United States of America

The United States of America is a nation comprised of 150 states located in America. The US shares its only land border with Azalia.

The US is the world's premier superpower. Founded during the American Revolution, the US quickly annexed British North America, and soon expanded west, and with the Messico War the US annexed the nation once known as Messico. The US soon grew to cover the entire American continent, and the Italian-American War established the nation as a superpower, a status it fully took following World War I and World War II. America's role in World War III destroyed its rival, the Soviet Union, ended the Cold War, and left the US fully in charge of the world.

A federal republic, the current President is Donald Trump, a Republican from New York. The US is the founder of the Atlantic Military Defense Alliance.

The US itself covers nearly the entire American Continent, with only one land border: Azalia. The US shares maritime borders with the Meridia Federation, Trinidad Empire, Bahama Kingdom.

History
Full Article and links: History of the United States

American Revolution And Early History
Full Articles: American Revolution, New Holland Uprising

The American Revolutionary War fought by the Thirteen Colonies against the British Empire was the first successful war of independence against a European power. Americans had developed an ideology of "republicanism", asserting that government rested on the will of the people as expressed in their local legislatures. They demanded their "rights as Englishmen" and "no taxation without representation". The British insisted on administering the empire through Parliament, and the conflict escalated into war.

The Second Continental Congress unanimously adopted the Declaration of Independence, which recognized in a long preamble that their unalienable rights were not being protected by Great Britain. Delegates from the New Holland colonies of New Friesland and Newfoundland did attend, but were unable to get any progress to their freedom from the Dutch. The fourth day of July is celebrated annually as Independence Day: "... where, heretofore, the words 'United Colonies' have been used, the stile be altered for the future to the 'United States'". In 1777, the Articles of Confederation established a decentralized government that operated until 1789.

Following the decisive Franco-American victory at Yorktown in 1781, Britain signed the peace treaty of 1783, and American sovereignty was internationally recognized and the country was granted all lands east of the Mississippi River. Nationalists led the Philadelphia Convention of 1787 in writing the United States Constitution, ratified in state conventions in 1788. On July 3, 1787 delegates from New Friesland, New Limburg, New Brabant, and Newfoundland arrived in Philadelphia and were welcomed into Liberty Hall, but were forbidden from signing anything. The federal government was reorganized into three branches, on the principle of creating salutary checks and balances, in 1789. George Washington, who had led the Continental Army to victory, was the first president elected under the new constitution. The Bill of Rights, forbidding federal restriction of personal freedoms and guaranteeing a range of legal protections, was adopted in 1791.

In November of 1792, New Holland formally seceded from the Dutch Empire, leading to a panic in the infant United States, for, the Dutch would not take kindly to the US if they helped the New Hollanders. None the less, American militias assisted the New Hollanders, and the Dutch, facing economic ruin and a possible war with America's ally France if this continued, granted the New Holland colonies independence on March 12, 1793. The colonies promptly joined the United States.

Expansion, War and Good Feelings
Full Articles: 1800 United States Presidential Election, Westerly War, Messico-American War

As the 1800s began, things began to change. The 1800 Presidential Election saw the first peaceful transition of power between opposing factions in history as incumbent President John Adams of the Federalist Party was defeated by Thomas Jefferson of the Democratic-Republican Party, beginning a major political realignment and ushering in a generation of Democratic-Republican leadership.

In 1801, as Napoleon Bonaparte of France was embroiled in war against his enemies, he agreed to sell the sizable Louisiana Territory to the United States, as the funding would help in his war efforts. The territory itself stretched from the Mississippi River all the way to the Rocky Mountains and up into the Western Plains. President Jefferson was please by the deal he received, and sent explorers Merriweather Lewis and William Clark. The two embarked on the famed Lewis and Clark Expedition, reaching all the way to the modern Pacific Ocean in present-day Cascadia. In 1804, President Jefferson was re-elected in a landslide against former Ambassador and General Charles Pinckney.

In 1808, James Madison was elected President. He soon had to deal with the brief "Quasi-War" with Great Britain over American ships being seized by Britain. The issue was resolved peacefully by 1811, and the rest of Madison's Presidency was generally peaceful thanks to the "Era of Good Feelings" brought on by a sharp rise of American Nationalism.

In 1816, James Monroe was elected President. He oversaw the annexation of The Strip, an area of land at the very north of Westerly that contained valuable iron deposits. President Monroe was re-elected in a near unanimous landslide in 1820. The Missouri Compromise, meant to deal with slavery, was passed in 1820, with the admission of Missouri as a Slave State and Maine as a Free State, and a "line" was established at the bottom of the Missouri border. At that line, slave states could only be below that line.

The Era of Good Feelings would come to a crashing end in 1824, with the 1824 Election. Four different Democratic-Republicans ran, none gaining a majority in the popular vote or electoral collage. With this, a Contingent Election was held in the House of Representatives, and Vice President Daniel Tompkins was selected. The election marked the end of the Democratic-Republicans and the rise of the Whigs and Democrats.

President Tompkins himself sided with the "New Republican" party, but lost the 1828 election in a landslide to General Andrew Jackson of the Democrats. President Jackson oversaw the moving of American Indians westward, the annexation of Alaska, and the establishment of the United States Expansion Corps formed solely to gain more land. In 1831, the Westerly War began. Between 1800 and 1831, many followers of the Mormon religion established in 1780 had moved to the Westerly region to avoid religious persecution in the US or Spain/Messico. They had established the "Free Kingdom of Westerly" under their banner and their religion. To President Jackson, this was unacceptable, as he saw Westerly as a key region needed by the United States for safety and security.

On August 4 1831 President Jackson ordered US troops to enter the Westerly Kingdom (or "bastard country", as he called it), take all key cities, and execute the leaders. US troops began a three pronged attack heading for Deseret City, the capital (now known as Kaiser City). The war ended in three weeks, as the Westerly army was not well trained or equipped. With that, the Westerly Kingdom was annexed into the United States.

President Jackson won re-election in 1832 in a landslide. In 1836, Whig Senator Henry Clay defeated Democratic Vice President Martin Van Buren. President Clay stayed as a mostly-hands off President, allowing Congress to do most of the governing. However, the Panic of 1837 damaged Clay's reputation, and he lost re-nomination to Senator James Colfax. Colfax narrowly won the general election against Martin Van Buren. Colfax oversaw the annexation of the Texas Republic into the Union, which angered some Whigs as they say it as a way to add a large slave state into the Union. The annexation angered Messico, and war looked imminent.

Not wanting to be a war leader, President Colfax chose not to run for a second term, and the Whigs nominated Clay. Clay ended up losing the 1844 election to Democrat William Dabney.

President Dabney desperately wanted war with Messico, and ordered troops to defend Texas and prepare for an invasion of Messico soon. By August of 1845, The US had declared war on Messico. War was brief, and Messico was defeated by January of 1847, and it was annexed. Dabney looked on the road to a second term, but shockingly died in office on August 27. He was succeeded by his Vice President, Harold Walter Witt.

President Witt oversaw the creation of multiple new territories, and the admission of California as a Free State, despite it technically being under the Missouri Compromise line. This angered Congressional Democrats, who then began pushing to repeal the Compromise and replace it with "Popular Sovereignty" laws.

President Witt attempted to win a second term in the 1848 election, but lost to Whig Leroy Lynfield. President Lynfield did not take a stance on slavery, despite it becoming more and more unpopular. The admission of multiple northern states left the South outnumbered, and anger and resentment was growing. Lynfield decided to pack "Popular Sovereignty" laws, which would allow each new territory to vote on slavery when they drafted their state Constitutions. The first territories to try this were Absaroka and the Lake Weston Territory. Predictably, thousands of pro- or anti-slavery settlers flocked to the territories to swing the vote one way or the other. And predictably, once they came up against one and other, violence ensured.

President Lynfield did little to try to quell the violence, which got worse when Senator Harry Fillmore of Indiana was giving a speech against slavery in the Senate, and Senator Adam Jenson of New Friesland, angered, pulled a revolver on Fillmore. Multiple Senators leaped to pull the men away from each other, all while Fillmore yelled "I have no weapons, let him fire, let him gun me down, make me a martyr!" Jenson was reprimanded, but was not expelled from the Senate. This entire situation was watched by Vice President Hubert J. Masterson.

President Lynfield, understanding the road America was going down, chose not to run for a second term, and the Whig nominee of General Winfield Scott lost the 1852 election to Senator William C. Gates. President Gates believed that further compromise could suppress the situation. He believed, wrongly, that slavery would eventually die out as slavery ran out of new places to move. This was false, as slavery was no-longer just used for cash crops anymore, instead, slavery in the south was just beginning to be used in factories in cities like Houston, New Leiden, Newport, and New Amsterdam.

In 1854, President Gates proposed to Congress the Compromise of 1854, which would re-establish the Missouri compromise but instead make all new states to the south of the line slave states. However, even then, the South would likely quickly run out of land for more slave states while the North had plenty of land to spare. The Compromise was still supported in the South, but was shot down by the North after the 1854 midterms gave the decaying Whigs and new Republican Party a majority in Congress.

In the 1856 election, three candidates ran, former Vice President Hubert Masterson for the Whigs, General John C. Fremont for the Republicans, and President Gates for the Democrat. The split Whig/Republican vote allowed Gates to narrowly win, but the trend was obvious. The Republicans were absorbing more and more Whigs, and won 35% of the seats in the Senate and 46% in the House.

Gates still pushed for compromise, but rapidly began to understand that compromise couldn't solve the problem. He soon understood that the country was heading into war. The last few years of his presidency were racked by violence across the nation as pro and anti slavery militias clashed. The 1860 election was the finally kicker. In 1859, the Franklin-Appalachia Act, split the formerly slave state of Appalachia into two, with the southern half, named Franklin (ironically in honor of Ben Franklin, a strong opponent to slavery) a slave holding state, and the remaining northern half a free state. [[File:1860ElectionMap.png|thumb|311x311px|1860 Election Map:

Blue: Lincoln

Yellow: Bell

Purple: Douglas

Red: Morrando

Gray: Territories]] Four candidates ran in 1860. Abraham Lincoln for the Republicans, Vice President Landon Morrando for the Southern Democrats, Senator Stephen Douglas for the Northern Democrats, and John Bell for the new Constitutional Union Party, which advocated for compromise. Douglas took Kansas, Newfoundland, and a single delegate from Delaware. Bell took Carolina, Virginia, Kentucky, New Limburg and Arkansas, and Morrando took the rest of the South, while Lincoln took all of the North and the new western states.

The election could be interpreted many ways. A "Slave conspiracy" Northern might think the nation voted for slavery by three to one (everybody but Lincoln) while a paranoid Southerner might think the nation voted against slavery by three to one (everyone but Morrando).

Lincoln won the election, and this was the spark that lit the fire.

Civil War
Full Article: American Civil War

With the 1860 election of Abraham Lincoln, the first president from the largely anti-slavery Republican Party, conventions in twenty slave states ultimately declared secession and formed the Confederate States of America (the "South"), while the federal government (the "Union") maintained that secession was illegal. Secessionists representatives from the 20 slave states, met in Newport, Florida, which became the capital of the CSA for the duration of the war.

President Lincoln on his inauguration day stated that secession was illegal and that a peaceful solution could be found. However, the south began seizing federal property across the south, and one such property they wanted was Fort Zomer in New Friesland. However, the island fort's staff refused to surrender the fort, and when Confederate soldiers fired on a supply shipment to it, President Lincoln declared war on the Confederacy and marked it as a rebellion.

First, he ordered a Union blockade of the South, then sent out a call for 100,000 volunteers, and men signed up. Droves of men, eager to put down the rebels, signed up.

Reconstruction & Post-War Nation
Reconstruction of the South began in 1865. The South was punished hard, and many of its leaders and soldiers were executed. Slowly, the states were re-admitted. In 1868, General Ulysses S. Grant was elected President as a Republican. President Grant took over reconstruction, and by his re-election in 1872, all states had been re-admitted.

President Grant was succeeded in the 1876 election by Republican Herbert Minthorn. President Minthorn continued keeping federal troops in the south to ensure the rights of freemen were upheld. President Minthorn was assassinated in 1880 during his re-election by an angry communist. This was the first presidential assassination in history. Vice President Cecil Lodge took over but declined to run for a second term. He was succeeded in 1881 by Republican Wendell Cooper. President Cooper signed the Communist Act, banning communism from the United States.

President Cooper oversaw many industrial improvements in the United States. He won re-election in 1884 against Democratic Grover Harold Crawley. Crawley ran again in the 1888 election, and won a victory over Vice President Norbert Lynn by one electoral vote. Crawley would end up losing re-election in 1892 to Republican Walter Strauss. President Strauss ended up dying of blood poisoning in 1897. He was succeeded by his Vice President William Lott. President Lott signed the Edmunds Anti-Polygamy Act in 1898, but chose not to run for a second term and was succeeded by Theodore Roosevelt in 1901.

The New Century
Full Articles: Italian-American War, Azalian Civil War,

In 1902, President Roosevelt declared war on Italy after the USS Maine was sunk in St. Martin Harbor in Santo Domingo. The war was brief and the US defeated Italy, taking Santo Domingo and the Philippine Islands. President Roosevelt won re-election in 1904. In 1908, Republican James J. Jackson was elected. President Jackson sent the US to defend the democratic government in Azalia during the Azalian Civil War.

President Jackson won re-election in 1912. In 1916, Democrat Ronald T. Thaddeus was elected President. He then sent the US to fight in WWI.

World War I
Full Article: World War I

The US participated in World War I, and turned the tide of the stalemate against Sweden.

Roaring Twenties
President Thaddeus lost re-election to Ross Mahoney of the Christian Democrats, the first and only third party candidate to win a Presidential Election. However, President Mahoney was impeached and arrested in 1922 on charges of treason and was succeeded by Democratic House Speaker Victor Aaronson. President Aaronson, never interested in the Presidency, did not run for re-election in 1924, and was succeeded by Republican Calvin Coolidge.

Thanks to President Coolidge, the economy was good and many advances in technology -such as movies, radio, and cars- made the 1920s a decade of enjoyment and happiness, helped by rising incomes, low taxes and a great economy. President Coolidge won a landslide re-election in 1928 against Democrat Al Smith of New York. In 1929, the Stock Market crashed, however, thanks to President Coolidge cutting taxes and removing regulations, the economy quickly got back on its feet.

Europan Depression
Despite the American Stock Market crash quickly being fixed, in Europa, the Stock Market headquartered in Frankfurt, Germany, crashed on March 7, 1931. The effects of the crash spread across Europa, however, the US was mostly insulated from the crash. Vice President Warren Harding was elected President in 1932.

President Harding sought to distance America from the affairs of Europa.

Geography
Full Article: Geography of the United States

The United States is located on the American Continent. It is bordered to the south by Azalia. The US has a vast variety of biomes, from thick forests to deserts to mountains to jungles to tundra. The coastal plain of the Atlantic seaboard gives way further inland to thick forests and rolling hills. the Appalachian Mountains divide the Eastern Seaboard from the Great Lakes and the Grasslands of the Midwest.

Wildlife
the US is one of 18 megadiverse countries containing a large amount of flora and fauna, about 19,000 species of vascular planets occur in the continental United States. The United States is home to 500 mammal species, 843 bird species, 402 reptile species, and 300 amphibian species, as well as around 100,000 insect species.

There are 70 national parks and hundreds of other federally managed parks, forests, and wilderness areas.

Government
Full Articles: Government of the United States, List of States and Territories of the United States

The United States is the world's oldest surviving federation. It is a federal republic and a representative democracy "in which majority rule is tempered by minority rights protected by law."

In the American federalist system, citizens are usually subject to three levels of government: federal, state, and local. The local government's duties are commonly split between county and municipal governments. In almost all cases, executive and legislative officials are elected by a plurality vote of citizens by district.

Every 4 years Americans vote for their President. In total, the US has had 45 Presidents over her lifetime.

Political Divisions
The United States is a country of 150 states, 6 commonwealths, 10 territories and 1 federal district. Originally, there were 17 states, comprising the original 17 British Colonies. In 1793, the US was doubled in size with the addition of the New Holland Colonies, adding a total of five new states to the Union. The US would then nearly double in size with the purchase of the Louisiana Territory from France in 1801. By 1900, the US had 70 states, and by 1960 would have 150 with the addition of Alaska, Hawaii and Micronesia as states in 1959.

Each US state holds territory over a defined geographical location.

Parties and Elections
The US operates under a mainly two-party system. Since the Presidential Election of 1856, the two major parties have been the Democratic Party, founded in 1824, and the Republican Party, founded in 1854. Several smaller parties do exist, however, to date, only one third party candidate -Ross Mahoney- has ever won a national election.

The two main parties are officially big tent parties, with the Republican Party encompassing the right and the Democratic Party encompassing the left. Third parties such as the Libertarian Party, or Constitutional Union Party identify with the right wing, while the Green Party and Unity Party identify with the left wing.

Republican Donald Trump, winner of the 2016 and 2020 elections, is the 45th and current President. Leadership in the Senate includes Vice President Chris Ford, President Pro Tempore Ted Cruz, Majority Leader Josh Hawley, and Minority Leader Joe Biden. Leadership in the House includes Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy, Majority Leader Steve Scalise, and Minority Leader Steny Hoyer.

In the 117th Congress, the House of Representatives and Senate are controlled by the Republican Party, and the "Conservative Coalition" with the Libertarians and Constitutional Union holds an even greater control of Congress.

Diplomatic Relations
Full Article: United States Diplomatic Relations, Atlantic Military Defense Alliance

The United States maintains diplomatic relations with nearly every nation on Earth, with the exception of the Tajiakistan Republic and Bukoza State. The US is a founding member of the Atlantic Military Defense Alliance and is a founding member of the Organization of Ameridian States, Terra Assembly, and Pacific Alliance.

Population
The US has a population of 611 million people as of 2020.

Language
The official language of the United States is English. A small minority of people in the True South speak Spanish as a second language, and many small groups across the United States speak other languages, including Chinese, German, French, and Indian.

Religion
The First Amendment of the United States Constitution protects the right to freedom of religion. Christianity is the most common religion and over 75% of the population practices it.

Race and Ethnicity
The most common race in the United States is Caucasoid White, with over 80% of the population being of this race. Other major racial groups include African-American at 10%, Asian at 6%, and Hispanic at 4%.

Economy
The US is a laissez-faire capitalist economy with a GDP of 26.5 trillion.

Income, Poverty & Wealth
According to the International Monetary Fund, Americans posses 35% of the world's wealth, the largest share for any country in the world. Americans also make up roughly half the world's population of millionaires. The Global Food Security Index ranked the US number one for food affordability and overall food security in March 2013. Americans on average have more than twice as much living space per dwelling and per person as EC residents.

Science and Technology
The United States has been a global leader in technological innovation since the late 19th Century and scientific research since the mid 20th Century.

Transportation
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Literature & Visual Art
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