House of Representatives rules

[windjammer]

Hey guys, I have some times today. Considering I wrote some part of the current senate rules and the Mideast Assembly rules, I wrote today the House of Representatives rules as well. It is basically really similar to the Mideast Assembly rules/Senate rules, a shorter version.

 I added something specifically to the new bicameral system: the President of Congress (ie the Vice president) would be responsible of the slots reserved for the legislations that previously passed the senate. I intend to give him the same function in the senate rules (legislations that would have previously passed the house).

The biggest interest of doing that is that if the House and the Senate constantly have to constantly adopt some amendments to the version they received from the other chamber, the "presiding officer" (in that case the president of congress ie the VP) wouldn't change so it would greatly improve the coordination between the 2 chambers. And it would finally give a role for the VP.

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I would like to have your opinions about the current House rules I wrote. If it is positive, I will write the new senate rules as well (considering everything will be wiped out, they will have to pass something again )

Regards,
Justice Windjammer

[windjammer]

Thank you all for your kind! I just wrote the Senate rules. Basically the same rules than the House rules, I believe it is important that 2 chambers have similar rules. Some differences: the Speaker is replaced by the President pro Tempore, and the Article about impeachment is replaced by the article about confirmation hearings.

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Your opinion is obviously welcome!

[windjammer]

So, tell me if I'm reading this right: in terms of legislation debate, a final vote can only be called on a contentious bill after the bill has been on the floor for 72 and has had no debate for 36 hours? In an example where there was one amendment that fixes all the issues senators have (not uncommon), you'd then have to wait for 36 hours after that amendment passed to open a final vote?

Just trying to get a firm grasp on this - it all looks great, just thinking of how a clause could be added in there to let the PPT open votes sooner.

Other than that, the only change I would want to make before this being introduced is moving all pronouns to gender-neutral.

Thanks!
Regarding the 72 hours requirement, it can be called waived if senators/representatives wish to do so:

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I hope I have answered your question, sorry if I have failed to do so .

[windjammer]

Not quite: I understand it can be waived in the first 72 hours, but say after a week of debating a bill, an amendment passes that kind of wraps up discussion. Do you then have to wait to open up a final vote for 36 hours or is there a way it can be opened soon?

I may be completely off on this, I'm not 100% sure what the procedure was before, but I'd think the PPT should be able to open a final vote pretty quickly in those types of situations.

Ooooooh I think this time I will be able to answer you properly .

Yes I understand your point, I was confronted to this problem when I was senate speaker.

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The term debate is relatively vague I guess. If no one objects to this amendment, when I was senate speaker, I didn't consider this time as "debated".

For example, let's imagine, you're a senator and me the PPT , you want to introduce an amendment an then quickly call for a final vote.
You introduce your amendment, I let 36 hours for objections, no one objected.
And then,

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Considering no one objected during this period, I consider that there was no debate. So you can directly motion for a final vote, and if no objection, 24 hours after the adoption of your amendment I could open a final vote.

Does that make sense?

[windjammer]

It does, thanks. Looks good!

Thank you! Oh and by the way, if you really want to act quickly and that the 36 hours have not elapsed, you can motion for ending the debates. I think I'm the last speaker who has used this procedure, but by experience, the 2/3 majority (most of the times) in order to end the debates is quickly reached!

[windjammer]

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I don't understand the need of having complete different rules between the House and the Senate. If I recall correctly, you are a partisan of the VP having some legislative duties. Now the VP serves in 2 chambers. It is really going to complicate his job if he has totally different rules in the 2 chambers.

Rules must be clear, understandable and shorter as possible

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I'm not against Majority leaders etc don't get me wrong. But, giving which duties in the senate rules? The only one that I could see is which bills should be debated on the floor. I would clearly oppose this rule. The administration of the House/Senate should be non partisan, everyone should have a chance to have his bills debated for example.
But again, I'm not against any symbolic title or whatever, but I really believe that the role of majority/minority leader should be dealt internally, ie the parties choosing their leader by their own, not the senate/house rules having to deal with it .

[windjammer]

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I don't understand the need of having complete different rules between the House and the Senate. If I recall correctly, you are a partisan of the VP having some legislative duties. Now the VP serves in 2 chambers. It is really going to complicate his job if he has totally different rules in the 2 chambers.

Rules must be clear, understandable and shorter as possible

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I'm not against Majority leaders etc don't get me wrong. But, giving which duties in the senate rules? The only one that I could see is which bills should be debated on the floor. I would clearly oppose this rule. The administration of the House/Senate should be non partisan, everyone should have a chance to have his bills debated for example.
But again, I'm not against any symbolic title or whatever, but I really believe that the role of majority/minority leader should be dealt internally, ie the parties choosing their leader by their own, not the senate/house rules having to deal with it .

In the original Duke Plan, the Senate would be non-partisan. The House would be partisan though.

The Senate is too small for such to work and would function best as you describe. The House though is different. It has both the size and the novelty factor to make it work.

The differences don't have to be 100%. The VP's job is to coordinate and I am all for that, and again that was also part of the original Duke plan in Ocotber 2013. Of course at the time the VP had responsibilities so that was more of strengthening an existing situation than introducing a new thing.

Well, so a chamber that is non partisan and the other that is partisan? That makes even less sense. Partisanship and not letting people introduce their bill will piss off a lot of people

I must say that fact that one of Labor's leading figures is more Conservative than me on legislative rules, is touching beyond belief in its sheer irony considering back in the day everyone from TNF to Talleyrand to Nix were in the tank for a partisan Senate.

Oh don't get me wrong, I have always believed that the administration of the senate/house should be non partisan. I opposed TNF's plan to create a Majority leader for example. I have always opposed the IRC faction regarding their proposals on rules to be honest: against the elimination of the GM etc etc

[windjammer]

From a personal standpoint I'd be in favour of a partisan house (even though it's against Labor's interests atm) It would certainly make the House more entertaining, and make the elections more worthwhile 

It will encourage inactivity. Legislators aren't going to write a legislation if the legislation in question isn't going to be debated.

[windjammer]

From a personal standpoint I'd be in favour of a partisan house (even though it's against Labor's interests atm) It would certainly make the House more entertaining, and make the elections more worthwhile 

It will encourage inactivity. Legislators aren't going to write a legislation if the legislation in question isn't going to be debated.

There are ways to do it, that gives a certain percentage of slots to the minority's legislation.

Also, doesn't the same apply as it is on the basis of whether or not something will pass. Plus Parties will weed out inactivity since a majority either way will likely be 1 seat, and thus an inactive member will devastate the majority's agenda.

I'm appalled by the fact that a partisan House could get any traction. If a representative is going to matter less by an another, he's going to be more inactive. Simple.

I have seen many bad ideas in my atlasian lifes to be enacted, like the elimination of every duty of the VP, the elimination of the GM, the "recall" amendment, so hopefully I won't see an anoter bad idea be enacted. But in case people wish to do that, please people who are reading this thread, I will be on the right side of history.

[windjammer]

From a personal standpoint I'd be in favour of a partisan house (even though it's against Labor's interests atm) It would certainly make the House more entertaining, and make the elections more worthwhile 

It will encourage inactivity. Legislators aren't going to write a legislation if the legislation in question isn't going to be debated.

There are ways to do it, that gives a certain percentage of slots to the minority's legislation.

Also, doesn't the same apply as it is on the basis of whether or not something will pass. Plus Parties will weed out inactivity since a majority either way will likely be 1 seat, and thus an inactive member will devastate the majority's agenda.

I'm appalled by the fact that a partisan House could get any traction. If a representative is going to matter less by an another, he's going to be more inactive. Simple.

I have seen many bad ideas in my atlasian lifes to be enacted, like the elimination of every duty of the VP, the elimination of the GM, the "recall" amendment, so hopefully I won't see an anoter bad idea be enacted. But in case people wish to do that, please people who are reading this thread, I will be on the right side of history.

Elections are too frequent and so there is always the chance of flipping the House. There are no districts and no gerrymandering, so the voters have complete, uninterrupted say hence why Duke rightfull called it, "The People's House".

Oh come on, you really believe that the random zombie voter will care about "muh some majority leader has been mean and has killed every legislation of the other side "
And my point still stands. You will have constantly 4 representatives who will have their voice mattering much less than the 5 others----> inactivity

[windjammer]

From a personal standpoint I'd be in favour of a partisan house (even though it's against Labor's interests atm) It would certainly make the House more entertaining, and make the elections more worthwhile 

It will encourage inactivity. Legislators aren't going to write a legislation if the legislation in question isn't going to be debated.

There are ways to do it, that gives a certain percentage of slots to the minority's legislation.

Also, doesn't the same apply as it is on the basis of whether or not something will pass. Plus Parties will weed out inactivity since a majority either way will likely be 1 seat, and thus an inactive member will devastate the majority's agenda.

I'm appalled by the fact that a partisan House could get any traction. If a representative is going to matter less by an another, he's going to be more inactive. Simple.

I have seen many bad ideas in my atlasian lifes to be enacted, like the elimination of every duty of the VP, the elimination of the GM, the "recall" amendment, so hopefully I won't see an anoter bad idea be enacted. But in case people wish to do that, please people who are reading this thread, I will be on the right side of history.

Elections are too frequent and so there is always the chance of flipping the House. There are no districts and no gerrymandering, so the voters have complete, uninterrupted say hence why Duke rightfull called it, "The People's House".

Oh come on, you really believe that the random zombie voter will care about "muh some majority leader has been mean and has killed every legislation of the other side "
And my point still stands. You will have constantly 4 representatives who will have their voice mattering much less than the 5 others----> inactivity

No, I expect them to campaign against the bills they are passing and to rally their base and swing voters in opposition to it.

You are on this game for a longer time than me, you should know that "swing voters" don't exist. People receive some messages from their party officials telling them how to vote on a legislation. A party always had a big structural advantage in this game. The House isn't going to flip every 2 months.

[windjammer]

I don't see why on God's green earth either side would want such a thing. The Right's hubris over its newfound power apparently is inducing amnesia.

This guy looks a bit younger than Yankee

It's like when JCL proposed changing the speakership election after Labor won the vote despite not being in the Majority. I'm sure the House will much like the Senate not be as straight forward as people think it is

If something is bad, you don't advocate for something that is half-bad of the first proposal. A partisan house is going to kill activity for 4 representatives.

----
Duke, with all respect I have to you, and trust you I respect you a lot, while indeed you didn't vote all the time for the same party, I wouldn't call you a swing voter. Depending on the elections, it was clear for who you were going to vote , so I wouldn't call you "swingy"

[windjammer]

Great job.

If elected VP, I'd probably leave running the Congress to a professional

So you would be impeached

[windjammer]

I don't see why on God's green earth either side would want such a thing. The Right's hubris over its newfound power apparently is inducing amnesia.

It was fine for three years when you had TNF on pedestal as if he was god's gift to the world. Your President's, your Senators, yourself were all marching in lockstep behind making him PPT and establishing his partisan administration of the Senate.

This has nothing to do with election wins or lossess.


I am following a three year-old blueprint from your Vice President!!!

It is funny you're saying that because if I recall correctly I did certify the PPT elections for you 3 years ago and I was forced to then certify the election to TNF because you were forced to withdraw the election for personal issues.
And anyway, yes, indeed TNF became PPT, but he didn't nuke the senate. Averroes indeed changed the rules, he simplified them. I disagreed with him about the elimination of the VP, but he didn't make the senate a partisan chamber. No senator had a higher priority.

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How many times the senate control changed it when you were in the senate? Not often. And that's going to be the same thing for the House. Parties have an actual advantage, that was Labor before, now it is the Federalists, then it may be the Labor or an another thing again in the future. But elections are almost never competitive.

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It's me who stood alone against them when they wanted to eliminate the VP.You were nowhere when it happened, not your fault but you cannot give you the credit for something you didn't.
And they didn't make the senate partisan like you plan to do with the House. This is a fact. The current senate isn"t partisan and follows mostly the rules that were adopted by them.

[windjammer]

And my point still stands. You will have constantly 4 representatives who will have their voice mattering much less than the 5 others----> inactivity

Not saying your point lacks merit, but would it be valid inverted? As in, if 4 Representatives being less powerful than others leads to less activity, would 5 Representatives being more powerful than others lead to more activity?

Now, with regards to my own opinion, I see both points, but as of now I'm leaning towards Yankee's purely due to the novelty factor. It's more fun if we shake things up here and there, and make there be some differences between each chamber. If it doesn't work, of course, we could change it fairly easily.

So basically you justify the fact that 4 representatives would become inactive because 5 others *could* become more active. You really think it is going to be a great situation where only 5 representatives run the show? The body is composed by 9 representatives, so all of them should be active, not only 5 of them.

[windjammer]

The one big thing we need to avoid however is the only allowing the majority to introduce bills- as we saw in the mock parliament (which had a partisan house) it kills off debate extremely quickly

That's why the house need not to be partisan!

[windjammer]

The one big thing we need to avoid however is the only allowing the majority to introduce bills- as we saw in the mock parliament (which had a partisan house) it kills off debate extremely quickly

I certainly agree with this. If we go the partisan route there definitely needs to be room for minority bills.

And my point still stands. You will have constantly 4 representatives who will have their voice mattering much less than the 5 others----> inactivity

Not saying your point lacks merit, but would it be valid inverted? As in, if 4 Representatives being less powerful than others leads to less activity, would 5 Representatives being more powerful than others lead to more activity?

So basically you justify the fact that 4 representatives would become inactive because 5 others *could* become more active. You really think it is going to be a great situation where only 5 representatives run the show? The body is composed by 9 representatives, so all of them should be active, not only 5 of them.

What? I'm not trying to justify anything, it was a valid question that you chose to not answer but instead react to nonexistent subtext.

I'm not really someone who states my opinion in the form of questions, I prefer to ask questions to help form my opinion.

My point is that it is not going to matter if 5 representatives become more active or not. You would have 4 representatives becoming much less active. So a partisan House that would kill activity for 4 of his members is just extremely bad. A game, in order to be functional, needs to encourage activity for all of his players.

And my point still stands. You will have constantly 4 representatives who will have their voice mattering much less than the 5 others----> inactivity

Not saying your point lacks merit, but would it be valid inverted? As in, if 4 Representatives being less powerful than others leads to less activity, would 5 Representatives being more powerful than others lead to more activity?

I don't think so. After all, there is a limit to how active one person can be - no matter how little social life you have, real life will eventually get in the way. I can also attest, having spent three terms in the Senate and three in the Mideast Assembly, that legislators do not become more active when their colleagues go MIA.

I'm okay with a partisan House leadership, but the minority party should not be sidelined in the process (fortunately, it doesn't seem like that's what you're proposing). As Blair pointed out, that arrangement pretty much killed South America. We should order the House on the model of the real life US House of Representatives: give the Speakership to the majority party, but allow everyone to propose bills and try to cobble together a coalition to pass their ideas.

If by partisan you just mean giving the majority party the speakership, I'm fine with that as long all representatives are treated equally. The US house of representatives is bad though, there are many votes that never can be open and they can do whatever they want with the rules (like killing a pro gay amendment).

[windjammer]

Setting aside the historical revisionism for a minute, I will deal with that in minute.


Truman and Blair are correct and like many things with mock parliament, they took things to the excess to express their dislike of the Atlasian way and ended up destroying themselves.

That is why I said before. You could give I don't five slots to the majority and two to the minority, or perhaps some other spread. Perhaps five and three. There are ways to make it work, so everyone is engaged and constantly pushing towards getting a majority, so that you balance involvement with differentiation in power so as to create that incentive to seek such constantly, producing more frequent competitive elections with more candidates.

Also, one thing to note is the theoretical power of indies and third parties. An indy or a third party can get to a seat pretty easily. Anyone who looks at the first election and sees that partisan 5 Feds, 4 Labor should note that CR scattered its votes and several Feds and Laborites won independent voters. A single candidate can unify that vote and get elected and he would almost certainly become the deciding vote on everything. Therefore rather being powerless, just the opposite, he now has a certain amount of leverage.

This is one major different vrom the old Senate, where partisan administration would have necessarily t-boned the third parties and indies because of the intersection of the election methods and the size of the chamber. One more reason why it was such a bad idea there.

There is a difference between theory and the results in the end.

I led the major party for a year last year with Griffin. And I can tell you this: swing voter isnt a thing. One party will have always a big structural advantage. Your partisan house will make things even worse because one party will always have his representatives second class citizens.

[windjammer]

Regarding your point about the PPT election, I was honestly believing that write ins weren't allowed, as ihe was unable he declared in time. That wasn't a scheme from my part or whatever.

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Oooooh, I didn't even know about that. I thought you were referring to the last big change that happened in the senate rules (after my resignation and before my election to the senate, my apology.

But yes, I never supported a partisan senate or whatever and I have always wanted to letthe VP having some duties in the senate. So for my part, I never changed my position on this issue.

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The same way Flo won the Southern emperor election. You will tell me the South was a swing region at this time?

[windjammer]

Things are now advancing in the Senate: https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=238972.0

Good!

[windjammer]

He won reelection by convincing fed zombies to vote for him because muh nice guy. Not a definition of swing voters for me.
And additionnally the fed candidate was a total cretin.