed by the Senate of the Union of Earth States, one of two global governments on the planet Earth, the other being the rebelling Confederate States of Earth, the nation the Union was at war with from 21 BBY to 20 BBY, which introduced conscription first the first time in the war.

The act was created due to low recruitment rates from the states of the Union, and the heavy casualties being suffered by Union forces on the battlefield, the act forced all male citizens of the Union between the ages of 18 and 50 to join the Union military and fight the Confederacy, however one detail the Union Senate added to the act was that one could pay U$10,000 to be exempt from the act, this addition was made because many of the senators had sons of the legal age, and didn't wish for their sons to fight in the war.

However, the working and lower middle classes weren't so fortunate, 10,000 dollars was practically an entire year's wages for the average Union citizens, who were thus unable to spare the money to avoid conscription, this served merely to feed the anger of the lower classes, who felt that it was unfair for the rich to be able to dodge forced service purely because of their family wealth.

"Why do I have to go and fight? I have a family to feed and take care of! Send the rich kids, surely they have more than enough spare time on their hands! They claim to be patriotic, let them prove it!"

- A working class protester to the act

Another point of contention was Confederate sympathies, most of the lower classes were sympathetic to the Confederacy, either out of a belief that the Confederacy stood for true liberty and freedom, or because the Confederacy had seceded to escape unfair and oppressive taxation, and the Union was forcing the lower-class Union citizens to fight to regain said taxes for the Union, and thus they had no desire to fight against the Confederacy. Others were simply afraid to go to almost certain death on the battlefield, most claimed this fear was not out of cowardice, but simply a worry of dying for a worthless cause.

"I ain't fighting in no damnable Union army! My sympathies lie firmly with the Confederacy! Long Live the Confederacy"

- A pro-Confederate protester

When the "Conscription Lottery" began, in which names were pulled out at random, the anger boiled over into full-scale civil unrest, a large riot broke out in Union City, in the Republic of Wekland, many buildings were burnt and figures of the local authorities attacked, the riot lasted 5 days, at one point the rioters even raised the Confederate flag above the City Hall. The riot was finally brutally put down, but this served to merely fan the flames of unrest.

As a result of the general public opposite to the act, and the way to the riots were put down, only 7,000,000 of the requested 25,000,000 soldiers were successfully conscripted, most citizens not engaged in rioting fled into the countryside to escape the authorities, in the end only the most loyal states to the Union, specifically Nortalia, Westalia and Soutalia, successfully conscripted soldiers in any serious number, and many of these later defected to the Confederacy anyway.

The act ultimately proved counter-productive to the Union's war effort, for not only did it turn the vast majority of the population firmly against the Union and the war, in exchange for only a fraction of the soldiers it demanded, but it also gave the Confederacy great propaganda, which they made great use of all the way to the end of the war.

"My people, as you may be aware, Union City, in the Republic of Wekland, is burning! It is being burnt the ground by it's own citizens, they are enraged at being forced to fight and die for the greedy, rich fatcats, who have the money to be able to escape the fight. They are naturally angry at the Conscription Act, the Union's desperate attempt to prevent the inevitable by sacrificing its own young men. The rioters are of the lower classes, they cannot pay the Union's insulting exemption fee, whilst the rich can, and so have decided to force the local authorities to abandon their conscription efforts, the rioters have apparently even raised our flag above their own City Hall! I wish the rioters and others fleeing to avoid conscription well, most of them are sympathetic to our cause, and do not wish to fight against the side of true freedom. If any of you conscripts are hearing this right now, defect, I beg of you to defect, save yourselves! The Union's war is done, come and join those fighting to defend freedom! Don't let your blood be spilt in the name of the greedy sending you to fight and die to preserve their oppressive taxes over us!"

- President Jane Zarkan in a message to the Confederate people on the conscription riots, and calling on Union conscripts to defect to the Confederacy

The act was finally repealed in the final days of the war, when the Union realised all hope was lost, and decided that continued conscription to be a worthless endeavour.

"It is with great sadness that I announce this war to be almost over, I have failed, I have failed in my duty to save the Union, we might as well repeal the conscription act, no sense in forcing any more young men to die for a failed cause."

- President Williams, after resigning himself to the fate of defeat, asking the Senate to annul the conscription act.