The New England Federation was the richest and most powerful alliance of States to survive the Second Great Depression. Guided by the Great Families of America, and ran by politicians carefully bought and placed into positions of power, they had spent decades removing the rebellious and non-conformists from their lands. Their original plan had been to do the same in the other States of America, but that did not work out. They chose to turn the obstinacy of other States into a feature rather than a bug, and encouraged their undesirables to leave New England through the time-honored strategy of simply making life uncomfortable in New England for such as them. And with complete and total control of the legal systems, life could be made very uncomfortable indeed.