CivRealm:Columbia

The Empire of Columbia, also known as the Third Empire of Columbia, is a sovereign nation which holds commune status within the IWW, and is located in the Western hemisphere. It is governed primarily by a President with sweeping authority and jurisdiction, representing a hereditary monarch, the Emperor.

History
The Empire of Columbia was founded in its current form on October 7th, 2017, and its current constitution was ratified on February 11th, 2018, however there were several versions of Columbia before that.

Devoted 3.0
The early history of Columbia begins in April of Devoted 3.0, when leaders of the (then) Empire of Caledonia, United Federation of Normandy, Kingdom of Jyrssa, and Free State of Astronya, came together to form the First Columbian Empire. This was the result of a few weeks of scheming between Chancellor kdeeks of Normandy and Emperor Onederful of Caledonia. Leaders of the United Federation, such as Hamboy_Jr, were also consulted about the unification of Northwestern territories to form Columbia, but did not all desire to join. Serious planning for the country began around April 25th, including the submission of ideas for the capital city and the formation of a government. The Columbian Empire was based on a council of Grand Princes, who would elect amongst themselves one Emperor in a cycle of elections which occurred once every two months. Grand Princes would transfer the title to one another depending on the results of the vote. Columbia was further expanded when the empire's leaders offered a position as the third Grand Prince to King Zebra of Jyrrsa, who accepted the position and annexation of his kingdom's territory into the Columbian Empire. Additionally, the three leaders plotted to annex the Free State of Astronya, headed by Supreme Leader shadedoom, into the empire by means of coercion or military force. After several days of debate, shadedoom agreed to join Columbia as the fourth Grand Prince and allowed Astronya to become an autonomous district. Once fully united, the Columbian Empire was quick to declare independence from Chanada, who claimed much of its land, and invade the small state of Olympus which refused to be subjugated. The war began on May 3rd, as the volunteer Two Minute Militia formed of Astronyan citizens, and marched on the capital city of the Olympians. Coming only two days after the May 1st Conflict, in which Astronya had previously occupied the capital of Olympus and seized its colors, Astronyans were delighted to have another shot at their Southern rivals. The force was quick to act, and pearled three Olympian leaders within five minutes, then continuing to drive all other citizens away from the country until the city-state was fully occupied. After this, Columbia declined on Devoted 3.0 due to a lack of activity, not having a national Discord server until late in its existence, and the emergence of CivEx 3.0 as a server.

CivEx 3.0
The story of Columbia continued on the CivEx 3.0 server as the core population of Columbia reorganized, created a Discord server, and moved over. While the Columbian Empire on Devoted 3.0 was intended to resemble an imperialistic model of the United States of America, the leaders of Columbia decided to change directions a bit and model the new Columbian state on the Confederate States of America, installing a government which was much more tolerant of local autonomy over national power. Thus began the Confederate States of Columbia, alternatively known as the Columbian Confederacy. The leaders of this Columbian state were the same four oligarchs as from Devoted 3.0, now also adding Hamboy_Jr officially to their ranks, however this time they decided to rebrand themselves as Councilors and abolish the system of rotating authority, making a five way council of equal members. Upon joining the server, Columbians rallied to the center of the map, gathered basic resources, and made a long hike West to claim lands that would eventually become the Syndicate of Co-Prosperity. The key tool Columbians used to recruit new members was to tell them simply, "You have been annexed by the Confederate States of Columbia," and many new citizens willingly joined as a result of this. After a few days of living in the Southwest of the map, the Syndicate settlers in the region became aggravated that we were on what they considered their land, and seeing the complete lack of resources and fertility of the area, Columbia decided to move to the Northwest and settle a long peninsula in the area. There was a brief border dispute with the neighboring state of Arcation, but it was resolved quickly and in Columbia's favor. The oligarchs then divided land and responsibilities, founding the states of: Tennessee, Carolina, Louisiana, and Virginia. A nearby ice mountains continent was also annexed and dubbed Alaska, leadership of it being awarded to NeoTide_, as was the inactive nation of Icenia which became a colony of Columbia, and the far-flung colony of Pasadena led by wittle_wubzy. More autonomous territories were carved out of existing states, including the Autonomous Island of Seminole, and the Leylin Farmers. By then, the population was booming to a height of 34 citizens, but it also proved to be problematic in terms of national supplies and infrastructure. During all of this time of internal political change and restructuring, the nation's infrastructure struggled to be erected, essentially being limited to a large mining pit under Tennessee, a couple small buildings in Nashville, Tennessee, a couple buildings in Alaska, and a sizable but limited farm in Carolina. Additionally, members struggled to get allegiance, and to get materials like clay and melons because of badmin crimes. The struggle for allegiance was particularly troublesome, because Columbia had decided to align itself with the Consulate of Varsany, a state in dispute with Arcation. Arcation, being a very powerful militaristic state, was able to easily overrun Varsany and the limited Columbian aid that was sent due to the PvP restrictions of non-allegiant players.

Eventually, Columbian unity would fall out of the frying pan and into the fire, with the betrayal of Councilor Onederful and Provincial Administrator wittle_wubzy. For quite a while Onederful had been being coached by inactive Channer lunatic bgbba about why he thought Columbia was a horrible nation and why he should betray the state. Onederful took his advice one day, stole all of Columbia's most precious items that the players had all grinded for, including many stacks of obsidian acquired by Herr_Speer, and secretly dropchested it far away. He proceeded to lock everyone out of the national citadel groups, delete the national discord, and go inactive after that. wittle_wubzy then announced the illegal secession of Pasadena from the country. What they thought would destroy Columbia forever only made it rally together stronger. The country quickly made a response via the national news service BOX News, and began an ultimately unsuccessful hunt for Onederful and wittle_wubzy. A few days later wittle_wubzy begged to be allowed back in Columbia, but was rejected for his treasonous acts. Although national spirits were high at the time, a growing movement for reformation sprouted from the base of non-government citizens, advocating for a democratic form of government in which they would get a say and be able to elect a President of Columbia, because the history of Columbia on CivEx 3.0 had proven that the council of five oligarchs, who constantly disagreed and formed voting blocks which vetoed anything from happening, was not a well-functioning form of government. The population and oligarchy agreed to a compromise after much debate, and thus began the drafting of the first ever Constitution of Columbia. This process was promising, however CivEx 3.0 quickly died due to the release of CivClassic 2.0 and the rampant badmin crimes from the CivEx team. Columbia did not move over to CivClassic 2.0 when it came out because of a lack of citizen spirit to continue with the nation.

CivClassic 2.0: Part 1
Following the shutdown of CivEx 3.0, a few citizens of Columbia moved over to CivClassic 2.0 and joined different nations. Most Columbians, however, went into a state of inactivity and retirement. Around the end of the Summer of 2017, shadedoom began playing on Devoted 3.0 once again in a new micronation he led called the Kingdom of Reidos. This return to the CivCraft genre of servers led him to reach out to his fellow former leader of Columbia, kdeeks, after a couple of months. Together, the two of them decided to bring Columbia back to life and move it over to CivClassic 2.0 as a whole. Once they had contacted many former citizens from CivEx 3.0 and Devoted 3.0 and convinced them to return, they set out to find an area of the map to claim and settle in. After much discussion, shadedoom scouted a set of islands in the deep Northwest of the map, which became Columbia's new home. This location was chosen largely because of its large plains biomes which were ideal for building cities, and because after just a few days of being on the server, the Somber War broke out, the initial action of which was occurring in the Southern hemisphere; Columbia wanted to be out of the way of the war. The people of Columbia initially chose to found the country as an absolute monarchy, the Grand Duchy of Columbia, and shadedoom pushed kdeeks to be the Grand Duke of the country. A council of nobles known as the Fürsten was formed to advise Grand Duke kdeeks, consisting of Just_Matter, shadedoom, and NeoTide_.

Construction quickly began on a new capital city on the main island of the country. After much dispute, the city was named Rotterdam, after the real life Dutch port city of Rotterdam. The concept was that it would be a mid-1700s to mid-1800s style port city with a prosperous waterfront district and harbor with ships. However, the humble beginnings of the city were in a neighborhood to the Southwest that would become known as Hamlet. This neighborhood was mostly built by, and was a simple assortment of wooden buildings in an agrarian setting. Soon after settling the small township of Hamlet, Columbia began work on mining to fill its national coffers, as well as digging rails to connect itself to the international community. Rotterdam slowly developed into a more urban looking environment with a few large buildings and a central town square being constructed, and other small settlements began to pop up around the country as well. One of these early townships was called Apoland, which was in the Northwest of Columbia. Apoland was very controversial in the beginning because it was illegally settled on the private estate of Fürst shadedoom, which was known at the time as Cascadia. It was a misunderstanding that occurred because shadedoom had been fairly inactive for a month or two at that point, and the other Fürsten gave the area to Aposii and Green_Trump not realizing shadedoom owned it. The situation was resolved with shadedoom being given a new estate he named Lëtzebuerg in the Southwest of Columbia, and Aposii and Green_Trump being allowed to keep the island Apoland was settled on, which they renamed to Zeeland. Because shadedoom had been inactive, however, the Fürsten Just_Matter and NeoTide_ refused to allow him to claim the title of Fürst anymore. However, because he was a founder and longtime member of Columbia, shadedoom was given a lower title of nobility by Grand Duke kdeeks, and made into a Margrave. Thus the estate of Lëtzebuerg became the autonomous Margravate of Lëtzebuerg. After these disputes were settled, the country was peaceful and stable for a while, with Rotterdam and Apoland continuing to see progress, and the Fürsten working on establishing farms and the first semblances of EXP-producing infrastructure.

However, as 2018 approached the server, Columbia began to face internal problems. The biggest of these was that Grand Duke kdeeks wasn't actually very active or involved in the leadership and public works of Columbia. The nobility and common citizenry alike were growing increasinbly frustrated with his lack of output, and something had to be done. In late December, key members of Columbia sat down to discuss political reform, and a document called the New Year's Compromise was ratified across all classes of the Grand Duchy. The document effectively turned Columbia into a very rough version of a constitutional monarchy, with a powerful Chancellor at the head of the country, but kdeeks keeping his position as Grand Duke with much more limited powers. The first election for Chancellor of Columbia saw Just_Matter win and become the first of the new democratically elected leaders of the Grand Duchy. He chose NeoTide_ as his Vice Chancellor, a position that didn't legally exist but would be carried forward since then as a constitutional tradition.

History of the Unitary Federation of Columbia on Expand to be written.

History of the Lusitan Occupation on CivClassics 2.0 to be written.

History of the restoration and Second Empire of Columbia on CivClassics 2.0 to be written.

Current Structure
To Be Written