Restored Roman Empire

The Restored Roman Empire (RRE) is a country that attempts to combine aspects of the Western Roman Empire, Roman Empire during its united periods, and Holy Roman Empire in 2025. More specifically it seeks a modern way for the Holy Roman Empire to become the true Western Roman Empire.

The RRE completely controls the modern-day countries of France, Spain, Germany, Portugal, Monaco, Andorra, Luxembourg, San Marino, Croatia, Slovenia, Austria, Malta, Liechtenstein, Italy*, Vatican City*, and Czechia as well as England and Wales. In addition to European territory, the RRE also controls Madeira, the Azores, the Canary Islands, all French overseas departments & territories, and Spanish territories near Morocco (Ceuta, Melilla, etc.) Scotland administers all territory previously owned by the UK including Gibraltar, the Isle of Man, Jersey, and Guernsey. Ireland has independently reunited in this timeline. The core territory of the RRE refers to all of the area under the RRE's jurisdiction except for Central Italy, which has a special status I'll get into later. For government purposes, the RRE's core region consists of one disputed Republic (Malta) and 13 kingdoms: France, England, Wales, Germany, Two Sicilies (mainland Southern Italy+Sicily), Sardinia, Castile, Aragon, Navarre, Portugal, Bohemia, Italy, and Croatia. All kingdoms are monarchies where the king (or queen if the ruler is female) is the executive and can decide the rules for how the executive and judicial branches of their respective realms are chosen. All monarchs are required to de facto and de jure practice separation of church and state. Succession monarchies is done using male-preference primogeniture. The relationship between royal monarchs and the imperial government is similar to the relationship between the federal government and states in the USA. All overseas territories are part of their respective kingdoms. The RRE borders Scotland, Poland, Hungary, Slovakia, Serbia, Bosnia & Herzegovina, and Denmark in Europe, Morocco in Africa, and Suriname and Brazil in South America. The border between Scotland and the RRE is defined as Hadrian's Wall.

The RRE's core territory is about 2,284,469.59 square kilometers or 882,038.64 square miles, similar in size to the DRC and Saudi Arabia or about 12th in the world in terms of total area. Its core population is about 352 million people, making it the third-most populous country in the world, with a two-million-person population lead over the USA.

The Republic of Malta is one subdivision of the RRE. It is primarily located in modern-day Malta but includes nearby insular territories in the Mediterranean such as the Pelagie Islands and Pantelleria. Its subdivisional government is democratic with a parliamentary legislature, a prime minister (PM) as the executive, and an independent judicial branch. The capital of Malta is Valetta. Parliament consists of 100 members of parliament (MPs) distributed among Malta's territorial constituencies based on population using a Mixed-Member Proportional (MMP) system.

Breaking News: This information may be outdated because of the war against Catalandia.

Due to the power of the Catholic Church, the RRE has allowed the Pope to regain control of the Papal States. The Papal States consists of Vatican City and the modern-day Italian regions of Latium, Umbra, Emilia-Romagna, and Marche. The capital of the Papal States is Vatican City and the primary western port of the Papal States is Ostia, Rome. The RRE has a special relationship with the Papal States where the Papal States are allowed partial self-governance and military protection in exchange for the Catholic Church agreeing to not criticize the RRE's government, the Catholic Church providing the RRE's government full financial transparency, and the Catholic Church agreeing to pay fines to the RRE's government if the RRE finds corruption within the Catholic Church's leadership. Additionally, the RRE and the Papal States agree to not tariff each other, to have freedom of movement for capital, goods, services, & people, equal fees for flights using RRE & Papal States' airspace regardless of the airline and whether the route is domestic or international, the RRE and Papal States will not have toll roads, to share rail service, and to give full freedom for both public and private organizations from each other to use each other's Exclusive Economic Zones (EEZs).

The RRE is a secular constitutional monarchy as although the country is largely Christian, the division between the Anglicans in England, Lutherans in Germany, and Catholics in the Mediterranean forces the RRE's government to not take any religious sides. Additionally, the majority of Bohemia is atheist and throughout the RRE there are substantial Muslim minorities caused by immigration from North Africa & the refugee crises in Syria, Iraq, & Afghanistan as well as a significant Turkish minority in Germany.

There are 14 official languages: English, Welsh, French, German, Catalan, Castilian, Standard Italian, Neapolitan,  Sardinian, Portuguese, Czech, Croatian, Classical Latin, and Basque. Additionally, Maltese was an official language but it has been demoted because of the war against Catalandia. All government officials are required to speak at least two official languages. Additionally, Aragonese, Astur-Leonese, Luxembourgish, Silesian, Sicilian, and Slovene are recognized by the RRE, which government officials and private citizens can speak but do not count towards speaking an official language.

The government consists of three branches: the legislative branch, the judicial branch, and the executive branch. The executive capital is Nuremberg, the legislative capital is Prague, and the judicial capital is Ravenna. The executive branch is led by the emperor, an individual is elected for a lifelong term. The legislative branch is a bicameral congress consisting of the upper house or Senate, comprising legislators chosen by the royal monarchs, and the House of Representatives, which is democratically elected. Each kingdom chooses two senators and the Pope can send one voting senator and one non-voting senator to the Senate to represent the Papal States. The judicial branch is the Imperial Court, which consists of 11 judges known as justices. Each justice is appointed for life and must be approved by the emperor, the Senate, and the House of Representatives. The Imperial Court primarily judges cases with appellate jurisdiction but also has original jurisdiction in cases between the RRE's government & a royal government, cases between the Papal States & the RRE's government, cases between the royal governments and the Papal States, and cases between royal governments. All elections in the RRE are administered and monitored by an independent council within the government to prevent elections from being unfair and ensure there is no fraud & corruption in the electoral process.

The official measurement system is metric so all road signs are in km/h not mph, and all medical records state heights in cm not ft in and all weights in kg not stones.

The standard driving side is set to the right side meaning it is illegal to drive on the left side of the road.

The main voting system in the RRE is the Repeating Voting System (RVS). In the RVS, elections are conducted using ballots with multiple candidates. The candidate with the majority of the votes wins, and then the election is repeated with all candidates with zero votes and the candidate with the least non-zero votes removed from the ballot. Votes are repeated using this method until either a candidate has the majority of the votes or there are only two candidates. If only two candidates are remaining, then the candidate with the most votes wins. Tie breakers for when there are only two candidates and the vote is somehow tied are specific to each election and will be specified for each election.

The Roman Emperor is elected, but not directly by everyone. Instead, there are seven electors; one each from the city of Mainz, the city of Trier, the city of Cologne, the Kingdom of Bohemia, the German state of Brandenburg, the German state of Rhineland Palatinate, and the German state of Saxony. Electors are democratically elected from the respective territories of the electorates during general elections, and the electors must resign before the next general election. General elections are held everytime in each electorate territory every time an emperor resigns, dies, or is removed from office (more information provided later.) General elections are conducted using RVS. If there is a tie when there are only two electoral candidates, then the elector is chosen using a coin flip where the electoral candidate cannot see what side of the coin is facing up and must choose tails or heads before the coin is flipped. Voters in a general election must be a citizen of the RRE, a resident of the electorate territory they are voting in, and at least 16 years old when the general election is held. After the electors have been chosen, they convene in Frankfurt to vote on who should be the next emperor. The only requirements for being an imperial candidate, or candidate for becoming an emperor, is to be at least 20 years old when the general election is held, to be a citizen of the RRE or the Papal States, and be a resident of the RRE or the Papal States. The vote for emperor is conducted using RVS. If a tie occurs when there is are only two imperial candidates then an election is held throughout the RRE between the two candidates directly for the emperorship. All voters in a last-resort election must be at least 16 years old when the general election was held, a resident of RRE, and a citizen of the RRE. If a last-resort election is tied then the King of Germany decides who is emperor but cannot choose himself.

The House of Representatives consists of one special representative for the Papal States and 500 House Representatives. The special representative for the Papal States, called the Papal representative, is chosen by a democratic election in the Papal States every 10 years. To be a candidate to become the Papal Representative, an individual must be at least 16 years old when the election is held, a resident of the Papal States, and a citizen of the Papal Citizens. In all elections for members of the House of Representatives, voting is done using RVS. For elections for the Papal Representative specifically, the Pope can break a tie or call for a second, third, fourth, etc. vote with the same two candidates. During this time of repeat elections, the Pope is allowed to choose an individual other than the two candidates to be a temporary Papal Representative but also has the right to not represent the Papal States in the House of Representatives. The other House Representatives are apportioned among the kingdoms based on population with each kingdom needing to have at least one House Representative. The first necessary step to take is to conduct a census. Once every 10 years, a census records the residencies of citizens in RRE. The residencies of most people are recorded as an exact home address, but homeless people are simply recorded as the urban area (city, town, village, etc.) they live in. After a census has been conducted, the 500 seats for House Representatives are apportioned based on population so elections for House Representatives are held once every 10 years and every House Representative has a term of 10 years. There are no term limits for House Representatives, but all House Representatives must be aged 18-65 years old at the time of the census. Each kingdom is required to have at least one House Representative seat after apportionment has been completed. For kingdoms with one House Representative seat, an election is simply held for the entire kingdom. Eligible voters for these elections must be citizens of the RRE, residents of the kingdom they are voting in, and at least 16 years old at the time of the census. For kingdoms with multiple House Representative seats, each kingdom is divided into House Districts using the Shortest Split-Line method to create equally populous districts as each House District elects one House Representative. The voters in these elections must be citizens of the RRE, at least 16 years old at the time of the census, and resident of the House District they are voting in. The tie-breaker for both House District elections & elections is a kingdom with only one House Representative is a decision by the reigning monarch of the kingdom.

The RRE has an imperial military consisting of four offensive branches: the Army or land forces, the Navy or sea forces, the Air Force, and the Marines or amphibious forces. A hypothetical Space Force would be included in the Air Force. Additionally each kingdom needs their own militia for immediate defense, just as a way to temporarily fight back if the Kingdom was attacked as the RRE is so large it will take a long time to mobilize troops. Both the RRE and the individual kingdoms are allowed to institute drafts or conscription orders for the Imperial Military and royal militias respectively. In peace time, the RRE's Imperial Army has a total of two millions troops with about 1 million soldiers, 500 thousand sailors, 300 thousand air personnel, and 200 thousand marines The RRE is currently at war against Catalandia and the size of the military is growing as this is being published. The RRE plans to land at Malta, take the island, then ask for a peace treaty but anything can happen.

The RRE desires to conquer or reconquer the Balkans however it is not unchallenged in the region. The RRE is western-aligned as it has economic & military alliances with USA, Canada, Japan, South Korea, Australia, New Zealand, Israel, the Philippines, etc. The RRE is a member of NATO and the Visegrád Group. NATO is a military alliance consists of the USA, Canada, Scotland, the RRE, the Netherlands, Belgium, the Nordic countries, the Baltic countries, Poland, Slovakia, Hungary, Turkey, Albania, Greece, Romania, and Bulgaria. The Visegrád Group is an economic alliance and consists of Poland, Slovakia, Hungary, & the RRE. The rival of NATO is BRICS+, mostly the alliance between Iran and Russia. The main place of convention is Bosnia & Herzegovina where Iran & Russia support and independent Bosnia & Herzegovina while the RRE wants to conquer it. No proxy war has started yet because Russia is focusing on the war in Ukraine, Iran is focused on intervention in Syria and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and the RRE is focused on the war against Catalandia.

Heart this blog if you like it. If you have comments & questions, chuck them below. Thank you for reading this blog! I hope this is a good submission for the Jetpunkers' Countries Project. It was stressful and also fun to turn one idea into a full blog about a fictional government existing on Earth before GTA6.