Post Archive

Region: The Thaecian Senate

History

Angypt wrote:Do you have any particular plans regarding the ministry moving forward?

Do you mean in terms of events? My first point of business will be to work with Xernon to find a new deputy. After that, we will work on polls until February, where we will be organizing a Valentine's day event.

Millenhaal wrote:How will you activate the ministry during your tenure? What things do you wish to change, if any? Do you have any activities you would like to undertake that you are particularly excited about?

Well, I plan to utilize the ministry in a similar manner to that of Kerovia, namely continuing keros two-pronged approach.

I may consider a ministry expansion (appointing a second deputy and more staffers) if the workload becomes too heavy.

I am planning a Valentine's day event, and something for Saint Patty's day.

1. What sort of events are we looking at here?

2. Regarding with staffers, how do you intend to recruit staff, since, during my tenure as CM, I found it hard to find staff?

3. What previous experience do you believe makes you qualified for the role?

The Sarangtus Lands wrote:1. What sort of events are we looking at here?

2. Regarding with staffers, how do you intend to recruit staff, since, during my tenure as CM, I found it hard to find staff?

3. What previous experience do you believe makes you qualified for the role?

1. Mainly, I am planning for a one-day Valentine's day event, featuring a few activities, ending in a game night, and a longer St. Patrick's day, following a similar schedule.

2. For staffers, I plan to stay in touch with the former CM, Kerovia (they're active again), as well as contact new residents who are looking for government experience.

3. I feel I am qualified, as I have both served as the deputy CM, and have stayed in the region long enough to see what residents want for entertainment.

Post self-deleted by Vedenmark.

I am now opening the Vote on New Ike as Communication Minister. (CM)

Sorry I don’t know how to tag everyone

Aye, sorry for the delay. The applicant has great and firm vision along with the necessary experience and I believe they are wholly qualified to run the CM.

Vote has been closed, and New Ikesandria is the Culture Minister of Thaecia with the closing of this vote. Forwarded to Honourable Prime Minister Xernon.

Senators, we are now debating two bills. The first bill I would like to place forward is this: https://www.nationstates.net/page=dispatch/id=1642601 and the second bill I am going to put on the floor is https://www.nationstates.net/page=dispatch/id=1625038 which I am sponsoring as well.

[spoiler=Senators]The Islamic Country Of Honour

The Sarangtus Lands

Vedenmark

Angypt

Millenhaal

Creckelenney

Primo Order[/spoiler]

I also seek unanimous consent for this bill: https://www.nationstates.net/page=dispatch/id=1585191

Edit: I acknowledge this motion.

[spoiler=Senators]The Islamic Country Of Honour

The Sarangtus Lands

Vedenmark

Angypt

Millenhaal

Creckelenney

Primo Order[/spoiler]

I acknowledge the unanimous consent to LR035, first of all.

Secondly, I support the first act as I believe it will help in investigations, especially in more complex cases of misconduct. I oppose the second act as I feel that the military should be FULLY accountable to the government, even at the expense of some security. In real life, classification is often needed because the lives of real people are at stake. They are not here, though I am willing to accept some classification as a matter of practicality and as a matter of benefit outweighing cost. However, I cannot accept full classification, even in the most extreme cases.

New Ikesandria

I would also like to announce that Creckelenney and Primo Order have been nominated by me to the Joint Committee on Court and Legal Reforms.

Both the individuals represent the leading ideologies present in this chamber, and in a discussion on revamping one of the branches of the region, I wanted both sides to have representation, and eventually reach a solution that works for both sides in the region.

I acknowledge the bill and I'd like to thank the Chairman The Islamic Country Of Honour for the nomination. I support the first bill but I oppose the second one.

The Islamic Country Of Honour, The Sarangtus Lands

I acknowledge unanimaous consent, as well as support the first bill and oppose the second.

The Sarangtus Lands

I acknowledge the bill

I acknowledge the motion

The Unanimous Consent Motion for this bill passes.

https://www.nationstates.net/page=dispatch/id=1585191

[spoiler=Senators]The Islamic Country Of Honour

The Sarangtus Lands

Vedenmark

Angypt

Millenhaal

Creckelenney

Primo Order[/spoiler]

Brototh, The Sarangtus Lands

First Bill: Congressional Investigation and Accountability Act

Voting Intention: AYE

Explanation: This is a decent bill, and details the procedure of conducting an investigation, a power given to the Congress by the laws of the land, more specifically LR 051. However, I have some suggestions for its improvement. First, Section I, Sub-Section I states that "Congress shall have the ability to investigate any past or current government actions and functions, which includes every aspect of the Thaecian government and its members. Investigating every aspect of the government is understandable and completely justified but investigating every aspect of its members, past or present? The members should only be investigated in relation to their actions as a government official, not in relation to what they did outside of the Government. Congress holds the government accountable, not the citizenry. If something wrong has been done, it is up to someone to file a court case, and for the court to investigate and hold the individual accountable. Keeping this in mind, I would like to propose an amendment: "Congress shall have the ability to investigate any past or current government actions and functions, which includes every aspect of the Thaecian government and its members in relation to their action(s) as an officer serving in the government. Furthermore, Section II allows the Congress to seek testimony from a past Thaecian citizen, which is bizarre because the Congress can't ask a now-foreign citizen to appear before the congressional body of Thaecia. When they leave Thaecia, they are no longer under its jurisdiction. So, another amendment: "During a Congressional investigation, the chamber of Congress can seek testimony from past and current Thaecian citizens and can seek government information relating to the objective of the investigation."

Furthermore, why do we have to let all 11 or 7 members be a part of the investigation, when the Speaker/Chairman could easily depute 4-5 trustworthy Senators/MPs to investigate it and then launch a report? This reduces the chances of sensitive government information from being leaked by certain members in the Congress, especially considering the fact that a Senator/MP might also serve in the government of the foreign region the investigation is kinda related to.

Also, what does "consent" define in "Individuals can testify publicly if they and the chamber of Congress both consent to hold the hearing in a public setting." Is it unanimous consent or just an approval by a simple majority of the Congressional Delegation? So, I would like to clarify it by amending it to read as "Individuals can testify publicly if they and the chamber of Congress both consent (in the case of the Congress, by a single majority vote) to hold the hearing in a public setting."

Starting the vote on the Amendments proposed by ICH himself.

https://www.nationstates.net/page=rmb/postid=46402576

Aye: You’re in agreement with it

Nay: You’re opposed to it

Abstain: You are not voting

Aye to the first, nay to the second and aye to the third. I feel that the second amendment - regarding foreign testimony - would render the testimony of past Thaecians inadmissible.

AYe to the first, nay to the second, aye to the third.

I will now be closing the vote on the Amendments to Marv’s Bill. We are now voting on Marvs Bill with the edit amendments in them along with Sunipis Bill.

https://www.nationstates.net/page=dispatch/id=1642601

https://www.nationstates.net/page=dispatch/id=1625038

When debating please state your stance on it

I. E: Oppose/For

Then, please state your claim and then your reasoning behind your thoughts.

I. E:

Stance-I oppose said Bill

Claim- It goes against (your thoughts)

Reasoning: This Demonstrates (also your thoughts)

CIA Act: Aye as it provides - even despite the watering down - a very good mechanism for Congress to conduct investigations.

Amendment to LR 40: Nay as I believe military accountability is of the utmost importance; the only reason we accept such heavy classification IRL is due to potential injury or loss of life, while in NS the most that occurs is people get a bit of egg on their face, and therefore the cost-benefit analysis I have done - in light of the much lower benefits than IRL - has led me to believe that this act is overall more a burden than a benefit, and encourage my fellow Senators to vote in favour of defeating it.

Vedenmark wrote:I will now be closing the vote on the Amendments to Marv’s Bill. We are now voting on Marvs Bill with the edit amendments in them along with Sunipis Bill.

https://www.nationstates.net/page=dispatch/id=1642601

https://www.nationstates.net/page=dispatch/id=1625038

When voting please state your stance on it

I. E: Oppose/For

Then, please state your claim and then your reasoning behind your thoughts.

I. E:

Stance-I oppose said Bill

Claim- It goes against (your thoughts)

Reasoning: This Demonstrates (also your thoughts)

I am for act number 1. I believe that it will be helpful in conducting investigations, something which is necessary to have. If one official gets corrupt, it should be within the powers of the government to investigate said individual if need be, and this act accomplishes that.

I oppose act number 2. I don't enjoy the idea of the government withholding this kind of information. The more transparent a government is, the better, but in the future my mind could change on the subject.

Vedenmark

Primo I hate to see you go and I hope you come to the senate sometime soon.

Primo Order

1: For. Reasons that have been stated before. Easier to conduct investigations.

2: Against. I would prefer to not have this information withheld.

Vedenmark

I am very sorry to see you go, Primo. Good luck with all your future endeavours.

Primo Order

Primo, I am very sorry to have you not in the Senate anymore. Best of luck in your future endeavours, friendo!

Primo Order

Aye to the first, and abstain to the second.

Senators, do keep in mind, the final bill contains the amendments you cleared earlier.

Vedenmark

I am now closing the voting session on the 2 Bills

Bill 1: Passes

Bill 2: Fails

—————————————

Candidacy Declarations for Senate Chairperson

—————————————

With the resignation of the Chair, a new Chairperson of the Senate must be chosen once more.

If you would like to run in the chamber leadership election, please announce your candidacy for Chairperson here on the RMB.

This period shall end when either all Senators have informed me of their intent/non-intent to run for Chair or until 24 hours have elapsed from the beginning of this candidacy declaration period, whichever happens first.

Senators, if you wish to run for the position of Chair, declare your candidacy now.

[spoiler=Senators]The Islamic Country Of Honour (IND)

The Sarangtus Lands (RPT)

Vedenmark (IND)

Angypt (CTC)

Millenhaal (TGP)

Creckelenney (FREE)

[/spoiler]

- Taungu

Acting Electoral Commissioner of Thaecia

I will be running for the Chairmanship

I do not intend to run for chair.

I would like to propose unanimous consent for this bill.

https://www.nationstates.net/page=dispatch/id=1656970

For it to pass, it has to receive the acknowledgement of majority of the representatives in this chamber with no objections in the next 24 hours.

Brototh, Vedenmark

I acknowledge the motion.

I acknowledge the motion

I acknowledge the motion.

Also, I declare my candidacy for Senate Chairperson

—————————————

Discussion & Statements Period for Chairperson Election

—————————————

With the completion of 24 hours since the beginning of the Candidacy Declaration Period, that period has elapsed.

As of the end of the Candidacy Declaration Period, the two Senators who have stepped forward with a bid for Chair are;

[list]- [nation=noflag]Angypt[/nation] (CTC)

- [nation=noflag]Vedenmark[/nation] (IND)[/list]

Senators, if you would like to make statements or pose questions regarding the candidates or otherwise, please do so now.

[spoiler=Senators][nation]The Islamic Country of Honour[/nation] (IND)

[nation]The Sarangtus Lands[/nation] (RPT)

[nation]Vedenmark[/nation] (IND)

[nation]Angypt[/nation] (CTC)

[nation]Millenhaal[/nation] (TGP)

[nation]Creckelenney[/nation] (FREE)

[/spoiler]

- Taungu

Acting Electoral Commissioner of Thaecia

Hey senators, as we know I am running for the Senate Chairmanship.

For starters, I would like to say that I have been trained for this position by the former Chairman himself Chairman The Islamic Country Of Honour who allowed me to act as Chairman for the last 3 weeks (maybe more) within his term before resigning. He has also made sure I’m aware of how to properly run the Senate without much problem.

My opposition Angypt knows this as well. I would also like to point out that my opposition in my opinion will not be dedicated fully to job considering the amount of inactivity they have had throughout all of the region, but specifically for this case—the Senate.

As we have seen on the RMB and in the Thaecian Senate channel, ICH has given us as senators many opportunities to step up to the plate and offer help on the RMB: I have been the only one doing so.

As you all can see, Angypt was offered many times to step up and take charge but sadly refused. How can we expect them to step up now; in a real situation.

Us as senators need to make a conscious choice about who we vote for and who is in our best interest, I plan to set new voting periods for the senate debates and votings. As we all have witnessed, we have been moving in a extremely slow process in the Senate. That is my main goal, not as much change they way we move, but more of putting it at a faster pace. Mainly because I realize people have their affairs outside of NS-Politics.

I have spoken with one of the most if not the most experienced legislature in Thaecia, Brototh. She has explained to me how to properly organized a docket for the Senate and how to receive Bills etc.

As you all can see I am more experienced and I believe that I will be dedicated to this position. Not to mention I’m more active throughout the region and it’s affairs.

Post self-deleted by Vedenmark.

1. What do you intend to actually do as Chairman?

2. Who will you appoint as your deputies, and what process have you come to in making these choices?

3. What will be your reasoning for the order you put things on the docket?

1.) As Chairman I believe it will be my role and responsibility to make sure the Senate is active and doing what it supposed to do effectively. My role would be to keep it organized and moving at a organized pace.

2.) I will appoint 2 deputies, a Jr. Dep, and a Sr. Dep. In the event I am elected Chairman I will appoint Emazia as my Sr. Dep and Senator Crek as my Jr. Dep. This is upon their permission of course. I will do this because I believe they are the most vocal among the senate and I plan to work with vocal people who I can rely on in the event I can not run the Senate effectively which should be never at the moment.

3.) I will organize my Socket based on the important sand urgent of said Bill. I will consider more on this parts because there can be some controversy but that’s all for now.

I will be glad to answer anymore questions.

The Sarangtus Lands

Dear senate,

I regret to inform you that I am hereby resigning from my position as senator. I am aware that something large is happening, and this may affect the case, but I feel that the spot I currently hold could be better suited by another candidate. I am currently preoccupied with other things and my investiture in this body is iffy at best. Might run again at some other time, but let's be honest here. I am arguably the worst senator we have right now. Y'all have been great, see you around.

Millenhaal, I’m sorry to see you go. It’s with heavy heart to see many senators resign at this moment. Because of your real life situations I will not hold you as the worst senator as personal life is more important. Hope to see you better as a more active Senator.

Vedenmark wrote:1.) As Chairman I believe it will be my role and responsibility to make sure the Senate is active and doing what it supposed to do effectively. My role would be to keep it organized and moving at a organized pace.

2.) I will appoint 2 deputies, a Jr. Dep, and a Sr. Dep. In the event I am elected Chairman I will appoint Emazia as my Sr. Dep and Senator Crek as my Jr. Dep. This is upon their permission of course. I will do this because I believe they are the most vocal among the senate and I plan to work with vocal people who I can rely on in the event I can not run the Senate effectively which should be never at the moment.

3.) I will organize my Socket based on the important sand urgent of said Bill. I will consider more on this parts because there can be some controversy but that’s all for now.

I will be glad to answer anymore questions.

How would you make sure the Senate is active?

The Senate current it is in a very unhealthy state. And I point no fingers at anyone. The inactivity to the resignations have all been heavy on the Senate and I plan to. Get the senate moving again. I plan to make sure the senate is active by establishing new voting and debating periods with the exception of someone wants to extend it a couple of more hours or so etc. Debating periods and Voting periods can be shorter.

—————————————

Voting Period for Chairperson of the Senate

—————————————

Seeing no further discussion on the floor with less than an hour left in the Discussion & Statements period, we are now entering into the voting period, the following vote options are available;

[list]- [nation=noflag]Angypt[/nation] (CTC)

- [nation=noflag]Vedenmark[/nation] (IND)

- Abstain[/list]

Senators, you may now cast your votes...

[spoiler=Senators][nation]The Islamic Country of Honour[/nation] (IND)

[nation]The Sarangtus Lands[/nation] (RPT)

[nation]Vedenmark[/nation] (IND)

[nation]Angypt[/nation] (CTC)

[nation]Creckelenney[/nation] (FREE)

[/spoiler]

- Taungu

Acting Electoral Commissioner of Thaecia

I vote for vedenmark

—————————————

Voting Results for Senate Chairperson Election

—————————————

As every Senator has cast their votes, the voting period is now closed.

[list]- [nation=noflag]Vedenmark[/nation] (IND): [nation]Vedenmark[/nation], [nation]The Sarangtus Lands[/nation], [nation]Creckelenney[/nation]

- [nation=noflag]Angypt[/nation] (CTC): [nation]Angypt[/nation], [nation]The Islamic Country of Honour[/nation]

- Abstain: [/list]

A majority in favor of a Chairperson-candidate has been established!

Jnr. Deputy Chair Vedenmark is therefore duly elected to the position of Senate Chairman by a simple majority of 3-2-0.

In accordance to L.R. 051 "Congress Regulation Act (2021)", Article III Section III, with more than one candidate standing to be Speaker of the House, the second placed candidate in the election is to be the Shadow Speaker. With that, the Senator Angypt is the incoming Shadow Senate Chair.

Senate business will resume as soon as Chairman Vedenmark brings the first matter into session.

- Taungu

Acting Electoral Commissioner of Thaecia

Senators, we are now Debating the Bill, Protecting Our Elections Act.

This Bill has passed the House and is Authored by a well known active Legislature, Marv.

Do keep in mind your conduct when debating this Bill and also keep in mind that you have 36 hours to Debate this Bill.

https://www.nationstates.net/page=dispatch/id=1651902

When debating please do the following:

Claim:

Reasoning:

Closing:

Keep in mind you do not have to follow these, you can make up your own if you want.

The Sarangtus Lands

Creckelenney

Angypt

The Islamic Country Of Honour

Brototh

I think this is a good, reasonable reform which will help us safeguard our election system more effectively.

Chairman Veden

This Bill if passed actively Demonstrates us keeping our Elections free, fair, and not fraudulent. Having this Bill will ensure that we are keeping elections from fraudulent situations such as the one a few months ago. Therefore, I will be voting Aye!

Senators, I am closing the debate early because no one had said anything and it will be useless to continue the debating session when no one else is participating. We are now voting on the Bills.

https://www.nationstates.net/page=dispatch/id=1651902

When voting please state what you’re voting for and your reasoning.

The Sarangtus Lands

Creckelenney

The Islamic Country Of Honour

Angypt

Aye. I already gave my reasoning in debate, but I'm just saying that these are necessary reforms once again, to ensure that it is entered into the record.

Chairman Veden

Aye! I will be voting Aye because these Bills are very much needed and the reasons I stated in the debate yesterday.

Aye. Not a tonne to say. Keeps elections safe. Very necessary reforms.

Chairman Veden

I am now closing the vote on Marvs Bill. It passes receiving 3 of 5 votes all voting in favor of the Bill.

We will now be moving to our next order of business. The confirmation of Zon Island. Zon Island you have permission to speak on the floor.

Senators make sure to ask up to 2 questions.

The Sarangtus Lands

Creckelenney

The Islamic Country Of Honour

Angypt

Chairman Veden wrote:I am now closing the vote on Marvs Bill. It passes receiving 3 of 5 votes all voting in favor of the Bill.

We will now be moving to our next order of business. The confirmation of Zon Island. Zon Island you have permission to speak on the floor.

Senators make sure to ask up to 2 questions.

The Sarangtus Lands

Creckelenney

The Islamic Country Of Honour

Angypt

Zon Island, I have two questions for you: how do you plan to address the staffing problems usually faced by all Home Affairs Ministries under various Administrations, and what changes are you going to bring to the Ministry?

Hi Zon. You have a history of being very trustworthy and reliable on many things, which is probably why you were nominated for this position. With the limited time you have, what do you plan to do in your position, if you get it.

1. How will you improve recruitment and retention?

2. What previous experience do you believe that you have which will help you carry out your job?

3. What does the job of Home Affairs Minister mean to you?

The Islamic Country Of Honour wrote:Zon Island, I have two questions for you: how do you plan to address the staffing problems usually faced by all Home Affairs Ministries under various Administrations, and what changes are you going to bring to the Ministry?

I plan to address the staffing problem through getting more people to participate in HAM by provide more incentives for work such as mentoring and welcoming which we did with recruitment and by regularly making annoucements so that people know about jobs available to try and fix staffing problems.

Chairman Veden wrote:Hi Zon. You have a history of being very trustworthy and reliable on many things, which is probably why you were nominated for this position. With the limited time you have, what do you plan to do in your position, if you get it.

I plan to mostly focus on trying to address staffing problems and improving mentoring program further.

The Sarangtus Lands wrote:1. How will you improve recruitment and retention?

2. What previous experience do you believe that you have which will help you carry out your job?

3. What does the job of Home Affairs Minister mean to you?

I plan to get more people to join the manual recruitment team so that we can send out more receuitment telegrams and also get more people to help with mentoring and welcoming. Regarding experience I have been Deputy Home Affairs Minister and had other positions in HAM such as a Welcomer and more. I feel that it is a important job that has a lot of responsibilities.

Xernon

Inauguration Notice

On behalf of the Electoral Commission, with verification from the High Court of Thaecia, I hereby inaugurate [nation=noflag]Islonia[/nation] and [nation=noflag]Gifty[/nation] to the Senate as Senators.

[spoiler=Relevant Parties]Chairman [nation=noflag]Vedenmark[/nation]

President [nation=noflag]Andusre[/nation]

Prime Minister [nation=noflag]Xernon[/nation][/spoiler]

Rayekka

Electoral Commissioner

Xernon, Chairman Veden

Hello Senators, we will now begin voting on the confirmation of Zon Island.

Please remember to keep your voting organized and well written.

The Sarangtus Lands

Angypt

Creckelenney

Islonia

Gifty

The Islamic Country Of Honour

Xernon

Aye: Zon has had a history of being trustworthy and he is seemingly worthy of the position, which I stated in the debate—however, he shows that he can do the job so I will be voting Aye.

Xernon

Aye; I'm sure Zon will do an excellent job, and I have no reason to oppose his confirmation

Xernon, Chairman Veden

Aye, I see no reason at all to object, I am sure he will do all he can in his job.

Xernon, Chairman Veden

Nay. As much as I know of Zon's capacities, this confirmation was rushed at best and a sham at worst. We know not of the nominee's plans barring basic information, which does not even reach the bare minimum set for the ministry.

Be it noted it's more a protest vote towards the situation than towards Zon. I'll switch to abstain may nays force a tie and aye may they be in majority.

Chairman Veden

Islonia wrote:Nay. As much as I know of Zon's capacities, this confirmation was rushed at best and a sham at worst. We know not of the nominee's plans barring basic information, which does not even reach the bare minimum set for the ministry.

Be it noted it's more a protest vote towards the situation than towards Zon. I'll switch to abstain may nays force a tie and aye may they be in majority.

Understandable

Senators, I will be closing the vote. It seems as though the majority of the senate has voted and the remaining 2 have not shown activity in the few days. With the exception of ICH ofc. I will be closing the vote and opening the Debate on the Judiciary Act and the Amends.

I am allowing the Justices; Marconian State and Peeps are being allowed to speak during the Debate making statements etc.

This debate is very crucial so I encourage you all to participate in this debate since it is very important. I will extend the voting and debating period to 45 hours.

Also!! The confirmation gets 5 votes 4-1 meaning it passes.

Judiciary Act: https://www.nationstates.net/page=dispatch/id=1656970

Amends: https://www.nationstates.net/page=dispatch/id=1658598

We will be debating those two, make sure to use the format I’ve given above to make sure your debating post are organized etc.

Justices: The Marconian State and Peeps

Senators: The Sarangtus Lands Angypt Creckelenney Gifty Islonia The Islamic Country Of Honour

Chairman Veden wrote:Senators, I will be closing the vote. It seems as though the majority of the senate has voted and the remaining 2 have not shown activity in the few days. With the exception of ICH ofc. I will be closing the vote and opening the Debate on the Judiciary Act and the Amends.

I am allowing the Justices; Marconian State and Peeps are being allowed to speak during the Debate making statements etc.

This debate is very crucial so I encourage you all to participate in this debate since it is very important. I will extend the voting and debating period to 45 hours.

Also!! The confirmation gets 5 votes 4-1 meaning it passes.

Judiciary Act: https://www.nationstates.net/page=dispatch/id=1656970

Amends: https://www.nationstates.net/page=dispatch/id=1658598

We will be debating those two, make sure to use the format I’ve given above to make sure your debating post are organized etc.

Justices: The Marconian State and Peeps

Senators: The Sarangtus Lands Angypt Creckelenney Gifty Islonia The Islamic Country Of Honour

And shadow as well, sorry for the delay.

Thank you Chairperson and thank you Senators for having me.

I'm here today to speak against the Judiciary Regulation Act. I will leave the LR44 amendments alone for now as they do not accomplish what they claim to accomplish. Under them a crime will still be a crime. I instead would like to speak on the Judiciary Regulation Act's bad effects on our Justice system and give specific alternatives to what it proposes.

To elaborate on what a crime is, in all jurisdictions that I am aware of, including under current Thaecian law, a crime has a very specific definition. It's a specific action that society has deemed immoral and worthy of punishment. Thus, the legislature gives a specific punishment for committing that action. We do this in Thaecia when we add something to LR44 and specify whether it's a misdemeanor, a felony, or any other category of crime. A crime is not, and ought not to be, defined as any violation of any law. There are numerous examples, both in real life and in Thaecian law of this being the case, for example in Thaecia when Congress passes an unconstitutional law Congress doesn't get banned, or when in real life the government infringes on the right to free speech, the government doesn't go to jail. I think we can all agree this is common sense. There are such broad possibilities for laws or actions to be unconstitutional or being an infringement on rights that making it a crime would make it impossible for laws to be made or actions to be taken, so we don't make them crimes.

However, there still must be a way for Citizens to access legal recourse if unconstitutional laws are passed or actions that infringe upon rights are taken. That recourse in the Thaecian system is Legal Review. When we were framing our new constitution, we specifically said there are two primary types of cases. Criminal cases, which obviously are the cases that happen when someone commits a crime, and legal reviews, which up until this point have been poorly defined. Currently the High Court's Rules (which are in the process of being updated), only define legal reviews as being able strike down laws or say whether an action was legal, with no "teeth" for the latter part. I do think that is a problem that should be solved by Congress.

So, I have put together a bill that does just that. It better defines our current cases and their differences, specifies how appeals are to be done if they ever come into play, and gives the High Court the statutory legal ability to make rules for its operation. However, the heart of this bill is its definition of Legal Review. My bill, which is linked here and I have reached out to many of you for comment on, gives Legal Reviews the power to result in an order by the Court commanding a Citizen to take or refrain from taking a particular action or actions, result in a Court declaration that a person is or is not the rightful holder of a particular office, result in a Court declaration that a past course of action is legal or not legal, or result in a Court order declaring a law unconstitutional." With this statutory power the High Court will be able to more efficiently provide redress to all harmed Citizens, and do it in a manner consistent with how proper legal systems are run.

Beyond the benefits of the system I've laid out, the system proposed by the bill in front of the Senate for consideration has downsides for Citizens seeking redress as well. Due to it envisioning criminal cases as the way Citizens get the government to do things, they have to go through the more complicated and arduous process for criminal cases. For one, a criminal case requires a higher burden of proof, or in other words, it is more likely that based on the same amount of evidence, a court would rule that someone is not guilty of a crime vs. does not need to act to resolve an illegal action. There are also other procedural differences, but I think I'm already running pretty long with this statement.

So in conclusion, the Judiciary Regulation Act would not create a fairer or more well thought out judicial system for Thaecia, it would instead upend the widely accepted manners of jurisprudence and make it harder for people to seek redress from government actions. If there is a problem with actions that should be crimes not being crimes, then the solution is to make those actions crimes. I am happy to answer any questions on this statement in this chamber or as it is not the topic under consideration, on my bill in any other place.

Chairman Veden

To start, saying the LR 044 amendments do not 'accomplish what they claim to accomplish' is strange- the bill has no preamble, thus they do not claim anything. However the point is for them to supplement the Judiciary Regulation Act- you yourself used it in an argument that we can't punish lawbreaking for any other law with LR 044 sentencing. What the LR 044 amendments do is remove something that is a) gramatically incorrect & b) not really useful anyway. With the new Judiciary Regulation Act, this section would be even further useless- really it should be in the same bill but we didn't notice this bit until afterwards, hence why I requested the bills are done at the same time.

I want to be entirely honest, Peeps has written five paragraphs of not really much- honestly when I look at it, I don't really get anything- so this is bad because the current law is vague and uh...okay?

It's also simply not true that citizens need go through a more 'complicated' process- because there is no other process. Peeps says that Congress is the one that should be defining what a legal review is- and I think this is very much so a case of "we Justices, who have managed this for three years, are too lazy to do it ourselves". The Justices did say they would be updating their procedures thirteen days ago- nothing has happened. And now we have a Justice telling us that the processes are 'being updated' but Congress should go and be the ones to do it.

Here we have a bill where we do it- as all the Senators and Members of Parliament know, Thaecia's established legal system for years has been if a law is broken, something is done about it- unfortunately the new system proposed by the Justices sans Sma Cyrillic is "Oh, so the law explicitly says 'No nation can do X'? It's time we hold a legal review on if a nation is allowed to do X! Shocker- they aren't! Only now can we take action because we have established precedent for it.".

Under their system:

[list=1][*]A nation breaks the law.

[*]A legal review, lasting four days if not longer, is held to determine if it is allowed to do the illegal action- even if the law explicitly says it isn't.

[*]We have to wait for the nation to do it again- who knows how long this will take; who knows if they will be caught even if we know they did it before- by this point, the damage is already done.

[*]Once the nation does it again, we hold the criminal case.[/list]

Under the system proposed, and has been for 3 years:

[list=1][*]A nation breaks the law.

[*]We hold a criminal case.[/list]

If this bill is making it harder for people to seek redress, then only God knows what isn't.

There is a point that a higher burden of proof is needed- and I think that is valid. The issue is, we would also need that for the system proposed: we would have to then hold a criminal case afterwards anyway and just waste time. The solution here is to cut out needing intent in LR 044- it is incredibly hard to judge intent on a text-based browser game, and frankly we should just get rid of it entirely.

The example I was told by Peeps was as follows: the government unconstitutionally suppresses my free speech- a legal review is held to make them undo it.

The problem we have here is that the Court then has to judge that the free speech was indeed unconstitutionally suppressed- sounds like something that should be argued in a case with evidence, lawyers, etc, no? Instead, we have to have the government's representative argue against the government- now what's going on there? It took a job to even get me to represent the Justice Ministry in the High Court and even then I was told prior by the JM that I should be taking the bar exam. Why do we not simply cut out the middle man and get to it? Because something like that might not require a ban? Well - don't ban them then! LR 044 already allows for simply warnings or no punishment and just a court order.

Ultimately, this bill is good- there are some issues with it, such as the Court maybe having too much power after this to ban for minor crimes, and the inclusion of motions in criminal cases which would probably be unconstitutional. For those reasons, I have co-authored these amendments to the bill with the Hon. Senator The Islamic Country Of Honour:

https://www.nationstates.net/page=dispatch/id=1661144

I implore Senators to pass these amendments and the bill- because if we do as Peeps suggests and pass his bill, we open up a door where laws may be broken and the Court must spend weeks dancing around itself (look at how they are unable to update vital procedures that caused a case to be rejected in 14 days: can we really say they will be able to hold a legal review and then a court case in a timely fashion?), or where laws may not be broken but with a mere "preponderance" of evidence we are able to start enforcing actions for things that may very clearly not or may very clearly go against Thaecian law. Such a dispute should be resolved in a criminal case to judge whether the law was truly broken or not.

The proposed amendments resolve the problems in this bill.

Chairman Veden

Brototh makes a fundamentally misguided contention, that all violations of the law should be criminally punished. She would be correct that her system works better if that is how we would like to guide our Justice system. However that is not how we should guide our Justice system at all. That is not how any Justice system I am aware of works. She contends that out of every legal review there would then be a criminal case, this would be incorrect. A legal review would not be deciding whether or not a criminal case should occur but instead whether or not the Court should order actions to be taken to remedy a violation of a law. If that order is disobeyed, that would constitute a crime. If it is not disobeyed, no crime would have been committed.

Under Brototh's system the traditional definition of crime will be thrown out the window. Rather than crimes being immoral actions society deems punishable, crimes will be any violation of any law. That is not what crime is under any system I am aware of. Under all systems I am aware of, and in common sense, not all violations of all laws cause punishment. That would be a fundamentally ridiculous system. Instead, for most laws, the Court orders corrective actions to be taken if laws are broken. Only if a crime is committed should someone be punished. The legal system shouldn't only be about punishment, it should be about providing redress through corrective action.

Furthermore, the Amendments that Brototh proposes do not resolve the fundamental issues with this bill. While they do resolve the unconstitutional provision regarding motions, although I'm not sure they fully do as I don't believe the definition of item in the Judicial Regulation Act is changed, only another conflicting provision is added. But still, they destroy the common definition of crime and replace it with, for all the reasons I've previously covered, a ridiculous definition of a crime.

Brototh should be further aware that "preponderance of the evidence" merely means that it is 50+1% likely that one sides case is correct. This is used in Legal Review proceedings because no one is going to get banned unless they explicitly disobey what the Court orders them to do. The Court isn't punishing, they are telling people what to do.

Chairman Veden

Brototh wrote:To start, saying the LR 044 amendments do not 'accomplish what they claim to accomplish' is strange- the bill has no preamble, thus they do not claim anything. However the point is for them to supplement the Judiciary Regulation Act- you yourself used it in an argument that we can't punish lawbreaking for any other law with LR 044 sentencing. What the LR 044 amendments do is remove something that is a) gramatically incorrect & b) not really useful anyway. With the new Judiciary Regulation Act, this section would be even further useless- really it should be in the same bill but we didn't notice this bit until afterwards, hence why I requested the bills are done at the same time.

I want to be entirely honest, Peeps has written five paragraphs of not really much- honestly when I look at it, I don't really get anything- so this is bad because the current law is vague and uh...okay?

It's also simply not true that citizens need go through a more 'complicated' process- because there is no other process. Peeps says that Congress is the one that should be defining what a legal review is- and I think this is very much so a case of "we Justices, who have managed this for three years, are too lazy to do it ourselves". The Justices did say they would be updating their procedures thirteen days ago- nothing has happened. And now we have a Justice telling us that the processes are 'being updated' but Congress should go and be the ones to do it.

Here we have a bill where we do it- as all the Senators and Members of Parliament know, Thaecia's established legal system for years has been if a law is broken, something is done about it- unfortunately the new system proposed by the Justices sans Sma Cyrillic is "Oh, so the law explicitly says 'No nation can do X'? It's time we hold a legal review on if a nation is allowed to do X! Shocker- they aren't! Only now can we take action because we have established precedent for it.".

Under their system:

[list=1][*]A nation breaks the law.

[*]A legal review, lasting four days if not longer, is held to determine if it is allowed to do the illegal action- even if the law explicitly says it isn't.

[*]We have to wait for the nation to do it again- who knows how long this will take; who knows if they will be caught even if we know they did it before- by this point, the damage is already done.

[*]Once the nation does it again, we hold the criminal case.[/list]

Under the system proposed, and has been for 3 years:

[list=1][*]A nation breaks the law.

[*]We hold a criminal case.[/list]

If this bill is making it harder for people to seek redress, then only God knows what isn't.

There is a point that a higher burden of proof is needed- and I think that is valid. The issue is, we would also need that for the system proposed: we would have to then hold a criminal case afterwards anyway and just waste time. The solution here is to cut out needing intent in LR 044- it is incredibly hard to judge intent on a text-based browser game, and frankly we should just get rid of it entirely.

The example I was told by Peeps was as follows: the government unconstitutionally suppresses my free speech- a legal review is held to make them undo it.

The problem we have here is that the Court then has to judge that the free speech was indeed unconstitutionally suppressed- sounds like something that should be argued in a case with evidence, lawyers, etc, no? Instead, we have to have the government's representative argue against the government- now what's going on there? It took a job to even get me to represent the Justice Ministry in the High Court and even then I was told prior by the JM that I should be taking the bar exam. Why do we not simply cut out the middle man and get to it? Because something like that might not require a ban? Well - don't ban them then! LR 044 already allows for simply warnings or no punishment and just a court order.

Ultimately, this bill is good- there are some issues with it, such as the Court maybe having too much power after this to ban for minor crimes, and the inclusion of motions in criminal cases which would probably be unconstitutional. For those reasons, I have co-authored these amendments to the bill with the Hon. Senator The Islamic Country Of Honour:

https://www.nationstates.net/page=dispatch/id=1661144

I implore Senators to pass these amendments and the bill- because if we do as Peeps suggests and pass his bill, we open up a door where laws may be broken and the Court must spend weeks dancing around itself (look at how they are unable to update vital procedures that caused a case to be rejected in 14 days: can we really say they will be able to hold a legal review and then a court case in a timely fashion?), or where laws may not be broken but with a mere "preponderance" of evidence we are able to start enforcing actions for things that may very clearly not or may very clearly go against Thaecian law. Such a dispute should be resolved in a criminal case to judge whether the law was truly broken or not.

The proposed amendments resolve the problems in this bill.

Before jumping in and adding my commentary on the Judiciary bills at hand, I do want to come forward and say that we are having delays in redoing our procedures due to having busy personal lives. for me personally, I'm working 48 to 60 hours a week on the regular right now. I am doing my best to be more available, but it's hard when most of your day is chipped away to do other things. So on behalf of the High court, I do appologize and I do wish this is not held against the Court. We are making effort and headway, but it is taking some time.

Secondly, and now time for my 2 cents on the situation known as the Judiciary Act.

I don't understand why we are splitting hairs on Judicial Reviews vs. Criminal Cases. If a nation breaks the law, law that we have codified, it should be treated as a criminal offense. There's a reason why we have laws codified. These are our guidelines for how the government works, how the region should behave, and various other odds and ends that I can't think of at this moment. The system Brototh is proposing is, in my personal opinion, the way things should be. The next thing the Court is currently working on is redoing it's proceedings and procedures. In that, any nation can sue the Government for legal redress in the Government has violated a law or is out of compliance.

I think Shadow's point actually gets at the heart of what this debate is about. This debate is about whether we wish to have a rare, perhaps unheard of, fully punitive judicial system focused on nothing other than punishing any infraction of the law no matter how minor, and if that is the case we should have the system Brototh is proposing.

Instead, the system I am proposing is the NS and global standard, where laws are not there to punish but rather to guide, and unless society has decided an action is worthy of punishment no punishment is given. That a Court should, if a law is violated but a crime is not committed, force restorative action rather than just punish for the sake of punishing.

I believe in the latter system because it works, it works all across NS and it works all across the real world. It is a system that reduces the politicization of the judicial branch as it means politicians can't remove their opponents over minor infractions, but only over real, congressionally created crimes. It is a system that restrains the government without banning everyone involved in government. It is a system that doesn't give justices full power and autonomy over how minor infractions should be punished rather than resolved.

Finally, I must announce that if the unheard of punitive system is chosen over the restorative, time tested system, I will be forced to reconsider my involvement in our judicial branch. I didn't sign up for this job to be one of three kings.

Xernon

As of now I'm leaning towards Peeps' idea. His second post cleared up the fuzziness of what he was proposing and doesn't seem to be against what I myself want our legal system to be (see my campaign dispatch: "«may law be broken, a punishement shall (and not must) be applied.». The words in bold implied situations where actions could be undone granted no damage was dealt.

If I understand correcly, and I believe all legislators and observers could make use of this, the two systems would work like this:

- Brototh's:

[list](1) A law is alledgedly broken;

(2) A case is presented to the courts;

(3) They judge the law has been broken and punishment ensues.[/list]

- Democratized Peoples':

[list](1) A law is alledgedly broken;

(2) A case is presented to the courts;

(3) They judge the law has been been broken;

[list](a) If it is a criminal offence/an act that can't be reversed, punishment ensues,

(b) If it isn't a criminal offence/an act that can be reversed, the court orders it to be [reversed]. If the order is not carried, the person deemed guilty is punished.[/list][/list]

For Peeps' (3)(b) I assume the punishment would be more severe than it would be under Brototh's system due to the person breaking the law twice, including one we know was defying the courts (meaning the first one was on purpose too). However, one issue with it I'd like to note is that some may purposefully break the law to do X knowing they can fix their actions later on (we've seen Thaecians bending the law for their own sake before so this isn't far-fetched).

Brototh, Chairman Veden

Democratized Peoples wrote:Brototh makes a fundamentally misguided contention, that all violations of the law should be criminally punished. She would be correct that her system works better if that is how we would like to guide our Justice system. However that is not how we should guide our Justice system at all. That is not how any Justice system I am aware of works. She contends that out of every legal review there would then be a criminal case, this would be incorrect. A legal review would not be deciding whether or not a criminal case should occur but instead whether or not the Court should order actions to be taken to remedy a violation of a law. If that order is disobeyed, that would constitute a crime. If it is not disobeyed, no crime would have been committed.

Under Brototh's system the traditional definition of crime will be thrown out the window. Rather than crimes being immoral actions society deems punishable, crimes will be any violation of any law. That is not what crime is under any system I am aware of. Under all systems I am aware of, and in common sense, not all violations of all laws cause punishment. That would be a fundamentally ridiculous system. Instead, for most laws, the Court orders corrective actions to be taken if laws are broken. Only if a crime is committed should someone be punished. The legal system shouldn't only be about punishment, it should be about providing redress through corrective action.

Furthermore, the Amendments that Brototh proposes do not resolve the fundamental issues with this bill. While they do resolve the unconstitutional provision regarding motions, although I'm not sure they fully do as I don't believe the definition of item in the Judicial Regulation Act is changed, only another conflicting provision is added. But still, they destroy the common definition of crime and replace it with, for all the reasons I've previously covered, a ridiculous definition of a crime.

Brototh should be further aware that "preponderance of the evidence" merely means that it is 50+1% likely that one sides case is correct. This is used in Legal Review proceedings because no one is going to get banned unless they explicitly disobey what the Court orders them to do. The Court isn't punishing, they are telling people what to do.

Once again- Peeps has failed to read my very very multiple posts, both here on the Senate RMB, and as I have said over and over again on Discord- if the honourable Associate Justice would like to read the law he uses to explain his point, he would find that it explicitly states a violation of the law does not have to come with a sentence. A violation of the law can also come with a warning. To suggest that I state that all violations of the law should be "criminally punished" is blatantly false- as I said in my post "LR 044 already allows for simply warnings or no punishment". May I ask the Associate Justice where it is I said that all violations of the law should be punished- considering I very much so stated that there needs be no punishment as the law says so. If it was my intent to punish everyone for every law, then I would also be removing that section from LR 044- as you can see, I hope, that is simply not a true statement.

The system simply does not provide redress through corrective action - as Islonia puts it, someone must break the law twice in order to truly be punished. You want to have something that needs a "preponderance" of evidence? You still have to argue all of that in court- why X is free speech, why X is illegally suppressed, indeed, why the government illegally suppressed X post; surely this could be resolved, hm, in a criminal trial, where the government is handed down a warning. Instead, the system that the Court currently, again, sans Sma Cyrillic, pushes, is one where we would have to be going through several trials for this: frankly, something that is not worth the time.

I don't see why you have a problem with the bill potentially still being unconstitutional- the problem you personally raised was that sueing under motions would be unconstitutional as it bypasses the Prime Minister. With the amendments, someone could not be punished for violating a motion (further enforces why motions are stupid: but hey, this is the word of you, Peeps), and we can also still retain looking over the meaning of a motion- no reason why we should cut that out either, it does no harm and may come in useful one day. I'd also again like to dispute this "common definition of crime"- the issue here is we are yet again going over what other nations, what other regions, do in response. The issue is that we have built Thaecia around this, and never before have we had an issue in Thaecian law like this before: in the past, if the law is violated, a sentence is handed down (again; optionally, see Thaecia v. myself et. al.).

I urge the Court now overturns Senota's ban for fraud, considering it was, as the Court sees it, not legally possible- why should we keep a violation of the law on the books? Never mind he did something wrong- but the law he was punished under simply stated "Fraud will be defined as posing as someone else (creating puppets, changing flags etc). The intention of gaining something from fraud is not necessary for the act to be considered a crime." and the preamble to the bill "hereby declared illegal and punishable under the law". Under the Court's definition, there is no actual punishment directly attached, so, thus- no crime- even if the law says so? Simply put because the Court seems to now believe that if the law is violated, unless an explicit punishment is given, there is no crime- hence I argue Senota's ban, which everyone agreed upon, unanimously, was impossible to carry out. If the Court is committed to the idea of not punishing law breakers, they should overturn this.

Sma Cyrillic wrote:Before jumping in and adding my commentary on the Judiciary bills at hand, I do want to come forward and say that we are having delays in redoing our procedures due to having busy personal lives. for me personally, I'm working 48 to 60 hours a week on the regular right now. I am doing my best to be more available, but it's hard when most of your day is chipped away to do other things. So on behalf of the High court, I do appologize and I do wish this is not held against the Court. We are making effort and headway, but it is taking some time.
I would simply like to put that- although I am a firm believer in the principle that IRL comes above NS, always in any circumstance, it should not impede on NationStates in a serious manner- such as MPs vanishing for weeks on end because of IRL: at such a rate, they should simply resign. While I do not believe that any of the Court members should resign because the procedures are taking a long time to update due to IRL, I don't think it's truly that serious- we should not be putting into effect a new, unbased in any of Thaecia's history, legal system, that requires more effort, and more time- when it has clearly proven difficult to get things done: yes, there is an OOC reason for that, but we should not be passing / failing to pass laws if we know that it can never be carried out or take too long to do so.
Democratized Peoples wrote:I think Shadow's point actually gets at the heart of what this debate is about. This debate is about whether we wish to have a rare, perhaps unheard of, fully punitive judicial system focused on nothing other than punishing any infraction of the law no matter how minor, and if that is the case we should have the system Brototh is proposing.

Instead, the system I am proposing is the NS and global standard, where laws are not there to punish but rather to guide, and unless society has decided an action is worthy of punishment no punishment is given. That a Court should, if a law is violated but a crime is not committed, force restorative action rather than just punish for the sake of punishing.

I believe in the latter system because it works, it works all across NS and it works all across the real world. It is a system that reduces the politicization of the judicial branch as it means politicians can't remove their opponents over minor infractions, but only over real, congressionally created crimes. It is a system that restrains the government without banning everyone involved in government. It is a system that doesn't give justices full power and autonomy over how minor infractions should be punished rather than resolved.

Finally, I must announce that if the unheard of punitive system is chosen over the restorative, time tested system, I will be forced to reconsider my involvement in our judicial branch. I didn't sign up for this job to be one of three kings.

The problem is it has worked and does work here- it has been "time tested" as you say, three times.

I also strongly condemn Peeps's attempt at intimidation- your threats to resign won't work on us. Don't like it, feel free to argue it, feel free to resign even, but it is a disgrace how you can use a threat to resign or at least consider resignation as part of your political statement. I have little more to say, for I have elaborated on it consistently, but I ask that others take note of the manipulative tactics that the Associate Justice is employing in order to win a debate on a text based browser game.

Islonia wrote:As of now I'm leaning towards Peeps' idea. His second post cleared up the fuzziness of what he was proposing and doesn't seem to be against what I myself want our legal system to be (see my campaign dispatch: "«may law be broken, a punishement shall (and not must) be applied.». The words in bold implied situations where actions could be undone granted no damage was dealt.

- Democratized Peoples':

[list](1) A law is alledgedly broken;

(2) A case is presented to the courts;

(3) They judge the law has been been broken;

[list](a) If it is a criminal offence/an act that can't be reversed, punishment ensues,

(b) If it isn't a criminal offence/an act that can be reversed, the court orders it to be [reversed]. If the order is not carried, the person deemed guilty is punished.[/list][/list]

I have cut this down to just respond to the bits I want to- the rest I agree with fully.

Section 3a is not true- the position of Democratized Peoples and I believe also The Marconian State is this, saying that if there is an offence that cannot be reversed, but also Court precedent has not been established. We will take the example of me violating a law that I cannot eat ice cream: for argument's sake, say that eating ice cream is a really terrible thing that distresses people emotionally upon witnessing it.

[list=1][*]Congress passes a law stating no ice cream may be eaten- it is signed into law, etc. I proceed to eat ice cream, and I am caught.

[*]There is no explicit punishment for eating ice cream. As such, the Court must make it so it is against court order to eat ice cream.

[*]A legal review is held to determine whether or not eating ice cream is illegal. They determine that it is- which is obvious because the law explicitly states "No eating ice cream", even though we already know that because the law says so.

[*]I am not punished at all, because otherwise I would be punished ex post facto- it was not yet against court ruling to eat ice cream, so I cannot be punished for contempt of court. The ice cream is already consumed, so it cannot be reversed. Nobody gets anything.

[*]I must, or someone else, must now eat ice cream for a second time, and be caught.

[*]The Court may then hold a criminal trial judging them of Contempt of Court.[/list]

Do we see the problem here, honourable Senators? At least with the amendments proposed by myself and The Islamic Country of Honour, which I humbly request a sponsor for, we can allow things to simply be "ah, the law is violated? Now we will hold a trial against it and punish it" and also employ a medium of "there is a maximum sentence for this, so we aren't just going to start banning everyone for something very minor (ie the law has a very small provision, it is accidentally violated as nobody was knowledgeable of the law [remember that ignorance is not an excuse, so it transcends intent], nobody gets banned and we simply are warned not to do it again)".

Under our current system, we had a case, Thaecia v. the Army- where myself and others were warned simply not to do it again. The problem is under Peeps's system, we would have to hold a legal review determining it is illegal. What is the actual point in that? In the real world, there is point and reason for it- what is the point of doing it here in NationStates? There truly is none: all we do is waste our time. To summarise: 3a is not true: no punishment is given if the act cannot be reversed, as the law does not explicitly state any punishment and only "contempt of court2 can exist.

As you state Islonia, "(see my campaign dispatch: "«may law be broken, a punishement shall (and not must) be applied.».". This is already very much the truth that Democratized Peoples has conveniently ignored in his first post, which I did point out in my own. I once again urge all Justices to read the law fully before arguing on it. LR 044 already states that a punishment does not have to be given if the Court "believes that giving a guilty person a conviction would outweigh the crime committed, said Court may hand down a discharge without conviction".

This would still ring true in the new bill- and would be even more effective with the new amendments, as it would all be part of the same law. I once again urge Senators to consider the full facts of all the law, all the bill, and the amendments proposed.

Islonia, Marvinville

I am stuck between the statements being made here. As of now I’m leaning towards voting abstain because both party’s are showing sufficient and strong willed comments when it comes to the Bills etc.

Brototh

Though I will say that I believe Peeps is making a strong and somewhat valid point.

Brototh wrote:3a is not true: no punishment is given if the act cannot be reversed, as the law does not explicitly state any punishment and only "contempt of court" can exist.

If that's the case then I'd argue to make 3a & 3b a reality.

Brototh

Brototh wrote:Once again- Peeps has failed to read my very very multiple posts, both here on the Senate RMB, and as I have said over and over again on Discord- if the honourable Associate Justice would like to read the law he uses to explain his point, he would find that it explicitly states a violation of the law does not have to come with a sentence. A violation of the law can also come with a warning. To suggest that I state that all violations of the law should be "criminally punished" is blatantly false- as I said in my post "LR 044 already allows for simply warnings or no punishment". May I ask the Associate Justice where it is I said that all violations of the law should be punished- considering I very much so stated that there needs be no punishment as the law says so. If it was my intent to punish everyone for every law, then I would also be removing that section from LR 044- as you can see, I hope, that is simply not a true statement.

The system simply does not provide redress through corrective action - as Islonia puts it, someone must break the law twice in order to truly be punished. You want to have something that needs a "preponderance" of evidence? You still have to argue all of that in court- why X is free speech, why X is illegally suppressed, indeed, why the government illegally suppressed X post; surely this could be resolved, hm, in a criminal trial, where the government is handed down a warning. Instead, the system that the Court currently, again, sans Sma Cyrillic, pushes, is one where we would have to be going through several trials for this: frankly, something that is not worth the time.

I don't see why you have a problem with the bill potentially still being unconstitutional- the problem you personally raised was that sueing under motions would be unconstitutional as it bypasses the Prime Minister. With the amendments, someone could not be punished for violating a motion (further enforces why motions are stupid: but hey, this is the word of you, Peeps), and we can also still retain looking over the meaning of a motion- no reason why we should cut that out either, it does no harm and may come in useful one day. I'd also again like to dispute this "common definition of crime"- the issue here is we are yet again going over what other nations, what other regions, do in response. The issue is that we have built Thaecia around this, and never before have we had an issue in Thaecian law like this before: in the past, if the law is violated, a sentence is handed down (again; optionally, see Thaecia v. myself et. al.).

What Brototh misunderstands is that I fundamentally believe, as do all other NS regions and IRL jurisdictions that I am aware of, that breaking the law does not always necessitate a punishment or even the possibility of a punishment. For the purposes of this bill, I will make no distinction between the two. We should not assume perfectly rational Justices giving everyone warnings, we should assume irrational Justices and think of ways to minimize irrationality.

I was more objecting to the inconsistency the amendments create with two separate, conflicting, definitions of what constitutes an item. I sure hope that when you say "things may change" you are not seriously considering cutting the Executive fully out of the lawmaking process.

Brototh wrote:I urge the Court now overturns Senota's ban for fraud, considering it was, as the Court sees it, not legally possible- why should we keep a violation of the law on the books? Never mind he did something wrong- but the law he was punished under simply stated "Fraud will be defined as posing as someone else (creating puppets, changing flags etc). The intention of gaining something from fraud is not necessary for the act to be considered a crime." and the preamble to the bill "hereby declared illegal and punishable under the law". Under the Court's definition, there is no actual punishment directly attached, so, thus- no crime- even if the law says so? Simply put because the Court seems to now believe that if the law is violated, unless an explicit punishment is given, there is no crime- hence I argue Senota's ban, which everyone agreed upon, unanimously, was impossible to carry out. If the Court is committed to the idea of not punishing law breakers, they should overturn this.I would simply like to put that- although I am a firm believer in the principle that IRL comes above NS, always in any circumstance, it should not impede on NationStates in a serious manner- such as MPs vanishing for weeks on end because of IRL: at such a rate, they should simply resign. While I do not believe that any of the Court members should resign because the procedures are taking a long time to update due to IRL, I don't think it's truly that serious- we should not be putting into effect a new, unbased in any of Thaecia's history, legal system, that requires more effort, and more time- when it has clearly proven difficult to get things done: yes, there is an OOC reason for that, but we should not be passing / failing to pass laws if we know that it can never be carried out or take too long to do so.The problem is it has worked and does work here- it has been "time tested" as you say, three times.
The former Constitution gave the Court the explicit power to ban and do it whenever they saw fit. We removed that from the current Constitution because it was an overly broad power. The Speaker should also be aware that changes in law now do not retroactively change previous sentences of the Court unless the law demands it. I feel like I've already responded to your other points but if Senators would like me to elaborate once again on them I will do so.

Brototh wrote:I also strongly condemn Peeps's attempt at intimidation- your threats to resign won't work on us. Don't like it, feel free to argue it, feel free to resign even, but it is a disgrace how you can use a threat to resign or at least consider resignation as part of your political statement. I have little more to say, for I have elaborated on it consistently, but I ask that others take note of the manipulative tactics that the Associate Justice is employing in order to win a debate on a text based browser game.I have cut this down to just respond to the bits I want to- the rest I agree with fully.
I think that Senators, and all Thaecians, should be aware of how strongly I feel about the independence and proper functioning of the Judiciary and how your bill will completely and utterly destroy both of those basic principles.

Brototh wrote:--snip--

In regards to the final textbloc, all of what Cinema factually contended is true. I believe that unless Congress makes something a crime there should be no criminal punishment. So if Congress believes that there is an action that deserves more than actions taken to restore any damage done by a violation of the law, Congress should specify. But what we should not do is give the Court a carte blanche to remove people from office or ban people for violations of the law which Congress have not specified should deserve a criminal punishment. There is no system that I am aware of where any Court has such broad power.

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