House Resolution: Amendment to Article 3, Section 3 of the Constitution (Debating)
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  House Resolution: Amendment to Article 3, Section 3 of the Constitution (Debating)
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Author Topic: House Resolution: Amendment to Article 3, Section 3 of the Constitution (Debating)  (Read 790 times)
Elcaspar
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« on: July 20, 2020, 08:13:58 PM »
« edited: July 21, 2020, 10:07:16 AM by Speaker Elcaspar »

Quote
The House of Representatives shall consist of nine members chosen at-large by the eligible voters of the Republic according to a method of proportional representation prescribed by the Federal Legislature. The # of members shall be 7 if there are 9 or fewer on ballot candidates running, 9 if there are 10-13 on ballot candidates running, and 11 if there are 14 or more on ballot candidates. Representatives shall serve a term of two months, and shall be elected in the months of February, April, June, August, October, and December.

Sponsor: Citizen Dwarven Dragon
House Designation: HB 25-05

72 Hours to Debate
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tmthforu94
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« Reply #1 on: July 21, 2020, 12:08:13 AM »

What is the justification behind these numbers?
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Attorney General, LGC Speaker, and Former PPT Dwarven Dragon
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« Reply #2 on: July 21, 2020, 01:16:00 AM »

I thank the Speaker for agreeing to bring this important bill to the floor. This will allow the house to scale in size according to the current interest in the game. Several times in the past, we have had 9 candidate for 9 seat elections. These are rather pointless elections because there is effectively little choice for the populace. It also demonstrates a current lack of interest in the House position. Thus in those situations, the size of the house should shrink to accommodate the fact that interest is less.

Conversely, when the interest in the game is especially high, the size of the house should increase to accommodate that interest. This will encourage a broader range of voices to contest the house election. Currently, because of the fixed size of the house, there is disinterest among third party ideologies among contesting the House as the seats are easily consumed by the major parties. Now, I am not suggesting we give representation to every washed up troll ideology that comes up, but should the numbers of such a third way ideology be large, the house should expand with the idea of giving that group representation. Further, even in the absence of the rise of such an ideology, I would note that all three regions currently up-size their legislatures in times of high interest to encourage such high interest, and thus the federal government should do the same during times of high interest.

The number at which the house increases is set at 14 because I think that would be a good representation of an exceptionally large field marking definite increased interest in the game. It is large enough that it will not happen routinely, but not so large as to be impossible. A probable combination would be 6 Labor/Pax, 5 Fed Candidates, and 3 DA/Green/etc.

The reduction threshold is set at 9 because that is when a 9 seat election becomes effectively uncontested, barring some late write in, which is not an argument for the current system as such efforts have always been party machine plans rather than a representation of something truly grassroots.

With respect to the 7-9-11 house size spectrum, I modeled this on Lincoln incrementing by the same amount (its spectrum is 3-5-7), but I'm not tied to this by any means and if someone wants it to be 8-10-12 or 7-10-11 or something that's completely fine. The main goal of this bill is for the house to scale along with current interest in the game just as regional legislatures do.


I again thank the Speaker for agreeing to bring this to the floor, and urge an Aye vote.
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Mike Thick
tedbessell
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« Reply #3 on: July 21, 2020, 11:11:50 PM »

Personally, I don’t have a problem with the current system. I think that right now third parties are represented roughly in proportion to their appeal — for example, DA is likely to have the numbers to elect a Congressman in August. I also have concerns about a sort of security dilemma: one party running a bunch of crummy candidates to inflate the size of the House, and the other party doing the same, resulting in a House with lots of crummy legislators. However, I’ll keep an open mind on the amendment as we debate.

I would be particularly interested in hearing the opinions of other party leaders who handle House recruiting re: how they think this would affect gameplay.
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Pericles
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« Reply #4 on: July 22, 2020, 06:28:13 AM »

I think 9 members works fine. We should definitely keep the House membership fixed, the instability and vulnerability of volatile seat numbers would be unhelpful. As no serious third party candidate has run since August last year (though if you count Lumine and cinyc as third parties then 2 of them won in one election), there is not actually any evidence to say the current system is unfair. There is not a clear need for this change, so don't take the risk.

I am also suspicious that this is yet another effort to change the rules to artificially boost non Labor parties, and actually those parties should have to actually do the hard work themselves and adapt.
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SevenEleven
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« Reply #5 on: July 22, 2020, 10:10:03 AM »

I can't support this. The number of candidates should have nothing to do with the size of the chamber.
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Attorney General, LGC Speaker, and Former PPT Dwarven Dragon
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« Reply #6 on: July 22, 2020, 04:07:59 PM »



I would note that unlike Tack's non partisan elections act, this makes no effort to prevent Labor on the Labor banner from obtaining whatever proportional number of seats they earn. If Labor gets 67% of the vote in a 14 candidate race they would get 7 or 8 of the 11 seats just as they should under any good proportional system. The whole, well currently it fits game interest, so why change, I would note that the future cannot be known, and as regional legislatures grow and shrink with interest, as recently upheld in a Lincoln referendum, we should do the same in the House. I would also note that voters are aware of the current system, and may stay out of the race knowing that there will never be room in the House for anyone aside from the slates approved by the major parties plus one DA member previously approved by a major party. If there was a possibility that high interest could expand the size of the house, more candidates may be inclined to run.
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Mike Thick
tedbessell
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« Reply #7 on: August 27, 2020, 12:49:24 PM »

Anything more to say on this, guys? It's been a month.
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Esteemed Jimmy
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« Reply #8 on: August 27, 2020, 02:04:03 PM »

Popping in from the Senate: this is an interesting idea for the House to vary in size based on the number of candidates running.
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Deep Dixieland Senator, Muad'dib (OSR MSR)
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« Reply #9 on: August 27, 2020, 05:35:37 PM »

The Southern Chamber fluctuates based on the number of candidates. If more people are interested in running then I think it not unreasonable to have a greater number of house seats. This is an elections game after all.
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SevenEleven
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« Reply #10 on: August 27, 2020, 05:42:34 PM »

Popping in from the Senate: this is an interesting idea for the House to vary in size based on the number of candidates running.

Doesn't that open the door for a party flooding the slate with uninterested candidates in hopes of gaining seats? I don't really see any tangible benefits but I'm happy to hear some of there are.
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Continential
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« Reply #11 on: August 27, 2020, 06:00:05 PM »

This is a elections game, and if there are a lot of people interested in running, there should be more congressmen and if there are not a lot of interest in people running, then there should be less congressmen.
----
My take on this.
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SevenEleven
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« Reply #12 on: September 06, 2020, 05:11:43 PM »

A final vote is now open. 72 hours.

Quote
The House of Representatives shall consist of nine members chosen at-large by the eligible voters of the Republic according to a method of proportional representation prescribed by the Federal Legislature. The # of members shall be 7 if there are 9 or fewer on ballot candidates running, 9 if there are 10-13 on ballot candidates running, and 11 if there are 14 or more on ballot candidates. Representatives shall serve a term of two months, and shall be elected in the months of February, April, June, August, October, and December.

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SevenEleven
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« Reply #13 on: September 06, 2020, 05:12:03 PM »

Nay.
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Tamika Jackson
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« Reply #14 on: September 06, 2020, 06:39:07 PM »

Nay
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Left Wing
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« Reply #15 on: September 06, 2020, 06:55:47 PM »

Nay
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Rep Jessica
Jessica
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« Reply #16 on: September 06, 2020, 07:36:58 PM »

nay

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Spark
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« Reply #17 on: September 06, 2020, 09:02:01 PM »

No
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SevenEleven
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« Reply #18 on: September 06, 2020, 09:10:16 PM »

A majority of Representatives have voted against this. 24 hours to change votes.
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Joseph Cao
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« Reply #19 on: September 06, 2020, 10:15:27 PM »

Nay.
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LAKISYLVANIA
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« Reply #20 on: September 07, 2020, 12:29:53 PM »

Nay
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Joseph Cao
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« Reply #21 on: September 08, 2020, 11:09:08 PM »

(Belatedly) closing the vote.

By a vote of 0-7-0-2, this resolution fails.
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