Chapter 2876 The Unforgivable Secret (13)

Pomona came to a rock wall under the Batar Tower, which seemed to blend in with the surrounding scenery, covered with a thin layer of moss, and nothing special.

From Muggle London to the wizarding world, you need to pass through the brick wall behind the Leaky Cauldron, and you need to hit the bricks with your wand in a certain order.

At the end of the 19th century, because the Muggle government needed to re-plan the city and plan to flatten the Leaky Cauldron, the Minister of Magic at the time, that is, Sparvin, who promulgated the "Restrictions on the Use of Magic by Minors", made a long speech about why the speech could not save the Leaky Cauldron. The Leaky Cauldron, which had been preserved by a series of Hiding and Oblivion Charms during his tedious speech.

The Minister for Magic before him, Doug MacPhail, was a Hufflepuff, who is remembered for keeping the Ministry in comforting calm when the Muggle Parliament was in turmoil over Parliamentary reforms.

The two of them handed over in 1865, before the Manchester riots broke out because of parliamentary reforms in 1866, and before the passage of the 1867 Act, before the cholera outbreak.

Aside from the Liberals' desire to expand the urban vote while limiting the total number of workers' votes, two other issues affected the reform.

First, the repeal of the Corn Laws and the European revolutions of 1848.

Second, Chartism.

Thomas Atwood was born into a prominent banking family in Birmingham, who are mentioned several times in Marx's Capital. Before 1819, the United Kingdom had always adopted the gold and silver double standard. However, due to the serious counterfeiting of silver coins and the instability of the exchange rate, the Parliament passed the Gold Standard Act in 1816, using silver coins as auxiliary currency.

At this time, the Napoleonic Wars were over, and the parliament did not need to print paper money to meet military expenditures, which led to the decoupling of paper money from gold. The determination of the bill provides a legal basis for restoring the link between gold and paper money, and also provides a basis for the "Peel Regulations", which obliges banks to convert paper money into coins.

At this time, Thomas Atwood's family proposed a "Small Shilling Act", that is, to reduce the gold content in the shillings, not by the gold content, but by the quantity as the unit of calculation.

At that time, a series of policies of the parliament would reduce the circulation of currency, which was beneficial to countries that had just gone through the war and needed to reduce inflation, but this method was not conducive to paying off national debts, and was also detrimental to loan recipients . This is not conducive to industrial development, and the small shilling can solve this problem, but this will involve the issue of England's currency issuance rights.

Rothschild said, "As long as I can control the currency issuance of a country, I don't care who makes the laws."

Thomas Atwood founded the Birmingham Political League in 1830 and became an MP for Birmingham during the Parliamentary Reforms in 1832.

Even as an MP, Thomas Atwood was a not to be underestimated member of the political alliance, and he joined the Chartists when the Chartist movement began. At the activities of the federation, such a banner will be drawn, on which three pieces of bread of different sizes are drawn, but the prices are exactly the same, and the names of Britain, France, and Russia are written on each piece of bread, of which the British piece is the smallest. France is in the middle, Russia is the largest, and a line of words is written below:

This is the effect of the Corn Laws.

During the early decades of the nineteenth century, British tenant farmers and landowners were paid an absolute minimum wage, which would have been lower had it not been for the fact that the laborers could not live on air.

At the same time the Church was responsible for paying the shortfall, which was paid out in the form of relief under the Poor Law. One of the slogans of Chartism was that the industrious laborer reap the just fruits of his labour.

Once the Corn Laws are abolished, it means that cheap food from foreign countries can be imported into Britain, and urban residents can buy bread at a cheaper price. But at the same time, it also means that the food produced locally in the UK will lose its competitive advantage. The price cut will not only bankrupt farmers, but also damage the interests of hundreds of lords, 60,000 barons and countless non-noble squires.

The 1832 Parliamentary Reform included taxpayers for agricultural land, and the 1867 Parliamentary Reform made the countryside the "property of the cities". Compared with the income in the countryside, the income of working in the city is higher. Then Birmingham, Manchester and other cities grow rapidly, and Atwood can also call on 100,000 Birmingham workers to march from the city hall to London.

This is of course different from the Marseilles singing the Marseillaise to Paris during the French Revolution. Atwood said in his speech that he is a peace-loving person and that he himself will not use violence to achieve the goals of the people, but if the parliament rejects the two million People's appeals, the result is bound to turn two million people into five million people. If the petitions of so many people fail to produce results, the congressman calls for a national general strike, during which not a hammer will move, an anvil will sound, and a shuttle will turn, and if "a hundred thousand troops" are to be called , also after his arrest, the crowd demanded his release.

Atwood's strike became another ending besides the violent revolution. At the same time, he also submitted the first Chartist petition. Although it was quickly dismissed, it also represented the establishment of the Anti-Corn Law League. Expanded from Birmingham to Manchester and other industrial areas.

By 1843, the League of Industrial Districts had turned its attention to the agricultural districts, attacking the tenants, dependent on the extravagant landowners.

Then came 1846, when the Irish potato harvest was reduced by three-quarters due to late blight, and calls for the abolition of the Corn Laws intensified. It was also in this year that the abolition of the Corn Laws finally succeeded and the Liberal Party won.

From 1845 to 1846, late blight not only occurred in Ireland, but also serious natural disasters occurred in other European countries. In 1847, an economic crisis broke out, and then a revolution broke out in Sicily, Italy.

It was okay at the beginning, but in February 1848, the February Revolution broke out in France. At that time, the July Dynasty, a constitutional monarchy, was in power. The people fought fiercely with the government forces in the heavy rain, and then Louis Philips fled to England.

This inspired the peoples of other countries, and then it was Germany's turn, and this movement indirectly led to the unification of Italy and Germany.

The "Magna Carta" was established in 1215. In official terms, it protects civil liberties, limits the privileges of the monarch, and also establishes juries.

In the words of the people of that era, it was "to put an end to the evil traditions created by the king's father and brother, which were harmful to the church and kingdom, and the atrocities that the king inflicted on others."

At that time, the Pope of Rome was still in charge of England. Innocent III, the Pope who created Purgatory, announced that the rebels, thirty nobles, and all London citizens were excommunicated, and declared Magna Carta invalid.

At that time, there was a nobleman named Langton, who was originally a neutral figure, but was misunderstood by both the king and the rebel nobles. He first refused to issue the pope's excommunication order in his territory, so he was deprived of his post by the king, and then he persuaded the two parties Reasonable dialogue, and the rebel nobles thought he was the king's lobbyist, so he had to leave England.

The king of England at that time was Richard the Lionheart, but he was busy with the Crusades. After he was captured, John planned to usurp the throne... In short, he was lucky to inherit the throne of Richard, nicknamed "King of the Lost Lands", he lost Almost all of England's land in continental Europe, in order to maintain the war, took back the land and stepped up the exploitation of citizens and nobles.

After Langton left, John sent 40 pigs to the rebels because "this is the lowest food", and then he dug a tunnel under one of the towers of the castle, poured oil into it and set it on fire. At this moment John Behavior is no longer rational. Although the army defending the castle fell into a food crisis, they would rather eat horses than those pigs.

The rebels surrendered from starvation, and John intended to have them all killed, but one of his officials advised him not to do so, and to meet other demands, including replacing the bishop.

Magna Carta contained restrictions on the king's extraction of money from the nobles, and the American Revolution's Declaration of Independence directly quoted Magna Carta.

At the beginning of the 19th century, the United States was still in the westward movement. In 1850, the United States passed the Compromise Act to solve the problem of slavery and prevent the disintegration of the Federation. The crisis broke out because California applied to join the Federation as a state, and stipulated in the state constitution that prohibits slavery. of. But this bill did not solve the problem, it only delayed the secession of the South from the Union, and the Fugitive Slave Hunting Act intensified the conflict between the North and the South.

There are so many "nosy things" that magic can't manage, but Doug McPhail was inspired by the Muggle transportation system and introduced the Knight Bus to help wizards in trouble.

Pomona pointed his wand at the stone wall.

"Torn apart."

As the light from the end of the wand hit the rock, the wall shattered, but not randomly.

It's as if someone had left a notch in the rock beforehand, and the cracks opened up, and finally became a "wall brick" similar to the entrance of Diagon Alley. touch them.

"Accio," she said to the tabs, and she pulled one of the tabs, and the stone with the tab moved too.

However, there seemed to be some traction behind the stone, and the stone did not really fly over.

Pomona did the same a few times, and the stone danced like a brick to get out of the way, revealing the "entrance" behind which was sealed by the metal door.

She took out Bacal's key, the handle of which was decorated with vultures and harps like a family crest.

Then she held the key and walked towards the "entrance".