COMPUTER89, Petitioner
V.
Department of Federal Elections
Held: The vote of TSA, acknowledged by all to be counted in error, should not be counted. The Amendment to Atlasian-British Common Market Agreement was not a deregistration authorization and could not have resulted in the deregistration of any voters. The Census Bureau did not err in maintaining the registrations of the voters affected, and no alterations to the election results are required on this count.
Justice Sestak delivered the opinion of the Court.
I.
Poster and former active politician TheShadowyAbyss (TSA) returned to the game after a months-long absence on April 15th. He attempted to vote in both the federal and Lincoln regional election on April 21; his vote in the federal election was counted but the Lincoln election administrator declared him invalid.
TSA was previously deregistered on August 28, 2022 for voting inactivity, and did not post another registration prior to April 15. As a result, he was not included in the most recent census prior to that date and April 15th can be taken as his date of initial registration. The Federal Electoral Act clearly stipulates that continuous registration for the 168 hours immediately prior to the commencement of the election is a requirement for a vote to be counted. The election in question commenced at midnight ahead of Friday, April 21st; the reqiuisite 168 hour period therefore began at midnight ahead of April 14th. TSA missed this time by nearly two days, having a continuous registration of only slightly over 122 hours when the election started. The law is clear; TSA’s length of registration is inadequate and his vote should not have been counted.
II.
Regarding the claims against the other two voters, a number of amici have called into question the results of a number of other elections on the same grounds; namely the February 2023 federal election and several regional elections. We dispel those arguments briefly. First, any claims to the February 2023 federal election are out of time; the Federal Electoral Act bars suits against election certification filed more than 168 hours after the certification is made; in this case this case was filed a full 65 days after that certification. As for regional elections, Article II, Section 4 of the Constitution requires all federally-valid voters to be counted in regional elections unless they resided in some other region or subregion within the last 56 days. This Court knows of no claims either of the voters in question ever resided in any region or subregion other than the ones they attempted to vote in; thus the only determiner in this case is their federal eligibility, the claim we now move to.
III.
Adam Griffin and Thumb21 are two fairly long-serving politicians of Atlasia who were both registered in the United Kingdom under the terms of the Atlasian-British Common Market Agreement (hereafter “CMA”). Adam Griffin registered to vote in Scotland on July 9, 2019, having previously resided in the state of Michigan, with his last posted registration in that state occurring on September 3, 2018. Thumb21 had multiple stints registered in the United Kingdom. The most recent commenced, at the very latest, with his egistration in Wales on April 17, 2022. His previous posted registration was in the state of North Carolina on May 24, 2021. This registration was never reflected in the census; we believe this to be an unintentional omission.
In February, Congress made an alteration to the CMA removing most of the provisions allowing Atlasians to maintain their voter registration in the United Kingdom. On April 19 and 20, both Adam Griffin and Thumb21 registered in their previous states of registration of Michigan and North Carolina. Petitioner contends that the amendment to the CMA had the effect of making both players invalid voters, and thus these registrations should be seen as initial registrations, with neither having continuous registration for the requisite 168 hours prior to the election. We disagree.
1. First, we look to our prior precedents. Notably, in 1184AZ v. Peebs, this Court set a very high bar for the statutory authorization required to alter a registration. In that case, we stated:
Whilst the fourth Constitution grants congress, and thus by extension the RG, the power to 'to regulate voter registration and federal elections', the Court found that this power did not extent to allowing the RG to change the political affiliation of dozens of Labor Party Members without their input, or consent. To allow a government officer such power, without explicit legislative approval would simply allow for too great a scope for abuse in the future.
The Fifth Constitution’s provisions are no different from the Fourth’s in this regard, and thus this precedent can be applied. We concluded in that case that
the existing body of statute has no provision for the RG to change the political affiliation of voters, and thus the court finds that RG Peebs acted unlawfully.
Thus, for Petitioner’s claim to succeed, the amendment to the CMA must be a valid authorization for deregistration. In fact, Petitioner contends that the CMA in fact acted as mandate for the Registrar General’s office to deregister the two players in question.
Other precedents (see Tack50 v. Atlasia) also suggest that additional scrutiny may be required as to laws authorizing deregistration specifically, due to the potential for conflict with Article I, Section 5 of the constitution.
2. Thus, we now examine the amendment to the CMA. Notably, the amendment is entirely a strikethrough-repeal of a section of the treaty; no attempt is made to specify to the Registrar General or any other officer of government as to how to handle registrations of the citizens in question. The repealed section reads as follows:
ARTICLE V (Limited Jurisdictional Authority)
Section 1. Atlasian citizens being permanent residents of the United Kingdom or Gibraltar shall be subject to Limited Jurisdictional Authority granted by this treaty to the government of Atlasia and those of the several Regions.
i. Atlasian citizens being permanent residents of Northern Ireland and Gibraltar shall be considered citizens of Fremont for Limited Jurisdictional and electoral purposes.
ii. Atlasian citizens being permanent residents of Scotland shall be considered citizens of the North for Limited Jurisdictional and electoral purposes.
iii. Atlasian citizens being permanent residents of England and Wales shall be considered citizens of the South for Limited Jurisdictional and electoral purposes.
Section 2. Atlasian citizens living within the United Kingdom and British citizens living within Republic of Atlasia shall be bound by the respective laws governing their residence and place of business, and no provision of this treaty shall be construed as weakening the national sovereignty of the United Kingdom or Atlasia, or otherwise encroaching upon the autonomy of the government of Atlasia or the United Kingdom.
The removal of Section 1 clearly indicates that the prior arrangement—that is, the existence of an option to establish one’s voter registration in the UK—shall no longer be valid going forward. Thus, the question now is how the Registrar General is to interpret this change when it comes to those already established with such registrations. It would certainly be apt to describe the resulting registrations as improper in some regard. However, this does not give the Registrar General the power to unilaterally deregister such players. In 1184AZ this Court made it clear - The RG requires
explicit legislative approval to make alterations to registrations. There is no explicit authorization here whatsoever, only a change in status as to what registrations are deemed legal. In such a situation, the RG can only interpret the law to authorize -
at most - the minimal reasonable alterations required to bring the registrations in question into compliance. Deregistration falls on the complete opposite end of the spectrum, and should exist as a last resort. Consider the hypothetical in which Congress decided an additional component (aside from username, party, and locality) was required for a registration, and specified nothing else. It would be ridiculous to declare every player registered without this additional component could simply be deregistered; the only logical interpretation would be for the law to instead allow the Registrar General to come up with some sort of placeholder in this new category for existing voters. The same holds here; the most this law can be said to authorize is for the Registrar General to find a minimally invasive alteration to keep the questioned registrations in form.
3. There are several additional points indicating that the law was not a deregistration authorization. First, Section 1 of the treaty clearly states that it is altering the status in terms of jurisdictional authority of “Atlasian citizens being permanent residents of the United Kingdom”. It did not create a permission that “Atlasian citizens may reside in the United Kingdom” or confer Atlasian citizenship on anyone. Thus, it can be presumed both before the treaty (and therefore after its repeal) that Atlasian citizens were still allowed to reside in the UK, and furthermore that the treaty’s repeal did not revoke the citizenship of any individuals. Indeed, this would be in line with how Atlasia (and most countries) treat expatriates; they are still citizens of the country by default. However, this court has also previously ruled that for forum posters, Atlasian citizenship is coterminous with registration; therefore the treaty repeal cannot have revoked registration status either.
Petitioner’s claim that neither voter was established under the jurisdiction of Atlasia does not hold muster either. Both players have operated entirely as if they were under such jurisdiction without protest; in particular, both have voted in elections prior to this one and both have held office; no objection has been made in either of these cases. In addition, by game canon the Cabinet (of which Thumb21, as Registrar General, is a part of) meets physically in Nyman, while the Governor of Lincoln (A title which, until recently, was held by Adam Griffin) is given an official residence within that region, further cementing that they fell under the jurisdiction of Atlasia in some regards. The fact that both returned their registration to their previous states of Michigan and North Carolina provides at least some indication of domicile within those states as well.
4. Finally, with regards to the Registrar General’s decision to maintain the registrations of these voters as-is, there is at least one reason to suggest it may be a valid decision. Specifically, we concern ourselves with an amendment made to the CMA in Section 4 of the Federal Game Procedure Amendments Act of 2021:
1. The following is added as an addendum to the Atlasia-UK Common Market Agreement:
For the purposes of subregional allocation, citizens of Atlasia residing in England and Wales shall be considered to reside within the Upper South subregion, citizens of Atlasia residing in Scotland shall be considered to reside within the Great Lakes subregion, and citizens of Atlasia residing in Nortern Ireland and Gibraltar shall be considered to reside within the Mountain West subregion.
This addendum was omitted entirely from the text when the CMA was amended in February. It was not listed either as struck-through or as part of the remaining text. It is the position of this Court that when amendments are presented in this standard way (with highlighted additions and struck-through removals), any omissions from the text should be interpreted as unchanged rather than as repealed. The alternative would force a messy set of questions (What happens if an amendment only quotes one section in the bill out of two total? What if it quotes three sections out of four?), but, more importantly, it would force legislators to have to comb through all past statute to check if there was some other section or amendment they might be inadvertently voting to repeal. Thus, we hold that amendments are to be read as making no changes to the underlying statute other than those clearly spelled out within the body of the amendment.
In this case, therefore, this addendum remains a valid portion of the treaty. The Court does not hold that this provision alone allows registration into the UK to continue; that would be a rather silly outcome given the repeal of the sections of the treaty actually defining this status. Instead, however, we believe that this section does give the RG a sufficient basis for his decision to grandfather in the existing registrations in the UK, while allowing their subregional (and thus regional) affiliations to remain unchanged. Once the citizens in question alter their registration to within Atlasia proper once again (as the two in question already have) the RG can make those alterations to the census list with continuous registration still having been maintained.
It is ordered that the certification of the election dated the 25th of April is VOIDED in its entirety. Respondent is ordered to publish a new certification identical to the voided certification in all respects other than the alteration specified herein.
