How a Bill Becomes a Law Amendment

Crushing Our Enemies

Crushing Our Enemies

TNPer
-
-
Discord
COE#7110
Recently, a citizen of TNP pointed out that the process by which a proposal before the Regional Assembly becomes law is slightly fuzzy. Currently, it is not explicitly spelled out in our laws. You can find the discussion of that here. I liked the substance of their proposed fix, but not the language so much. I think the Assembly will find my version is slightly clearer and more stylistically consistent with the rest of our laws. I applaud Alunya for recognizing the problem, and coming up with a good and workable solution. My amendment draws heavily from their work.

I propose the following constitutional amendment to correct the problem:
How a Bill Becomes a Law Amendment:
1. The clause in Article 3 of the Constitution describing the Delegate's power to veto proposals and the Regional Assembly's power to override the veto shall be replaced by the following four clauses, which shall be numbered separately:
  • When a proposal of the Regional Assembly to enact, amend or repeal a law is passed, the Speaker shall promptly present it to the Delegate, and it shall take effect immediately upon their signature.
  • The Delegate may veto a proposal of the Regional Assembly to enact, amend or repeal a law within one week of its passage.
  • The Regional Assembly may override such a veto by a two-thirds majority vote, which shall cause a proposal to take immediate effect.
  • If a proposal of the Regional Assembly to enact, amend or repeal a law has not been signed or vetoed by the Delegate, it shall take effect seven days after being passed.
2. The rest of Article 3 shall be renumbered appropriately.
Click to expand...
 
Crushing Our Enemies:
Recently, a citizen of TNP pointed out that the process by which a proposal before the Regional Assembly becomes law is slightly fuzzy. Currently, it is not explicitly spelled out in our laws. You can find the discussion of that here. I liked the substance of their proposed fix, but not the language so much. I think the Assembly will find my version is slightly clearer and more stylistically consistent with the rest of our laws. I applaud Alunya for recognizing the problem, and coming up with a good and workable solution. My amendment draws heavily from their work.

I propose the following constitutional amendment to correct the problem:
How a Bill Becomes a Law Amendment:
1. The clause in Article 3 of the Constitution describing the Delegate's power to veto proposals and the Regional Assembly's power to override the veto shall be replaced by the following four clauses, which shall be numbered separately:
  • When a proposal of the Regional Assembly to enact, amend or repeal a law is passed, the Speaker shall promptly present it to the Delegate, and it shall take effect immediately upon their signature.
  • The Delegate may veto a proposal of the Regional Assembly to enact, amend or repeal a law within one week of its passage.
  • The Regional Assembly may override such a veto by a two-thirds majority vote, which shall cause a proposal to take immediate effect.
  • If a proposal of the Regional Assembly to enact, amend or repeal a law has not been signed or vetoed by the Delegate, it shall take effect seven days after being passed.
2. The rest of Article 3 shall be renumbered appropriately.
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
Several suggestions to avoid ambiguity:

Give a deadline to how long the Speaker has to present the bill to the Speaker. Otherwise, the one week period start and end is impossible to calculate with certainty.

Require the Delegate to "return" a vetoed bill to the Speaker via a message

Give a time frame (number of days) for the Speaker to (whichever you prefer) open debate on the veto or reopen debate on the bill.

State when (how many days) the veto override vote should start after the veto message is received by the Speaker.

That should completely get rid of the ambiguity in the process.
 
Grosseschnauzer:
Give a deadline to how long the Speaker has to present the bill to the Speaker. Otherwise, the one week period start and end is impossible to calculate with certainty.
Click to expand...
I don't think a strict deadline is necessary. The one week period starts when the bill is passed. "Promptly" is used numerous times in our legal code to indicate that an action should not be unnecessarily delayed, and should be treated as urgent.
Grosseschnauzer:
Require the Delegate to "return" a vetoed bill to the Speaker via a message
Click to expand...
Again, unnecessary. There is a thread for bills to be presented to the delegate, and the delegate traditionally posts veto messages in that thread.
Grosseschnauzer:
Give a time frame (number of days) for the Speaker to (whichever you prefer) open debate on the veto or reopen debate on the bill.

State when (how many days) the veto override vote should start after the veto message is received by the Speaker.
Click to expand...
This is completely disagree with. It's up to the Regional Assembly when and if to try to override a veto. A veto override should be treated as a separate proposal, and go through non-legislative procedures, beginning with a motion and second.
 
Crushing Our Enemies:
Grosseschnauzer:
Give a deadline to how long the Speaker has to present the bill to the Speaker. Otherwise, the one week period start and end is impossible to calculate with certainty.
Click to expand...
I don't think a strict deadline is necessary. The one week period starts when the bill is passed. "Promptly" is used numerous times in our legal code to indicate that an action should not be unnecessarily delayed, and should be treated as urgent.
Grosseschnauzer:
Require the Delegate to "return" a vetoed bill to the Speaker via a message
Click to expand...
Again, unnecessary. There is a thread for bills to be presented to the delegate, and the delegate traditionally posts veto messages in that thread.
Grosseschnauzer:
Give a time frame (number of days) for the Speaker to (whichever you prefer) open debate on the veto or reopen debate on the bill.

State when (how many days) the veto override vote should start after the veto message is received by the Speaker.
Click to expand...
This is completely disagree with. It's up to the Regional Assembly when and if to try to override a veto. A veto override should be treated as a separate proposal, and go through non-legislative procedures, beginning with a motion and second.
Click to expand...
You would rather commit hari kari than admit any suggestion from me has merit.
 
Believe what you want, but the truth is I didn't accept your suggestions because I disagree with them, not because I'm holding a grudge against you for being a complete jerk to me.

Don't get me wrong, I do not like you, but good legislation trumps that.
 
Committing Hari Kari to avoid admitting someone has a point makes as much sense as shooting yourself in the foot because you can't see out of one eye.
 
Lord Ravenclaw:
Committing Hari Kari to avoid admitting someone has a point makes as much sense as shooting yourself in the foot because you can't see out of one eye.
Click to expand...
Not funny because of the impaired eyesight in my right eye.
 
Crushing Our Enemies:
Grosse, I promise that Raven meant no offence to people with impaired vision.
Click to expand...
Doesn't matter; it's not something that is appropriate to use these days, especially when you have no idea who may be reading those words.

It's not classy, and that, you can't excuse.
 
Er, no. It's just a turn of phrase. It isn't meant to be offensive to those with vision impairments, it's not trying to make a joke out of them, it's just making the point that doing something completely unrelated is well...completely unrelated.

We all have problems, Grosse. If we all got offended by innocent turns of phrase, meant not at all maliciously and not even with offensive or derogatory language then we'd have real problems with an awful lot of idioms.

As to this amendment, it certainly seems to make sense.
 
Funny how certain someones are making excuses for the person who actually said it, maybe let them respond directly would be the right thing to do.

There's more to it that that btw, even my doctors have wondered how I managed to survive four distinct instances of medical malpractice. So perhaps not attacking people in those sort of ways would be smarter? You'll note I haven't attacked anyone for their eyesight or their hearing, or their typing skills, so.....
 
*sigh* Back on topic, I do not see the need to define time periods more closely than in the original proposal. It reads fine to me.
 
I support the text of this as written, and I think COE is absolutely right that it is up to the RA to decide whether or not it wishes to try to override a delegate's veto or allow it to stand.

I will note, as written, the delegate has the ability to veto a bill even if it has not been formally presented to them - so a sneaky speaker could not simply "forget" to present a controversial bill to the delegate and thereby avoid a veto.
 
If the RA passes a bill with a 99% majority, the Delegate can still veto it.
How about the Delegate can only veto a bill if it passed at under 2/3 majority?

How often is the RA aware that a bill has been vetoed?
Is the Speaker required to notify the RA?


Grosseschnauzer:
You would rather commit hari kari than admit any suggestion from me has merit.
Click to expand...
Grosse, this is offensive to me because one of my co-workers committed hari kari; but I accept your apology.
 
I think it's fine for the delegate to veto a bill that passes by more than 2/3, because sometimes such a public action by the delegate is enough to sway some voters against it. Also, it's possible that different voters will turn out for the override. Indeed, if the votes were guaranteed to be the same from the original bill to the override vote, there would never be a need for an override vote.

As far as how often the RA is aware that a bill has been vetoed, it's only happened twice in my memory, and the RA was aware both times. The Speaker is not required to notify the RA.
 
Crushing Our Enemies:
I think it's fine for the delegate to veto a bill that passes by more than 2/3, because sometimes such a public action by the delegate is enough to sway some voters against it. Also, it's possible that different voters will turn out for the override. Indeed, if the votes were guaranteed to be the same from the original bill to the override vote, there would never be a need for an override vote.
Click to expand...
OK, I think I can agree with this line of reasoning.

Crushing Our Enemies:
As far as how often the RA is aware that a bill has been vetoed, it's only happened twice in my memory, and the RA was aware both times. The Speaker is not required to notify the RA.
Click to expand...
I think this is a perfect time to address this issue, to ensure that the Speaker DOES notify the RA.
 
I don't think it's necessary. The delegate notifies the whole region by posting his veto publicly. There's always *someone* who cares enough about a particular bill to check and see if it's been signed or not. People notice vetoes, they get talked about, and if an override is possible it gets attempted.

No need to have it announced twice. If no one cares enough to check if it was signed or not, the RA doesn't deserve the chance to override it.
 
Crushing Our Enemies:
I don't think it's necessary. The delegate notifies the whole region by posting his veto publicly. There's always *someone* who cares enough about a particular bill to check and see if it's been signed or not. People notice vetoes, they get talked about, and if an override is possible it gets attempted.

No need to have it announced twice. If no one cares enough to check if it was signed or not, the RA doesn't deserve the chance to override it.
Click to expand...
The duty shouldn't be on the individual RA member to ascertain whether the Speaker or the Delegate acted, it is the duty of whichever officer that handles the updating of the Legal Code to notify the R.A. if a bill was vetoed.

That's the way the real world does it (veto message from the executive delivered to the chair(s) of the legislature) and it surely isn't burdensome for the Delegate to inform the Speaker via message of a veto that the Speaker can then present to the R.A.

Since the Speaker has unilateral and nearly unfettered control over R.A. procedure, unless otherwise contrained, it is not unreasonable for the Constitution or the Legal Code to at least require that the information be formally relayed to the membership of the R.A. in a manner calculated to best have their attention. Relying on a thread hidden somewhere in the Delegate's area of the forums is not a way to best achieve that. Not to mention that the Delegate could move the thread within his area without anyone else's prior knowledge. (Of course, the other option ins to move that thread into the R.A. area, pinned, so R.A. members can find it.)
 
Grosse, it's pinned in a top-level forum, and that's not gonna change. We've never had a problem with being aware of vetos in the past. Hell, it's only been since January 2013 that we've even *had* a thread for it at all. It was just ad-hocked before that. If you and Byron feel strongly about it, propose a separate piece of legislation after this one passes, but it's not going in my bill.
 
COE, you can't prevent a Delegate from moving the thread if they choose to do so, and it is risky to assume that it would never happen. So that argument makes little sense and does not address the valid point that there is no mechanism to assure that the membership of the Regional Assembly are notified that a bill they passed has become law, or has been vetoed.

I have had trouble even with that thread in determining when a change in the Legal Code actually took effect (on which actual date) because of the ambiguous nature of the current informal process of incorporating a signed bill into the Legal Code. There could be a time when the actual date is material in some way, and your insistence on using a time code doesn't help, which is one of the other concerns I have with a number of the gaps that have developed in the Legal Code.
Unlike you, I prefer to anticipate and prevent problems from occurring with our laws, and a little more effort when laws are being drafted often would prevent such misunderstandings from developing. (The "Reopening Nominations" debacle is an example of this.)
And as Roman and I showed in the Civil Code legislation, it is necessary to take the time to think through the language being used to minimize such problems. And oft times, the problem won't be apparent at first, second, or even third blush, but emerges as the bill is worked over. At least that was my experience in the past.
 
Grosse, I don't understand your point. A veto has to take place publicly, or it hasn't truly happened. The delegate can't decide in his mind that a bill has been vetoed and then object when the legal code is changed. I'm satisfied with requiring a public veto, and am not fussed about exactly where it takes place. We have never had an issue with a veto not being appropriately communicated, and there's no reason to complicate the system with strict rules about exactly where such a post has to be made.

The whole point of this law is to clear up the ambiguity about when a law takes effect, which it does completely. I agree that it is better to prevent a problem from occurring than to solve a problem after it occurs. The difference in our views is that you see a potential problem and I do not. It is interesting that you cite the Reopening Nominations matter, since I am the one preventing problems from occurring in that case.
 
Crushing Our Enemies:
If no one cares enough to check if it was signed or not, the RA doesn't deserve the chance to override it.
Click to expand...
Of course, there's no time limit on overriding a veto. Even IF the entire RA, somehow, missed the delegate's veto, they could override it at any time.
 
COE i like your original proposal. I also like Grosses proposal about a specific time frame. I.E. replace promptly with a specific time frame.

1. The clause in Article 3 of the Constitution describing the Delegate's power to veto proposals and the Regional Assembly's power to override the veto shall be replaced by the following four clauses, which shall be numbered separately:
When a proposal of the Regional Assembly to enact, amend or repeal a law is passed, the Speaker Speaker or Deputy Speaker shall promptly present it to the Delegate within 3 days, and it shall take effect immediately upon their signature.
The Delegate may veto a proposal of the Regional Assembly to enact, amend or repeal a law within one week of its passage.
The Regional Assembly may override such a veto by a two-thirds majority vote, which shall cause a proposal to take immediate effect.
If a proposal of the Regional Assembly to enact, amend or repeal a law has not been signed or vetoed by the Delegate, it shall take effect seven days after being passed.
2. The rest of Article 3 shall be renumbered appropriately.
Click to expand...

Or whatever time frame is chosen. Perferably within 3 days for me, longer indicates a delay and not prompty. Also in case a issue arrises with the speaker being gone the Dep. Speaker may also put the bill on the Delegates "Desk"
 
PaulWallLibertarian42:
Also in case a issue arrises with the speaker being gone the Dep. Speaker may also put the bill on the Delegates "Desk"
Click to expand...
This can be considered covered by Article 2, Clause 8 of the Constitution:

8. The Speaker may appoint deputies to assist them in the execution of any of their powers and duties. Appointment of deputies may be regulated by law and the rules of the Regional Assembly.
Click to expand...

:)
 
Essentially I can do almost anything Zyvet can do, but I tend to tackle the easier stuff, like sorting out citizenship/RA lists.

Once I was counting the votes for one bill and I didn't notice that he finished it while I was doing it. >.> <.<
 
Then strike that added clarification out.

We're debating cleaning up language correct? And doing some house keeping. I am generally im favor of sny proposals that clean up language and makes it easier to read and understand.

I'd still like "prompty" replaced with a specified time limit to have it done in. Rather its the Speaker or one of his deputies. As long as it is on the Delegates desk in no less than 3 days.

Has there ever been an occurance where "prompty" wasnt so promped? Either in this or past administrations?
 
Also after reading this. I also agree that if a bill is vetoed. (Even though the delegate traditionally comments on the bill in the applicable thread) I feel it should be the Duty of the Speaker to follow up if the delegate has signed or vetoed it and give the RA a choice to try and override or not. Not put it on a concerned RA member to decide to check up on it or not and ask for a override vote. Also, I think there should be a certain timeframe to enact an override attempt and not as COE said the RA could override a veto at anytime. It wouldnt make sense to me that any time really means "anytime" so 6 months later "hey that bill that got vetoed 6 months ago lets have an override vote."... Doesnt make sense does it?

I think that if a delegate vetos a bill the Speaker should follow up with the delegates bil signing and vetos and notify the RA and give the RA a timeframe to try to garner support for an override or not and give it like a week or two to do it in. If the RA fails to act or doesnt get an override passed in two weeks then the bill got defeated by a veto. If a RA member really wants it to pass try introducing it again work on whatever the issue was and get a vote and hope the delegate signs it. Not "we can try an override whenever".

If those issues gets addressed and promptly is changed to define a specific timeframe I'd definately support this.
 
All these ideas have some merit, but the purpose of this bill is essentially to formalize the system we have already, which works quite well. This is not an ambitious bill: it seeks only to clarify certain when exactly a bill becomes law, acknowledging and codifying the informal steps that various government officials have already created to form a smooth system of passing legislation. If you want to change that system, that should be a different bill, with a different author, because I think the system we have is working.

Passing this bill will make it much easier to make improvements on the system down the line if it runs into trouble, since the language will already be there, and only need tweaking.

I move for a vote.
 
This bill is now in formal debate for five days, after which a vote shall be scheduled.
 
The proposal in its current form still suffers from a vagueness and an ambiguity that will only invite more and not fewer problems.
Since these issues have not been addressed by its sponsor, and given that the proposal in its current form does not meet the posted guidelines of the Speaker for the proper formatting and organization of a legislative proposal, I object to a vote on this proposal, and will continue to object until these issues are cured. In fact I request the Speaker to rule the proposal as being out of order because of its lack of compliance to the drafting procedures posted by the Speaker.
 
Grosse, if you're referring to this thread, that's not a set of rules or procedures. I should know - I wrote it. It's a non-legally-binding guide to navigating the legislative proposal procedures which are found here (and are binding).
 
Crushing Our Enemies:
Grosse, if you're referring to this thread, that's not a set of rules or procedures. I should know - I wrote it. It's a non-legally-binding guide to navigating the legislative proposal procedures which are found here (and are binding).
Click to expand...
There is nothing stating that it is binding or non-binding, and given the fact that every bill until your two very recent proposals, including this one followed that format provides practical credence that it is percieved as being binding.

In addition clause numbers and identifiers are required to be part of a bill so that the Legal Code can be updated without reliance on the "minor errors" cluase to fix things, since the Court has held that provision unconstitutional.

Since the Court has adopted a strict reading of the elements of adopting legislation, the format you've taken to use lately creates an legally impermissible situation of giving the Speaker discretion that officer no longer has in edited adopted laws into the Legal Code or the other Governing Documents of TNP.

Which is to say that you should know better than to draft on deliberately incomplete bills to force an illegal act by the Speaker in order to place passed laws in the Legal Code. It introduces uncertainty as to what is legal and binding and what is not, when a bill is improperly edited as law into the Governing Documents. It's very lazy on your part.
 
The most recent bill that was passed, as well as this one, give explicit, unambiguous instructions to the speaker about how to edit the legal code. There is no discretion given to the speaker about how to edit the legal code. If you can point out to me how my bill could be applied two different ways to editing the legal code, I will withdraw it and eliminate the ambiguity.
 
I will simply point to the preamble to the Legal Code which requires:
This Code will be divided into several Chapters, which may contain Sections. Every operative sentence must be a numbered clause, numbered within a Chapter. Clauses may be referenced by chapter and clause number.
Click to expand...

The Legal Code requires numbered clauses; assigning that task to the Speaker after a bill becomes law effectively requires the use of the minor correction clause in the preamble to the Legal Code which the Court has held to be unconstitutional. In other words, you are giving the Speaker an authority that has been held to be a violation of the Constitution.

That is the problem with this bill and that is a problem that you could easily fix. It makes no sense for that matter not to provide what the Legal Code requires, namely, that each operative sentence be a numbered clause.

I stand by my objection as to allowing this bill to go to a vote until the defect is remedied.
 
Every operative sentence in this bill is a numbered clause.
How a Bill Becomes a Law Amendment:
1. The clause in Article 3 of the Constitution describing the Delegate's power to veto proposals and the Regional Assembly's power to override the veto shall be replaced by the following four clauses, which shall be numbered separately:
Click to expand...

And for the Speaker to be given any discretion at all, there must be more than one way of editing the legal code Constitution to reflect this bill. If there is only one way, then there is no discretion allowed. That's what discretion is: the ability to choose between multiple courses of action. Until you can show me such ways, I fail to see any problem with this bill.

EDIT: and this is a constitutional amendment, so neither the preamble of the legal code, nor the minor error clause is of any importance here.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top