Proposal: Constitutional Change on Embassies

Uan-aa-Boa

Mount Seymour The problem is in 6.4 since the new shorter term means the next electoral cycle can end in April not October.

Regarding your proposal, what would prevent a single embassy enthusiast from sponsoring every single application? Their statements of support might all be of dismal quality and the Foreign Minister might have dismissed them from all their previous ambassador roles for being rubbish, but by posting something and declaring themselves willing they would be able to ensure the requirements were met every time.

Mount Seymour

Uan-aa-Boa MountSeymour The problem is in 6.4 since the new shorter term means the next electoral cycle can end in April not October.

I've edited 6.4 to change that:

6.4 To avoid embassy request spamming, if a region has been rejected twice within a 12-month period, then they must wait until the next election cycle is completed, i.e., the following 1 October or 1 April, to lodge a third request. Thereafter, they can apply once each ~~election cycle~~year.

Is that better?

Uan-aa-Boa Regarding your proposal, what would prevent a single embassy enthusiast from sponsoring every single application? Their statements of support might all be of dismal quality and the Foreign Minister might have dismissed them from all their previous ambassador roles for being rubbish, but by posting something and declaring themselves willing they would be able to ensure the requirements were met every time.

I'd be fine with requiring the sponsorship of one resident plus the stated support (without needing an explanation) of one or two other residents in order to make sure it's not just one person every time. I wouldn't imagine the situation you describe being a very common occurrence, though.

Uan-aa-Boa

Mount Seymour That looks great with respect to 6.4. Thanks.

I'm not saying the lone enthusiast scenario is likely, but we saw with extra WAs being sent to Christmas that some people are very much willing to work the letter rather than the spirit of the law. More importantly, the constitution should be as robust as possible. The proposal as it stands is satisfied by someone posting "I vouch for this embassy because I want to collect as many as possible and I'm willing to be ambassador" even if they then don't become ambassador or have any contact with the new embassy. There's no filter for quality, you're just asking for something /anything to be posted. And that's not particularly unlikely, because people do post random stuff for shits and giggles, especially if the Embassy Officer is inviting them to do so.

Mozworld

How about 3 people needing to be required. One to sponsor, one to second it, and one to third it.

How about at least one of them should be a WA member (or all 3)?

Just spitballing ideas.

New_Bluestocking_Homeland

Am I reading it incorrectly or is the last clause raising the requirements to both open and close and embassy (excepting embassies proposed for construction by the FK), from 2/3 to close to 3/4? Because I remember the sentiments to close the embassy with Gay (when they amended their structure) were pretty strong, but closure only scraped through on a 2/3 vote.

While a 3/4 vote would make sure fewer embassies are opened, they also might make it harder to close embassies, too (should one of our embassies significantly change their structure or character).

Perhaps a clear and separate clause for closing embassies might prevent this ever being a problem?

Turbeaux

New_Bluestocking_Homeland 3/4 seems a little overly stringent. I also like the @Mozworld concept regarding sponsorship but believe only one nation should be required to be WA.

Mount Seymour

New_Bluestocking_Homeland The closing clause (6.3) lists two types of votes: 2/3s if the region has >6 WA nations and 50% if it has <6. Three-fourths (clause 6.6) is only used for establishing embassies with <6 WA nations/<6 months existence. I'll admit the construction is a bit unwieldy though, and I'll see how I can restructure it so it doesn't have as many inline exceptions and references.

I'll also tentatively add the sponsorship with 1 WA nation idea, given that people seem to like it.

Uan-aa-Boa

Spend as long as you want on the draft, obviously. When you're ready to proceed to a vote let me or Turbeaux know.

Mount Seymour

Sorry this got completely left by the wayside-- I've now updated it with the seconding/thirding and clarified some other references. Any other comments?

Uan-aa-Boa

Pedantic small print stuff now...

It's ambiguous to say that a vote is decided by a 2/3 majority. If the vote is 50/50 then what you're proposing delivers a decision - no embassy - but there's no 2/3 majority. I think you need to say that a 2/3 majority is needed to open an embassy, or words to that effect. I'm not sure you can meaningfully have a tie in a vote that isn't decided by simple majority either, so the bit where the Forest Keeper decides probably only applies to closure votes.

The first sentence of 6.5 (embassy votes which fall under this category...) now looks redundant because with the deletion of 6.6 there isn't another category.

In 6.3 there's still a reference to election years left over from before the last amendment. Better to plump for electoral cycle or calendar year.

Hope this helps, it's meant constructively.

Mount Seymour

Uan-aa-Boa It's ambiguous to say that a vote is decided by a 2/3 majority. If the vote is 50/50 then what you're proposing delivers a decision - no embassy - but there's no 2/3 majority. I think you need to say that a 2/3 majority is needed to open an embassy, or words to that effect. I'm not sure you can meaningfully have a tie in a vote that isn't decided by simple majority either, so the bit where the Forest Keeper decides probably only applies to closure votes.

Edited, hope it’s clearer now.

Uan-aa-Boa The first sentence of 6.5 (embassy votes which fall under this category...) now looks redundant because with the deletion of 6.6 there isn't another category.

I think it’d be best to keep this, because this clause is being referenced elsewhere and only a specific subcategory (in this case the default one) of votes fall under it. The only difference is that now the other categories (3/4, simple) are listed all within other clauses instead of as a separate clause.

Uan-aa-Boa In 6.3 there's still a reference to election years left over from before the last amendment. Better to plump for electoral cycle or calendar year.

Changed to “calendar year”.

I think I’d like to submit this to you now to bring up as an official amendment, unless there are other changes to be made.

Turbeaux

Mount Seymour It looks good to me.

Uan-aa-Boa

Mount Seymour Yes, I think that looks clear now. Can you please publish the text of the proposal in a dispatch showing how it differs from the current constitution (no need to track the changes that happened in this drafting process)? I'll then pass it to Errinundera for approval. Assuming that's not an issue then as I said would I'll put it out to a consultation vote open to all residents. If it wins 2/3 support I'll formally propose it for WA nations to vote on as per the rules. Thanks for putting in the time and effort on drafting this.

VerdantHaven

Apologies for popping in after this has been published in dispatch, but there's a change that should be made grammatically, which won't change any meanings, in the very first sentence of the quoted section:

"less than 6 WA nations" should read "fewer than 6 WA nations"

Mount Seymour

VerdantHaven Fixed.

Uan-aa-Boa

I have TG'd Errinundera asking for approval (or otherwise) of the proposal as required in clause 8.2 of the constitution.

Turbeaux

Uan-aa-Boa Did Erinundera get back to you? I would like to see this go up for a vote!

Mount Seymour

Turbeaux Agreed! Was wondering if anything was going to happen on this.

Uan-aa-Boa

Turbeaux Sadly Erinundera completely ignored me from shortly before Christmas until the end of my term. Perhaps you'll have more luck taking this forward,

Turbeaux

Uan-aa-Boa I just TGed Erin the final draft of the text and a link to this thread. Hopefully, we can finally get this up for a vote!