Ratification Poll ~ CoL O.1

[Cyc]

This is a proposed Poll for an ammendment to the Code of Laws. This ammendment covers the formation of new Provinces under Article O of the Constitution. Please review the legislation carefully before voting.

Section O(1)

A: All land that is not within or surrounded by the Cultural Boundaries
   of another nation may be considered as part of the Japanatican Nation.

B: In the beginning of the game, a default Province shall be established and
   a Governor installed by election therein. This First Province shall contain
   all lands that are part of the Japanatican Nation until other Provinces are
   formed, and has at its Capital the First Established City.

C: Territories shall be formed by the House devising "Boundary Lines" within
   established Provinces. Ratification by the People is required before these
   boundaries have effect. The minimum size of these Territories should be a
   space large enough to fit 3 cities at full Temple Radius.
[INDENT]1: Once a Territory has at least three (3) towns or has at least 50% of
   the land within the entire territory under Japatanica's Cultural 
   Borders, then it becomes a Full Province with its own Governor.[/INDENT]
[INDENT][INDENT]a: Until this happens, administration of towns within the territory
    are retained by the Governors of their respective former 
    Provinces. Administration of New Towns formed before the limit
    is achieved will be under the control of the Domestic Minister.[/INDENT][/INDENT]
[INDENT][INDENT]b: Governors of new Provinces will be appointed by the President,
    under recommendations from the Domestic Minister. These 
    appointments will last only until the end of the current term,
    and be subject to Section G of the Code of Laws.[/INDENT][/INDENT] 

D: Provincial Boundaries may be readjusted with consent of the affected
   Governors and the House.

Please vote one of the following options:

YES: I approve of this Section
NO: I do not approve of this section
ABSTAIN: No opinion.


This Poll will last 72 Hours and be subject to Section I(1) of the Code of Laws.

Relevant discussion can be found here.

 

[Civman2004]

I love the nationalistic assumption that if it isn't already claimed by someone else, then it's ours

Of course, the inevitable conclusion is that the entire world starts (unclaimed) as our rightful posession, and that any cities built by foreign powers are acts of agression against our sovereign right to use those lands as we see fit.

 

[Rik Meleet]

As I've stated in the discussion thread I do not agree with the Governors's approval for changing existing borders between provinces. I think that is 100% a matter of the House.

I have therefore not voted yet (I will, but I prefer to not have to vote "No" as the rest is excellent).

 

[invy]

A. is predator law. That is no mans land. Seems wierd to me that it belongs to Japanatica. The land belongs to Japanatica when it is in its cultural borders (?).

----
b: Governors of new Provinces will be appointed by the President,
under recommendations from the Domestic Minister. These
appointments will last only until the end of the current term,
and be subject to Section G of the Code of Laws.

This seems very undemocratic. If we had a list of citizens in cities they could vote for governors in their province but we probably don't have so many active citizens. I still would like some other way to nominate governors.

 

[Rik Meleet]

Invy:
I think A is very smartly formulated. We consider everything "ours" unless it is proven to be the possession of other civilizations. Cultural borders do that and so does the color of the unit.

B: that is indeed debateble, but having mid-term governor elections looses a lot of times for the nomination and election process. Appointing saves a lot of time. And we still have (although named differently) "refusal polls"; meaning if you really don't want that person in the governor's seat you can file a complaint and the citizens vote on refusing the appointed person in office.

 

[invy]

OK i will vote yes.

The point is that article A does nothing. What if we consider ours some unclaimed teritory and certain nation settle there. They violated our teritory and took what was ours (hm...). 'A' is redundant imo.

b. We should have some standards when appointing governors because we're going to despotism this way. This worked fine but should really change if we find right time and solutions for it.

If we could at least create some standards (requirements) for a citizen to become governor we could avoid 'despotic' nominations.

I think we don't have 'much' better solution at this time so i can accept it as it is now.

 

[zorven]

I like the inclusion of paragraph B.

Paragraph C is a bit confusing on first read, but I think I got it. However, I don't understand C.1.a - if all land within Japanitica is always within a province (see paragraph B), then how would the Domesitic Minister ever be able to control a city?

I don't like paragraph D - the House should rule the matter.

 

[Cyc]

Wow. I'm really pleased. People are actually talking about the Law. This is great. I re-arranged my chair and got comfortable when I saw this.

Ok, let me answer some questions, end some confusion. First, let's look at paragraph D.

D: Provincial Boundaries may be readjusted with consent of the affected
Governors and the House.

Discussion came up on this paragraph during discussion also. It was then said that the main responsibilities of approving ANY changes to Provincial borders were laid upon the shoulders of the citizens in the House. If the changes modified a Governor's Province in such a way that they lost a value (a land tile, a resource, whatever) then that Governor's approval would have to be obtained first. If more than one Governor's Province was modified with the same results, their approval would need to be met also. Governors would not be able to modify the borders themselves. The citizens (House) would have to approve the changes. The Governor's role in this would be pre-liminary, pre-poll. All major changes to Japanatica, including changes to our Provincial borders map, have to be approved by the House. So your worries are taken care of.

Let's look at C.1.a:
1: Once a Territory has at least three (3) towns or has at least 50% of
the land within the entire territory under Japatanica's Cultural
Borders, then it becomes a Full Province with its own Governor.

a: Until this happens, administration of towns within the territory
are retained by the Governors of their respective former
Provinces. Administration of New Towns formed before the limit
is achieved will be under the control of the Domestic Minister.

The question was, if all land within Japanitica is always within a province (see paragraph B), then how would the Domesitic Minister ever be able to control a city? This is the "new, tricky" part. We must first accept the part about territories being a "pre-Provincial" status. A territory can be established by the House (you) as a precursor to a Province. The Province may be larger or different than the territory, or it may remain the same. That is also up to the House, as stated in Article O of the Constitution. Article O is the over-riding factor in this. Just because a territory has been approved by the House, doesn't mean the Territory HAS to become a Province, as all Province borders are determined by the House. Of course if the citizens are happy with the Territory boundries, then making it a Province would just require a rubber-stamp approval poll. But if something new were to come up, such as a resource, or a captured city, or whatever, the House may want the Territory to be expanded to include this item. Now to the question ~ This was primarily written to explain the control system to be used in new territories. Keep in mind I didn't write this. What SD3 says is that land outside of an existing Province (note: say if one of the Provincial border plans was to win in which the Provinces were limited, or left area open), or new cities established in any territory would be under the control of Domestic. "But..." you say. "That land is under the control of the Provincial Governor that had control of the land." Not so, grasshopper. According to SD3's plan, once the land was designated as a Territory, responsibility for the new cities would slip from said Governor's hands. In the case of the limited Provinces and any "outside land", the Domestic Dept. would handle those any way. The key factor here is the designation of a Territory.

Paragraph A is just about imminent domain, written to inspire national pride. Allowing us to push forth a establish cities where ever there is unclaimed land.

 

[invy]

I usually don't like to read through these legal staff becuase it seems complicated. I don't like laws and lawyers too No offense hehe.
Just try to keep laws as simple as possible and probably more people will discuss it. Complex sentences make things harder to understand, especially for non-english citizens.

 

[Cyc]

I usually don't like to read through these legal staff becuase it seems complicated. I don't like laws and lawyers too No offense hehe.
Just try to keep laws as simple as possible and probably more people will discuss it. Complex sentences make things harder to understand, especially for non-english citizens.

I can't stand Lawyers mah damn self. Makes me wonder why I do this.

I'm just really glad that people are discussing the ruleset. Whether that's because they have a question about something or they just plain disagree with a proposal, I love it! In the Judicial thread, people are now starting to respond to the requests for Judicial Review. I look forward to opening up that thread because their might be an opportunity for me to debate the Laws of Japanatika outside of a Judicial Review format. I have found that discussion between the Justices doesn't last long (but that's ok), so I relish the opportunity to debate in an informal way. Please continue.

 

[Zarn]

Adjusments should go through the people.

I'm against those appointments. Domestic should take over until mid-term elections are held.

The more I think about it, the more I hate the idea of territories.

 

[Sir Donald III]

Actually, Section A was based directly on Article O:

The area contained within the national boundaries of Japanatica
shall be divided into areas called provinces, each of which
is under the control of a Governor as stated in Article E. of the
Constitution. These boundries must be defined and approved by
the House well ahead of expansion, and may extend beyond the
cultural boundaries. City locations shall be determined by the
Will of the People.

There was only one thing I could interpret from that sentence in Article O: That all land that is not within the Cultural boundaries of another nation is a defacto part of Japanatica.

Section B was crafted to make legal recognition of Governor Zarn's status, since without it, there would have been no "First Province".

As for Mid-term appointments, it is exactly as Rik stated. I toyed with the idea of having Mid-term elections where the term begins at the end of the turnchat after the election ended, but that might have led to "lame" Provincial Governors who would only have 1-2 TCs or even none. Either that or else a complicated series of rules for these mid-term elections based on what day the Province became "official" (i.e. had 3 cities in its territory.)

And, given that this would be the only place where elective positions are added and not merely cycled out, and thusly mid-term elections would apply, I decided in favor of appointments for the initial governor only.

And Adjustments do go through the People, as well as the Governors. Both the House and the affected Governors have to approve of the change. Cumbersome, I know, but also fair.

 

[snipelfritz]

I don't like political babble myself. I don't have the attention span to read all that.

But I have noticed paragraph C.1.a. It seems to me that that the administration of new towns falls under the domestic ministry and that territory's former govenor according to this law. Please, could somebody clear this up for me.

 

[Sir Donald III]

Under the proposal, Administration of previously existing towns within a Territory would be covered under the Governor of the Province they were formerly a part of, until the Territory is upgraded into an official Province.

Towns newly created by settling within a marked Territory that would not push the territory "over the limit" would be administered by Domestic.

 

[donsig]

I love the nationalistic assumption that if it isn't already claimed by someone else, then it's ours

Of course, the inevitable conclusion is that the entire world starts (unclaimed) as our rightful posession, and that any cities built by foreign powers are acts of agression against our sovereign right to use those lands as we see fit.

This is a demogame tradition that goes back at least to DG2.

 

[Cyc]

This is a demogame tradition that goes back at least to DG2.

Let's hear it for Demogame traditions!!!

 

[Rik Meleet]

With your explanation I see no reason to withhold my "yes"- vote.

 

[blackheart]

This is a demogame tradition that goes back at least to DG2.

This isn't just limited to the DG. Seems like it was modeled after real life

 

[Sir Donald III]

Yes. We are in the Ancient Era, after all, and ICly, probably think quite low of our present rivals. Especially given our Superior Culture and the Iriquois' mismanaged attempt upon Immo.

Later on, Post-Great-Lighthouse, I think that we will feel "threatened" by the "Alien" Civs on the other Continent, and thus wish to destroy them before they destroy us

 

[Cyc]

As this poll has closed and there is a sufficient number of YES votes, Code of Laws ~ Section O.1 has been ratified. Thanks to all who voted.