A suggestion regarding TNP judicial elections

I have had a thought.

Our laws are reasonably complex, and when you add in rulings, precedent etc they take a bit of understanding. We need to know that our justices are up to speed.

I would like to suggest introducing a "bar exam", testing knowledge and understanding of our laws. Passing the bar exam would allow citizens to run for justice, and we would know that they were fit to run.

I would suggest the exam is set by CoE, Elu and Asta. they seem to know their way round our laws, and I would trust them to be fair.

WE would insert into our election law something like this:

"Justices shall be elected from among those citizens who have passed the TNP bar exam"

What do you think? It would mean, possibly fewer candidates - but better ones.

Why it would definitely bar most that aren't extremely familiar with the law, I also feel like it would put off new/newish citizens from even attempting to run for justice as well as missing out on those candidates who "shine" through doing.

I do not think new citizens ought to run for justice. Those who have have generally managed to make fools of themselves through no fault save inexperience. If they were made to wait a little longer and actually show competence before applying then that might be the better for them.

And newish citizens who managed to pass the bar exam would be able to show critics some evidence that they knew their stuff.

I have a few concerns.

Is the creation of the exam purely up to the person tasked with it? Or will there be a minimum set of requirements to be encompassed in the exam? I would also like to know the processes to amend the exam. And finally, there would need to be a certain threshold of difficulty to weed out those who are unqualified while allowing those who might not be "100% qualified" to run.

I feel that this would also make some people shy away from running, as they would have to take an "exam." That being said, I have no inherent personal objection to having competency exams for important positions.

Not sure about this.

I'd suggest that if we feel a bar exam is necessary, that we write one, and see how people go with passing it before we put anything into law. That way we don't find ourselves without any eligible justice candidates before the next election

I like the idea, Flem, but it would likely lead to more complexity and confusion - mainly because it would lead to a very narrow number of potential candidates.

And easier solution would be to eliminate most of the concept of precedent and replace it with a methodology involving the merits of a particular case. A much more responsive method and more in keeping with the attitudes of the current state of the region at the time a case is adjudicated.

After the much ballyhooed introduction/passage of the Citizenship Bill, this is funny. The Citizenship Bill removed barriers to participation, this discussion proposes erecting one. Lol.. if COE, Silly String, and Eluvatar are the only people qualified to be Justices (in your opinion), just introduce a bill to set them up as Justices 4 life.

Roman:

I like the idea, Flem, but it would likely lead to more complexity and confusion - mainly because it would lead to a very narrow number of potential candidates.

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That's the idea Roman. No outsiders unless they jump through the requisite hoops first.

If you look at my voting record in elections you will find that I have a good track record of voting for new and newish candidates. However, I think it is a good idea to have justices who have a knowledge and understanding of our laws.

Perhaps it would be best to have a bar exam that is a voluntary qualification rather than a job requirement. It would allow candidates to empirically demonstrate that they have a grasp of the role - which ought to give them an edge over unqualified candidates.

As far as Asta, CoE and Elu are concerned, they were sinply the three I could think of who would have the knowledge to set such an exam up. I also know that Eluvatar did similar in the region of Taijitu.

And no, I would not want them to be justices for life. The court is far more entertaining when they are not on the bench. If you can think of better, please suggest away.

I think a voluntary exam is a good idea. I'd certainly like to see what one would look like & who would pass it.

It would definitely be wise to make it voluntary first and if we believe it is working well, to adopt it as part of the law. But I'm not convinced of that at this stage.

I'd be happy to work with COE and Elu (and probably a couple others - r3n comes to mind) to set up a voluntary bar exam.

I'm not sure it's a good idea to enshrine it into law, though. As with other issues like running for multiple offices and use of annoying campaign methodologies, I prefer voters fail candidates rather than those candidates being disqualified from running. Even if a bar exam could benefit the quality of justices we get, I'd definitely want to see the results of any such exam before codifying it.

Since votes in TNP are primarily (at least historically) popularity contests that have little to do with competence in relation to the office being sought, I think this sort of thing would be helpful.

Even with the question and answer sessions we currently have, nations that fail to answer, or answer in a miserably ignorant manner, still win at a very high rate, especially, it seems, in the Judicial elections.

flemingovia:

I have had a thought.

Our laws are reasonably complex, and when you add in rulings, precedent etc they take a bit of understanding. We need to know that our justices are up to speed.

I would like to suggest introducing a "bar exam", testing knowledge and understanding of our laws. Passing the bar exam would allow citizens to run for justice, and we would know that they were fit to run.

I would suggest the exam is set by CoE, Elu and Asta. they seem to know their way round our laws, and I would trust them to be fair.

WE would insert into our election law something like this:

"Justices shall be elected from among those citizens who have passed the TNP bar exam"

What do you think? It would mean, possibly fewer candidates - but better ones.

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I noticed that you excluded me. Wonder why that is, Flem?

BEcause I was thinking of people who might deliver in a reasonable time frame and collaboratively.

Gracius Maximus:

Since votes in TNP are primarily (at least historically) popularity contests that have little to do with competence in relation to the office being sought, I think this sort of thing would be helpful.

Even with the question and answer sessions we currently have, nations that fail to answer, or answer in a miserably ignorant manner, still win at a very high rate, especially, it seems, in the Judicial elections.

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That was pretty much the reason for the suggestion.

mcmasterdonia:

I think a voluntary exam is a good idea. I'd certainly like to see what one would look like & who would pass it.

It would definitely be wise to make it voluntary first and if we believe it is working well, to adopt it as part of the law. But I'm not convinced of that at this stage.

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This

Yes, I have taken that on board.

The trouble with this sort of exam is that our laws change frequently, sometimes dramatically. it would take a lot of maintenance to keep the exam up to date.

The other problem would be cheating - I'm not sure any conventional method of preventing cheating on online exams is available to us in an online game setting. We would have to rely on the honor of each test participant not to share the questions or answers with future participants. The best scheme I can think of to prevent this would be to generate a massive number of questions and give a random sample of them on each test. However, the more questions there are, the more maintenance will be required to remove or change outdated questions and add new questions as the body of law changes.

I do not support adding restrictions on who can stand for Justice, but I think an independent examination board offering a test and making the results public would be a good idea. We would need to think of implementation solutions for the problems I've noted above, though.

I am not okay with requiring tests to hold office, however I do like the Idea of a TNP Bar Association..for Role Play Purposes where TNP Lawyers and Judges can join and discuss informally problems in the laws and debate the merits and follys of TNP Case law...and have a chairperson of the bar..and if a member cocks up the bar may vote to censure them etc. And if someone is a certified member of the bar they can have a TNP Bar association badge..and then if people are seeking legal council they can see if a person is bar association certified or not...and the bar can endorse candidates for judical elections...but coming up with a law quiz to run for Justice..Im not comfortable with that.

Maybe we should consult Leekem. He was, after all, elected president of his law firm.

Crushing Our Enemies:

The trouble with this sort of exam is that our laws change frequently, sometimes dramatically. it would take a lot of maintenance to keep the exam up to date.

The other problem would be cheating - I'm not sure any conventional method of preventing cheating on online exams is available to us in an online game setting. We would have to rely on the honor of each test participant not to share the questions or answers with future participants. The best scheme I can think of to prevent this would be to generate a massive number of questions and give a random sample of them on each test. However, the more questions there are, the more maintenance will be required to remove or change outdated questions and add new questions as the body of law changes.

I do not support adding restrictions on who can stand for Justice, but I think an independent examination board offering a test and making the results public would be a good idea. We would need to think of implementation solutions for the problems I've noted above, though.

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Here's an interesting idea that would keep the field of potential candidates larger than just a handful of people:

We set up a section of the TNP University to offer a course of instruction for anyone who might want to run for a position as justice. In that section, you present a series of 'lectures' concerning what the laws are, where to find them, various court decisions and where to find them. Require potential candidates to actually read the law and Constitution, court procedures, etc.,,,. Just a relatively simple set of instructions.

This, of course, would require the construction of a definitive and cross referenced listing of laws, relative constitutional items, precedents (in the form of an annotated legal code (specifically, a series of foot-notes to each law showing cases in which those laws were prosecuted, etc.,,,), court opinions, etc.,,,. Wouldn't take too long if you set two or three people at the task.

Also, addressing the Flemingovia's concerns about any constipation issues involving the court, there is a simple solution to that:

We increase the number of Justices on the Court to something like six (6) justices, and then require that on criminal cases, three of the six sit; on constitutional matters, at least four (4) of the justices concur. Or, you could just have one justice sit and decide criminal cases with the right of appeal to the greater court (at least three justices, but excluding the presiding justice of the originating case).

Or, we could just replace it with trial by ordeal and bring back the dunking stool.

Ill grab the baseballs to tosd at the target to activate the dunk tank.

I think folks are rather overcomplicating this. The point was not to provide a training regimen for justices (although, God knows....), it was to provide a measure of competence, so that he electorate would know that those standing for election know how to do the job they are standing for.

If TNPU wants to offer law courses, that's their business. That can proceed separately from this matter.

Crushing Our Enemies:

The other problem would be cheating - I'm not sure any conventional method of preventing cheating on online exams is available to us in an online game setting. We would have to rely on the honor of each test participant not to share the questions or answers with future participants. The best scheme I can think of to prevent this would be to generate a massive number of questions and give a random sample of them on each test. However, the more questions there are, the more maintenance will be required to remove or change outdated questions and add new questions as the body of law changes.

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I thought of a solution for this - we could simply have all the questions be answered in writing, rather than multiple choice or other selected response formats. Responses copied or paraphrased from someone else would be easily detected. The weakness here would be the subjective nature of scoring - but that is a much easier problem to solve.

Isn't this all getting a bit over complicated and convoluted? I mean, if we have a legal system and constitution so complicated that we need to make people pass a test before they run for a given office, I think it's time we concentrate our efforts on simplifying the system rather than making it more arcane, Byzantine and complex.

This is bordering on something like asking applicants for citizenship to take a TNP civics test before they can be given citizenship.

1) It's not "a given office" - it's Court Justice. Legal expertise is a desired qualification.

2) We don't need to make people pass a test before they run for Justice. Having them take an exam and reporting their score to the public would simply allow voters to make a more educated decision about who to vote for.

3) Such an exam would not make our legal system more complex in any way.

4) This is absolutely nothing like requiring a civics test for citizenship. All that is required for citizenship is residency and an oath, and that is not going to change in the foreseeable future.

Of course, any bar exam would be voluntary. But the electorate would be reasonably able to ask an election candidate WHY they refused to sit the exam.

flemingovia:

Of course, any bar exam would be voluntary. But the electorate would be reasonably able to ask an election candidate WHY they refused to sit the exam.

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That's fine and dandy, but we all know that elections are a popularity contest and not a measure of competency by any means.

To be honest in a hopefully innocuous fashion, what is being suggested by some here is tantamount to establishing an elite group of people who will always occupy a given branch of government, perpetually. If we have a legal system that becomes so complicated that we need to have a test to qualify people to run for a particular type of office, then we may as well hang it up in that department.

Since the root of the problem with the legal system is inactivity of Justices and an overly complicated and wishy-washy Criminal Code that has more holes in it than a wheel of Swiss Cheese, the answer here may be to greatly simplify the Criminal Code and the Legal Code in general to plug those holes, and to diminish a large amount of Judicial discretion on most legal matters not dealing with constitutional determinations.

My suggestion is to convert most of the legal system to a Codex System and do so incrementally.

We create a set of Codes which are simply a matter of obligations/duties and "thou shalt nots". You violate a law, you pay the penalty proscribed by that law.

For instance:

Code item: Any Justice who has not logged into the forum or has not attended to standing matters on the docket for three days shall be removed and replaced within 48 hours by temporary appointment by the Delegate.

If you want an effective legal system, don't waste your time on silly 'Bar Exams' when that is not the problem. The real problem is dereliction of duty by inactivity. If you have Justices who are active all the time, you have no problem. It is not a matter of whether or not they have passed a 'bar exam', but rather a problem of Justices having the will and desire to actually do the job they campaigned for in the first place.

Also, with a Codex system, you could actually have a quick legal system that would be amenable to a "Fiqh" process. This would be more timely of a method than we have now. Right now, if you have an inactive Justice, you end up with a mess - nothing gets done and you have to go through the agonising process of special elections and all the associated BS and waste of time. And in the end, nothing gets resolved and you get more of the same.

Create a Codex System that is clear and concise to the point that anyone can adjudicate an issue, and that solves the problem.

It would also be better to streamline the Justice election system and have strict procedures and activity requirements rather than to inflate an already complicated system with tests and exams that will in the end only make matters more constipated than they are now.

That's the simple solution there. We need to have overly complicated BS for the context of TNP.

Romanoffia:

flemingovia:

Of course, any bar exam would be voluntary. But the electorate would be reasonably able to ask an election candidate WHY they refused to sit the exam.

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That's fine and dandy, but we all know that elections are a popularity contest and not a measure of competency by any means.

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You are saying this because you consistently lose elections to people both more popular and more competent than you, and wish to downplay the issue of competence in favor of focusing on the issue of popularity, thereby minimizing your own faults.

To speak to your ridiculous codex system, I would certainly not be satisfied with a government that was 100% punitive in nature. Our laws do not exist for the purpose of punishment, but to guide The North Pacific in its practice of democratic governance, to quote the preamble to the constitution.

The biggest problem with our legal system is that it is entirely punitive and adversarial. In terms of building community it is almost entirely counter productive.

We talked years ago about a bar exam to admit people who could appear as counsel before the Court. We ran into same problems that are being raised now.

One reason for the current problem, I strongly suspect, was the move away from voting separately for each seat and going to the system being used now. The current system encourages a popularity contest and not voting on competency. I think we'd be a lot better off going back to separate votes on each seat.

@Grosse: how does separate voting not make it still a popularity contest?

Crushing Our Enemies:

Romanoffia:

flemingovia:

Of course, any bar exam would be voluntary. But the electorate would be reasonably able to ask an election candidate WHY they refused to sit the exam.

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That's fine and dandy, but we all know that elections are a popularity contest and not a measure of competency by any means.

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You are saying this because you consistently lose elections to people both more popular and more competent than you, and wish to downplay the issue of competence in favor of focusing on the issue of popularity, thereby minimizing your own faults.

To speak to your ridiculous codex system, I would certainly not be satisfied with a government that was 100% punitive in nature. Our laws do not exist for the purpose of punishment, but to guide The North Pacific in its practice of democratic governance, to quote the preamble to the constitution.

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If I didn't know any better, I'd say you appear to have something personal against me due to your constant gain-saying of anything I say. I think that attitude you display maximises your own faults.

And, for that matter, all of our elections in TNP are a popularity contest and nothing more. Competence has absolutely nothing to do with who wins any election - it's all about who is the most popular or who can abuse and denigrate their opponents the best. In that aspect, our elections are no different than real elections.

I just can't wait until someone really vicious comes along and starts winning elections.

flemingovia:

The biggest problem with our legal system is that it is entirely punitive and adversarial. In terms of building community it is almost entirely counter productive.

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You have just also described the entire political culture of The North Pacific.

When you get people who are automatically adversarial and feel the need to denigrate others as a matter of course, you get punitive and counter-productive legal systems too.

Lord Nwahs:

@Grosse: how does separate voting not make it still a popularity contest?

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There's more of a chance of electing competent Justices, as voters can focus on each seat. As it is now, It becomes very difficult to try and sort out who could win and who should win on the basis of competency that won't make things impossible. I don't recall ever seeing these sort of issue we've seen since the group pool system of electing Justices was implemented.

Romanoffia:

all of our elections in TNP are a popularity contest and nothing more. Competence has absolutely nothing to do with who wins any election - it's all about who is the most popular or who can abuse and denigrate their opponents the best.

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So you think r3n and mcm have been elected delegate because they are the most abusive members of our community? And not because they are competent to do the job?

Crushing Our Enemies:

Romanoffia:

all of our elections in TNP are a popularity contest and nothing more. Competence has absolutely nothing to do with who wins any election - it's all about who is the most popular or who can abuse and denigrate their opponents the best.

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So you think r3n and mcm have been elected delegate because they are the most abusive members of our community? And not because they are competent to do the job?

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What a lame question to ask in a poorly executed attempt to re-frame the intent of my question. You really need to avoid cherry-picking statements in an effort to distort the meaning of said statements.

I think they largely got elected as a result of their popularity as the primary reason. I find it sad that most people probably didn't even think about considering their competence and only considering their popularity.

Let me refine that statement and reduce it to the lowest common denominator in metaphorical terms:

Choosing a candidate for any given office is tantamount to choosing which doctor you will be treated by based upon the appealing qualities of the doctor's neck tie and not his skill as a physician.

And, if by chance, a candidate who has a less than appealing neck tie of the wrong colour or pattern gets elected to a position, they will generally be demeaned and abused by a very vociferous minority and then hanged by their neck tie as a result of the viciousness of that vociferous minority.

This general attitude is exemplified by the low information voters who generally actually decide elections and tends to ignore and even demean the competency of a given candidate. I've been in this region a hell of a lot longer than you and have noticed this pattern which goes unnoticed by some and exploited by others.

I cannot disagree with you more strongly, Roman. I believe that most TNP voters attempt to put the best candidates in office, and that our electoral system, in most cases, produces very meritorious officials. I think that there is a definite correlation between competence and popularity, of course. It stands to reason that people who are very good at government work become popular for doing their jobs well.

Crushing Our Enemies:

I cannot disagree with you more strongly, Roman. I believe that most TNP voters attempt to put the best candidates in office, and that our electoral system, in most cases, produces very meritorious officials. I think that there is a definite correlation between competence and popularity, of course. It stands to reason that people who are very good at government work become popular for doing their jobs well.

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I tend to agree with you in regards to the General Election cycles, although there is also a very strong element of popularity contest mentality involved as well.

But, the Judicial Election cycles have consistently produced mediocre Courts. While it is true that every once and a while a good panel will take office, it is by far more prevalent for an ineffective and/or inactive group to gain the posts.