Category:Constitutions

A constitution is the aggregate of fundamental principles or established precedents that constitute the legal basis of a polity, organisation or other type of entity and commonly determine how that entity is to be governed.

When these principles are written down into a single document or set of legal documents, those documents may be said to embody a written constitution; if they are encompassed in a single comprehensive document, it is said to embody a codified constitution. The Constitution of the Belarusian People's Republic is a notable example of an uncodified constitution; it is instead written in numerous fundamental Acts or decrees of the executive or legislature.

The most common form of organisation to use Constitutions are sovereign states or nations. A treaty that establishes an international organization is also its constitution, in that it would define how that organization is constituted. Within states, a constitution defines the principles upon which the state is based, the procedure in which laws are made and by whom. Some constitutions, especially codified constitutions, also act as limiters of state power, by establishing lines which a state's rulers cannot cross, such as fundamental rights.

The National Constitution of Cascadia is the longest known written constitution of any country in EarthMC, with 4,621 words in its English-language version, while the Constitution of the North Sea Republic is the server's oldest active written constitution, since some of its core documents have been in operation since Classic Canada.