Confederacy

The Confederacy of Free Systems is a free association of systems within Sol System. It was the first political entity in Sol System to be organized off of Earth. It predates the Consortium by several standard decades and as such regards itself as the original protector of solar liberty and the spacer way of life. 
At right is the First Flag of the Confederacy, the most common variation before the Solar War. The four large dots represent the four founding members. The cross of dots represents the asteroid belt.
== History ==
=== Formation ===
In 49 BSC, Ganymede, Kamijing, Dosijing, and Freitaika managed to secure a trade agreement with Mars wholly independent of Asteroidal Industries. Previously, these systems were simply administrative sublets of Asteroidal Industries, Inc and depended almost entirely on the company for everything from basic goods to luxury items. The trade agreement permitted the platforms a degree of autonomy which only grew over time. Several years later, the four systems issued a common protocurrency in the form of promissory notes (similar to mineral bonds) as a guarantee of future resources. Using the notes, the four systems began to independently aggregate resources and form small independent industries.
Tension between the four systems and Asteroidal Industries continued to grow until a demand for full political autonomy was made in 42 BSC. The Confederacy of Free Systems was organized in 41 BSC as a formal economic (but not political) union between Ganymede, Kamijing, Dosijing, and Freitaika. This became the First Confederate Congress. The same year, they wrote the Articles of Solar Confederation which permitted each of the founding systems to form their own independent states. Popular referendums allowed the organization of each platform according to the will of the people. Dosijing had become a minarchist state; Kamijing organized a parliamentary democracy; Ganymede chose constitutional anarchism; and Freitaika became a hereditary monarchy based on the lineage of their Explorator Rudolph Carlson. In late 41 BSC, the Congress issued the formal Declaration of Confederacy and invited any Solar entity to join.
=== Second Congress ===
In SY0, the Second Confederate Congress met in response to the formation of the Consortium. The Second Congress accepted Ceres, Vesta, and the sixteen minor platforms as members. Asteroidal Industries withdrew it's political power from the Main Belt to join the Consortium and retained control over a few minor asteroids, the rest of which became the collective property of the Confederacy. In a concerted effort to normalize relations, the Confederacy established official trade with the Consortium.
=== Third Congress ===
In SY 97, the Freitaika Rebellion occurred, leading to the Third Confederate Congress. They passed the Militia Legalization and Freitaika Repatriation Acts.
=== Fourth Congress ===
In SY 132, the Confederacy became a major participant in the Solar War. In SY 134, the Confederacy joined the Protectorate unity faction.
== Government ==
The Confederacy is organized around the Articles of Solar Confederation. All member systems recognize the Articles as a legal foundation.
The unitary legislative body of the Confederacy is the House of Confederation. The House acts as an arbitration ground for economic matters. Representatives of the House regularly rotate and are appointed by each of the constituent systems of the Confederacy. The House has specifically enumerated powers to make trade deals for the whole Confederacy, to issue a currency, to provide for the maintenance of the capitol building on Kamijing. The Militia Legalization Act gave the House power to raise an army and navy for the common defense of member entities. Delegates are unpaid and serve for one standard year.
For non-economic legislation to be passed, a Congress must be called. All legislation is an amendment to the Articles and must be agreed upon by both the Congress and the House.
Each member system is allowed to rule itself as an independent state. Most Confederate systems choose minarchist governments. Dosijing, for example, is governed by a minarchist council of professionals who maintain essential utilities in exchange for a very small tax on sales. Kamijing continues to be ruled by parliamentary democracy. Ganymede continues it's constitutional anarchism.
Kamijing and Ganymede have regular court systems but other Confederate systems do not, leaving citizens to arbitrate disputes themselves.
=== Parties ===
==== Kamijing People's Party ====
The KPP is the most popular party and together with the CUP formed the coalition government of the Confederacy at the outbreak of the Solar War. It is the political wing of the Army of Eastern Kamijing and as such is the only political party to have an armed wing. Founded at the conclusion of the Freitaika Rebellion, it is a big tent populist party that adheres to progressive social values, free market economics, noninterventionism, and the preservation of the Confederate constitution and spacer way of life. Their highly popular representation in Confederate Congress at the outbreak of the war is due to their vocal protectionist and anti-Technocracy stance. 
==== Confederate Union Party ====
The CUP is the oldest political party in the Confederacy and was founded by the intelligentsia of the original platforms. They value the status quo of the Confederacy and are strictly non-interventionist, a position that caused them to lose most of their seats after the Freitaika Rebellion.
==== Kamijing First! ====
Kamijing First! is a hard right party founded by soldiers who fought for the Republic after it's defeat in the Rebellion. It seeks to replace the current Confederate constitution with a stronger central government, a full standing military with compulsory service, and a hard limitation on any immigration from the Consortium or the Rim.
==== Community of Parliamentary Choice ====
CPC is a centrist party with moderate values. 
==== Provisionals ====
The Provisionals are a one-issue party that lobbies for extensive funding for militias from a communal fund they believe all Confederate members should contribute to. 
==== National Front ====
National Front is a far-right spacer supremacist party. They usually vote with KF! and support third position economics, eugenics, racial hygiene, and the conquest of the Consortium by spacers. However, KF! has extensively distanced themselves from any affiliation from them. During the Solar War, they were absorbed into the Technocracy and the party was outlawed.
==== Democratic Socialists ====
DS are a center-left party with traditional values of direct and parliamentary democracy. They seek to create a strong central government and expand the Confederacy into a socialist welfare state.
==== Technocracy First ====
Technocracy First is the official political wing of the technocracy movement. While never holding more than a few seats in Confederate Congress, they achieved great success in local elections directly prior to the Solar War.
==== Communist Party of Kamijing ====
The CPK is a vanguard Marxist-Leninist party that seeks to seize the means of production on Kamijing, secede from the Confederacy, and formally unite with the Soviet Union and therefore the Consortium. They are widely unpopular and only ever achieve a single seat. They participated in the Technocratic uprising and were outlawed.
== Articles of Solar Confederation ==
The Articles of Solar Confederation are the foundation of the Confederacy.
It forbids the regulation of intersystem and intrasystem commerce.
It provides for the common defense of each system should the need arise; that is, an attack on any Confederate system is considered an attack on the Confederacy as a whole and each constituent member is expected to respond.
It forbids an income tax but recognizes the right of individual systems to levy taxes upon themselves. The intermittent Congresses that have met have therefore done so at their own expense.
Intrasystem war or conflict is strictly forbidden.
It firmly establishes the economic union of the Confederacy; a trade agreement with one Confederate system is granted to all Confederate systems.
Each Confederate citizen has the right to defend life, liberty, and property but may not deprive that of another.
== Economy ==
The Confederate economy began as an extension of Asteroidal Industries' logistics chain, which was required to provide all the necessities of life for the tens of thousands of spacers that formed the first colonies in the Main Asteroid Belt. Almost everything was imported from Earth at the out-of-pocket expense of the company from about 227 BSC to roughly 150 BSC. Every colonist was an employee of the company and received a salary paid in United States Dollars; room, board, and per diem rations; access to healthcare, the Solarnet, and paid vacation time; and the choice of either stock options or mineral bonds. After seventy years of hard work, spacers were successfully operating their own businesses in addition to their official employment.
During the Golden Age of Sol System, Explorators energized by the growing Main Belt colonies and platforms began operating one way missions to establish their own settlements in Main Belt space. Each of these missions brought varying quantities of luxury goods from Earth such as alcoholic drinks, authentic tobacco, real meat (vs lab grown) and flash-frozen vegetables. These goods established a luxury market almost overnight. 
By 97 BSC, the Main Belt had half a million permanent residents. Approximately a third of these were free spacers and not direct employees of Asteroidal Industries. The first exports began and the descendants of the first colonists to take mineral bonds or stock in the company began to cash out, and many spacers became extraordinarily wealthy in their own right. 
Every Confederate citizen, whether an immigrant or born, is issued a Solarnet address that functions as their permanent legal identity. The official domain for Confederate citizens is .conf and possession of a .conf address constitutes proof of citizenship. The number of aggregate addresses are used as a census measure for the regulation of trade with the Consortium, which ships certain goods to the Confederacy in exchange for a proportional measure of asteroid resources payable directly to the Consortium, the surplus of which may be sold at any price. 
Category:First Trilogy
Category:Factions