Uranus in Aries

[Jim Eshelman]

Here are dates Uranus was in Aries for the last half millennium or so. Perhaps some of you would like to dig through your history books and see what life was like when this happened in the past?

Apr 11 1597 to Dec 20 1597
Jan 5 1598 to Jun 3 1604
Nov 26 1604 to Mar 23 1605

Apr 13 1681 to Dec 9 1681
Jan 15 1682 to Jun 6 1688
Nov 23 1688 to Mar 27 1689

Apr 16 1765 to Dec 7 1765
Jan 21 1766 to Jun 9 1772
Nov 22 1772 to Mar 30 1773

Apr 19 1849 to Dec 3 1849
Jan 27 1850 to Jun 13 1856
Nov 21 1856 to Apr 3 1857

Apr 21 1933 to Dec 3 1933
Jan 30 1934 to Jun 15 1940
Nov 21 1940 to Apr 6 1941

Apr 23 2017 to Dec 1 2017
Feb 2 2018 to Jun 17 2024
Nov 20 2024 to Apr 7 2025

[Jim Eshelman]

I'm starting to review the following time periods. Given a seven-year span, I'm looking for broader trends during that period, and may edit and adjust this post quite a lot.

Apr 21 1933 to Dec 3 1933
Jan 30 1934 to Jun 15 1940
Nov 21 1940 to Apr 6 1941

[Jim Eshelman]

Hitler was Chancellor of Germany from 33-45, and Führer from 34-45. Fascism was kind of a broad trend. And military backed land grabs.

[Jim Eshelman]

I've finished a fairly detailed read of the period 1933-1941 (the exact dates tracked) across most parts of the world, and the commonality of themes is striking. Also, to my surprise, they compress to a short list - very few specific themes.

I expected major issues of economics, government, and probably militarism, and great challenges to the stability of existing alliances; and these are most of what appears - with a particular flavor that becomes obvious when reading across regions.

Yes, fascism was on the rise, and touched almost every region. Besides the obvious areas where it was taking over, we find that Brussels and Switzerland outlawed such activities as the wearing of uniforms by political entities - an effort to shut down fascist groups and pre-groups.

More widely, though, it was an acute tension almost every where between fascism and socialism - or political elements that, if more extreme, would have emerged as overtly fascist or socialist. It was more than the usual left vs. right tension - it was a seesaw and struggle between extreme right and extreme left.

Politically it was a hugely volatile, unstable time. Having come through most of the normalization after WW I, Europe in particular was newly sorting out its future. Nations were reinventing themselves and their governments, with the two large competing waves sweeping through. Then along comes the worldwide Great Depression, forcing the hands of governments to find new ways to cope and stirring extreme unrest in economically hurting populations.

I read through the shifts and reshuffles in Europe and then remember that the new Uranus transit of Aries will overlay Brexit. I fear the EU has very significant challenges ahead.

Economics had a distinctly nationalistic feel. England, after attempting a world economic conference that failed, dove deeper into pointedly nationalistic economics, "Buy British," aggressively shoring up against trade inequities. One (to me) positive outcome is that more smaller countries became more aggressive in forging country-by-country trade deals. But throughout the time, there was the feeling that economics, and trade in particular, were on a fulcrum.

One very interesting phase of the read-through was turning to the U.S. after reading about Europe. Superficially, it was a quite opposite picture, but actually it showed similar themes. This was the most aggressive time of New Deal programs, the establishment of social security, and more. It was easily the most aggressively socialist pe3riod in U.S. history, not eclipsed to this day. What gradually became clear, though, is that the state of "emergency powers" had this socialism emerging in a nearly autocratic way, particularly with the government (mostly by signing the checks) gaining more and more dominion over economic and social issues. In American and Europe in particular, common themes repeated many times centered on extraordinary powers being granted rulers or presidents due to a state of unremitting emergency. It was as if, absent a state of war, there was nonetheless a suspension of checks and balances on autocracy that normally only accompanies an imposition of martial law.

For this period, then, these are the main themes - instability of economy especially with regard to trade (with an autistic nationalization of perspective), rearmament, actual and virtual dictators as checks and balances are suspended as if in a state of continuing emergency, increasingly polarization and struggle between increasingly extreme Let and Right expressions, etc.

Nicely summarizing this is a label given to this period by some historians. After WW I, there was a Period of Settlement (1919-1924), and a Period of Fulfillment (10924-1930). However, the period from 1930-1939 is sometimes called the Period of Repudiation & Revision.

Now... on to the 17th Century.

[Jim Eshelman]

Next, I'm turning to this period (because it's the one I wrote down before I left the house):

Apr 13 1681 to Dec 9 1681
Jan 15 1682 to Jun 6 1688
Nov 23 1688 to Mar 27 1689

I didn't get much out of this... partly, there aren't a lot of details from that period compared to more recent ones; party because ordinary political life of the time was a lot more like the autocratic 1930s.

But one thing stood out... not sure if it's relevant, but I'll see if similar patterns show in other periods. Instead of the fascism vs. socialism polarization, there was an acute division (at the level of civil wars and other wars) between Protestantism and Catholicism. Is there a similar acute polarization in all Uranus in Aries periods?

[Jim Eshelman]

Let's move on to the 19th Century.

Apr 19 1849 to Dec 3 1849
Jan 27 1850 to Jun 13 1856
Nov 21 1856 to Apr 3 1857

After reading through England and some smaller countries, I was thinking I might not find anything that seemed relevant at all. Then I got to France: The Second Republic existed from 1848-1852, and the authoritarian Second Empire from then until 1860.

After Louis Philippe's abdication in early 1848, the people proclaimed a left-leaning republic. Eventually, a new constitution was adopted that seems surprisingly autocratic given the liberal populism in ascendancy: It had a single legislature and a very strong presidency, an office to which Napoleon's nephew, Prince Louis Napoleon, was soon elected by a landslide. Within a month of his assuming office, he had forced the assembly to vote its own dissolution. A series of further steps were taken to narrow and impede voting rights. After several turns Louis Napoleon was given the power to draft a new constitution, giving the chief of state him "free and unfettered authority," including total command of the military, the ability to unilaterally make laws, etc. By early 1852 he was crowned Emperor Napoleon III. This autocratic rule continued beyond the time Uranus was in Aries.

Many other countries were creating new constitutions. It seemed to be the mark of the times. Switzerland and Germany were two other significant examples, and the Austrian Empire emerged beginning right on schedule in 1849. I have no trouble seeing this as a solidly authoritarian seven years.
I notice, as in the 20th Century examples, that this extensive authority was granted to him, more than taken by him.

Italy was another matter. Until 1848, Italy had always been a set of separate states that were then, in the middle of the 19th century, forged into a single nation. Within days of Uranus first entering Aries, guerrilla leader Giuseppe Garibaldi emerged powerfully on the scene to resist forces then in control. From 1849 to 1870 he led the fight to unify Italy. Count Cavour was the strong man in the first several years, holding the office of premier from 1852-1859.

Russia was on the march westward, conquering new territories; but the reign of Alexander II beginning in 1855 is considered a time of reforms favoring the people, eventually liberating the serfs (but not until Uranus and moved well into Taurus).

In the United States, of course, 1849 marked the discovery of gold in California with a resulting rush west, admission of California as a free state, and administrative organization of the rest of the western territories. Here the polarity being fought out was over slavery, and the Compromise of 1850 fought out the issue in part by establishing a more effective fugitive slave law. This was replaced by the Kansas-Nebraska Act in 1854 - ongoing efforts to resolve the slavery polarization issues, culminating in the pernicious Dred Scott decision by the Supreme Court mere days before Uranus left Aries.

[Jim Eshelman]

Next...

Apr 16 1765 to Dec 7 1765
Jan 21 1766 to Jun 9 1772
Nov 22 1772 to Mar 30 1773

The French and Indian War was newly ended (a continuation of the Seven Years War from Europe), but this (by one reckoning) started the onramp to the American Revolution. England's progressively distasteful economic and legal demands on its colonies intensified during these years.

[Jim Eshelman]

I guess that only leaves...

Apr 11 1597 to Dec 20 1597
Jan 5 1598 to Jun 3 1604
Nov 26 1604 to Mar 23 1605

This was the late Elizabethan period and the years immediately following, which of course were filled with strong imperial control and nasty political infighting. It was also a time of enlightened thinking prevailing and often coming into conflict with authority. In theory, the Fama Fraternitatis was written in the last year or so of this time, though it wasn't published until Uranus was well into Taurus.

Both in England and France (this being in the heart of the Protestant Reformation), conflicting rights between Catholics and Protestants was a huge issue over which wars were fought. In France, it was the Edict of Nantes that tried to resolve this; in England, the challenge of my ancestors, the Stuarts, to Elizabeth's throne.

[Jim Eshelman]

Apr 13 1681 to Dec 9 1681
Jan 15 1682 to Jun 6 1688
Nov 23 1688 to Mar 27 1689

I didn't get much overall either.

But one thing stood out... not sure if it's relevant, but I'll see if similar patterns show in other periods. Instead of the fascism vs. socialism polarization, there was an acute division (at the level of civil wars and other wars) between Protestantism and Catholicism. Is there a similar acute polarization in all Uranus in Aries periods?

This was also when Christian Catholic forces set out to destroy (their words & their intention) the Ottoman Turks, and the Ottoman Empire, which, in my opinion, is one of the major causes of the hatred of Europeans there today, and has led, in direct cause and effect to Isis backed attacks in the US today.

[Jim Eshelman]

Interesting. - There does seem to be, in each case, a prevailing polarity, each side extreme and mostly intractable. I didn't expect this, but find it is exactly opposite the Libra idea of coordinated, equilibrated opposites. It is opposition with little sense of opportunity for reconciliation, and they are all epochal: fascism vs. socialism, opposite views of slavery, Protestant vs. Catholic, each in its era.

But that's a side issue, or a context. The authoritarian elements, the willingness of a nation to turn extreme and (we normally would think) unreasonable power over to a solitary individual, usually due to a persistent state of emergency... this is kind of scary compared to what we see outside our windows right now. Economic autism, divorcing of historic alliances and allegiances. I'll write this up as better summary when I get the time, but it all seems to be there in my original piece from last night about the '30s.

One of the reasons we didn't see so much in the 17th Century, I think, is that some of these themes were more natural to the time. To oversimplify, Uranus in Aries brings back the kings and gives us autocrats and near-autocrats (look at Turkey's recent elections). Well, in the 17th Century we already had those, they were normal fare. It isn't surprising that Queen Elizabeth I was on the throne and ruling autocratically in her time, or that there was a political and armed battle to win her successorship. That's the way things were. Same way 64 years later.

I forgot to mention other king issue in the '30s. There was the drama of Edward VIII, who gained and surrendered his throne within the same year. There is more to this than the romantic element, of course; he'd been an early believer that Hitler was a good leader, and one that England and other countries should support. That not only started looking less likely, but also became highly unpopular. This was not an era when England's monarchy was strong - the democratization had prevailed, and the actual power of the throne had waned considerably. Yet the (I might say) spiritual power of the throne remained (and remains) enormous, and England required a king to bring it through. One might say that they needed a good, stern, in-charge father; and that, too, seems the spirit of many of the other periods.

[Jim Eshelman]

Here is my (for now) final summary of all of this - my current interpretation of Uranus in Aries:

A volatile time politically, with issues of economics, government, and accelerated armament. Great challenges to the stability of existing alliances: Acute polarization splits former allies (whether individuals, social groups, or nations) along new axes. Widespread dissatisfaction fuels repudiation of views and values closely held historically. Each such era feels, while people are passing through it, like a transitions between an old cycle that is concluding and a new one going forward.

As an unyielding, unremitting sense of emergency exists, autocratic governance increases. Extraordinary autocratic power is yielded (voluntarily granted) to national leaders, who acquire increasing dominion of economic and social issues. Armament, safety, going one's way alone without the encumbrances of alliances... these win out over the demand for personal liberty and social egality. It is as if, absent a state of war, there is nonetheless a suspension of checks and balances on autocracy that is normal to martial law. The masses seem more comfortable with a stern, authoritarian father figure to "make everything OK."

Increasing polarization and struggle between opposing extremes - each historic period has its own example, whether it be arising fascism vs. socialism (or political elements that, if more extreme, would have emerged as overtly fascist or socialist, extremism of right vs. left), opposing views on slavery, or Catholic vs. Protestant wars, to name a few examples.

Economics (especially trade) are unstable, in a precarious balance. Economics policies become more nationalistic and autistic, increasingly protective, to defend against trade inequities and competition imbalances. Extreme unrest in economically hurting populations.

[Jim Eshelman]

Do you believe that the upcoming Jupiter transit into Libra in September may help to mitigate (or, since Uranus would still be very early in Aries: delay) the above effects, especially with the "extreme polarisation" and the breaking of past/historical alliances?

I don't see one planet's sign transit mitigating another. I see it adding more things to the mix.

Having not studied historic placements of Jupiter in Libra, I can only guess what it means. When it enters in September, I'll probably start historic research. One might think (probably what you're thinking) that it could enhance diplomacy, etc. I doubt (just from understanding the state of politics) that it will stabilize checks and balances, as nice as that symbolism is.

One might ask what Jupiter in Virgo has provided. Nothing comes to mind besides the "victory of the common worker" theme of the last election. At least, that's the Madison Avenue version of what came down. There are so many traditional Virgo themes that have done quite poorly this year, from healthcare to real care for the common, middleclass, working class folks. I have poor hopes for general social welfare.

ADDENDUM. Most lawyers are Libras. I would speculate that Jupiter in Libra shows heightened prosperity for more lawyers, especially in Big Law. If that is so, then expect highly advantageous legal victories for large corporations, accelerated merges and acquisitions, deeper inroads into monetization of novel entertainment avenues, and... perhaps especially... more lobbyists. In Washington, most lobbyists are attorneys, although there also are separate companies and individuals (still: most are attorneys). In theory, Jupiter in Libra is more about lawyers than the courts, and the general tone is "using the law for all good things for everyone" - but, in practice, I suspect "the good of everyone" will mean "the good of the wealthy."

[Jim Eshelman]

Uranus is back in Aries. This time for good. (Well, at least until 2024.)

Here we go...