Obed A. Wayland

Obed Allen Wayland was a New Cambrian politican and author, who is widely considered to be the second most influential New Cambrian Statesman after Edwin J. Swancoates for his contribution to leading New Cambria to victory during the East Antigonian War, and essentially forming New Cambrian foreign policy for the following 70+ years. At the time he was elected in 1924, he was 49 years old, the youngest New Cambrian president in history at the time. Despite his influence he has received significant criticism in recent years, particularly for supporting Apartheid in Estheria. However many historians claim that his support of Apartheid was not due to racial animus on his behalf, but due to a firm personal belief that imposing such a political shift on Estheria would inevitably cause further conflict with Estheria, something Wayland desperately wanted to avoid.

Wayland died in 1937 of intestinal cancer, and a state funeral was held in his honour and his remains laid to rest in his family cemetary in Swan's Rock, a suburb of his native Scratchley.

Political Career
Wayland began his life as a Whig, due to the upbringing of his Whig parents. When he was 19 he was conscripted into the New Cambrian Provincial Army, and served during the War of 1894, early into the war he was gravely wounded and awarded the Republic Medal for Heroism after being shot in the thigh. His time witnessing the horrors of war led him into a decidedly anti-war stance, and while wounded and unable to serve in combat he took up writing, largely horror fiction inspired by his experiences in the war. He remained in hospital until the end of the war later in 1894.

As a result of the New Cambrian Recession, which occured due to economic collapse after the war, Wayland reexamined his political views. Initially, he thought in the immediate postwar period that affluent people would take on the characteristics of his ideal aristocracy and solve New Cambria's problems. When this did not occur, he became a socialist and began to associate with the then fledgling New Cambrian Labour Party. Despite calling himself a socialist, Wayland opposed the Ostrovic marxism that was developing in Stasnov and Gorbatov, as he thought that a such a revolution would bring about the destruction of New Cambrian civilization. Wayland believed in an intellectual aristocracy which would unite New Cambria as an autonomous country, divorced from its past as the head of the United Provinces of East Antigonia. For his 1924 campaign, he aligned with the Federalists, due to their commitment to an independent New Cambria, as opposed to the revanchism of the Unionist party, which sought to reunite the southern provinces of Estheria by force.

In his 1924 campaign, he advocated governmental control of resource distribution, fewer working hours and a higher wage, and unemployment insurance and old age pensions. He also expressed his belief in the necessity for an oligarchy of intellectuals. He believed that power must be restricted to those who are sufficiently intelligent and educated. Despite his ardent support of an intellectual oligarchy, this never truly was realised, as his "Grand Education Scheme" which was intended to produce a new generation of intellectuals was interrupted by the East Antigonian War and subsequent economic damage made the Education scheme unrealistic and was ultimately cancelled in 1928.

Wayland remains a controversial figure to this day. His reforms were some of the most progressive policies in Atlas at the time, however many have criticised his foreign policy positions, including maintaining apartheid in Estheria and expressing support for Granzerian Vezér Istvan Huszar, although supporters claim that many New Cambrians supported Huszar, and Wayland died before the Second Great War and before many of the atrocities committed by Granzery were uncovered.

East Antigonian War
During the East Antigonian War, Wayland excercised his experience in the War of 1894 and is well-regarded for his leadership during the war. He was said to greatly value the lives of individual New Cambrian soldiers, and through shrewd tactical knowledge and effective leadership was able to lead New Cambria to a conclusive victory. Despite this, he is regarded to have been excessively weak-wristed in postwar peace negotiations, without dismantling any of the racial policies of the Estherian government, saying at the time that his only concern was with maintaining New Cambrian independence and the way of life of New Cambrians. Later in his life he revealed that he feared that excessive penalties on Estheria would only lead to further conflict, something which he wanted to avoid.