SENATE RESOLUTION: Federal Initiative System Amendment (Passed)

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

AN AMENDMENT
to the Constitution of the Republic of Atlasia

Be it enacted by the Senate and the House of Representatives, in Congress assembled:

Section 1 (Title)
i. The title of this Amendment shall be, the “Federal Initiative System Amendment.” It may be cited by its ordinal number in order of ratification.

Section 2 (Federal Initiative System Amendment)
i. Article II, Section 1 of the Constitution of the Republic of Atlasia shall be amended as follows:

1. All legislative powers herein granted shall be derived from the people, who ordinarily vest this power vested in the Congress of the Republic of Atlasia, which shall consist of a Senate and a House of Representatives.
2. The Vice President shall be the President of the Congress, but shall have no vote in the House of Representatives, nor in the Senate save when they be equally divided.

ii. Article II, Section 5 shall be amended as follows:

1. Legislation may ordinarily originate in either house, and both houses shall reserve the right to propose and concur with amendments; but all bills for raising revenue shall originate in the House of Representatives.

2. Whenever either house shall vote to pass a bill, order, or resolution that shall have originated in the other, having previously made amendment to the same, the President of the Congress shall immediately call the amended bill to a vote in the house in which it originated. If the original house should then vote to pass the amended bill, it shall proceed to the President; otherwise, the President of the Congress shall instruct the other house either to pass the bill as it stood prior to its amendment by that house, or else reject it entirely.

3. Every bill, order, or resolution which shall have passed the Senate and the House of Representatives shall, before it becomes law, be submitted to the judgment of the President. If they approve of it they should sign it; but if they disapproves they should return the bill to the house in which it originated with their objections. If, after considering the objections of the President, both houses should by a 2/3 vote agree to pass the same bill, it shall become law regardless of the President's objections.If any bill, order, or resolution shall not be returned by the President within ten days after it has been presented to him, the bill shall become law.

4. If so specified in the text of the bill, order or resolution in question, the bill may be required to pass a national referendum before its enactment. In that case, the person responsible for the management of federal elections shall be duly notified and organize a national referendum at a date specified by the Congress in the text of the bill, order or resolution; but this referendum may not start until at least 14 days have passed since the bill has received support from the President, except if this date coincides with a federal election. If no date for the referendum is specified in the text of the bill, order or resolution; it shall be assumed that the referendum is to take place alongside the next federal election.

5. The People of the Republic of Atlasia shall reserve themselves the power to directly introduce legislation. Any citizen of the Republic of Atlasia shall have the right to post a bill in the Atlas Fantasy Elections board, clearly specifying that the post in question is a bill to be submitted as a National Legislative Initiative. If this Legislative Initiative gets signatures representing 10% of the voters at the last federal election and accounting for 5% of the last Federal Census within 10 days from its introduction; the Legislative Initiative shall be considered to be accepted. Otherwise it shall be considered to be rejected, and no Legislative Initiative on the same subject may be introduced for a period of 30 days.

6. Legislative Initiatives considered to be accepted shall be duly taken note of by the person responsible for Federal Elections. The person responsible for Federal Elections shall take a public note of this in their office thread, and open a vote on the initiative in question alongside the next federal election.

7. Any Initiatives introduced by the people of the Republic of Atlasia shall not exceed the ordinary powers of the Congress.

8. Initiatives introduced by the people of the Republic of Atlasia may not deal with the following subjects:
a) Constitutional Amendments of any kind
b) The Federal Budget
c) The raising and lowering of taxes; or any other bills for the purposes of appropiating money for the federal government

9. Any national referendums shall be considered to have passed if a simple majority of voters votes in favour of the bill, order, resolution or initiative in question.

10. Any national referendums shall be operated under the same rules as federal elections for the Presidency of the Republic of Atlasia

Section 3: Explanation
1. This amendment allows the people of the Republic of Atlasia to directly introduce legislation and submit it to a national referendum. This amendment also allows the Congress of the Republic of Atlasia to divert pieces of legislation to a national referendum if it finds it is in the national interest.

Sponsor: Tack50
Senate Designation: SR25:10

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Initial Debate Period - Sponsor Advocacy!

[Former President tack50]

Ok, so basically this is a constitutional amendment aimed at creating an Initiatives and Referendums system not too unlike that of California in real life. While I doubt this will get much use, it will still give an option and something to do to private citizens

Section 4 defines how "referred referendums" should work. Basicallly Congress explicitly gets the power to call for referendums on certain bills if it so chooses in the body of the bill. Referendums can take place at any weekend but if no date is specified, they will be done alongside the next federal election (in other words, the presidential one, the mid terms or the extremely rare special elections for House)

Section 5 defines how citizen initiatives should work, as well as how many signatures are required (for now I set it at 10% of the voters in the last federal election and 5% of the census). Unlike with referred referendums, these must happen alongside federal elections no matter what, with Peebs (or her eventual replacement as SoFE) taking note of them in their office.

Sections 7 and 8 establish some limitations on the Initiatives system to ensure they are not abused. Basically, initiatives cannot change taxes, cannot deal with the federal budget and they also cannot be used to introduce constitutional amendments

Sections 9 and 10 establish that a simple majority of votes is needed for the referendum to pass and that they should work under the same rules as elections for the presidency of Atlasia

[Pericles]

Odd for someone who complains about machine politics to want to outsource Congress' policy making functions to gotv machines.

[Former President tack50]

Odd for someone who complains about machine politics to want to outsource Congress' policy making functions to gotv machines.

I don't get the accusation, this is just an additional way for legislation to get passed? I still expect the vast majority of bills to be passed by the regular legislative process.

[Former President tack50]

I will also note that as of now, the South has a (very limited) direct democracy procedure. Lincoln and Fremont also have something close enough in recalls.

However, I will further note that initiative processes were a very common feature of pre-reset constitutions at one point. Indeed, the last constitution of the Mideast still retains such a feature:

Section 11
Initiatives may be proposed for public referendum with the support of at least 25% of the number of registered voters in the Mideast.

The old Southern Region also had an initiatives process:

The Citizens of the Imperial Dominion of the South shall have the right to petition their government to gain access to the ballot for any issue. Such a petition shall have at least three signatures of registered Imperial voters in order to be added to the ballot at the next Initiative election. Initiative elections should be held on the third weekend of each month beginning within 12 hours after midnight Central time on Friday morning and ending at 11:59pm Central time on the following Sunday night. Initiatives that receive a tie vote shall be voted upon again in the next Initiative election without the need to be reproposed. Every initiative shall relate to but one subject, and that shall be expressed in the title. However, the Emperor, or 35% of the Citizens of the Imperial Dominion of the South in a petition may declare a certain initiative to be of emergency character. When that happens, said initiative shall be put to vote in the 24 hours after emergency status has been atributed to it. The voting shall last the regular voting period.

So at least regional initiative processes are there.

I will also say that this comes from seeing a bit more activity, and more importantly, more new faces in the AFE board. I do not know how long it will last. But I think giving people who are out of office an avenue to contribute is a good thing that can also keep them engaged in some way.

[tmthforu94]

There is currently the option for any citizen to introduce a bill through the Public Legislation Submissions thread - if it is a reasonable idea, it shouldn't be too difficult to get one member of Congress to sponsor. However, not sure how often folks pay attention to the thread - Fairbol introduced a bill in there nearly 10 days ago in there and it has received no recognition to my knowledge.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Most all the Regions had initiative process prior to 2010 and had no elected legislatures. Mideast was the only region that had a legislature for a while then the NE followed. IDS formed one in early 2010.

[thumb21]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think I've seen a single referendum innitiative attempted in the South according to those rules in the 2.5 years I've been here. Part of that might just be that the threshold is so high or because many people probably don't know its there. In any case, referenda won't be happening too often so it isn't a radical change and is unlikely to significantly undermine Congress' control over the legislative process.

[Esteemed Jimmy]

This is an interesting idea.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think I've seen a single referendum innitiative attempted in the South according to those rules in the 2.5 years I've been here. Part of that might just be that the threshold is so high or because many people probably don't know its there. In any case, referenda won't be happening too often so it isn't a radical change and is unlikely to significantly undermine Congress' control over the legislative process.

There is a term for this that I cannot recall basically when people collectively forget something exist. Not quite collective memory but close. I realized this with newspapers in that when you go a period of time without them new people won't know they are a thing.

This dynamic is even worse now thanks to the discord effect and decline of the afe board.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Back a few months ago, I dug up the initiatives from the 2009 era in the South. The word meme wasn't big then but it applies to several of them.

[Former President tack50]

I wonder if this reform would work better at the regional level first, by expanding the current initiatives systems and building upon them instead of starting federally.

Lower stakes if something goes wrong and what not

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

I wonder if this reform would work better at the regional level first, by expanding the current initiatives systems and building upon them instead of starting federally.

Lower stakes if something goes wrong and what not

Regardless of level, a lot of these things need serious promotion and awareness raised to make sure that people take notice of them.

[Former President tack50]

I wonder if this reform would work better at the regional level first, by expanding the current initiatives systems and building upon them instead of starting federally.

Lower stakes if something goes wrong and what not

Regardless of level, a lot of these things need serious promotion and awareness raised to make sure that people take notice of them.

In fairness other than a public post in the forum if this is ratified (and possibly some sort of pinned post or reference to it in the guide for new players) I cannot think of anything else that could be done?

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

I wonder if this reform would work better at the regional level first, by expanding the current initiatives systems and building upon them instead of starting federally.

Lower stakes if something goes wrong and what not

Regardless of level, a lot of these things need serious promotion and awareness raised to make sure that people take notice of them.

In fairness other than a public post in the forum if this is ratified (and possibly some sort of pinned post or reference to it in the guide for new players) I cannot think of anything else that could be done?

We have to figure out ways to encourage engagement and to that end it is perhaps time to consider outside of the box approaches to this same end. Naturally though there are cons to every option. PM/DMing people brings annoyance risk and also the heavy lifting to actually do that arduous task.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Leaving the issue of player engagement, what is the next item of business on this resolution?

[Former President tack50]

Leaving the issue of player engagement, what is the next item of business on this resolution?

Well, since this is a constitutional amendment, I personally like to have comments from Windjammer and/or Truman as Chief Justice and AG respectively; just to know if this would mess up our constitution badly or if they have any suggestions.

Unless it is super simple stuff, we should certainly proceed with caution when amending the constitution

All other Senators and citizens are of course invited to bring up any issues they may have.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Leaving the issue of player engagement, what is the next item of business on this resolution?

Well, since this is a constitutional amendment, I personally like to have comments from Windjammer and/or Truman as Chief Justice and AG respectively; just to know if this would mess up our constitution badly or if they have any suggestions.

Unless it is super simple stuff, we should certainly proceed with caution when amending the constitution

All other Senators and citizens are of course invited to bring up any issues they may have.

Has such a request for input been sent to those people yet?

[Former President tack50]

Leaving the issue of player engagement, what is the next item of business on this resolution?

Well, since this is a constitutional amendment, I personally like to have comments from Windjammer and/or Truman as Chief Justice and AG respectively; just to know if this would mess up our constitution badly or if they have any suggestions.

Unless it is super simple stuff, we should certainly proceed with caution when amending the constitution

All other Senators and citizens are of course invited to bring up any issues they may have.

Has such a request for input been sent to those people yet?

No. I'll do it now.

I really should get in the habit of actually PMing people instead of just mentioning it

[Unconditional Surrender Truman]

NO REFERENDUMS!

(Seriously, what is the point of an elected Congress if you are going to institute direct democracy? Pick a system and stick with it.)

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Give em Hell Harry giving a Hell No!

[YE]

Motion to table.

[Former President tack50]

NO REFERENDUMS!

(Seriously, what is the point of an elected Congress if you are going to institute direct democracy? Pick a system and stick with it.)

I mean, it's not like we are changing Congress to a universal legislature? (which would indeed be a very bad thing)

I don't think referendums are bad per se, though it is hard to poll the Atlasian population directly.`

I assume this critique would also apply to any similar regional systems? (if this fails, I plan to reintroduce it regionally in Lincoln, where the stakes are lower)

[Former President tack50]

Introducing the following amendment, to remove some limitations that I put in place and I feel are unnecessary. The text removed is in red

AN AMENDMENT
to the Constitution of the Republic of Atlasia

Be it enacted by the Senate and the House of Representatives, in Congress assembled:

Section 1 (Title)
i. The title of this Amendment shall be, the “Federal Initiative System Amendment.” It may be cited by its ordinal number in order of ratification.

Section 2 (Federal Initiative System Amendment)
i. Article II, Section 1 of the Constitution of the Republic of Atlasia shall be amended as follows:

1. All legislative powers herein granted shall be derived from the people, who ordinarily vest this power vested in the Congress of the Republic of Atlasia, which shall consist of a Senate and a House of Representatives.
2. The Vice President shall be the President of the Congress, but shall have no vote in the House of Representatives, nor in the Senate save when they be equally divided.

ii. Article II, Section 5 of the Constitution of the Republic of Atlasia shall be amended as follows:

1. Legislation may ordinarily originate in either house, and both houses shall reserve the right to propose and concur with amendments; but all bills for raising revenue shall originate in the House of Representatives.

2. Whenever either house shall vote to pass a bill, order, or resolution that shall have originated in the other, having previously made amendment to the same, the President of the Congress shall immediately call the amended bill to a vote in the house in which it originated. If the original house should then vote to pass the amended bill, it shall proceed to the President; otherwise, the President of the Congress shall instruct the other house either to pass the bill as it stood prior to its amendment by that house, or else reject it entirely.

3. Every bill, order, or resolution which shall have passed the Senate and the House of Representatives shall, before it becomes law, be submitted to the judgment of the President. If they approve of it they should sign it; but if they disapproves they should return the bill to the house in which it originated with their objections. If, after considering the objections of the President, both houses should by a 2/3 vote agree to pass the same bill, it shall become law regardless of the President's objections.If any bill, order, or resolution shall not be returned by the President within ten days after it has been presented to him, the bill shall become law.

4. If so specified in the text of the bill, order or resolution in question, the bill may be required to pass a national referendum before its enactment. In that case, the person responsible for the management of federal elections shall be duly notified and organize a national referendum at a date specified by the Congress in the text of the bill, order or resolution; or during the next federal election, whichever happens sooner. but this referendum may not start until at least 14 days have passed since the bill has received support from the President, except if this date coincides with a federal election. If no date for the referendum is specified in the text of the bill, order or resolution; it shall be assumed that the referendum is to take place alongside the next federal election.

5. The People of the Republic of Atlasia shall reserve themselves the power to directly introduce legislation. Any citizen of the Republic of Atlasia shall have the right to post a bill in the Atlas Fantasy Elections board, clearly specifying that the post in question is a bill to be submitted as a National Legislative Initiative. If this Legislative Initiative gets signatures representing 10% of the voters at the last federal election and accounting for 5% of the last Federal Census within 10 days from its introduction; the Legislative Initiative shall be considered to be accepted. Otherwise it shall be considered to be rejected, and no Legislative Initiative on the same subject may be introduced for a period of 30 days.

6. Legislative Initiatives considered to be accepted shall be duly taken note of by the person responsible for Federal Elections. The person responsible for Federal Elections shall take a public note of this in their office thread, and open a vote on the initiative in question alongside the next federal election.

7. Any Initiatives introduced by the people of the Republic of Atlasia shall not exceed the ordinary powers of the Congress.

8. Initiatives introduced by the people of the Republic of Atlasia may not deal with the following subjects:
a) Constitutional Amendments of any kind
b) The Federal Budget
c) The raising and lowering of taxes; or any other bills for the purposes of appropiating money for the federal government

9. Any national referendums shall be considered to have passed if a simple majority of voters votes in favour of the bill, order, resolution or initiative in question.

10. Any national referendums shall be operated under the same rules as federal elections for the Presidency of the Republic of Atlasia

Section 3: Explanation
1. This amendment allows the people of the Republic of Atlasia to directly introduce legislation and submit it to a national referendum. This amendment also allows the Congress of the Republic of Atlasia to divert pieces of legislation to a national referendum if it finds it is in the national interest.