Re: Agenda for June 15 SC meeting

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Cindy Ecksol
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Re: Agenda for June 15 SC meeting

Post by Cindy Ecksol »

With regard to http://forums.slcds.info/viewtopic.php? ... 475#p13417:

Claude Desmoulins wrote:

1. Discussion of AA merger = Note that this is NOT Gwyneth's requested review of the constitutional amendment. The SC can only proceed with that review if the amendment passes, which we won't know until those voting seven day weigh in.

OK, so there's no appeal on the table of the pending amendment, and the date to contest the validity of the merger itself has passed. Just out of curiosity, what else is there that the SC needs to discuss about this? Does the SC have any authority to just pop up at random and weigh in on a topic without being asked? Or is there another appeal on the table that we should all know about? If so, who are the appellants, who are the defendents, and what is the issue?

I'll also note that I agree with Jamie: the SC cannot be asked to weigh in on the validity of a constitutional amendment passed by the RA. It requires five votes to change the constitution which is, by definition, an SC override vote. Which makes sense: constitutional amendments are, by definition, "unconstitutional." The SC's job is to ensure that all other actions taken by RA are within the bounds of what citizens (represented by the RA) have chosen to declare within the bounds of the constitution. Once an amendment has been passed, it is as "constitutional" as any previously passed section of the constitution and the SC is bound to enforce it.

Here's a simple example of how this works from one of the oldest constitutional systems in the world. When the US passed the 26th Amendment to the US Constitution in 1971, the voting age was changed from 21 to 18. Had anyone tried to challenge the right of Congress and the States to approve that amendment on the grounds that it changed the Constitution, they would have been laughed out of the Supreme Court. The people had spoken according to the process defined by the Constitution, and anyone who could prove that they were at least 18 years old (and met all of the other criteria defined of course) could not be prohibited from registering to vote nor from actually voting. The old Constitutional rule defined by the Founding Fathers that said that one had to be 21 to register and vote no longer applied.

And how about a real stupid example from the same source? No one thought to challenge the passage of the 18th Amendment prohibiting sales of alcohol nationwide on the grounds that some in Congress were teetotalers who had a vested interest in making sure that liquor was no longer available to tempt them. Nor did anyone appeal to the Supremes the passage of the 21st Amendment repealing the 18th on the grounds that some in Congress would benefit from liquor sales once the amendment was passed. Both were the "will of the people" as expressed by their representatives at the time they were passed. After the 18th Amendment, one could appeal to the Federal Courts if a community permitted liquor sales and expect that the prohibition would be enforced. After the 21st Amendment (or before the 18th Amendment for that matter), that same case would never have made it past the courthouse door because the Constitution itself had been changed by the passage of the amendment.

That last example points out that there IS a way to challenge an amendment to the constitution that turns out to be a poor idea. It's simple: you organize support and propose an amendment to repeal the amendment that was passed. The final vote isn't in on the current amendment of course, and if it passes it is always possible that it will turn out to be more idiotic than the 18th Amendment to the US Constitution. But it will be up to a future RA to speak to that issue, not to the SC.

Cindy

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Jamie Palisades
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Re: Agenda for June 15 SC meeting

Post by Jamie Palisades »

While I agree with much of Cindy's view, I am a little hesitant about the "one of the oldest constitutional systems" thing.
We probably can discount countries that claim to have a constitution, but refuse to write anything down -- it's just a "virtual idea". That and 2 pounds 50 will buy you a small latte at Pret a Manger :D .. a SMALL latte.
But as among written ones, I think Athens has the USA beat by about 2430 years.
Regards JP

== My Second Life home is CDS. Retired after three terms
== as chancellor of the oldest self-governing sims in SL.
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Patroklus Murakami
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Re: Agenda for June 15 SC meeting

Post by Patroklus Murakami »

The SC can be asked to judge the validity of a constitutional amendment. That's one of its main tasks :) Article III, Section 8 of the Constitution states that:

"The Philosophic branch may veto or rewrite and resubmit a bill or constitutional amendment if it is in violation of any of the founding documents."

The founding documents have been previously held to be the documents described in the Preamble - the Universal Declaration Of Human Rights, Founding Philosophy, Constitution, local laws, the SL ToS, and Community Standards.

Five votes in the RA is not 'an SC override vote'. The RA could, for example, pass constitutional amendments to:

  • *abolish the Executive Branch and install Gwyn as monarch for life
    *extend its current term until the year 3000 and postpone future elections until then
    *proscribe the CSDF and prevent it from standing in elections (which has been seriously considered!)

The SC would be the last line of defence of liberal democracy in these circumstances as it would (I hope!) strike down these amendments regardless of whether they got five, six or seven votes out of seven in the RA.

That being said, the SC usually gives the RA a fair degree of latitude with regard to the passage of bills and constitutional amendments. In recent times the SC has been quite reluctant to challenge the decisions of the RA so, if Jamie's constitutional amendment permitting the 'selection' of additional RA members gets 5 votes out of 7, the SC may well decide that this was a valid amendment to the Constitution.

Honi soit qui mal y pense
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