Executive Reform Bill

As promised, I'd like to now improve the clarity and usefulness of the "Chapter 7: Executive Government" created by my Bill to Split Chapter 6: Government Regulations which has just passed the Regional Assembly.

To my pleasant surprise, it really is an appropriate time to be legislating regarding the Executive as we now have onsite Regional Officers appointable by the Delegate, as discussed here.

I would like to get some solid feedback before writing an actual text.

The Executive Government chapter, as passed, has 5 sections: a section on ejections, satisfying the constitutional requirement that any ejections be explicitly authorized by law; on the Attorney General, creating and regulating the office of the official regional prosecutor; the Freedom of Information Act, mandating the cooperation of the Delegate in publishing information at the request of regional residents and requiring the Court to review justified decisions against publication; a section on Mandatory Ministries; and a section authorizing the Delegate to vote on WA resolutions as they see fit.

As discussed in the Executive Officers topic, there is a solid case for some limited regulation of the WA Delegate's ability to appoint Regional Officers.

Before I get started, I should define some sticky terms:

• Serving Delegate: as defined in the Regional Security Law: "the serving Delegate means the person holding the constitutionally-mandated elected office of the Delegate or, in the case of a vacancy in that office, the person that has assumed the duties of that office." -- this is the person legally responsible for the duties of the Delegate of The North Pacific under our laws, not necessarily the person who is the WA Delegate right this moment. (It should be the same person, 90% or so of the time at least, though).
• WA Delegate: the nation which is the WA Delegate of The North Pacific on nationstates.net. Should usually be the Serving Delegate, but could be the previous Delegate, the Vice Delegate, or even a member of the Security Council acting during a Delegate Emergency. (Could also be an invader or couper, theoretically speaking [me] knocks on wood against that.)
• Executive Officer: as defined in the Constitution, these are the (primary) people appointed by the Delegate to assist them in their duties. Most of them are generally Ministers, but the Delegate could name their titles pretty much whatever they like.

That being said, some changes I would like to consider:

1. Currently, there are two ways the Delegate can banject nations outside of our normal judicial process: the Criminal and Penal codes grant them the power to summarily eject or ban adspammers that break adspam rules they determine at their discretion, and they may eject or ban violators of NationStates rules. As several of our recent Delegates can attest, with the increasingly active TNP Regional Message Board, this can be incredibly limiting and frustrating. While I am usually very skeptical of bans for speech, I've come to see that our Regional Message Board is the front page of the region, and it can be harmful to our region for posts that are just shy of what moderators would find actionable to keep coming. Further, it can be very hard to say whether a post breaks the NationStates rules, and the law as written makes no allowances for a margin of error. I would consider allowing the serving Delegate to generally regulate the Regional Message Board so long as they avoid banning speech that is political within a TNP context and (still) subject to judicial review.
2. Also, the laws about ejection and banning are spread out across several sections: the Criminal code's bit on adspam, the section I'm talking about here, and the Regional Security Law's statute on Reckless Endorsement Gathering. I don't think we want to repeat ourselves, and the location of some of these may make sense, but I think the section could use revision to at least nod to the existence of other such specific statutory circumstances. Maybe the bit about Adspam should just be moved from the legal code to this section, to put all the non-security non-judicial use of force stuff in one place.
3. It seems that the legislation regarding who must discharge the duties of the Attorney General should they and the Delegate and the Vice Delegate have a conflict of interest is... ambiguous. The section on the Attorney General may need clarification.
4. The Freedom of Information Act is a great idea, and has been somewhat useful from time to time. We could, however, go farther. Perhaps I should defer revising this Section for another bill, as it's clearly hard enough on its own, however.
5. As revised, the Mandatory Ministries section requires two Executive Officer roles to be filled: foreign and military affairs. I think that's probably adequate, but I'd welcome thoughts on the subject. The general idea behind Mandatory Ministries was to allow the RA to govern the region if the Delegate declined to do so, adopted during a time of serious inactivity. As a backstop against such problems in the future, I think allowing the RA to fill those crucial ministries should they be vacant for a prolonged period of time is sensible.
6. The WA voting section bugs me. It does nothing, except introduce confusion regarding our treaties. I think we should consider repealing it.
7. I think we need a new Regional Officers section to this chapter which will allow the serving Delegate to grant any powers besides Border Control to any Executive Officer, require the WA Delegate to grant all powers to the serving Delegate, allow the serving Delegate to authorize granting Border Control powers to members of the Security Council either in Order of Succession order during a Delegate Emergency or otherwise with the permission of a majority vote of the Regional Assembly, and will otherwise prohibit giving out Regional Officer powers.

Thoughts?

1: I agree with this completely, I think a change that allows greater power for the Delegate and/or officers to handle such issues would be very positive.
2. Not so fussed on this. Sounds fine.
3. I think it has worked relatively well so far, but I agree that some clarification wouldn't hurt.
4. My first impression on this is that the FOIA system works well enough already. But I am open to hearing other people's opinion on this.
5. So you aren't proposing any changes in this area? I think the two that are listed are arguably the most important Ministry, I'm not necessarily supportive of adding the others to the mandatory ministries list.
6. Meh, okay.
7. I have some thoughts on this. I disagree with your opinion on the granting of border control powers. In my opinion, Border Control powers should always be given to the first two members of the line of succession beyond the Vice Delegate.

Restricting them to /only/ an emergency (without RA approval) is not particularly helpful, especially as most of the time emergencies in our region have been created by the disappearance of the Delegate. In such circumstances, a RA vote would not be helpful at all - we would be unable to appoint any officer during the Delegate's absence. Requiring that two or three SC members *always* have that power is the best way to handle that issue, which would help safeguard the Delegacy and the region on an ongoing basis. Other officers could also help with WFE editing and communication as required.

I do not think that such appointments should require RA approval, if the individual who is assigned those powers is to change, it should be handled by amending the line of succession. I'm not a fan of the Delegate simply hand selecting which SC member they want with those powers, I'd rather it be a long standing appointment.

I agree with your last point though, I do not think we should allow any other person to be assigned border control powers. It would not be that hard for a Delegate to appoint someone with those powers, who is very popular, but not necessarily trustworthy or well tested and see them achieve RA approval on that appointment.

The top two SC members by the order of succession may be more secure than the top three.

It's only more secure than nomination and RA approval in that we'd be instituting a hard limit on them, though. (This does help).

I'm convinced of your arguments regarding discretion. I'm inclined to think it'd be best for the selection of BCOs to be conservatively made by the region and not individually by the Delegate.

We should grant theserving Delegate more liberal authority to grant BCO powers in an Emergency, however. Any Security Council member in good standing, or even the Vice Delegate, should be okay in an emergency.

The bill to split chapter 6 has now been signed into law by the Delegate.

I was hoping for some more diverse feedback before writing up a bill on this matter, but if there isn't any in the next week, I suppose I'll go with what ideas I have.

I will have some to give you once I get home from work.

1. I like more flexibility for the delegate but not necessarily citing the example you used. In others I probably agree on the function but perhaps not the purpose. Gets to the same point though.
2. Agreed, this will streamline things.
3. I agree they are ambiguous, but i'd go further and argue that a sitting delegate should not also be compelled to be an attorney general. By compelled I do understand they can decline to stand as AG, but then the complainant who may not have legislative experience would pretty much serve as the AG. I think that's not a good system and we can tighten this up further.
4. I would favor any action that makes the FOIA even stronger than it is today.
5. I dislike the idea of the RA voting for vacant ministries. I prefer to recall an inactive delegate and then allow an incoming delegate to select their own team. I think having people you've selected working for you is better than working with random un-selected teammembers.
6. We fought on this one for a while. I'm good with keeping as is unless some compelling need is there to change it.
7. I agree that we should put some rules in for the delegate around RO's. I'm not convinced that what you're outlining is the best way, but we do need to have this conversation. I'd argue, however, we should have a separate conversation on this topic because it's a big one.

Currently, there are two ways the Delegate can banject nations outside of our normal judicial process: the Criminal and Penal codes grant them the power to summarily eject or ban adspammers that break adspam rules they determine at their discretion, and they may eject or ban violators of NationStates rules. As several of our recent Delegates can attest, with the increasingly active TNP Regional Message Board, this can be incredibly limiting and frustrating. While I am usually very skeptical of bans for speech, I've come to see that our Regional Message Board is the front page of the region, and it can be harmful to our region for posts that are just shy of what moderators would find actionable to keep coming. Further, it can be very hard to say whether a post breaks the NationStates rules, and the law as written makes no allowances for a margin of error. I would consider allowing the serving Delegate to generally regulate the Regional Message Board so long as they avoid banning speech that is political within a TNP context and (still) subject to judicial review.

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I would agree with adding more flexibility to the delegate's actions here. I think I'd like to see a requirement that the offending nation be warned before being banned, except when their post is blatantly offensive/derogatory/spammy/etc. This would provide some protection to people who don't mean to cross the line but aren't quite sure about it (and who cut it out when told to), while still letting real problems be dealt with immediately.

Also, the laws about ejection and banning are spread out across several sections: the Criminal code's bit on adspam, the section I'm talking about here, and the Regional Security Law's statute on Reckless Endorsement Gathering. I don't think we want to repeat ourselves, and the location of some of these may make sense, but I think the section could use revision to at least nod to the existence of other such specific statutory circumstances. Maybe the bit about Adspam should just be moved from the legal code to this section, to put all the non-security non-judicial use of force stuff in one place.

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That would make sense, I think - I do think it's odd that adspammers are technically criminals in TNP, and I'd support making it a bannable non-criminal thing instead.

It seems that the legislation regarding who must discharge the duties of the Attorney General should they and the Delegate and the Vice Delegate have a conflict of interest is... ambiguous. The section on the Attorney General may need clarification.

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Agreed. At minimum, we need more clarity on what happens if both the VD and Del have conflicts of interest - is it stuck? Does it go to ministers? Along the Line of Succession? Does it bounce back to the complainant?

The Freedom of Information Act is a great idea, and has been somewhat useful from time to time. We could, however, go farther. Perhaps I should defer revising this Section for another bill, as it's clearly hard enough on its own, however.

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I agree with revising this section of the legal code, and I believe you've seen my draft (sadly still unfinished).

As revised, the Mandatory Ministries section requires two Executive Officer roles to be filled: foreign and military affairs. I think that's probably adequate, but I'd welcome thoughts on the subject. The general idea behind Mandatory Ministries was to allow the RA to govern the region if the Delegate declined to do so, adopted during a time of serious inactivity. As a backstop against such problems in the future, I think allowing the RA to fill those crucial ministries should they be vacant for a prolonged period of time is sensible.

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This is actually a defense to mandatory ministries that sways my mind - up until now I've opposed them entirely, but this actually makes some sense. On the other hand, I can see someone being elected who doesn't care for, say, the NPA and not wanting there to be an active military during their term - I'm not sure whether I think that's their call as delegate to make, or whether the RA ought to be able to override them for the greater regional interest. And I'm not sure what's special about the NPA as opposed to, say, culture, which is arguably much more important during times of inactivity.

The WA voting section bugs me. It does nothing, except introduce confusion regarding our treaties. I think we should consider repealing it.

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Sure.

I think we need a new Regional Officers section to this chapter which will allow the serving Delegate to grant any powers besides Border Control to any Executive Officer, require the WA Delegate to grant all powers to the serving Delegate, allow the serving Delegate to authorize granting Border Control powers to members of the Security Council either in Order of Succession order during a Delegate Emergency or otherwise with the permission of a majority vote of the Regional Assembly, and will otherwise prohibit giving out Regional Officer powers.

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I agree with creating a new section for this, and I broadly agree with your ideas. I'm iffy on mcm's suggestion of requiring the top-2 in the LOS to have BC powers, though it's probably a reasonable one.

Thoughts?

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Nah, I don't have any.

Section 1:

Currently, there are two ways the Delegate can banject nations outside of our normal judicial process: the Criminal and Penal codes grant them the power to summarily eject or ban adspammers that break adspam rules they determine at their discretion, and they may eject or ban violators of NationStates rules. As several of our recent Delegates can attest, with the increasingly active TNP Regional Message Board, this can be incredibly limiting and frustrating. While I am usually very skeptical of bans for speech, I've come to see that our Regional Message Board is the front page of the region, and it can be harmful to our region for posts that are just shy of what moderators would find actionable to keep coming. Further, it can be very hard to say whether a post breaks the NationStates rules, and the law as written makes no allowances for a margin of error. I would consider allowing the serving Delegate to generally regulate the Regional Message Board so long as they avoid banning speech that is political within a TNP context and (still) subject to judicial review.

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Always a fan of a little more flexibility in executive power. As long as, as you said, it remains subject to judicial review then I think it'll work fine. Adspam is a blight as is.

Section 2:

Also, the laws about ejection and banning are spread out across several sections: the Criminal code's bit on adspam, the section I'm talking about here, and the Regional Security Law's statute on Reckless Endorsement Gathering. I don't think we want to repeat ourselves, and the location of some of these may make sense, but I think the section could use revision to at least nod to the existence of other such specific statutory circumstances. Maybe the bit about Adspam should just be moved from the legal code to this section, to put all the non-security non-judicial use of force stuff in one place.

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Whatever.

Section 3:

It seems that the legislation regarding who must discharge the duties of the Attorney General should they and the Delegate and the Vice Delegate have a conflict of interest is... ambiguous. The section on the Attorney General may need clarification.

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Agreed. I know we talked about it a little bit yesterday. My first thought would be to kick it back to the complainant and give them the opportunity to appoint their own lawyer or take up the case themselves if they so desired. Something as specialized as lawyering, in my opinion, shouldn't run down a line of succession outside of the AG office itself.

Section 4:

The Freedom of Information Act is a great idea, and has been somewhat useful from time to time. We could, however, go farther. Perhaps I should defer revising this Section for another bill, as it's clearly hard enough on its own, however.

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I'm curious as to your thoughts behind "go farther". In what way, exactly?

Section 5:

As revised, the Mandatory Ministries section requires two Executive Officer roles to be filled: foreign and military affairs. I think that's probably adequate, but I'd welcome thoughts on the subject. The general idea behind Mandatory Ministries was to allow the RA to govern the region if the Delegate declined to do so, adopted during a time of serious inactivity. As a backstop against such problems in the future, I think allowing the RA to fill those crucial ministries should they be vacant for a prolonged period of time is sensible.

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I agree with Silly String on this one. While I think the NPA is crucial for our regional sovereignty, Silly String is absolutely correct that resources would be better spent on Culture with the focus of bringing back up activity levels rather than simply riding them out. I hesitate to suggest removing Defense from the Mandatory Minimums, however. Perhaps add in Culture?

Section 6:

The WA voting section bugs me. It does nothing, except introduce confusion regarding our treaties. I think we should consider repealing it.

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Whatever.

Section 7:

I think we need a new Regional Officers section to this chapter which will allow the serving Delegate to grant any powers besides Border Control to any Executive Officer, require the WA Delegate to grant all powers to the serving Delegate, allow the serving Delegate to authorize granting Border Control powers to members of the Security Council either in Order of Succession order during a Delegate Emergency or otherwise with the permission of a majority vote of the Regional Assembly, and will otherwise prohibit giving out Regional Officer powers.

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I agree completely here. I like the restriction of the Border Control powers and am loathe to see it outside of their hands (except in the cases you've noted).

Having spoken to Eluvatar about the FOIA proposal, I would support a declassification regime similar to what the Court has adopted.

Grimalkin:

Section 4:

The Freedom of Information Act is a great idea, and has been somewhat useful from time to time. We could, however, go farther. Perhaps I should defer revising this Section for another bill, as it's clearly hard enough on its own, however.

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I'm curious as to your thoughts behind "go farther". In what way, exactly?

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Not to speak for Elu, but my own thoughts on the matter are that the current FOIA is weak and ineffectual. Based on the wording of the law and two court decisions - both of which I helped write, one much more reluctantly than the other - FOIA only applies to the executive branch, and not the security council or the court. The latter I think is fine, but the former not so much. Additionally, given how much we generally value transparency, it is problematic to me that the baseline assumption of FOIA is that secrets are to be kept.

I would prefer an approach that assumes a default of transparency (with private threads needing to be released after a given period of time), but provides exceptions for certain types of information. Personal information, like name, address, etc, should never be revealed, and should be redacted from any thread before that thread is released, and classified information, like military/intel/FA stuff that remains relevant and could damage TNP to become public, should remain private as long as it needs to, but everything else would default to public after 6-12 months.

I implemented a system like this in the court, and I would love to see it expanded to include more of the government. The text I used was:

Section 1: Declassification of Records

1. Private Court records, in either the Justices' private forum or the private archive, which reach one year of age will be relocated to the Declassified Justice Archive.
2. Private Court records which have reached six months of age may be released early in the same manner when requested by a Citizen.
3. Private Court records which are younger than six months but predate the sitting Court may be requested by a Citizen and released if the Court finds a compelling benefit to their publication.
4. Private Court records from within the term of the sitting Court will not be released.
5. Private Court records which pertain to open or ongoing cases will not be released, regardless of their age.

Section 2: Privacy of Information

1. Information protected as private is defined as follows:
   • Real life information about any NationStates player from which there is a risk of inferring that player's real life identity and which has not willingly been disclosed to the public, including, but not limited to, an individual's name, IP address, physical address or location, phone number, place of employment or education, appearance, social media accounts, and other knowledge about a player, unless the player in question provides explicit consent for this information not to be considered private.
   • Real life information about any NationStates player for which there exists a reasonable real life expectation of privacy or discretion, including, but not limited to, health status, both mental and physical; financial status; personal tragedies; changes in personal status such as marriage, divorce, pregnancy, birth, or death; and other similar information, unless the player in question provides explicit consent for this information not to be considered private.
   • Information that, upon being made public, would jeopardize any ongoing military or intelligence operations; or jeopardize the security of units and agents participating in them, or be harmful to the diplomatic interests, military interests, or security of The North Pacific.
2. The Court will not release Private information during its declassification process. This may take the form of withholding a thread in its entirety, or producing a copy of of the original thread with the Private information or posts redacted.

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I basically agree with SillyString's comments on all of Eluvatar's topics of discussion, and with McM on granting automatic Border Control to the two or three Security Councillors first in the Line of Succession.

I would also support allowing the Delegate to give BC further down the LoS if necessary in an emergency, with RA consent.