Proposal: The Court

[Darkness' Edge]

I ripped this off the Civ3 game, because it's quite a complicated thing to come up with. However, I've simplified it somewhat, decreased the necessary amount of justices, and changed it to suit our game.

Comments anyone?

I'm open to anyone's ideas of simplifying this further, but it really is quite complicated, and needs to be to function well.

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Article VI: 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 involving the game.

2. Construct of the Court:

a. Size of Court:
The Court is composed of five Justices. Each Justice is to to be elected by the people, with a poll lasting three days.

b. Terms in office:
There is no limit to the number of terms a Justice may serve.
Each Justice serves a term of two months. All appointments and re-appointments must be approved by a majority vote of the public.

c. Senior Justice:
At the beginning of each case, the Court is to select a 'Senior Justice', who will be responsible for ensuring that a report is published for each decision made by the court, showing the rationale behind the decision. If the report is not provided, this may be grounds for an appeal. The Senior Justice will also preside over any hearings before The Court.

d. Other Governmental Posts:
A Justice may serve in other governmental posts, but may not serve as Commissioner or Alpha Talent while a serving Justice.


3. Case Structure:

a. Quorum:
At least three Justices must be involved in any ruling that is made. If only three justices are involved and they cannot agree, a non-voting justice must step in to break the deadlock.

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

c. Appeals:
Appeals may be granted if there are grounds to believe that the constitution has not been applied properly. Any citizen directly involved in the case may make an application for an appeal. If 3 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 stop 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 24 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 24 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 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.

[Method]

but do we really need it?

[Nubclear]

Originally posted by Darkness' Edge
a. Size of Court:
The Court is composed of three Justices. Each Justice is to be appointed by the Commissioner, and each must be approved by a simple majority of the people in an approval vote.

I do not like this part at all. I believe that it should be like an election. Several people nominate themselves, and then the people vote. Top 3 candidates get it. And if there are only three candidates....

Other than that, its fine.

[Darkness' Edge]

Originally posted by Tassadar5000
I do not like this part at all. I believe that it should be like an election. Several people nominate themselves, and then the people vote. Top 3 candidates get it. And if there are only three candidates....

Other than that, its fine.

Justices have never been popularly voted. Myeh, I guess elected could be alright? Any other opinions?

Originally posted by TKG
but do we really need it?

I think so. Even if we don't use it often, it's still a safeguard to fall back on. One clause which could be stricken from this draft is the one banning justices from taking on any other government positions - depends on how often this is likely to be used. But its been requested often enough that I think it should be put into action.

[Method]

hmm, i agree that justices should be allowed to hold positions as a director, otherwise i don't think we'd have enough. we barely have enough to make up the directorate as it is

as for justices' terms, i'd prefer 2 months to 3 months. 3 months is a long time. what if someone left the game?

also what if we wanted to impeach a justice? who would handle that?

[Darkness' Edge]

Originally posted by TKG
hmm, i agree that justices should be allowed to hold positions as a director, otherwise i don't think we'd have enough. we barely have enough to make up the directorate as it is

Yeah, that's what I'm afraid of. It's early yet though - once things have fired up a bit, once we've run into a few other factions, we might see things improve. Until then, I think we have to be able to be a director as well.

That poses two questions.
One - if we can be both directors and justices, isn't there likely to be many people standing for justice positions? This could be a reason to appoint justices.
Two - if we can be both directors and justices, I'm tempted to increase the number of justices to five, which would be the same as the Civ3 game, and would also be fairer and easier to work. The only reason I'd decreased it to three was because we have less active citizens and I didn't think we could find five.

If there's no opposition to this, I'll take the "may not hold other positions" clause out in the next draft.

Originally posted by TKG
as for justices' terms, i'd prefer 2 months to 3 months. 3 months is a long time. what if someone left the game?

That's a good idea, actually. In Civ3, two of the five justices resigned recently due to RL commitments, and new ones were appointed in their place. But 3 months is an awful long time to commit - I think two would do.

Originally posted by TKG
also what if we wanted to impeach a justice? who would handle that?

The other justices.

[Archaic]

Originally posted by Tassadar5000
And if there are only three candidates....

*Points to all current elections with only one canditate, especially his*

Hypocrite.

[Nubclear]

Originally posted by Archaic


*Points to all current elections with only one canditate, especially his* Hypocrite.

Your right. If abstain wins, then we need a new justice because yes, abstain is a vote of no confidence.

I'll conceed that to you

[Pandemoniak]

Suppress Alinea 2d and make the Court five Justices
They indeed should be appointed and not elected, but this appointement made by the Commisionner should received the agreement of a vote by the directorate, to prevent from abuses. I dont think it will too heavy as a procedure, since it will quickly work as a confidence vote from the directorates.
for the rest of it, I think it should work very well, because of this very important article :

e. Case Presentation:
The Court cannot act on any issue until a 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.

[DeathByTheSword]

pande i always was a supporter of the court but i dont think 5 judges are needed and i want it to be a quick court within 3 days it must be done max of 5 days

[Darkness' Edge]

Originally posted by Pandemoniak
Suppress Alinea 2d and make the Court five Justices
They indeed should be appointed and not elected, but this appointement made by the Commisionner should received the agreement of a vote by the directorate, to prevent from abuses. I dont think it will too heavy as a procedure, since it will quickly work as a confidence vote from the directorates.

This is already included in the amendment, as shown below - a full vote of the people being necessary to confirm a justice.

a. Size of Court:
The Court is composed of three Justices. Each Justice is to be appointed by the Commissioner, and each must be approved by a simple majority of the people in an approval vote.

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Originally posted by DeathByTheSword
pande i always was a supporter of the court but i dont think 5 judges are needed and i want it to be a quick court within 3 days it must be done max of 5 days

I disagree. In the C3DG, court sessions take as long as necessary. In most cases, this would only be a short period of time, but if necessary, they can deliberate for a while. In short: hopefully the cases will be quick, but give the justices the time they need.

And five justices are an important safeguard. It allows the court to rule in the absence of one or two justices, and gives greater fairness, increasing the likelihood of an impartial bench.

[DeathByTheSword]

I disagree. In the C3DG, court sessions take as long as necessary. In most cases, this would only be a short period of time, but if necessary, they can deliberate for a while. In short: hopefully the cases will be quick, but give the justices the time they need.

And five justices are an important safeguard. It allows the court to rule in the absence of one or two justices, and gives greater fairness, increasing the likelihood of an impartial bench.

if it is about a RP problem i agree but if it affects the game i want to have it over with as soon as possible and about the 5 i agree with more fairniss but where do you get them from...? i submit myself btw way as a back-up judge if there arent enough how much enough is we dont know but what the heck

[Pandemoniak]

I prefer to have five judges because it wont be neccessarly too long to have the results of the justice with five judges. On the other hand, I dont really care if it is the people or the directorate who votes confidence on them.

[Darkness' Edge]

Originally posted by DeathByTheSword
if it is about a RP problem i agree but if it affects the game i want to have it over with as soon as possible and about the 5 i agree with more fairniss but where do you get them from...?

We've got enough active people here to come up with five, especially if they can be directors as well as Justices.

[Schinkenjoe]

i could take a judge´s seat as a nondirector.

[- Groucho -]

I'll re-volunteer/re-nominate myself for the judiciary. For those new to the forum, the idea of a court was polled and discussed on this thread: http://apolyton.net/forums/showthrea...&pagenumber=1.

[Pandemoniak]

Id volunteer too for a seat of Justice.

[Darkness' Edge]

Changes made. Any further comments, before I put this to a vote?

[- Groucho -]

I can't believe I'm actually advocating ANOTHER poll - but yeah - put it to a vote.