Leland Newton

Leland Newton was one of the two Consuls of Atlantis at the time of the Atlantean Servile Insurrection. Newton hailed from Croydon. He was a lawyer by trade, and had served as a senator before his election to Consul. Like many politicians in Atlantis, Newton could claim Edward Radcliffe as a distant ancestor.

Newton was strongly anti-slavery. This brought him into frequent conflict with his Co-Consul, Jeremiah Stafford, a slave-holder from Cosquer. When the Insurrection broke out, Newton used his veto powers to prevent the deployment of the Atlantean Army, much to Stafford's frustration. Newton's decision was reasonably popular in the northern half of the country, and reviled in the southern half.

When Stafford attempted to subvert the system by unofficially condoning the Ministry of War's decision to release southern Atlanteans from their duties, so that they in turn might join the local militias that were fighting the insurrection, the information came to Newton, when imprudent Ministry officials bragged of it in a restaurant. Newton immediately acted to stop this process.

However, after some weeks of insurrection, Newton was convinced to intervene militarily by Senator Hiram Radcliffe, who feared that without federal intervention, the governments of the southern states might allow harsher reprisals against the rebels, which could in turn cause even more bloodshed and racial stratification. Newton agreed, and he and Stafford took the field.