Flem's request re: "Affected Party" Definition

punk d

punk d

TNPer
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So, Flem would like us to define affected, but are we really going to set up ALL the boundaries for affected in this ruling? Seems like we'd be setting ourselves up to fail in the future and/or have a court overturn this ruling if we miss something.

Sanc has offered this as a definition

1. Any Nation may petition the Court for a review of government policy or law, but only those who the Court deem to have standing in a case will have their petition accepted. Standing shall, for the purposes of these rules, be defined as being personally affected by the policy or law currently in effect.
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To which Flem would counter he was affect as defined by the above. I'd be inclined to agree with him. This is just a pretty broad request that is asking us to define, not interpret, the meaning of 'affected' and I'm not all that comfortable with doing so in the context of this review.
 
Flem's right to vote was not affected. He has no right to vote for whomever he wishes, only for those on the candidate list.

Flem's rights were not affected, therefore he is not an effected party.
 
His right to vote was affected because the EC stated the candidate he wanted to vote for was not able to stand.
 
That's not his right to vote, flem, that's his right to vote for whomever he wants, which isn't a right recognised by the laws.

He could still vote, that right was not hindered.
 
In true flem style, he's rambled on a bit in his request, but he's only actually directly asked us to define if he was an affected party or not - as someone who wanted to vote for Asta - so that's all I think we should address.

It comes down to if a right to vote extends to a right to vote for whoever you want. Ultimately, a right to vote isn't much of a right to vote if you can't vote for who you want - so upon further reflection, I'm inclined to think that in this particular case he did indeed have standing. He was unable to vote for a candidate who wished to run based on whether said candidate was actually legally able to run - the subject of the review - so I'd say he had standing.

I think, however, that we do need to have a broader discussion about what an affected party is - we looked like fools when we weren't sure which way we were going. We can always put it in as a Court Rule - although I suspect that somebody will ask a more general request for review when we rule only on this specific case.
 
"Ultimately, a right to vote isn't much of a right to vote if you can't vote for who you want"

Woah, where is that coming out of. This isn't whether you think that or not, it's whether or not it's written in the law. Where in the law does it say he has a right to vote for whoever he wants?
 
Also I think you're wrong, Abbey, he's asking what the definition of affected party is. Which should be when a person, or his rights, is considerably/substantively affected.

Does he have standing in this particular case? I don't know. I'd agree that as a voter he has a right to challenge an Election Commissioner's decision, but I don't think his right to vote was infringed, and as his rights were not affected, he wouldn't have standing in that scenario.

The definition of affected party should be: when a person, or his rights, is considerably/substantively affected.

On a completely separate issue, was flem's right to vote affected? No. Does he have standing to challenge an EC's decision? Yeah, sure, as a voter I think he does.
 
To me it's about the term "affected". Flem can't vote for the man on the moon because that person is not eligible to vote. So if he were to ask us to review why he can't vote for the man on the moon, i'd be inclined to reject such a review request. However, in this particular case Astarial wanted to run for office, Flem wanted to vote for her, but the EC rejected her candidacy. Flem then took his issue to the courts which seemed to me very reasonable.

I just really don't want to pigeonhole us or future courts by 'defining' affected. Maybe that's copping out but it's a bit subjective.
 
Sanctaria:
"Ultimately, a right to vote isn't much of a right to vote if you can't vote for who you want"

Woah, where is that coming out of. This isn't whether you think that or not, it's whether or not it's written in the law. Where in the law does it say he has a right to vote for whoever he wants?
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That was my instinctive reaction, sorry, on the basis that it's a crappy right if you can vote, but you can only vote for x person. But you're probably right there.

Also, upon reading his review more carefully, he has in fact asked us to define affected party, and we're in no position to dodge that - sorry punk. We don't, nor should we try to.

Does he have standing in this particular case? I don't know. I'd agree that as a voter he has a right to challenge an Election Commissioner's decision, but I don't think his right to vote was infringed, and as his rights were not affected, he wouldn't have standing in that scenario.
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How can we reconcile these two though, as they are fundamentally at conflict? He's asked us to rule both on that case and on more generally, so we need to deal with both.

I think the point of that was that it was subjective - avoiding the typical mess we end up in that we've been far too specific in our laws. So our ruling equally needs to be general - some way of putting in that their rights were unnecesarily infringed. But we still have the issue above, that we would then be infringing the right to challenge the actions of government officials...
 
You can only challenge the actions of government officials if you've been affected by them i.e. if you perceive you or your rights have been infringed. I think that's what we should define affected as.

As a voter flem can challenge an EC's decision, so I would concede that he has standing in asking why Asta was excluded. ECs run the election, and as a voter flem is a participant in that election, just not a candidate. But he is a participant. That's both giving a general definition of affected, and answering his own question on the case at hand.

Also, apropos of nothing, there is no right to vote granted to people either; it's an entitlement to vote, and only certain people are entitled, which, from the currents laws, are those in the RA.
 
Well, that particular clause in the BoR uses entitlement at first and then right in the latter half - which is messy.

"As a voter flem can challenge an EC's decision, so I would concede that he has standing in asking why Asta was excluded. ECs run the election, and as a voter flem is a participant in that election, just not a candidate. But he is a participant. That's both giving a general definition of affected, and answering his own question on the case at hand."

I think that's a pretty reasonable definition, all in all. We in agreement, here, and if we are, who wants to draft this one?
 
That's probably the earliest I can do it, unfortunately. If you think you'd be able to do it earlier, feel free.
 
I've done a draft ruling here:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/13D15sQwCjr_gXsCcSFYouKe7yg_VlJUn7PD3L6uhI_M/edit?usp=sharing

No sharing that link, of course. I've put some comments into the comments section - I'm struggling to really say anything that's not going to get us lambasted again, but I dunno. Have a crack at drafting something, you're free to either use that or draft something yourselves, and if you come to a consensus I'd like it if we could get something out on this before I return because that's getting really silly time-wise otherwise.
 
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