Term 6 ~ Judiciary

[Black_Hole]

Welcome to the Term 6 Courtroom!
This court is currently not in session(but will be on January 1st).
Please visit the term 5 judiciary for any urgent CCs or JRs. Thank-You!

Justices:
Chief Justice: Black_Hole
Public Defender: Ravensfire
Judge Advocate: Ashburnham

Census/Amending Laws:
Term 6 Quorum: 25
Number of votes needed to amend Constitution: 16
Number of votes needed to amend Code of Laws: 9
Note: The Census Info. will be updated after the elections as I have to average the voters of all contested elections(Being 1 )

Links:
Japantican constitution
Japanatican Judicial Log
Term 1 Judiciary
Term 2 Judicary
Term 3 Judiciary
Term 4 Judicary
Term 5 Judiciary

This Court is Currently In Session

 

[Black_Hole]

The Term 6 Court Procedures(Approved/Official)
Approved by: Black_Hole, Ashburnham, Ravensfire



1. The Judiciary is comprised of three members, the Chief Justice, the
Public Defender, and the Judge Advocate.

2. All members of the Judiciary shall share certain rights and
responsibilities.
A. Discuss the Court Procedures, as composed by the Chief Justice,
in a most constructive way, and ratify when reaching consensus.
B. Post polls and discussions on interpretations of the Constitution, and
any lower laws.
C. Do not have Deputies, but may appoint Pro-Tem officials
(Pro-Tem CJ, Pro-Tem PD, and Pro-Tem JA) if they are unable
to fulfil their duties.
Pro-Tem officials have all the rights and responsibilities of the
officials they are filling in for, but are a temporary position, and
must surrender their pro-tem status upon the request of the official.
The pro-tem status may be given for individual assignments or for the
entirety of the official (this must be declared).
D. Initiate and participate in Judicial Reviews to determine the legality
of proposed Constitutional Amendments and any other form
of lower law. Any citizen may request a JR for this purpose.
E. Initiate and participate in Judicial Reviews (JRs) to interpret and
clarify existing Constitutional Articles and any other form of lower
law. Any citizen may request a JR for this purpose.
F. Initiate and participate in Judicial Reviews to examine whether
or not all investigations should be considered as having "No Merit".
G. Post Legislative polls that have passed Judicial Review.

3. The Chief Justice ~
A. Performs as needed in the positions of Public Defender and Judge
Advocate in the absence of either official. This duty shall only apply
if said officials have not appointed a Pro-Tem official.
B. Is responsible for posting the current Active Census in the Judicial
thread at the beginning of the Term.
C. Is responsible for updating and maintaining the Judicial Log.
D. Is responsible for monitoring investigation threads to keep them on
topic and procedurally accurate.
E. If the situation arises where the actions of a Leader (Advisor) of a
Department fall within the parameters of being absent from a position,
as set forth by CoL Section G.3, the Chief Justice may declare said
Office vacant.

4. The Public Defender ~
A. Is tasked with ensuring all Citizens’ Complaint investigations are
performed correctly, with deference to the presumed innocence
of the accused.
B. Will ensure that the accused understands the charges brought
against him and what rules were purportedly broken so the accused
can mount an effective defence.
C. Will perform as defender, unless the accused wishes otherwise.

5. The Judge Advocate ~
A. Is tasked with the mechanics of Citizen's Complaint investigations
and trial.
B. Will open and close discussions and polls as appropriate to the trial.
C. Will perform as Prosecutor (gather and present evidence) for any
anonymous accusers.

6. All Judicial Review and Investigations will be held publicly. Public
communication between the Justices will be posted in the Judicial thread
or the Investigation threads.

7. Judicial Review
A. A quorum requires the attendance of all three members of the Judiciary.
B. Review of proposed legislation.
1. Any member of the House may present proposed legislation to the
Judiciary after following procedure for proposing amendments and
laws.
2. The request will be included in the Court’s Docket.
3. 2 of 3 Justices must agree that the amendment or law does not
conflict with existing rules.
4. If a proposal is rejected due to conflict(s), it is returned to the
House with details of the conflict(s) noted. This proposal may then
be edited and resubmitted for Review.
5. If the proposal is approved through Judicial Review, it is posted as
a ratification poll by a member of the Judiciary.
C. Interpretation and clarification of existing Law.
1. Any member of the house may request a Judicial Review for
interpretation or clarification of an existing Law. The existing Law
must be clearly stated in the request.
2. The request will be included in the Court’s Docket.
3. The Chief Justice has the right to dismiss a Judicial Review,
if the Chief Justice deemes a Judicial Review to have "No Merit".
i. Specific reasoning must be given by the Chief Justice for a
judgement of "No Merit".
ii. If the Judge Advocate and the Public Defender believe that the
Judicial Review has merit, while the Chief Justice dismissed a
Judicial Review, the Majority Opinion will be followed.
4. 2 of 3 Justices must agree on the interpretation or clarification,
forming a Majority Opinion.
5. The interpretation/clarification is then entered into the Judicial
Log for reference.
D. Dismissal of Investigations deemed as having "No Merit".
1. 3 of 3 Justices must agree that the accusation shows "No Merit".
2. Specific reasoning must be given by each Justice for a judgement
of "No Merit".

8. Citizen's Complaint
A. If any citizen believes that someone has violated an Article of the
Constitution or any other lower form of law, they can report this
suspected violation for investigation and trial.
1. The allegation can be posted in the Judicial thread.
2. The allegation can be made privately to the Chief Justice via
Private Message.
B. Allegations of misconduct must include:
1. Name of the defendant.
2. The Article(s) or lower Law(s) suspected of being violated.
3. When and where the suspected violation(s) occurred.
C. The Citizen's Complaint will be included in the Court’s Docket.
D. The Judge Advocate notifies the Public Defender and the accused
of the charge(s).
E. A brief Judicial Review of the charge(s) is done (see 7.D above)
to determine if the charges have "No Merit".
F. If the charge(s) are found to have "Merit", the Judge Advocate
opens an Investigation thread detailing the alleged violation(s).
1. The first two replies to this thread are reserved for the Public
Defender and the accused to respond publicly to the charge(s)
(Defence). Either may post first, and both may say what they wish
(within forum rules). If their replies/responses have not been
posted within 24 hours of the thread's posting, they lose these
reserved spots and anyone can post.
G. Citizens can post in this thread their opinions on the charge(s),
whether they think the accused is guilty of the infraction or not, and
if the case should go to Trial.
H. If the accused pleads guilty, the Trial is skipped and the case moves
to the Sentencing Process. The Chief Justice may close the
investigation thread early if this occurs.
I. When discussion has petered out and at least 48 hours have passed,
the Judge Advocate will post a Trial poll.
1. The Trial poll will have the Options of Guilty, Innocent and Abstain
and will remain open for 48 hours.
2. In the event the Trial poll ends in a tie, the members of the
Judiciary will determine if the defendant is innocent or guilty by
posting independent and clear Opinions at the end of the Trial poll.
J. If the accused is found guilty through the Trial poll, a Sentencing poll
is posted by the Judge Advocate.
1. The Sentencing poll will remain open for 48 hours, and have the
following Options:
i. Recommended Moderator action - turned over to the Moderators.
ii. Impeachment from Office (if applicable)
iii. Final Warning (whether or not a prior warning has been given)
iv. Warning
v. No Punishment
vi. Abstain
2. If the guilty party has previously received a final warning for the
current offence, the Judge Advocate will post that in the Sentencing
poll narrative.
3. Once the poll has been closed, the Chief Justice shall determine the
sentence for the accused.
i. Each vote shall be determined as a vote for the option selected,
and all less-severe options.
ii. The sentence selected shall be the most severe sentence that a
majority of the citizens supported.

Example:Option A- 4 Votes
Option B - 12 Votes
Option C - 13 Votees
The sentence carried out is option B.

Option A has 4 total votes.
Option B has 16 total votes.
Option C has 29 total votes.
A total of 29 citizens voted, making Option B is the most severe
sentence that a majority of the citizens support with a total of 16
votes in support and 29 votes overall.
4. In the event the Sentencing poll ends in a tie, the members of the
Judiciary will determine the Sentence by posting independent and
clear Opinions at the end of the Sentencing poll.
5. The guilty party must abide by the sentence as determined in the
Poll by the Chief Justice.

K. The Judicial Log may be referenced for further interpretation or
clarification, but may not be used for criteria for review of proposed
legislation.

L. For any Judicial Review ruling or issue involved with a Citizen Complaint,
each Justices must post independently their opinion on the matter. In
essence, they must answer the question asked by the Judicial Review
in a Yes or No fashion (have "Merit" or "No Merit" also applies here).
Specifically, there will be no "fence-riding". Each Justice will come down
on one side of the issue or the other, clearly.

 

[Black_Hole]

==================================================
The Judical Review Docket
==================================================

DG5JR34
Status: Closed
Submitted By: mhcarver
Details: mhcarver, as the Chief Election Officer has requested a judicial review over CoL H.4. He is asking 2 questions:
1.Are election officials terms indefinite?
2.Can election officials be declared absent? if so how?

DG5JR35
Status: Closed
Submitted By: Moth, law specified by Cyc and Moth
Details: Moth, as a citizen has requested a judicial review over an undisclosed law. The question is:
Does any elected position include the responsibility to determine what victory condition we should accept?
The JR required a specifacatin of law, and Cyc has responed with article J. Moth also later wished to specify article N.

 

[Black_Hole]

==================================================
The Citizen Complaint Docket
==================================================

 

[mhcarver]

Congratulations Mr.CJ elect,
I would like to request a JR for the start of the term. the reason for this is that it deals with the election office and if I ruled on that it would be conflict of interest.
Anyways:
How long is the term of an election office official? Can election office officials be removed?

The COL says

4. Election Office
a. The Election Office shall be comprised of those citizens 
willing to assist the election process. These citizens are
nominated by the President, and are subject to a confirmation 
poll.

Election officials are subject to a confirmation poll so one could argue they are elected officials. to sum my questions are
1.Are election officials terms indefinite?
2.Can election officials be declared absent? if so how?

-Mhcarver
Elections office
Office of the outgoing Chief Justice

 

[Black_Hole]

Congratulations Mr.CJ elect,
I would like to request a JR for the start of the term. the reason for this is that it deals with the election office and if I ruled on that it would be conflict of interest.
Anyways:
How long is the term of an election office official? Can election office officials be removed?

The COL says

4. Election Office
a. The Election Office shall be comprised of those citizens 
willing to assist the election process. These citizens are
nominated by the President, and are subject to a confirmation 
poll.

Election officials are subject to a confirmation poll so one could argue they are elected officials. to sum my questions are
1.Are election officials terms indefinite?
2.Can election officials be declared absent? if so how?

-Mhcarver
Elections office
Office of the outgoing Chief Justice

I find the JR has merit. Your JR will be filed as DG5JR34 but will not be ruled on until the beginning of Term 6.

P.S.: I approve the Judicial Procedures, and would like my fellow justices to do so also or decide on some changes.

 

[Ashburnham]

I, too, approve the Judicial Procedures. I look forward to my first term on the bench. hammer: )

 

[ravensfire]

The Public Defender's office is open once more! The proposed Judicial Procedures look good to me.

-- Ravensfire, Public Defender

 

[Black_Hole]

The Term 6 Court is Now In Session(Even though a bit early)
Please file all JRs and CCs in this court now, however only extremely urgent ones will be ruled on before the start of term 6. Even ones that are ruled on before term 6 will not be official until Jan. 1.

Thank-You

 

[Black_Hole]

One question for my fellow justices:
On the census(25) 67% is required to modify the constitution however 67% of 25 is 16.75 now should it be 16 votes required or 17?

 

[Black_Hole]

DG5JR34
As the election officers are appointed and no time is specified I have come to an answer.
To answer the questions:
1. Terms are indefinite, but election officers can always be replaced by the president with someone else. This is because all the CoL says is that they are appointed by the president.
2. They can be declared temporarily absent by themselves according and be temporarily replaced by a presidents nominee since they have no deputy according to CoL G.3, however according to CoL G.3B if officials do not post in the tc instruction thread for 2 tcs in a row they can be declared permanently absent. So the president has authority to replace them if he believes they are vacant.

To sum it up:
1. They continue to remain in official until removed by the president.
2. They are basically headed by the president and only he can declare them vacant.

This may be a loophole that the legislature wants to clear up, however it may not matter since we might not get to future elections.

 

[Ashburnham]

One question for my fellow justices:
On the census(25) 67% is required to modify the constitution however 67% of 25 is 16.75 now should it be 16 votes required or 17?

For this, we should look at which number is closest to the 67% mark. 16 people out of 25 is 64%, but 17 out of 25 is 68%. Thus, I rule that the number required should be 17.

 

[Ashburnham]

I would like to request a JR for the start of the term. the reason for this is that it deals with the election office and if I ruled on that it would be conflict of interest.
Anyways:
How long is the term of an election office official? Can election office officials be removed?

The COL says

4. Election Office
a. The Election Office shall be comprised of those citizens 
willing to assist the election process. These citizens are
nominated by the President, and are subject to a confirmation 
poll.

Election officials are subject to a confirmation poll so one could argue they are elected officials. to sum my questions are
1.Are election officials terms indefinite?
2.Can election officials be declared absent? if so how?

The CoL is lacking in its definition of the operations of the Election Office. It is something that should be remedied in the future. However, the ruling must be based on the CoL as it stands now, and that is where I base my ruling.

1. Because they are appointed by the President, they are not traditional elected officials. As such, they are not subject to the same standards as regular officials. Thus, their term may be considered indefinate. They may serve as long as they please, or as long as the President pleases. Because he appointed them, it makes sense that he may remove that appointment. Such a move, however, would probably have to go through a poll.

To sum up, I agree with the ruling of the Chief Justice. EO terms are indefinate.

2. Here, too, the standard rules for elected officials do not apply to the Elections Office. Because they do not regularly post in the Turnchat Instruction Thread, they can not be held up to CoL G.3B which states that if an official does not post in the TCIT for two consecutive TC's then they are absent. Because of this, the only alternative is that the president must declare the Elections Official absent, unless the official says so himself.

In short, I agree with the Chief Justice here as well. They must be declared absent by the President for them to be officially absent.

 

[Black_Hole]

Is the Public Defender here?
A JR needs to be ruled on.
Thanks

 

[ravensfire]

The PD was waiting for any citizen comments on this matter.

As one of the crafters of this law, I'm finding it somewhat humorous to note that I did put a rather large "oops" in there, actually a couple. Ah well, we are at the end of the DG, and interest traditionally falls off.

The law in question mentions only means to appoint citizens to the EO, not how to remove them. It also does not mention limits of any kind. As these positions are not elected, or leadership positions, the current provisions in our laws do not apply. These are indefinite terms.

As my fellow justices have noted, the current law is somewhat lacking in the ability to remove those appointed to the office. To keep matters simple, I agree with the theory proposed by them, that the President may remove members of the EO that are not assisting the office. To provide a concrete measure of what that means, I rule that the President may remove a member of the EO from office should they fail to assist or participate in the planning or the execution of an election cycle.

-- Ravensfire, Public Defender

 

[MOTH]

I would like to question the census. Article I reads in part:

                c.  A total number of votes greater than or equal to 
                    2/3 the census current at the start of voting on 
                    the amendment, dropping any fraction therein.

My math has 25 *2/3 = 16.67 and the fraction dropped would result in a quorum of 16 votes. The inital post list 17 as the number of votes needed to amend the constition.

Thanks - MOTH

 

[Black_Hole]

I would like to question the census. Article I reads in part:

                c.  A total number of votes greater than or equal to 
                    2/3 the census current at the start of voting on 
                    the amendment, dropping any fraction therein.

My math has 25 *2/3 = 16.67 and the fraction dropped would result in a quorum of 16 votes. The inital post list 17 as the number of votes needed to amend the constition.

Thanks - MOTH

i thoght so, that was my original until I asked for someone to verify it

P.S. Sorry for the rush Ravensfire

 

[MOTH]

A judicial review question:

Does any elected position include the responsibility to determine what victory condition we should accept?

My opinion is:
NO. As such it is the right of any citizen to conduct discussions and hold polls to determine the WOTP in this regard.

 

[Black_Hole]

A judicial review question:

Does any elected position include the responsibility to determine what victory condition we should accept?

My opinion is:
NO. As such it is the right of any citizen to conduct discussions and hold polls to determine the WOTP in this regard.

This judicial review has no merit as no law specified. Please specify the law/laws in which you wish to question. This is added to the docket, but will not be official until a law is specified. Sorry, but I have to follow the judicial procedures

 

[Cyc]

In response to CJ Black_Hole's request to specify a law for this JR, I submit that in accordance to Article J of the Constitution, all elected officials are responsible for fulfilling the will of the people in this regard, but any citizen, including elected officials may seek to determine the WOTP through discussion and formal/informal polling.

Article J. Elected officials must plan and act according to the will
of the people. The will of the people will be determined
through discussion and polls, formal or informal.