Term II Judiciary - The Dikastic Court

[ravensfire]

Welcome to the Dikastic* court!

This is the site of the second term of the DG VII Judiciary. Here, the three Justices resolve any disputes that arise and make sure than any new laws don't conflict with existing ones. We're available to answer any questions you have - just let us know!

The Court:

Chief Justice - Ravensfire
Judge Advocate - Strider
Public Defender - bootstoots

Term 1 Court - The Areiopagos

The Chief Justice coordinates the efforts of the court, and keeps everything on schedule. They create the Judicial procedures, and make sure that the othe Justices follow them. At the conclusion of each judicial proceding, they create an entry in the Judicial Log summarizing what happened.

The Judge Advocate represents the interests of the State. During investigations, they work with the Public Defender to find evidence and determine if there's a reasonable chance something wrong was done. If there was, the Judge Advocate argues the side of the State in the ensuing trial.

The Public Defender represents the interests of each citizen. During investigations, they work with the Judge Advocate to find evidence and determine if there's a reasonable chance something wrong was done. If there was, the Public Defender argues the side of the accused in the ensuing trial.

During reviews, the Justices work together to discuss the situation. Along with comments from interested citizens, the Justices determine how to interpret sections of the laws that aren't clear. These interpretations are considered part of the law. At the end of each review, the Chief Justice is responsible for making sure that the Judiciary has clearly answered the questions, and put the summary in the Judicial Log.

Thanks!
-- Term 2 Judiciary

* Solon was second of the two original law givers for Ancient Greece. The first, Dracos, created a harsh system of law, where death was a common punishment. His name is now the root of Draconian. Solon threw out many of Dracos' laws, keeping only the punishment for homicide as exile. His laws went far beyond criminal law, creating standards for buildings, civil law, marriages.

Several hundred years later, the Dikastic was formed. This court succeeded the Areiopagos, and was run by the ephetai, a group of about 50 citizens. These courts tried all matters of law.

 

[ravensfire]

Scrolls of Knowledge

The Constitution
The Code of Laws
The Judicial Log

The Ruleset FAQ

Judicial Procedures
Common
Rights and Duties of all Citizens

• Participate in all Judicial discussions
• Request that any Judicial discussion be moved to its own thread in the Citizen's forum
• Post requests for Judicial Review of existing law. These requests should contain a specific question and the section of law in question
• Post requests for Judicial Review of proposed amendments. This request should contain the exact text to be reviewed and a link to the discussion thread
• Post requests for clarification. This is an unofficial question about the rules that does not create a finding, but may lead to a Judicial Review
• Post requests for Investigations. This is a request to determine if a citizen has violated a rule. This request must be posted in the Judicial thread. There are no anonymous requests

Shared duties and responsibilities of all Justices

• Conduct the business of the court in a fair, impartial, open and speedy manner unless otherwise required
• Review and discuss any questions about our laws
• Review all proposed Amendments to our laws
• Review all requested Investigations to determine if there is need
• Participate in all Investigations in a fair and impartial manner
• Post clear opinions on all questions
• Notify the Judiciary during any Absence, and arrange for a Pro-Tem replacement
• Discuss and ratify these Judicial Procedures
• Recuse themself from any Investigation that they are involved in as either the citizen requesting the investigation, or as the citizen under investigation.

Rights and Duties of the Chief Justice

• Post polls for amendments once they pass review
• Post any valid Recall poll
• Determine and post the official Census
• Oversee all Judicial Proceedings
• Maintain the Judicial Log
• Appoint all Pro-Tem justices and seek confirmation by the President

Rights and Duties of the Judge Advocate

• Post any valid Recall poll if for the Chief Justice
• Serve as the Prosecution during any trial of a citizen. In this role, the Judge Advocate need not act impartial as they are arguing for a specific side

Rights and Duties of the Public Defender

• Serve as the Defense during as trial of a citizen, unless requested otherwise by the citizen. In this role, the Public Defender need not act impartial as they are arguing for a specific side

Judicial Reviews
Judicial Reviews are used to resolve questions of the law and to validate proposed amendments. The opinion of a majority of the Justices will be used to resolve the Judicial Review.

Reviews of existing laws may be requested by anyone. The Chief Justice shall review each request for merit. If the Chief Justice declines the request, the other two Justices may both accept the request, and override the Chief Justice. The Chief Justice will post each accepted request, clearly denoting the questions. After at least 24 hours, each Justice may post their finding. This post should clearly answer the questions as posed by the Chief Justice. The Chief Justice may request clarification of these findings as needed.

Reviews of proposed law may be requested by anyone. The post must include the proposed law, and a link to the discussion thread. The proposed law must have been conspicuously posted as a proposed poll for at least 24 hours, and the discussion thread open for at least 48 hours. The Justices will review the law for any conflicts with current law, and post their findings. The Chief Justices will post the poll for all proposals that pass Judicial Review.

Investigations
Investigations are used to determine if a citizen has violated a rule. They may be requested by any citizen in a post in the Judicial thread. Except as noted, the Justices must act in a fair, impartial, open and speedy manner throughout the process. All citizens are innocent unless determined to be guilty. All evidence, except foreknowledge of the game, must be presented publicly. Evidence of foreknowledge of the game will be reviewed by the Judiciary, and a statement about that evidence posted. Once that evidence becomes irrelevant due to game progress, any citizen may request it to be posted.

At any time during an investigation, the citizen making the request may drop the request, ending the investigation unless another citizen wishes to continue the process. Likewise, the citizen under investigation may accept the charges, and move immediately to the Sentencing phase.

Review
Each requested Investigation will be reviewed by the Judiciary. Justices will gather and look through the evidence presented, including requests for statements from all citizens. If all three Justices determine the request to have No Merit, the basis for that finding will be posted by each Justice and the request is denied. If at least one Justice determines the request to have Merit, a trial on the facts will be conducted. The Judge Advocate will review the request and the relevant law, and determine the specific law the accused citizen is alleged to have violated.

Trial
The Judge Advocate will create a thread for the trial in the Citizen's forum. This initial post should contain the specific violations and the evidence for those accusations. The next two posts are reserved for the citizen accused and the Public Defender - until they post, or 24 hours from the initial post, no other citizen may post in the thread. All citizens are encouraged to post in this thread, but are reminded to respect the rights of all citizens.

Once the at least 48 hours have passed, and discussion has petered out, the Chief Justice can declare the discussion closed, and post a Trial poll.

The Trial poll will be a private poll, with the options Innocent, Guilty and Abstain. It will run for 48 hours. The option receiving the most votes will determine the result. In the event of a tie, the members of the Judiciary will determine the result by posting clear opinions in the Trial thread.

Sentencing
If a citizen under an investigation has accepted the charges, the citizen, the accuser and the Judiciary may determine and assign a sentence if they all unanimously agree to the arrangement. Failure to uphold that arrangement will result in full sentencing poll posted as if the citizen were found guilty in a Trial.

If an arrangement cannot be made, or the citizen was found Guilty, the sentence will be determined by the citizens through a poll. The Chief Justice will post the poll, marked as private with a duration of 48 hours. The options for the poll will include:

• Suspension from Demogame
• Removal from Office (if applicable)
• Final Warning
• Warning
• No Punishment
• Abstain

Other options may be included through unanimous consent of the Judiciary.

Once the poll closes, the Chief Justice will determine the sentence imposed using cumulative voting. The most severe option that a majority of citizens support will be imposed. If there is a tie, the Judiciary will break the tie through a majority vote of the options tied, with each vote, and the reasoning, posted in the sentencing poll thread.

 

[ravensfire]

Term II Docket

Pending Matters (link will go to request post)

• None

Completed Matters (link will go to ruling post)

• DG7JR6 - What happens on a Confirmation Poll if the action has already occurred and is irreversible
• DG7JR7 - What does the phrase "majority of citizens" in H.5 mean
• DG7JR8 - How is Article C of the Constitution to be interpreted - is it 1 city per civ, or a total of 7 captured cities, regardless of the civ we capture them from.
• DG7CC1 - Donovan Zoi
• DG7JR9 – May the President issue legal instructions if a leader posts incomplete instructions?

 

[ravensfire]

Deleted - contained the proposed Judicial Procedures. Copying without change to the Scrolls of Knowledge thread.

-- Ravensfire, Chief Justice

 

[ravensfire]

Original post

I would like to request a judicial review. Section H.5 of the constitution relates to confirmation polls, and states:

Originally Posted by Constitution Section H.5
When the poll closes, if the majority of citizens, not including abstain, voted No, the action is overturned. Any other result confirms the action.

I have two questions:

What happens if the action has already occurred (eg a battle has already been fought or a city built)?

Does the majority of citizens clause refer to all citizens registered, all active citizens (at the last census) or all citizens who voted in the confirmation poll?

Thank you in advance

 

[ravensfire]

I'm not too sure about the first, but I'll comment on the second:

Article A of the Constitution declares:

Article A. Citizenship
All Civfanatics Forum users who register in the Citizen Registry are citizens of our country, and members of the Assembly.

This would seem that "all citizens" would be "all those who registered in the Citizen Registry", rather than all citizens who voted in the poll. Confirmation Polls do not have a simple majority voter turnout requirement, unlike some other polls (e.g. Recall Poll), which could lead to a situation where a majority vote is ignored (see below). However, a Declaration of War poll also does not have a simple majority voter turnout requirement, but has protection against such a case (formatting is mine):

Section F.2 Declaration of War
To declare a war, the Minister of Foreign Affairs will create a normal poll for the House, and a thread poll for the Senate. If more than 50% of the voters, not counting abstain, in both polls support the declaration, war can be declared. If either poll gains a 67% majority in support of war, war may be declared regardless of the other poll.

The ambiguity in a Confirmation Poll could lead to a situation where a necessary majority of those who voted pass the vote, but where the vote still fails due to not having enough citizen votes. A Declaration of War poll, however, won’t have this problem because it explicitly declares that the ‘Yea’ votes would be compared to the total voters rather than total citizens. The approach in F.2 (Declaration of War) works well, as it removes the possibility of a situation described above occurring. I would thus recommend it be considered whether a similar approach could be used to solve any potential ambiguities that the Confirmation Poll law may give.

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Citizen comments on DG7JR6:

In large part, this is a hypothetical request. Confirmation polls are explicitly limited to "where permitted by law". That's two situations right now - appointment to fill a vacancy and the structure of a game session. The former doesn't have a time period, so I'll ignore it and focus on the latter.

A confirmation poll is a way for any citizen to challenge certain, unilateral decisions taken by another citizen. It's a check on the use of a specific power. It's also designed to be fairly quick and responsive in use - use within 24 hours of the action and run for 2 days.

There is a presumption built into the Confirmation Polls that the action will be approved. If the action takes place before the poll closes, that presumption must take precedence - no poll is final until it closes. I suggest that means that taking an action renders the Confirmation Poll for that action moot if that action is irreversible and happens before the poll closes. Now, using that against somebody in an subsequent election is fair game.
Citizen comments on DG7JR7:

Easy - it refers to the citizens that voted in that poll.

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Citizen comments on JR's 6 and 7.

On JR6, a confirmation poll (or perhaps more correctly named protest poll) must be opened early enough for it to close prior to the action it is protesting, or the chance to affect that event is lost. This is very clear in the law and it is also common sense that we can't be expected to hold up the game for a last-minute challenge. To allow such a challenge would open the door for malicious road blocks.

On JR7, the only time a percentage of the entire population (or of a specific body) is ever required is when a quorum is explicitly stated. This is not only common practice in the DemoGame, but just about everywhere people vote on anything.

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Here are my citizen comments:

On JR 6, the relevant law is as follows:
The way this article is worded, it sounds like any action already taken could be overruled as well. However, if the action is irreversible, this is obviously impossible. Though it could be ruled that a DP must either postpone the game session or risk being held responsible for a decision that was later overturned, this is obviously impractical and could result in the game being held up for malicious reasons. If I were on the court, I would probably rule that the confirmation poll must have closed by the time the action is to be taken in order to be binding. However, this leaves much to be desired. A leader could theoretically get away with posting something unpopular less than 48 hours from the deadline, and the citizenry could do nothing about it, as far as I can tell (other than not vote for that official in the next election cycle). Therefore, I'd also add a provision to the ruling that if the confirmation poll has not finished before the start of the gameplay session, the DP may choose to ignore the instruction even though it hasn't finished. If, however, the confirmation poll ends with a majority supporting the action, the DP could be subject to a CC for not following the instruction. On the other hand, if the poll closes with a majority opposing the action, the DP is immune to prosecution because the Will of the Assembly, as expressed in the poll, is for the action not to take place, thus overruling the official who posted the instruction. This way, if a leader posts something ridiculous (i.e. "raze City X"), the instruction could be ignored as long as it was later overturned in a valid poll.

JR 7 is fairly obvious. The very clear intent of the law is for "citizen" to mean "citizen who voted in the poll." Only a very strict constructionist could possibly rule otherwise.

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Now my comments on JR 6:

This looks to be clearly written to undo an action made prior to even posting the poll. If officials make a controversial call in their actions for a TC, a poll could theoretically only get them to undo their actions of posting their instruction post. If the TC already happened and the actions done, well, they can't be undone.

If a problem occurs where an action can't be undone and it was largely disapproved, I believe that it's up to the citizens to demand a full explanation, and possibly warrent the punishment of those responsible.

If the mistake is so grave and absolutly horrific (say razing one of our first five cities for no reason) , I would hope that the DP would end the turnchat, even if not one turn is accomplished. The Code of Law declares that a DP may end the TC at any time, and while it shows a list of actions that could cause the end of the TC, this list is purposefully incomplete. This, however, is of course of an unthinkable oversight happening, but there are already guards in place of it's event.

So in summary, no need to change the law. If the poll shows majority didn't like an undoable action, I would hope that it would serve as grounds for the initiation of recalling that official.

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I've seen several posts on JR6 which seem to have missed a critical point. Confirmation polls must be enabled for a kind of action before they apply to that kind of action. To quote the illustrious Chief Justice:

Originally Posted by ravensfire
In large part, this is a hypothetical request. Confirmation polls are explicitly limited to "where permitted by law". That's two situations right now - appointment to fill a vacancy and the structure of a game session. The former doesn't have a time period, so I'll ignore it and focus on the latter.

Let's say that again. The only actions which can be challenged by a confirmation polls are appointments and game session structure.

What does this mean in real terms? Appointments have received so little interest this game that they are not worth mentioning. Therefore what other use does a confirmation poll have?

If someone schedules an on-line play session (chat), an anti-chat person could post a confirmation poll. If 2/3 voting say NO, then the chat is cancelled and the play session must be offline.

Likewise, if someone schedule an offline session, a chat supporter can force a confirmation poll, and 2/3 would have to vote NO to force the session to be played online.

These (online vs offline, and appointments) are the only things you can challenge with a confirmation poll.

Now, on the timeframe question... A game session must be scheduled 3 days in advance. The confirmation poll must be posted less than 24 hours after the session is scheduled, to be valid. The confirmation poll must be open 2 days. This means a valid confirmation poll must close before the play session is scheduled to begin -- if it closes after the play session then by definition it is invalid.

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I agree with DaveShack's last post, however the timescales for the confirmation poll and the requirement that the TCIT goes up only 2 days before the scheduled session, with no requrement for advanced planning means that if the TCIT were posted at the last moment (as they often have been this term) it would not be possible to get up a confirmation poll which closed before the session took place. In this case the timescales for the confirmation poll seem to have been written for when the TCIT was required to be up 3 days before the next session not 2.

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shh.... that was the ace in the hole to make sure we never have a valid confirmation poll...

 

[ravensfire]

<Gavel> BANG! </gavel>

I hereby declare the Term II Judiciary now in session! The honorable Ravensfire, Strider and Bootstoots presiding.

All ye with business for the court, come now before your fellow citizens and present your case. Be swift with words, open of mind and willing of spirit!

Welcome to the new member of the Court, Judge Advocate Strider and Public Defender Bootstoots!

The Court recognizes that the matter docketed as DG7JR6 and DG7JR7 by the previous Court were not completed. This Court recognizes and accepts those requests, and dockets them under the same number. The original request, and all citizen comments have been transferred over. The clock for rulings has, however, restarted. Justices, please refrain from posting rulings for 24 hours. Your comments as citizens are, of course, more than welcome!

In addition, the proposed Judicial Procedures are posted - please review them, comment and approve/disapprove.

Thanks!
-- Ravensfire, Chief Justice

 

[Bootstoots]

I've reviewed the proposed procedures and they look good to me. One minor quibble: if cumulative voting is used, a tie for severity of punishment in a sentencing poll is impossible, so the section about the Judiciary deciding punishment in that case should be stricken out.

Other than that though, I approve these procedures.

 

[Strider]

I am currently preparing my rulings on the current Judicial Reviews, and they will be posted sometime tommorow.

 

[ravensfire]

I've reviewed the proposed procedures and they look good to me. One minor quibble: if cumulative voting is used, a tie for severity of punishment in a sentencing poll is impossible, so the section about the Judiciary deciding punishment in that case should be stricken out.

Other than that though, I approve these procedures.

Probably right, but rather than take a chance that there is a scenario - I'm just going to leave it in.

Strider - thoughts on the procedures?

-- Ravensfire

 

[Strider]

I'll accept the procedures, with the understanding that I might ask for a change or two sometime or another. Excellent framework, Very good organization, and covers almost everything I could think of (at this moment anyway).

 

[Strider]

Sorry for the late reply, some unexpected things came up.

Anyway, onto the Judicial Reviews:

DG7JR7:
It should refer to the number of active citizens, or the census. While, based on Gerikes comments, it does seem that this does refer to the total number of registered citizens, I'm hoping this was just a mess-up. So, yeah, technically I should be ruling that it refers to the total number of citizens registered, however, this will force us to then amend the law for then we can actually use it. I'm going to save us the headache and un-needed paperwork. As such, I rule that it does refer to the most recent census.

Also, if the other justices agree with my ruling, I wonder if it would be possible to change the wording of this amendment to eliminate any other possible misunderstandings.

DG7JR6:
Now, while I agree with much of Bootstoots comments earlier on this issue, I'm afraid that it would take an amendment to make much of that possible. These "confirmation" polls lack the flexibility, detail, and finesse that they should. However, in regard to the orginal question asked, I rule that a confirmation poll must have closed (or finished) before the action in question has been initiated.

However, this law does lack much, and we should amend it immediantly.

 

[Bootstoots]

Okay, here are my rulings:

On DG7JR6, I will retract my previous citizen comment. I missed the "where permitted by law" phrase in section H.5. The law only notes two places where confirmation polls may be used: for appointments and for whether or not a game session may be played offline. Appointments, of course, are not an irreversible action, so this review applies only to the structure of a game play session. As the poll must run for 2 days according to H.5, any data before that 2 day limit is not legally binding. Therefore, the poll must have finished before the start of the game play session to be valid, though a DP may voluntarily choose to switch a gameplay session to online if a confirmation poll is failing (this, however, is strictly voluntary).

On DG7JR7, I will stick to my previous opinion that the article refers to a majority of citizens who voted in the poll, not all citizens of Fanatikos nor the number of citizens in the census. There is no reason to believe that the intent of the law is to require a majority of all citizens in Fanatikos to vote no in a 2-day poll in order for an action to fail a confirmation poll (which would be much harder to accomplish than the Constitutional amendment requirement), nor that it would require a majority of the census, which would have been explicitly mentioned if the law had been intended to require that. As such, a majority of the citizens who voted in the confirmation poll must cast a no vote in order to overturn a decision.

 

[Strider]

nor that it would require a majority of the census, which would have been explicitly mentioned if the law had been intended to require that. As such, a majority of the citizens who voted in the confirmation poll must cast a no vote in order to overturn a decision.

The census was put in place (orginally) for exactly these types of polls. People kept posting polls during holidays, or other times when few people could vote. As such, you had a dozen people making a decision for 40.

 

[Civlord]

Mr. Members of the Judiciary,


All of us may seem to be informed of the recent attempt of putsch made by mr. M4 Sherman in the President Office thread and in a separate thread opened in the forum, now all erased for the sake of a healthy Fanatikos. My question is: will the Judiciary act according to the law, will it punish M4 Sherman? Will there be any intervention?

Gratefully,

Civlord

 

[DaveShack]

The census was put in place (orginally) for exactly these types of polls. People kept posting polls during holidays, or other times when few people could vote. As such, you had a dozen people making a decision for 40.

Your logic is backwards, as it takes a no vote to overturn the action. For this kind of poll you want a lower threshold, or it will make it harder to overturn actions.

If a confirmation poll was really for confirmation, requiring a majority yes vote then your logic would be correct.

 

[RegentMan]

My question is: will the Judiciary act according to the law, will it punish M4 Sherman? Will there be any intervention?

Moderator Chieftess has already taken care of that.

 

[Civlord]

hmm... So, what about that whole stuff of Public Defender and Judge Advocate? The Public Defender defends a citizen, isn't it?

 

[Strider]

Your logic is backwards, as it takes a no vote to overturn the action. For this kind of poll you want a lower threshold, or it will make it harder to overturn actions.

If a confirmation poll was really for confirmation, requiring a majority yes vote then your logic would be correct.

No, you don't want a lower threshold, for the exact reason I stated. So, if I don't like an action, I can post a confirmation poll and get 5 people who I know will vote for whatever I'd ask them to, to vote with me. Generally speaking, only about a dozen people check these forums everyday. I then go about making posts inside of the other polls, knocking my confirmation poll down the forum, and helping it escape notice.

If 9 people vote total, and 6 of those are me and my buds, then it's going to overturn the action. Regardless of what the majority thinks.

If you want to open it up to abuse, then be my guess. I'll be perfectly happy to use it to my advantage, as you guys seem to think it's legal.

Also, you shouldn't want actions to be overturned, and they should only be overturned in the most drastic of situtations. Overturning an action would cause un-needed divison and anger.

 

[RegentMan]

hmm... So, what about that whole stuff of Public Defender and Judge Advocate? The Public Defender defends a citizen, isn't it?

The public defender defends the accused in a trial. The accused might be a DP who disbanded three of our cities or rushed a temple when the governor asked for a hoplite. Forum stuff that violates forum rules is handled by the moderators. Our demogame laws are diddly squat to the forum's.