The Referendum on Scottish Independence

In our discussion evening yesterday Kris and I looked at the forthcoming referendum, to be held in Scotland on September 18th 2014, which asks the following simple question: Should Scotland be an independent country?

We looked at plenty of horoscopes that Kris had prepared, including those of England (the coronation of William The Conqueror in 1066), Scotland (the coronation of Malcolm II in 1005), The 1707 Act of Union and the disastrous Darien Scheme that led to it, as well as the charts of the SNP, Alex Salmond and the New Scotland, should it be voted for. In addition, we looked at the two previous Scottish devolution referenda in 1979 and 1997, the latter of which gave rise to the Scottish Parliament which was opened in July 1999.

It was notable how little transit activity there will be in September in the country charts, though quite a lot in Alex Salmond's personal horoscope.

Finally, we examined the chart cast for the close of polling on the day of the referendum, set for Edinburgh (shown below). Given that the chart ruler, Mercury, is a fitting planet for the act of putting a cross on a paper, and is in democratic Libra, the chart would seem to be radical, i.e. appropriate for the event in question.

Those present noted the Jupiter-Uranus trine in fire signs - a positive indication of a 'yes' vote, set against the idealistic but rather scattered Mars-Neptune square in Sagittarius/Pisces. Both of these outer planet aspects are applying (building up in energy) in the days before the referendum. In addition, Uranus, symbolising independence, is perhaps unfortunately placed in a fairly wide conjunction with the Moon's South Node, perhaps symbolising the perception that the spirit of independence might also be linked to a hankering for the past.

The Moon, symbolising The People in a mundane horoscope, is strong in its own sign of Cancer, suggesting that security and the future of their families will be paramount in people's minds when they come to vote. It was also noted that the chart ruler Mercury is in the sign of reasoned judgment, Libra, indicating that many people are undecided, as they try to weigh up the arguments in a rational way based on facts. However, Mercury's square to the Moon shows that strong feelings will influence or even get in the way of purely rational decisions.

Once we concluded our discussion of all the charts in question, the audience was then asked to vote with a show of hands on whether they thought Scotland would leave the United Kingdom. The result was a unanimous 'no', though most agreed that the result would be very close, thanks to the ruling planet being in Libra, the sign of perfect balance. It must be noted that the audience was predominantly English, so this may have biased the result.