AMENDMENT (as previously proposed)

[J Bytheway]

Since there were no objections, I propose the following amendment to the constitution (Articles II, III, IV and V), containing wide-ranging changes detailed in other threads (here, here and here)

This poll expires on the 1st of February at about 15:30 GMT.

(I de-hyperlinked the internal links since many of them were pointing to the wrong article anyway, after I had corrected the internal cross-referencing).


Article II: Executive Branch: The Ministers

1. General Contents

(a) The members of the Executive Branch are called ministers and the positions in the Exective Branch are called ministerial offices or executive offices.
(b) Any citizen become a candidate for an executive office by expressing his desire to in the thread started by the Court as described in Article V, paragraph 1(e).
(c) An elected minister is charged with the duties explained in this Section 2 of this Article until the end of the term for which the minister was elected.
(e) The terms for all elected offices last one month. All ministers will remain in office for this period unless they resign or are impeached before the end of it.
(f) If a minister will be unable to perform its duties for some part of the term, this minister is obliged to choose a willing citizen as delegate, who will act on his behalf, until further notice from the minister or the end of the position term, whichever is the sooner. This delegate will still be subordinated to the citizen being replaced. A minister can be delegate of a fellow minister.
(g) A minister who expects to have to appoint a delegate for a significant portion of the term is encouraged to resign.
(h) Every in-game action made or recommended to the President by a minister must be posted to the forum, no matter how insignificant it is.
(i) All resolutions passed by the citizens through a resolution poll declared valid by the Court will be obeyed by all ministers and will overrule all decisions made by ministers in order to make its content part of the game.

2. Government Positions

I. The President
(a) The President shall physically play the game on a regular and scheduled basis whenever possible and post the save and a complete report of the game events to the forum.
(b) The President is encouraged to use turnchats, turnthreads, or any other similar method while playing the game.
(c) The President must follow the instructions of the Court, the Ministers and their delegates while playing the game and doesn't hold any veto powers unless specifically named in the constitution. If an instruction is clearly erroneous, or by changed circumstances made impossible or harmful the President may decide in the best interest of the game.
(d) In case of missing orders for a whole turn from a minister and all his delegates the President may not play on.
(e) The President is responsible for the naming of all new cities of the empire regardless of how the cities were created or assimilated. A name has to be evaluated by the citizens through an Official Poll (Article IV, Subsection 3-II) before a city is named.
(f) The President is in charge of all the Empire settings and sliders, including Rations, Workday, Wages, Public Works rate and Science rate.
(g) The President has the power over the monetary reserve. Therefore every money spending decision must have the approval of the President in order to be act.

II. The Minister of Domestic Affairs
(a) The Minister of Domestic Affairs is responsible for managing all cities. This includes their distribution of specialist citizens and production queues, rushed production requests and disbanding.
(b) The Minister of Domestic Affairs can only disband a city after this action has been evaluated by the citizens through an Official Poll (Article IV, Subsection 3-II).
(c) The action of Rush buying items can only be perfomed with the President's approval.
(d) The Minister of Domestic Affairs is responsible for settlers, choosing site for new cities and moving these units to this site.

III. The Minister of Infrastruture
(a) The Minister of Infrastructure is ultimately responsible for the placement of tile improvements, choosing the best tile and the best improvement, with the current reserve of public workers.

IV. The Minister of Diplomacy, Trade and Science
(a) The Minister of Diplomacy, Trade and Science is responsible for gifts, requests, exchanges and agreements with other nations.
(b) The actions of the Minister of Diplomacy, Trade and Science are subject to the following further restrictions:
* Any payment of gold in gift or tribute must be approved by the President.
* Exchanges of cities must be approved by the Minister of Domestic affairs.
* Disarmement treaties must be approved by the Minister of Defence.
(c) The Minister of Diplomacy, Trade and Science is responsible for all unconventional units, except settlers. Spending gold with the unconventional units orders must be approved by President. Any action which would result in a declaration of war has to be evaluated by the citizens through an Official Poll (Article IV, Subsection 3-II).
(d) The Minister of Diplomacy, Trade and Science is responsible for all internal and foreign trade.
(e) The Minister of Diplomacy, Trade and Science is responsible for research.

V. The Minister of Defense
(a) The Minister of Defense is responsible for all units and their orders including the disband order, except settlers and all other unconventional units.
(b)Any action which would result in a declaration of war has to be evaluated by the citizens through an Official Poll (Article IV, Subsection 3-II).
(c) The Minister of Defense may name any army to ease discussions.


Article III: Judicial Branch: The Court

1. Purpose

(a) The Court is constituted to rule upon: contested disputes involving legal interpretation, validity of polls and elections, violations of the Constitution, or any other legal dispute involving the game.

2. Construct of the Court

(a) The Court is composed of 3 Judges who will serve a three month term of office. There is no limit to the number of terms a Judge may serve.
(b) Each Judge has to be elected by the people in a seperate election poll. Every month one of the Judge positions shall be open for election. This positition shall be the one of the Judge who has reached the end of his term.
(c) When the election of a Judge position starts, the Judge who enters the last month of his term becomes the Senior Justice.
(d) Paragrah 2(c) only applies to regular elections at the end of a Judge's term. It does not apply to elections that take place to replace impeached Judges. The replacement for an impeached Judge shall serve for the remainder of the term that their predecessor served. If the Senior Justice is impeached, the new Judge shall become the Senior Justice. If another Judge was impeached, the Senior Justice shall keep his position.
(e) A Judge may not serve in other governmental posts.

3. Cases

(a) The Court can only rule on cases filed. A case may be filed by any citizen who is not a Judge, by publically notifying the Senior Justice. This case must involve a dispute that the Court is empowered to rule upon.
(b) The Senior Justice will either accept or deny the case. This decision cannot be appealed. If the case is denied, the Senior Justice will publically inform the filer of the case, explaining the reason for the denial.
(c) If the case filed deals with the constitutionality of a poll, the judges may make an immediate ruling without the use of a public hearing if all the judges agree with the ruling. The ruling may be challenged by either the owner of the thread or the person who filed the case. A public hearing will then be commenced to hear the case.
(d) Upon acceptance the Senior Justice is to open a thread with the description of the case. A public hearing will be held in that thread lasting three days.
(e) After three days, the thread will be closed and the Senior Justice will organize the Court's ruling. At least two Judges must vote on any ruling that is made. Any ruling is immediately official and final as soon as two Judges have voted in favour of it.
(f) The only possibilty of an appeal is a Resolution poll put up by the citizen that filed the case, the respondent or by a Minister or by the President. In that case, the current verdict is placed on hold until after the appeal is voted upon. The ruling of the Court can be declared void by means of a Resolution poll.
(g) If a ruling is declared void by appeal, a new public hearing will be held in accordance with paragrahs 3(c), 3(d) and 3(e), with the exception that the public hearing may be closed in less than three days if the Court deems this appropriate.

4. Rights and responsibilities

(a) The Court may make its own rules of procedure and enforce them upon citizens who are before it, so long as such rules are in accordance with the constitution.
(b) The Court will keep a record of all disputes, issues, and hearings before the Court. The Court will also keep a public record of the Constitution in its current form. The Court may appoint a Clerk of the Court to keep these records.
(c) If the Court rules that the actions of certain Citizens are in violation with the Constitution or other rules of Lemuria, it may hand out punishments to these Citizens if it deems this appropriate. The Court will determine for itself what kind of punishment is applied, the punishment must fit the crime. However, no punishments may permanently affect a Citizens participation in the Democracy Game, the Court may not dismiss active members of government (although it may start up impeachment procedures as described in Article V) and the Court may not alter the Constitution (although it may start an Amendment poll, as described in Article IV Subsection 3-IV).
(d) Punishments the Court may hand out include but are not limited to: warnings, impeachment procedures, barring Citizens from specific or any government offices in future elections, banning Citizens from the Democracy Game, declaring resolutions void, closing threads or polls, deleting or editing posts or threads, declaring polls invalid. Punishments which require action from the CtP2-Democracy Game forum moderator must be approved by this moderator, who shall offer an explanation to the Court if approval is not given.
(e) The Court may issue an injunction to halt any aspect of the game for up to 72 hours if at least two Judges agree to do so. Injunctions may only be issued for good cause. An injunction may only be continued beyond 72 hours if all three Judges agrees to do so. An injunction may be overturned at any time by a majority of the Court.
(f) The Court is responsible for organizing elections. It shall post election polls and nomination threads whenever this is needed, as defined in Article IV and Article V.


Article IV: Polling Rules

1. Definition and validity:

(a) All official decision making will be done through polls, in which Citizens can express their opinion on issues. A poll is the standard vBB poll feature in which people can anonymously vote for one of a list of options.
(b) There are 5 types of polls: Election polls, Official polls, Resolutions, Amendments and Unofficial polls.
(c) Any Poll that is not Unofficial (see Section 3, particularly Subsection V) and that violates any of the rules specified in this Article will be declared invalid.
(d) Any polls not declared ELECTION, RESOLUTION, AMENDMENT, or OFFICIAL will be considered Unofficial.
(e) The Court has the right to rule over the validity of polls. Invalid polls should be considered Unofficial and may be closed if the Court requests this.

2. Poll Organization:

(a) The first post of all polls must contain the following elements:
* A clear and unbiased explanation of the question and the answers, if needed;
* Expiration date, if applicable;
* Links to related threads or other information sources, if any;
* Type (see Section 3) and purpose of the poll (for example: information gathering or decision making).
(b) Two types of poll organization are allowed: Yes/No polls and multiple choice polls.
(c) Yes/No polls must have three options of which only one can be chosen. The three options must be:
* Yes, meaning that the voter agrees with what was stated in the poll;
* No, meaning that the voter does not agree with what was stated in the poll;
* Abstain, meaning that the voter does not have a specific opinion on what was stated in the poll or does not wish to express it. Abstain votes may not be considered to say anything about what was stated in the poll.
(d) Alternative terms for 'Yes' and 'No' may be used in a Yes/No poll, as long as their meaning is along the same lines as 'Yes' and 'No' (examples: 'I agree'/'I don't agree' or 'In favour'/'Against'). Terms are along the same lines as 'Yes' and 'No' when the question in the poll can be rephrased so that it can be answered with 'Yes' or 'No'.
(e) Multiple choice polls must have at least three options. Such polls must have an Abstain option as defined in paragraph 3(c). All other options are open for the poll creator to fill in as he wishes, as long as they are clear and unbiased.
(f) All polls except unofficial ones must have options of which only one can be chosen. Multiple selection polls (which are described in the vBB poll system as 'multiple choice') are expressly forbidden.

3. Poll Types:

I. Election polls:
(a) These polls must be started by the Court. They serve to elect the persons who will fulfill the official positions of the executive and judicial branches of the government, as defined in Article II and Article III.
(b) The subject line must contain the word 'ELECTION', written in capital letters, and the name of the office for which the election is held.
(c) They have to be multiple choice polls with only the names of the candidates as options. They can only be decision-making polls, they cannot be used for not information gathering.
(e) They must follow the rules as defined in Article V.
(f) Election polls in accordance with Article V paragraph 1(h) shall expire in five days and the Court must include the expiration time in the first post of the poll.

II. Official polls:
(a) These polls must be started by members of the executive branch of the government, as defined in Article II of this Constitution, and relate to the game.
(b) The subject line must contain the word 'OFFICIAL', written in capital letters.
(c) They can be either Yes/No or multiple choice polls and can be used for either information gathering or decision making.
(d) The government official who started the poll may or may not follow the opinion of the majority of the voters. In case (s)he does not follow what was decided, (s)he must make this decision public. Failure to do so will be regarded withholding of information, as defined in Article I Section 5, and can serve as grounds for Impeachment (see Article V).
(e) Official polls shall only expire at a time chosen by the officer who opened the poll. And if the poll has an expiring day the same officer who started it must include this information in the first post.

III. Resolutions:
(a) These polls can be started by any Citizen, including members of the governement, and must be used to propose resolutions. Resolutions, if passed, modify the rules that clearly affect the course of the game or the policy of the executive branch of the government (as defined in Article II of this Constitution). Except in the case of impeachments which shall be decided according to Article V Section 2.
(b) The subject line must contain the word 'RESOLUTION', written in capital letters.
(c) Resolution polls must be Yes/No polls. Multiple choice polls are not allowed as resolutions.
(d) Resolutions may not violate or change the Constitution. Resolutions may change, amend or remove any existing resolutions or judicial decisions regarding resolutions.
(e) If there are more votes in favour than against, and at least 1/6 of those citizens who do not abstain vote in favour, and the Court does not declare the poll invalid, then the resolution is considered passed. All Citizens must from that time on obey it.
(f) Resolutions must be recorded by the Court. The person who proposed the Resolution that has been passed must inform the Court of this as soon as possible.
(g) The Court will resolve all conflicts of resolutions. The Court’s ruling on an interpretation of a resolution is of the same power and authority as that resolution.
(h) Resolution polls shall expire in three days and the citzen who started the poll must include the expiring day in its first post.

IV. Amendments:
(a) These polls can be started by any Citizen, including members of the governement, and must be used to propose Amendments to this Constitution.
(b) The subject line must contain the word 'AMENDMENT', written in capital letters.
(c) They have to be Yes/No polls. Multiple choice polls are not allowed as Ammendments.
(d) Amendments may change/append/override any existing Laws, judicial decisions regarding Laws or any part of the Constitution.
(e) If there are more votes in favour than against, and at least 1/6 of those citizens who do not abstain vote in favour, and the Court does not declare the poll invalid, then the Ammendent is considered passed. All Citizens must from that time on obey it.
(f) Amendments of the Constitution must be recorded by the Court. The person who proposed an Amendment that has been passed must inform the Court of this as soon as possible.
(f) Amendment polls shall expire in five days and the citzen who started the poll must include the expiring day in its first post.

V. Unofficial polls:
(a) These polls can be started by any Citizen, including members of the government.
(b) They may only exist to debate or gather information. Their outcome should not be used by the president to make choices during game play, but may be taken into account by the ministers when providing instructions for the president.
(c) Unofficial polls are the only polls in which more than one option may be chosen from the list of options.
(d) They do not have to follow all the rules specified in this Article. However, rules specified in Article I of this Constitution must still be obeyed.

[J Bytheway]

Article V: Government Changes

1. Elections

(a) The Court is empowered to oversee all elections and is empowered to resolve any election disputes according to the rules in this Constitution.
(b) An officer can leave his office in three ways:
* The term of the office ends.
* The officer is impeached.
* The officer resigns.
(c) An election process must be initiated by the court before the end of any government position term. The previous officer will remain in office until the end of the term or until a new candidate is elected, whichever is the later.
(d) If an officer resigns or is impeached, the timing of the election process and allocation of duties is as described in Sections 2 and 3.
(e) At the start of the election process, the Court must start a nomination thread. All citizens who wish to be candidates for an office must publicly express their nomination in this thread. For this they have three days.
(f) No citizen may be a candidate for an elected office if such candidacy might cause this citizen to be in more than one elected office simultaneously.
(g) If no candidate is nominated the Court shall extend the nominations for a further three days. This extension can be repeated indefinately.
(h) Once the time in which citizens may express their candidacy for a given elected office has expired, the Court will create an Election poll (see Article IV, Subsection 3-I) for the office, with the names of the candidates as options. The poll shall expire in five days.
(i) If only one candidate is available for an office, a Yes/No poll shall be held to decide if this person may serve in this office. This poll shall expire in five days.
(j) If the single candidate is rejected by a majority of voters then the Court shall reopen nominations for that office.
(k) The candidate who has received the majority of the votes when the election thread expires will be declared the new holder of the office for which he was a candidate.
(l) In case of a tie in the election poll, the other newly elected members of the same branch of government position in question whose election polls were not tied will vote again to decide which one of the tied candidates will take over this position. If all polls for executive branch positions are simultaneously tied then the Court (including the newly elected member, if there is one) shall select the President, and the President shall select the other ministers from the tied candidates in their respective election polls.
(m) In case of a tie in the election of a judge, the newly elected president will vote along with the two judges already in office in deciding who will be the new judge.

2. Impeachment

(a) Any Citizen may bring the case of impeachment of an elected Minister, President, or Judge to a member of the Court.
(b) The Court shall review the allegations made, allow an answer by the accused, and by a vote determine if there are proper and legal grounds to hold a Resolution poll to decide on impeachment. If the accusations are found to be without legal merit, the allegations shall be dismissed.
(c) Should a member of the Court be the subject of impeachment, he shall not take part in the decision by The Court. The President shall sit in this Court member place for the sole determination of whether the impeachment has merit, and shall be considered a “Judge” for that vote only.
(d) If the Court decides there are grounds for impeachment, it shall start a poll in which it clearly states the person to be impeached and outlines the events that led to the request for impeachment. If the impeachment is confirmed by a majority of the voters in the poll, the officer in question shall be removed from the office, losing all rights and responsibilities thereof.
(e) Elections for a replacement shall be started only if they could conclude at least one week before the end of the term for the office. If elections are not started a temporary replacement can be chosen as described in paragraph (h).
(f) The Court may open nominations for a replacement for the impeached official at any time while the impeachment poll is open if it considers that the impeachment is likely to occur. In this case, the nomination thread must clearly state that the election is conditional on the impeachment of the official.
(g) If the impeachment poll closes and the officer is impeached and nominations have not yet begun, then the Court must start them as soon as possible.
(h) The Court may choose a willing citizen to fill that office until a replacement is elected. The chosen citizen will have the word temporary as a prefix to the name of their office.

3. Resignations

(a) Any officer may announce his desire to resign at any time.
(b) Elections for a replacement shall be started be the court upon this announcement only if they could conclude at least one week before the end of the term for the office.
(c) The officer who wishes to resign shall be requested to remain in office until a replacement is elected.
(d) If the officer is unwilling to remain in office, then the Court may choose a willing citizen to fill that office until a replacement is elected. The chosen citizen will have the word temporary as a prefix to the name of their office.

[H Tower]

i'm really glad somone stuck it out and combined all these amendments

[J Bytheway]

I'm glad noone's voted against it yet . If anyone does, please say why.

[Gilgamensch]

Just read through everything, quite a bit to read (but good work )

I am not sure about this one:

(e) If there are more votes in favour than against, and at least 1/6 of those citizens who do not abstain vote in favour.......

OK, it is clear that if Yes>No,, but now: 1/6!=abstain.....

It isn't clear (at least for me).

Do you want to say 1/6 of the CTP2DG? The # of people voted? or what??????

IF this will not get claryfied, I think I'll have to vote NO.

(not yet done)

[J Bytheway]

You count all those citizens who do not abstain (in this particular vote), and if at least 1/6 of those vote in favour, then th resolution is passed.

eg. with 40 citizens, if 10 abstain, you need at least 5 votes in favour.

[Gilgamensch]

That clears it up.

What about fractions? DO we round up?

Like with 44 members you would need 7 1/3 Yes-votes. What if 7 only voted and in favour?

Is this really sufficent, a 1/6th of the community?

I am still not sure..........

The rest sounds fine for me (at least till now )

[Locutus]

If at least 1/6 of the population = 7 1/3 citizens is needed, then obviously 7 citizens isn't enough...

This amendment looks good to me

[Gilgamensch]

The rest is fine with me as well,

it is just that 1/6th might be a bit low figure. It would be easier if more people would participate (voting etc.....). But with this figure I am afraid that we might get to vulnerable to 'wrong approaches'. If enough people agree they could legally change anything and nothing we could to about. I think it isn't a problem here in our community, but I am just afraid.

Imagine some crazy Civ 3'rs would come over, just for spoiling our fun. (Don't really think, it'll happen, I even don't know if they know how to read and slic...... ).

[H Tower]

if we vote against the proposal we have a chance to defeat it. if a bunch of civ3 people came in to spoil the game, they would defeat us anyways, or have you not noticed how there are close to a billion of the little children running around?

[Pedrunn]

I will probably vote against because I think the term should last 4 weeks and not a month.

[J Bytheway]

1/6 in favour is exactly the same as the 1/3 of citizens voting requirement that is currently in force...

[Gilgamensch]

1/6 in favour isn't really the same as 1/3 at all.

I must admit, that after rethinking this idea, I start to like it. But I am still 'afraid' that 1/6th of our population might be a bit low. I am afraid that it might be used in the wrong way......

H Tower:

OK, admitted. they could always overrun us....... maybe we should include in the connie, if you are particpating in any way in CIV 3 activity your vote will only count as a billionth of a normal vote ?

[mapfi]

2nd Gilg...

[Devil of Truth]

I like it. Good evolution.

[J Bytheway]

Originally posted by Gilgamensch
1/6 in favour isn't really the same as 1/3 at all.

Well, it's not exactly the same, but it's the obvious extension. What I mean is (ignoring absentions):

If 1/3 of the citizens vote, and at least half of those vote in favour then at least 1/6 of citizens have voted in favour.

Conversely, if 1/6 have voted in favour, and fewer than 1/6 have voted against, no matter what other citizens arrive and vote (even if they are all opposed) so as to bring the total number of votes to at least 1/3 of the citizens then there will still be at least as many votes in favour than against (and we don't worry to much about the possibility of a tie).

[Gilgamensch]

As I said, I start to like the idea, it's just it seems to be a too low figure. If you, as you did, analyse it a bit deeper, it shows little difference. I t actually improves as in the actual connie we could have 2 Y, 1 N, 30 A and it would be vaild

[H Tower]

how many more votes do we need to get this passed? hopefully not many

[MrBaggins]

I believe more than 1/6th (8) have already voted in favor.

[J Bytheway]

A total of 15 votes, so at least 4 more.

[MrBaggins]

two more at this point

[J Bytheway]

Originally posted by MrBaggins
I believe more than 1/6th (8) have already voted in favor.

Yes, so it would have already been enough if this amendment had already passed, but that's insufficient under the current system.

[MrBaggins]

Yup... gottit... realized after I posted...

[Tamerlin]

We should encourage everybody to vote this amendment in the various CtP2-Democracy Game related threads, I am really concerned by the fact several votes have been canceled because the quorum had not been reached.

[Gilgamensch]

The proposed change would make sense in the moment, 13 votes for Yes, no one against or abstains.

But as to our current connie, it is still failing...........

We would still need to more votes (44/3=14.666 makes 15 votes), doesn't matter how they would vote

[Gilgamensch]

Funny enough, after I posted my last comment, somebody voted NO.

Still means, just one vote to go..........

[child of Thor]

well if i can become prime minister of my country with about 40%(Thatchers 2nd term? or one of John Majors i think) of the votes cast in my favour then i can't see why we need such a contrast here. Surely if the majority vote positively for something that should be ok? so if 40% said yes , 25% no and 35% abstained then the 40% should carry it? Not that i really care about this stuff too much, but at least it would encourage the fence sitters to make up their minds

[Tamerlin]

Originally posted by child of Thor
well if i can become prime minister of my country with about 40%(Thatchers 2nd term? or one of John Majors i think) of the votes cast in my favour then i can't see why we need such a contrast here. Surely if the majority vote positively for something that should be ok? so if 40% said yes , 25% no and 35% abstained then the 40% should carry it? Not that i really care about this stuff too much, but at least it would encourage the fence sitters to make up their minds

The fence sitters will be encouraged to act if they can see the game is evolving and that we are having fun with the DG. The problem is the current Quorum is too high and don't allow the citizens to express their will, two important issues were not settled by a vote because the Quorum was not reached and our dear President and Ministers were forced to act by themselves or to postpone their decision until a vote is organized.

[Oerdin]

I'll vote for it.

[child of Thor]

Excuse my ignorance Tamerlin, but what is a Quorum exactly and just what level of height is it set to at present

or to put it another way if 15:1 for the motion isn't enough to get it through then i vote for dictatorship ovr democracy!!!