1931: Britain's Financial Change of Direction and a New Social Order
by Jude Cowell
Many of the historical events of 1931 are significant and a few of them stand out to me such as the 'United Kingdom abandons the gold standard' on September 20/21, 1931 under the influence of the 5 Old South Series (chart shown, below) which ended on September 11, 1931 (in the US; September 12th in the UK).
Oddly enough, 40 years later in the US, Dick Nixon took the US off the gold standard in 1971, the year the 9 Old South Series ended with a final solar manifestation @29Cancer on July 22, 1971. (Perhaps astrologers were involved!)
Inconveniently, I have no information concerning 5 Old South eclipse themes which ran in the background of society in 1931, but I do have a bit concerning 1971's 9 Old South themes: 'idealism, great energy', and/or 'reunions' (B. Brady). However, the initial eclipse in the 9 Old South Series, which began on June 23, 727 OS @4Can16 (conjunct what would become America's 1776 Venus and Jupiter positions), also contains hints of 'quarrels' and 'perverse inclinations' (BB). Could the 'reunion' be American bankers joining British bankers off the gold standard? Just a thought.
So for readers interested in financial topics, here's a pdf from 2012 by Michael Kitson of Cambridge University concerning the advantages (or not) of utilizing the gold standard, titled, End of an Epoch. Perhaps you're familiar with Kitson's work but if not, there it is.
Now I suppose a posting of the the final 5 Old South Eclipse Horoscope for September 1931 would ideally be set for London but since this is Stars Over Washington, below is the September 11, 1931 eclipse chart set for DC, as we always called the capital city when I resided there many moons ago.
Notably, financier Jupiter is in Sun-ruled Leo, the sign of gold, wealth-hoarder Pluto is in the financial 2nd house in business-oriented Cancer, and there's a deceptive if creative Mercury-Neptune conjunction in Virgo with Mercury retrograde in 3rd house of Communications, near the IC of the horoscope. In the 5th house of Speculation and Risk-Taking is Mars in Libra where the planet of energy, motivation, and action can express himself with too much frankness which can cause conflicts in relationships.
Then as you see, the disruptive, 'change of direction', 'cosmic blink' Solar Eclipse itself is posited in the 4th house @19Virgo (near US 1776 Neptune in Virgo, sign of Work, Employment, Service, and Health), a placement which was opposed by transit Neptune in 2020 from contagious, secretive Pisces, and suggests that Britain's financial 'change of direction' in 1931 affected the US economy as well which would be naturally expected between the two nations:
As you see, a dynamic T-Square between the harsh Saturn-Pluto opposition (across the avaricious Cancer-Capricorn axis of investment, business, and ambition) squares erratic, disruptive Uranus Rx in Mars-ruled Aries (in 11th house in DC but revealingly in the corporate 8th house in London). Now even by itself, Uranus in Aries denotes potentials for 'blind zeal, fanaticism, violence', plus, Utopian idealism and can indicate radical political reform. Add both Saturn and Pluto squaring the planet of anarchy, Utopianism, and war, and a dangerous mix results replete with negative karma. Years of financial mismanagement is suggested (which I believe there was).
Many of the karmic Saturn-Pluto-Uranus trio's variety of potential expressions are listed on the chart lower right and across the bottom of the chart but I'll type them for you here, mainly because they imply that it was not only in the financial realms that turmoil and upheaval were occurring in 1931, and suggest, of course, the rise of despotism and tyranny which tends to have an easier time gaining a claw-hold when a Uranus-Pluto square is in force which suggests apathy in society, and a Saturn-Uranus square forms which denotes a period when an old order can give way to a new order:
'Sudden violence; mass murder; harsh conditions; cruelty; poverty; power plays at the top'; "brutal efforts to start a new order" (Tyl).
So as you know, dear reader, society has been under the influence of such planetary squares in our day as well, first between Uranus and Pluto, now between Saturn and Uranus, as tyranny and totalitarianism challenge Democracy in the US and in various locations across the globe. You'll recognize the tendencies of certain anarchists toward blind zealotry and acts of violence for they're easy to spot along within the concurrence of similar attitudes and objectives from the 1930s brought into our era as 'fascism' attempts again to take control of society, particularly in America. After all, if America should fall, so goes the rest of the world.
The Social and Economic Order of the 1930s
Then revealingly, another highly influential event occurred in 1931 (May 15th), especially among those of a Catholic persuasion, which relates to the above topic squarely within the economic realms of society, and this was the encyclical Quadragesimo anno (the 'reconstruction of the social order') issued by Pope Pius XI in which he dicusses "the ethical implications of the social and economic order" and "the major dangers" "arising from unrestrained capitalism, socialism, and totalitarian communism." Well, yes. The Vatican hierarchy does interfere at times - certainly in the Nazi era with the church's famous capitulation in 1933.
In closing, and if you wish, follow the above link for more 1931 events which may grab your fancy with other 'endings and new starts' among them.
