Ruling of the Court of The North Pacific
In regards to the judicial inquiry filed by Barbarossistan on the validity of a previous ruling
Opinion drafted by Sil Dorsett, joined by Cogoria and Sasten
The Court took into consideration the inquiry filed here by Barbarossistan, and its follow-up here.
The Court took into consideration the legal brief filed here by Falapatorius.
The Court took into consideration the legal brief filed here by Goyanes.
The Court took into consideration the legal brief filed here by SillyString, and its follow-up here.
The Court took into consideration the legal brief filed here by Guy.
The Court took into consideration the legal brief filed here by Zyvetskistaahn.
The Court took into consideration the relevant portions of the Constitution of The North Pacific:
Article 5. The Court
1. The Court will try all criminal cases, resolve conflicts or ambiguities in the law, and review the constitutionality of laws or legality of government policies by request of an affected party.
The Court took into consideration the relevant portions of the Legal Code of The North Pacific:
Article 3. Judicial Law
6. If one or more Justice positions are vacant, or any Justice is absent or has recused themselves, the remaining Justices will promptly appoint replacements from among available citizens to participate as temporary Hearing Officers.
8. Any recusal or absence of a Hearing Officer will be treated as a vacancy.
The Court took into consideration the relevant portions of On the Nature of Precedent and the Scope of the Court's Powers:
The Court holds that the Court is obliged to review its own decisions should the need arise (and a proper request be made - arbitrary requests for review every time a new Court is elected are not permissible), as it is responsible for doing with all governmental policies.
The Court does not believe, however, that precedent may be overturned sua sponte (unilaterally, at the Court's discretion, without an action being brought), nor do we believe that precedent may be disregarded unless it is conclusively overturned. We furthermore believe that a heightened standard of review must be followed when reviewing the decisions of a previous Court, out of respect and deference to the law as established by our predecessors. Should it come to pass that precedent must be overturned, this Court believes that that decision must only be made after all legal alternatives have been examined, and must be done in as transparent and explanatory a fashion as possible.
The Court may overturn its prior rulings, but must do so in response to a new request as a result of some factual evolution (not simply a request to "look again"), and must do so concurrent with the publication of its reasoning in doing so. The Court must avoid disregarding precedent wherever possible, but cannot, in the interests of justice and fairness, be irrefutably bound by precedent regardless of the consequences.
The Court opines the following:
Regarding the ruling being made sua sponte:
The Court believes that in order to answer the question of whether accepting Lord Ravenclaw's Request for Review was legal, it
must have considered the question of whether reviewing the matter and issuing a ruling in the first place would have been proper and in-line with precedent, and therefore the ruling was
not issued sua sponte. It may not have answered the petitioner's original question, but it answered an underlying question that the court was required to decide first.
Regarding the ruling being made as a majority decision with an absence:
The Court also acknowledges that there was an additional question on the ability of the Court to issue a ruling when one of its justices or hearing officers is not present during drafting or voting. When the ruling
"On the Suppression of Posts on the Regional Message Board" was issued, Flemingovia noted that Punk Daddy had been absent during drafting and did not cast a vote, and was counted as abstaining. Therefore, there was an apparent precedent for Abbey and Plembobria to do the same when Yalkan was absent. With Plembobria joining the decision that is being challenged here, the Court issued the ruling.
This is in conflict with the previously cited clauses of the Legal Code that make it clear that an absent Justice or Hearing Officer must be replaced, and that the remaining Justices must
promptly appoint a replacement from available citizens. Abbey and Plembobria failed to do so. There will no doubt be questions as to how long someone should be absent before being declared so, but the Court believes that should an absence be declared when there isn't one, the supposedly absent member should be able to reassert their place on the panel should it be demonstrated that there was in fact no legitimate absence.
However, the Court also recalls instances in 2012 where there were cases in which Justice Hileville issued a ruling shortly after another justice joined the decision, marking the remaining justice as abstaining if there was no prompt reply. For example, In
"On the Scope of Clause 9 of the Bill of Rights", Hileville posted the ruling two days after Blue Wolf II joined the decision and there was no reply from Funkadelia. Funkadelia had not abandoned the office, and there's no indication that Funkadelia had gone absent; there was just no timely reply. The ruling issued by Abbey and Plembobria could have been issued under the same circumstances had Abbey not confessed that Yalkan had gone absent. Since the definition of an absent justice or hearing officer is unclear and since past decisions have been issued with a majority vote, this Court finds no reason to declare that Court officially did not consist of three members at that time and therefore set aside the decision for that reason.
Regarding "exceptional circumstances":
The Court disagrees with the previous ruling that only under exceptional circumstances can the Court be reviewed. With no clear definition of "exceptional circumstances," the Court would be free to raise such standards to dismiss a case through the use of whatever criteria it felt was necessary to do so. It could also lower the same to accept a case that ordinarily wouldn't be under the concept of "exceptional circumstances." Even the oft-cited ruling on the Nature of Precedent and the Scope of the Court's Powers failed to adequately define its own concept of "heightened standards," leaving the definition to be decided by the Court arbitrarily. While this Court agrees that a request to simply "look again" because a petitioner or the Attorney General's office was unhappy with the result should be rejected, whenever there is the possibility that the court was not in compliance with the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, or the Legal Code, overturned precedent without explanation, or if there is new evidence uncovered that might impact a past ruling, a review would be warranted.
Therefore, the ruling in regards to the judicial inquiry filed by SillyString on the ability of the Court to review RA proposals is set aside, and having previously accepted SillyString's inquiry, the Court is ordered to reconsider the matter.
