Amendmend II - Apolytonian Court Mk. III

[Captain]

Here is jdjdjd's version with minor changes (language, tightening, typos, etc...) and the 1 big change in the appeals.

Jdjdjd, just create a poll with this. Or if you want, I can do it. Just let me know.

This amendment hereby creates an official Apolytonian Court (hereafter refered to as "The Court")

1. Purpose:

The Court is constituted to rule upon: contested disputes involving legal interpretation, validity of polls, violations of the Constitution, impeachment, or any other legal dispute of national importance.

2. Construct of the Court:

a. Size of Court:
The Court is composed of Five Justices. Each Justice is to be appointed by the President, and each must be approved by a simple majority of the populace in an Approval Vote.

b. Installing the First Court:
The First Court appointed, upon ratification of this amendment, are to be chosen to staggering terms. One member will serve for one month, two will serve for two months and the remaining two will serve for three months. These first Justices of the Court will be appointed in the following manner: President selects 2 (3 month terms), Vice President selects 1 (two month term), Minister of Imperial Expansion(two month term) selects 1 and Econimics Minister selects 1 (one month term). All appointments must be approved by a majority vote of the public.

c. Terms in office:
There is no limit to the number of terms a Justice may serve.
Each Justice serves a term of three months in length, except as indicated above in 2b. All appointments and re-appointments must be approved by a majority vote of the public.

d. Senior Justice:
The Court is to select a 'Senior Justice', who will be responsible for ensuring that a timely report is published for each decision made by the court that communicates the rationale behind the decision; and make sure that the decision is stored and archived. Failure to provide the report is grounds for an appeal. The Senior Justice will also preside over any hearings before The Court.

e. Other Governmental Posts:
A Justice may not serve in any other governmental post.

f. Reappointment:
At the end of that term a Justice may be reappointed by the President. In cases where a Justice is not being re-appointed by the decision of the President, the President may be bypassed in this process if 75% of the populace re-approve the Justice in a vote. Any citizen may create such a poll. Such a poll would have to conclude before the term is completed.

3. Case Structure:

a. Quorum:
A quorum of at least 3 Justices must be involved in any ruling that is made. Should The Court be tied about how to rule on an issue, any non-voting justice is to then review the case and vote.

b. Rulings:
All rulings are immediately official and final except where appeals are granted.

c. Appeals:
Appeals will be granted if there are grounds to believe that an error in the application of the law has been made. Any citizen directly involved in the case may make an application for an appeal. If 3 or more of the 5 judges decide to grant the appeal, a new trial will be created to examine the case. In that case, the current verdict is placed on hold until after the appeal process.

d. Injunctions:
The Court cannot halt the game to make a decision without a 2/3 vote amongst the people. In case of an emergency due to timing of a turnchat and poll of the populace, the Court may halt the game for 72 hours, but only by unanimous vote of the Court and only if a specific case has been presented to them that must be decided prior to the turnchat. In the emergency case, the Court would immediately have to present a 72 hour poll to the people for their approval of the Injunction. If not approved by the time of the poll's closure, the game immediately resumes where it was before.

e. Case Presentation:
The Court cannot act on any issue until a non-judicial citizen of the nation brings forth an Issue to The Court. Issues to The Court should be posted publicly and must involve a dispute that The Court is empowered to rule upon.

(edited to fix another thing)

[Togas]

The above revision by Captain is excellent. Someone please post it for ratification. It'll get my vote.

--Togas

[Kramerman]

Here is my celebration song:

Simpsons parody of an old cartoon short -

boy: "hey, who through this garbage on the steps of Congress..."

Bill: "Im not trash, I am a bill"

boy: "Whats a bill?"

....

*singing*

Bill: "Im an ammendment to be, yes an ammendment to be, only if Congress ratifies me;
There are to many flag burners, who got to much freedom, I want to make it legal for policemen - to beat 'em...."

I don't know if any of you oldtimers or at least Simpsons fans know this one.... I kinda butchered it.

Kman

[Captain]

Amendment:
'Cause there's limits to our liberties,
At least I hope and pray that there are,
'Cause those liberal freaks go too far.

(spoken)
Kid: But why can't we just make a law against flag-burning?
Amendment: Because that law would be unconstitutional. But if we changed the Constitution...
Kid: Then we could make all sorts of crazy laws!
Amendment: Now you're catching on!
Kid: What if people say you're not good enough to be in the Constitution?

(sings)

Amendment: Then I'll crush all opposition to me,
And I'll make Ted Kennedy pay.
If he fights back, I'll say that he's gay.

(spoken)
Congressman: Good news, Amendment! They ratified ya! You're in the US Constitution!
Amendment: Oh yeah!

[Captain]

otoh, to balance out the Simpson's take, I'd quote from the movie "With Honors" (at least, i think that was the movie) but I can't actually remember it verbatim. So I'll paraphrase:

Professor: blah blah blah about the constitution blah blah wisdom of the founding fathers blah blah we should not tamper blah blah what, you think you know better?

Joe Pesci's character: you're wrong. the true wisdom of the founding father's was that they knew they weren't infallible and that circumstances would change. the law would have to be flexible enough to best suit the public good in the future. That's why they created an process within the Constitution, for the Constitution itself to be amended.



otooh, Canada's Constitution is virtually impossible to change given its amendment requirements...


also, lastly, if there are no further objections... this will go up for a vote by or before tomorrow morning, ok everyone?

[Kramerman]

bart: "what the hell is this?"

lisa: "its one of those [something] 70s throw backs that appeal to generation "X"ers."

bart: "we need another Vietnam...thin out their ranks alittle..."

lisa *smacks* bart

lisa: 'so cartoons DO inspire violence!"

Glad you knew this one captain

EDIT:

"we need another Vietnam...thin out their ranks alittle..."

True dat, Bart, true dat....

[Ninot]

Originally posted by Togas
The above revision by Captain is excellent. Someone please post it for ratification. It'll get my vote.

--Togas

Were all clear for Ratification?

[Jon Shafer]

Originally posted by Togas
Sounds like Trip is finally starting to enjoy the position of not feeling responsible for every little thing, and being able to take some time off.

Thanks for getting it started, Trip, and for your considerable work on this project.

--Togas

I can only lay claim to drafting the original amendments, and nothing more. Others (even Panag ) came up with the idea, I only allowed it to develop later on with other's help. I would love to help finish the thing off, but with about 6 long posts per hour, and a ton of other stuff to do, I don't think I have much of a chance of staying caught up with what's going on.

Hopefully someone will pick up on the election standards amendment. If not, I might have to get back to work.

[Kramerman]

I've heard now objections or arguements for a few hours now. Ninot, perhaps you should tell us what you think of it. Though Im pretty sure its ready for posting.

Kman

[Captain]

One more change...
since we removed the impeachment/removal clause, I took the word "impeachment" out of the first paragraph.

that's the only change, but I thought it warranted another post, rather than editing my post buried way up this page.

This amendment hereby creates an official Apolytonian Court (hereafter refered to as "The Court")

1. Purpose:

The Court is constituted to rule upon: contested disputes involving legal interpretation, validity of polls, violations of the Constitution, or any other legal dispute of national importance.

2. Construct of the Court:

a. Size of Court:
The Court is composed of Five Justices. Each Justice is to be appointed by the President, and each must be approved by a simple majority of the populace in an Approval Vote.

b. Installing the First Court:
The First Court appointed, upon ratification of this amendment, are to be chosen to staggering terms. One member will serve for one month, two will serve for two months and the remaining two will serve for three months. These first Justices of the Court will be appointed in the following manner: President selects 2 (3 month terms), Vice President selects 1 (two month term), Minister of Imperial Expansion(two month term) selects 1 and Econimics Minister selects 1 (one month term). All appointments must be approved by a majority vote of the public.

c. Terms in office:
There is no limit to the number of terms a Justice may serve.
Each Justice serves a term of three months in length, except as indicated above in 2b. All appointments and re-appointments must be approved by a majority vote of the public.

d. Senior Justice:
The Court is to select a 'Senior Justice', who will be responsible for ensuring that a timely report is published for each decision made by the court that communicates the rationale behind the decision; and make sure that the decision is stored and archived. Failure to provide the report is grounds for an appeal. The Senior Justice will also preside over any hearings before The Court.

e. Other Governmental Posts:
A Justice may not serve in any other governmental post.

f. Reappointment:
At the end of that term a Justice may be reappointed by the President. In cases where a Justice is not being re-appointed by the decision of the President, the President may be bypassed in this process if 75% of the populace re-approve the Justice in a vote. Any citizen may create such a poll. Such a poll would have to conclude before the term is completed.

3. Case Structure:

a. Quorum:
A quorum of at least 3 Justices must be involved in any ruling that is made. Should The Court be tied about how to rule on an issue, any non-voting justice is to then review the case and vote.

b. Rulings:
All rulings are immediately official and final except where appeals are granted.

c. Appeals:
Appeals will be granted if there are grounds to believe that an error in the application of the law has been made. Any citizen directly involved in the case may make an application for an appeal. If 3 or more of the 5 judges decide to grant the appeal, a new trial will be created to examine the case. In that case, the current verdict is placed on hold until after the appeal process.

d. Injunctions:
The Court cannot halt the game to make a decision without a 2/3 vote amongst the people. In case of an emergency due to timing of a turnchat and poll of the populace, the Court may halt the game for 72 hours, but only by unanimous vote of the Court and only if a specific case has been presented to them that must be decided prior to the turnchat. In the emergency case, the Court would immediately have to present a 72 hour poll to the people for their approval of the Injunction. If not approved by the time of the poll's closure, the game immediately resumes where it was before.

e. Case Presentation:
The Court cannot act on any issue until a non-judicial citizen of the nation brings forth an Issue to The Court. Issues to The Court should be posted publicly and must involve a dispute that The Court is empowered to rule upon.

[Ninot]

grrr.. i suppose i can edit it in the poll

[Captain]

sorry!
well at least not many people have voted yet, i think just 2.

[wervdon]

Captain's version definately has my vote.

[Moral Hazard]

You don't think I should be a judge?

I did it from memory. So I wasn't sure who had all signed on, all give you hmm 2.00. Of course I was gone for a couple of weeks so if some was actually betting me they'd probably make money. It's just fun, and my evaluation of the prospects.

[Decimus]

I like captians version hes got my vote.

[Moral Hazard]

Sorry Captain missed your question. Decimal odds are done like this if the odds are say 2.00 then a $10 stake would return $20, 1.50 odds would return $15 etc. basically just multiply the odds by your stake and that your returns. Oh and you don't get your stake back you just get your returns, so you'll never see anything below 1. Its better than American odds which quite frankly still confuse me.

[Ninot]

nm, spam post, sorry

[jdjdjd]

Captain, thanks for the final draft. Ok by me.

[BigRed515]

I'm not sure if it's too late to change the ammend, but if it is, a couple important things to include:

I think we should include in this ammendment a couple or rules about the presentation of cases, representaion, and other procedural details so that we can ensure the cases go as quickly and efficently as possible. For example, putting in a rule to have only one representative for each side than can present a case to the court, so that we don't have 200-post long threads of people piggy-backing off each other's cases.

As a collary to that, time limits for presenting the case, so that the presenters know the amount of time they have to confer with the other supporters on their side to present the case.

A quick format for case presentation would make things easier on the judges and the public in reviewing cases.

Finally, I'm not sure if this would make a big difference or not depending on how many cases go in front of the court, but it might be wise to indicate whether the judges pay attention to precedent, or whether each case must be taken seperately on the merits of the case.

The example clauses I was thnking of for this part of the ammend:

3. Procedure of the Court:

a. Only one individual may present a case to the court. This person must either:
i. Be the citizen who brought the Issue before the court

ii. Be directly and specifically appointed by the citizen who brought the Issue before the court

b. Only one individual can defend a case before the court, This person must either:

i. Be the individual who the case has been brought against

ii. Be the directly and specifically appointed representative of the individual who the case has been brought against

iii. Be the directly and specifically appointed representative fo the group who the case has been brought against

iv. Be appointed by the President and approved by a majority of the Ministers if the suit is not brought against an individual or group

c.The case breif must be presented to the Court in full by the within 48 hours of the acceptance of the case

d. The breif must be presented to the court in the following format:

CLAIMANT: (person who brought the issue)
REPRESENTATIVE: (If different than the Claimant)
STATEMENT OF THE CLAIM: (breif title of the claim, 1 sentence at most)
FACTS OF THE CLAIM: (as long as needs to be. Only facts, such as "the election occured from ddmmyyyy through ddmmyyyy", not opinions)
ARGUMENT OF THE CLAIMANT: (opinions)

The respondant must present a breif following the above formate, except that the word "claim be replaced by "response"

e. The Court will give the full weight of precedence to the decisions of the pat, except when decisions of the past contradict. When cases of the past contradict, the more recent case will be given precedence.

--Sorry for the long post, but this is about a court, and law is long and boring --

[Panag]

hi ,

Trip ; it seems great the way it is !

, some countries in the real world should take an example on it

have a nice day

[jdjdjd]

BigRed,

We went this way ( the amendment is already up for a vote), I think mainly because to get into greater procedual detail would be to tie the hands of the court, to practice something that may turn out to be inefficient when applied to practice. The prcedural details will have to be hashed out by the court itself once it starts to operate. Also, in case we were to set up some type of procedure that did not work, the constitution would have to be amended if some procedure turned out to be inefficient.

We created the court, time and practice will get the rest down.

[BigRed515]

Sorry, didn't see the poll was already up. That's what I get for posting at work.

[Kuciwalker]

I don't really care about individual things, those can be worked out later, but it is a definate priority to actually get this up and running.