Angels Republic

The Angels Republic, often known by its initials AR or simply by its central location, California, is a post-Great War republic inspired by the pre-war United States.

Los Angeles During the War
On October 29, 1962, a large force of California National Guard was deployed to the city of Los Angeles in order to quell the riots that occurred as a result of false rumors that the east coast had already been hit by nuclear warheads. In some parts of the city, these riots continued for even days after the bombs really hit. Most of the surviving National Guard soldiers would later become the backbone of the Unionist Army.

James Hathaway and the Unionists
As Los Angeles devolved into hostile gangs of raiders and looters, a wealthy World War II veteran named James Hathaway gathered many celebrities and rich people living in Hollywood at the time of the war, and formed the Unionists in 1973. He also gained the support of many of the surviving National Guards sent to LA on the day of the war. Hathaway believed that, with enough support, he would be able to rebuild his country.

As the Unionists grew, the largest unified gang in the city, known simply as the Looters, found that soon, the Unionists would be a threat to them. The Looters attacked the Unionists in 1974, but didn't destroy them completely. This sparked a war between the two as Hathaway led a counter-attack against the Looters. As for Angel City's other gangs: the Surfers and the Panthers joined the Unionists in fighting the Looters, while the Hounds allied with the Looters. Word of the Angelican War spread across California, and Hathaway's cause was made known to the people of California, inspiring many to create their own nation-states based on that of pre-war America.

By February of 1977, it was clear that Unionist victory was imminent. So five men convened to create a constitution that would be used to govern the Angel City area, soon to be unified -- James Hathaway, Andrew Wayne, Jonathan Mason, Frank Sinatra, Roy E. Disney, and Ronald Reagan. On February 15, 1977, the Unionists declared the Angels Republic into existence. The war ended on September 1, 1977, when Roy E. Disney led troops into the old Disneyland Theme Park in Anaheim to remove the last of the Looters.

CANTA and the California Unification Treaty
In July of 1977, the Angels Republic joined the California and Nevada Trade Agreement, a trade union between the civilized nation-states of California and Nevada. Later in 1978, a raider gang expanded influence in central California, known as the Motor Heads (who originated in Atwater, California). The Motor Heads commonly raided CANTA trade caravans, evoking a response from the CANTA nations in early 1979. After about a year of the countries fighting together, the Motor Heads disappeared, and the roads cleared up. This success brought about a sense of unity within CANTA's nation-states, especially the ones in southern California.

In March of 1980, James Hathaway wrote the California Unification Treaty, which would be presented to the CANTA headquarters in Sacramento by Jonathan Mason on April 8, 1980. San Diego, and the republics of Tilden, Riverland, and Inyokern, accepted the treaty's terms, which declared that the nations would be united under one flag in the Angels Republic as a federation of states like the pre-war United States. The rest of CANTA's members refused the terms of the treaty, and sowed disagreement between the northern and southern nations of California. The Angels Republic left CANTA after this. A new constitution was soon written by representatives from each state, and James Hathaway was elected the Angels Republic's first president under the new constitution. The new government, consisting of a president, Congress, and Supreme Court, became active on the twentieth of January in 1981.

The Tribal Wars and Mexican War
After the foundation of the Angels Republic, the new Congress rose an army which would protect the roads between the states. But there were many tribes and raider gangs throughout southern California who didn't recognize the Republic as a legitimate government, and resisted its control. The army found itself in multiple wars against local gangs and tribes for the duration of Hathaway's two terms as president, and into the presidency of Michael Calvert.

Michael Calvert was the son of the founder of the Inyokern Republic, Peter Calvert I. He campaigned taking a harsh stance on the resisting tribes, and on the northern nations who refused the terms of the California Unification Treaty. Calvert gave the people of the Angels Republic a strong sense of unity as he rallied them for a cause to strive towards: the unification of the entirety of California. Calvert first wanted to secure the south, by colonizing Baja California. The locals in Baja showed heavy resistance to Angels Republic colonization, and the Mexican War began.

The Tribal Wars and the Mexican War ended around the same time in 1993.

The Maverick Pact and the Californian Wars
In 1981, not long after the Angels Republic left CANTA, the government of Sacramento, large trading hub and location of CANTA's headquarters, collapsed. As a result, both the Cisco and Nevada Republic sought to expand into the area, and went to war over it in 1983. After an exhausting seven year war, the two nations' top generals agreed to stage coups in their respective governments, and formed the Maverick Pact. The pact said that the two nations would split the land (which they named Maverick) in a particular way, but allow each others' military forces to pass through the area. It also formed a general military defensive pact.

However, after the election of Michael Calvert, things changed in the Cisco Republic. Calvert had produced pro-Angels Republic propaganda across California, mainly by radio. The people of Cisco began to feel that they'd gotten the short end of the Maverick Pact, and that they'd have a better chance of survival as a state in the Angels Republic. In 1994, Cisco petitioned to leave the Maverick Pact. The Nevada Republic agreed to let them leave, but argued that Cisco's side of Maverick would be forfeited to Nevada because they were still in the pact. The Angels Republic supported Cisco, and would soon go to war with Nevada. This was the First Californian War, which raged from 1994 to 2001.

The Second Californian War began in 2020, when Governor of Tilden Hugh Graham declared Tilden's secession from the Angels Republic, and the Nevada Republic invaded Cisco. Tilden was swiftly pacified by the Angels Republic government. After a few months of fighting, a tribe in central Nevada and Las Vegas under the Locatelli Family joined the war. The war ended with the Angels Republic annexing all opponents in 2024.

Californian Unity and the Cascadian War
During the Second Californian war, an old mentality was revived in the Republic: the idea of Californian unity. The first Californian Unity movement was brought about by Michael Calvert in the 1990s, but many didn't take it seriously. The new movement advocated annexation of the bits of what was once California in Cascadian territory. Some, however, wanted peace with Cascadia. The Election of 2028 decided the matter when Democratic John Castello was elected to the presidency along with a Democratic Congress. Just months after Castello's inauguration, the invasion of Cascadia began.

There were many in the Republic who still did not support the war. Protests occurred across California, opposing the war of aggression in Cascadia. Castello would not be elected to a second term, but his successor Owen Montgomery, who had campaigned on ending the war in Cascadia, continued it for another year until the Californian land was finally secured for the Republic.

Mexican Prejudice and Adrian Calvert's Reign
The Cascadian War produced many new stereotypes about Mexican people, the foremost being that they were cowardly and unwilling to fight for the Republic. Even President Castello bought into these stereotypes, and publicly spoke out about them. Throughout the 2030s and 2040s, a sentiment brewed in California that Mexicans were nothing more than ungrateful parasites in the Republic, and many believed they should be removed. In October of 2040, war veteran Charles Berger founded the National Protection Force, which terrorized Mexicans and other minorities in California. Largely ignorant of the group's following and violent actions, President Marcus Cairn saw it as pointless to divert resources and men to fight a group who he thought were simply exercising their free speech, even when calls to do so were so loud. His successor, Abigail Mason, was the opposite. She did everything she could to fight the group, politically and, when it was necessary, militarily (though many in the military weren't so enthusiastic about pacifying the NPF, as they supported them).

In 2044, the Democratic Party split into the Unionist and Nationalist Parties. Adrian Calvert, the grandson of Michael Calvert, was elected as a member of the Nationalist Party, to the presidency. The NPF became a paramilitary branch of the Nationalist Party, and Adrian Calvert asserted absolute power in the Republic. Calvert began a mass state-supported genocide against Mexicans and other groups, and a war with the Causer Empire. Hundreds of thousands of Mexicans were killed in the genocide, and hundreds of thousands more people were killed in the war with Causer. The war with Causer in Arizona was used only as something to unify the people.

This ended in 2054, when a conspiracy led by General Johnathon Alexander, supported by former president Abigail Mason, and others who opposed Calvert, removed Calvert from power. The conspiracy publicly hanged him in the park in front of the Capitol Building. Johnathon Alexander temporarily took control of the republic, reversing many decisions made by Calvert, and making peace with the Causer Empire. He called an election to be held that year.

Post-Adrian Calvert Years and Californian Civil War
The damage caused to so many people by Adrian Calvert's administration made many question whether such a powerful nation should exist. Many separatist movements began to gain traction, along with an anarchist movement within the Republic. The president elected in 2054, Thomas Jefferson Eldridge, was assassinated by an anarchist after only a few months in office. There was strong debate in the Republic's government over how Eldridge would be succeeded. Unionists believed Vice President Joseph van Dorn should fulfill Eldridge's term, while Adaptionists wanted a whole new election to be held. In the end, an impromptu election was held that year, and Ron Breckenridge was elected to replace Eldridge.

In the following years, states within the Republic became quite competitive with each other, and it showed even in congressional legislation. Political assassinations became commonplace in this time, and Ron Breckenridge was a quiet president who didn't do much to fix the problem. The presidential Election of 2061 saw the fiercest campaigns in the Republic's history, with Kent Kingsley and his running mate Matt Finley running for the Unionists, and George Robertson and Edward Fairchild (a longtime political rival of Kingsley's) for the Independence Party which had now outpaced the Adaptionist Party. Just a month before the election, George Robertson was assassinated, and many pinned it on the Kingsley campaign.