Dutchfire's request for a review of the amendment regarding the executive branch is accepted as case 7-2.
Term 7 - Judiciary
- Thread starter DaveShack
- Start date
donsig
Low level intermediary
DaveShack said:
Will the three of us be conferring on this before handing down a decision?
GeorgeOP
RF Bleachers
Yes. Is there anything specific you want to discuss Donsig?
donsig
Low level intermediary
GeorgeOP said:
Haven't looked at it yet. I do tend to take a comprehensive view of JRs, meaning the whole text under consideration (and not just changes being made) is reviewable. I take this stance because the CoL as a whole was enacted before we had a sitting judiciary and therefore there may be inconsistencies. Once that text is brought before the court for review we are authorized to deal with any conflicts we find.
By conferring I meant a private discussion (in chambers, so to speak) via chat or PM. I would like to read both your thoughts and those of the CJ on this matter before any official rulings are made. I am quite willing to share my views as well.
robboo
Deity
Request....three days till election so how will this effect that. Will it delay this being enacted another term? I am requesting speed in your discussion.
GeorgeOP
RF Bleachers
The Poll for this amendment will last for 4 days. Therefore we need to have the poll up within 3 days for this to take effect before the next term starts. However, I don't think it's a good idea to rush an Amenment process. If it gets done before then, fine. We should plan on it not getting done in time. It also isn't guaranteed to pass the two remaining phases to become law.
donsig
Low level intermediary
I agree. Since there has been no conferring whatsoever amonst the judiciary (that I know of) I don't see how this will be done in time to be effective next term.
I'm not planning to initiate any conferences, but will respond to conferences initiated by others. I'm not quite sure why we should need a conference. I can state quite openly that I'm very unlikely to find a conflict in any proposed amendment and this is no exception, so the only reason to confer is if another justice is likely to find a conflict and be open to persuasion.
Such discussions shouldn't need to be private, this is not a sensitive matter. If there is a concern about the existing law, a standalone JR may just as easily address that concern. This review should focus on the changes and t heir immediate effects. This CoL was enacted by the people the same way every other CoL has ever been enacted, and reviews of its amendments don't need to be more complicated than reviews of past amendments.
I'll go ahead and predict the end result -- an obstructionist justice will have prevented this court from making any rulings at all, by simple inaction. I will of course ask our citizens to take note of this at the polls.
Such discussions shouldn't need to be private, this is not a sensitive matter. If there is a concern about the existing law, a standalone JR may just as easily address that concern. This review should focus on the changes and t heir immediate effects. This CoL was enacted by the people the same way every other CoL has ever been enacted, and reviews of its amendments don't need to be more complicated than reviews of past amendments.
I'll go ahead and predict the end result -- an obstructionist justice will have prevented this court from making any rulings at all, by simple inaction. I will of course ask our citizens to take note of this at the polls.
robboo
Deity
Can 2 of 3 make ruling and stop the inaction from causing a slow down.
Sure we can respond in the polls...but we would have to have people actaully willing to run.( or be able to...unsure yet for myself).
Things like this have been cited by at least 3 former demo-game citizens as why they are not taking part here. When I see things like this I personally start wondering if this is worth any of my time.
What really ticks me off it first we hear a "if the citizens want a change write a amendement" now that we have written it we see an obivous attempt to slow down the process.
I ask that this term at least have the poll up before you leave office. It would be great to see the system work and get this accomplished in one term instead of dragging it out into another JR next term.
Sure we can respond in the polls...but we would have to have people actaully willing to run.( or be able to...unsure yet for myself).
Things like this have been cited by at least 3 former demo-game citizens as why they are not taking part here. When I see things like this I personally start wondering if this is worth any of my time.
What really ticks me off it first we hear a "if the citizens want a change write a amendement" now that we have written it we see an obivous attempt to slow down the process.
I ask that this term at least have the poll up before you leave office. It would be great to see the system work and get this accomplished in one term instead of dragging it out into another JR next term.
donsig
Low level intermediary
DaveShack said:
Perhaps the CJ should build in procedures that allow two concurring justices to pass a ruling. After all, a two to one vote usually wins, right?
As for private discussions among the judiciary I think our current CJ has in the past saw fit to use them. Why is this case different?
Oh, wait, I see why it is different. Because our CJ has a predisposition to rubber stamp any proposed amendment! That statement makes a mockery of his past behaviour of remaining silent so as to be unbiased. Shame on you DaveShack!
donsig said:
Amendments aren't really sensitive, are they? Yes we had private discussions for really sensitive items, for example when we were deciding on whether this game would actually continue we had lots of discussion.
"Unlikely to find a conflict" is different than "predisposed to rubber stamp". If you factor in the simple fact that few proposed amendments will have a conflict, an obvious corollary is that finding a conflict is unlikely.
However, someone who thinks the objective is to find a conflict might go to great lengths to call something a conflict even if it isn't really one.
donsig
Low level intermediary
DaveShack said:However, someone who thinks the objective is to find a conflict might go to great lengths to call something a conflict even if it isn't really one.
And someone who wrote the laws in the first place might be willing to overlook real conflicts.
I have two problems with this JR.
First, I do not see the point in this amendment. The culture office or what ever it was called is defunct. That is a fact, is it not? Why do we need a full blown amendment to rubber stamp this de facto act? This points out another flaw in our current system. Things that we wanted to be easy to change should be easy to change. When we came up with the idea of three levels of laws, this is the very type of thing that was envisioned to go into standards. Unfortunately, the idea of standards has also been perverted in the other direction, giving chief justices and censors great power to decide on their own what conflict of interest is and whether or not private initiative polls should be allowed.
The other problem lies with the fact that we have a code of laws that was passed before we had a judiciary in place to look for internal or constitutional conflicts. By now we realize there are some. As members of the judiciary, are we not charged with pointing out whatever conflicts we find in proposed laws? Even in a seemingly routine amendment such as this there is risk. If we rubber stamp it because we've only looked at narrow changes and ignore the other text before us then we risk giving the whole law credibility should conflicts be found later.
GeorgeOP
RF Bleachers
Donsig, I agree with your second paragraph but disagree with your first paragraph. Defunct or not, we should require an amendment to eliminate a position. This amendment also delegates the old responsibilities of the MoC to other offices. I'm sure if the President or someone else tried to make this permenant change, someone would JR them for stepping over the bounds of their office.
donsig
Low level intermediary
GeorgeOP said:
And such a JR would have no have no merit (as long as the change is made by the Triumvirate since ouf CoL says:
1. The Triumvirate may change Cabinet Offices in a manner prescribed in Section 1, Sub-Section B, Clause III.
I am quite tired of hearing about officials who are afraid to do something because they will get JRed or CCed or someone will make a post disagreeing with what they did.
robboo
Deity
don..you mean this
The bold part is what we are doing..I have already dissolved the Cultural office for this term since it wasnt filled. (Did you not know that? I posted it here.) We were not scared of a JR or CC we want to do this to stop having to do this every term.
We are trying to make this permanent for a couple of reasons 1) no one seems to want the job...do you? 2) if we shrink the government and have less elections it will force people to run in other offices if they really want an office. 3) many of us consider it to be a useless office.
The bold part is what we are doing..I have already dissolved the Cultural office for this term since it wasnt filled. (Did you not know that? I posted it here.) We were not scared of a JR or CC we want to do this to stop having to do this every term.
We are trying to make this permanent for a couple of reasons 1) no one seems to want the job...do you? 2) if we shrink the government and have less elections it will force people to run in other offices if they really want an office. 3) many of us consider it to be a useless office.
donsig
Low level intermediary
robboo said:
If DaveShack runs for Cultural Minister, I will run for Cultural Minister.
You are all making a bigger deal out of this than there must be. If no one wants to be Cultural Minister and no one thinks we need one, what's the problem? If no one runs, just don't appoint anyone. No one will act as cultural minister and no one will care.
Still looking for a legal discussion (private or public) on the amendment itself.
donsig
Low level intermediary
DaveShack said:
I've got a lot of homework to do but maybe I'll open up a beer and see what I can do for you.
donsig said:
So if the laws are skrewed up, we should just leave it that way, instead of repairing them, because we don't use them anyway?
And wait until something goes wrong, and then all get CCed/impeached/whatever?
donsig said:
Quite right, until something comes up in the culture minister's area of responsibility. Then we'll be in a bind because another official cannot organize the necessary decision without fear of legal action.
The amendment has two purposes, abolishing the unwanted office, and assigning the duties to other offices.
Another way of handling the "unassigned work" problem is to have an amendment giving the President, or the triumvirate as a whole, the power to perform the duties of vacant offices other than the judiciary. Right now there isn't any mechanism other than appointing to the vacancy, right?
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