Upper Chantler v. The Government of Christadelphia [OOC]

[Anfra]

This begins the civil tribunal case of Upper Chantler v. The Government of Christadelphia, beginning October 18, 2016, at 18:05 PDT. It shall consist of the following members:

Anfra as head and judge of the tribunal,
Upper Chantler as the plaintiff,
and Ecclestia as the defendant, representing the Government of Christadelphia.

The request for a tribunal was lodged to the RMB of Christadelphia on October 3rd, 2016 by Upper Chantler, regarding the passage of a new Regional Charter.

The tribunal will begin with Upper Chantler making a claim.

For those viewing that are not part of this tribunal, please do not post and clog up the thread.

[Upper Chantler]

I am arguing that the New Charter is invalid and that the Old Charter should remain in force.

The old Charter, which is here: https://www.nationstates.net/page=dispatch/id=691223, said, in Article 7:

Article 7 – Amending the Charter
7.1 Any nation may formally propose an amendment to the Charter.
7.2 The proposed amendment shall be voted upon by the AB’s. Unless the vote is greater than or equal to 75% of the total vote of the AB’s (3/4 or 4/5), in which the proposed amendment shall proceed straight to a regional vote, the Founder may veto or approve the amendment for a regional vote. In order for the proposed amendment to come into force, the proposed amendment must receive 50%+1 votes of all regional nations in the regional vote and at least 50%+1 of all WA nations in the region.

I want to highlight the word Amend.

The Oxford defines 'amend' as 'Make minor changes in order to make it fairer or more accurate, or to reflect changing circumstances.'

This implies that Article 7 was made to make minor changes only and not to change the Charter entirely. As such, the change was not legal and should be reversed so that we are under the old Charter.

[Ecclestia]

I would like to open by saying that it is an honour and privilege to be representing the ABs in this case.

Since its inception, the region has had a strong 'constitutional' underpinning which has been represented through the Charter. It is integral that we recognise and deeply respect this tradition as it has provided much stability to the Region since its inception over a year ago.

I do not refute Upper Chantler's definition of the word 'amend'. This is very much a definition which is used in 'ordinary' conversational language.

What I want us to focus heavily on is the difference between an 'ordinary' meaning and a 'legal' meaning. An ordinary meaning of a word is that which is used by the person on the street. I would agree that if we were interpreting a telegram, one may assume that the word 'amend' here refers to the ordinary meaning or a 'minor change.'

As this is the Charter, we need to look at the context of the Charter to see whether or not we should employ the 'ordinary' meaning or whether there is a different legal meaning of the word amend.

I suggest that Article 7.1 of the Old Charter: '7.1 Any nation may formally propose an amendment to the Charter.' uses the word amend with a special legal meaning allowing the replacement of the Charter for the following reasons:

-The provisions of 7.1 are very broad. Any nation, that is any nation at all is enabled to propose an amendment in this situation. There is no indication of what a proposal may entail. This suggests that a proposal may be as small or large as that nation desires. There have been numerous examples of this in our Region. Our Regional Changelog shows that on December 16 2015, Article 5.6 was changed only slightly and was restricted to this 1 clause. However on 24 March 2016, the entire Article 6 was replaced - this included 3 clauses and was a very large change. If we adopt Upper Chantler's definition, we have a problem of needing to further define what a 'minor change' is. How much of 1 clause are we allowed to replace, are we allowed to replace a whole section? Are we only allowed to change a few words. If this tribunal decides to define amendment, as relevant to 7.1, as a 'minor change' it would not only unnecessarily increase the complexity of Changing the Charter but would, I believe provide a bizarre interpretation of this passage when there is no good need to.

-Another reasons to suggest that this passage was intended to be broad is the large number of safeguards and entrenched provisions required for these proposed amendments to pass. The Charter specifically defines a rigid process in 7.2. It requires firstly for the ABs to vote. If the AB vote is low, then the Founder may veto it. If it succeeds that process, the Region must vote and not only have a simple majority of all nations but a majority of WA Nations. If the Tribunal were to rule that the clause was narrow and not broad we would be restricting the ability of the Region itself to decide whether or not they want the amendment. If such a change was too big, it has to pass the initial screening process of the ABs. And even then, if the Region didn't like it, they could vote against it. By finding the provision to be narrow, we would be denying the Region their entrenched right to decide whether or not they want the proposal to pass. This would be a case of judicial overreach and would restrict the democratic rights of the Region's members.

-The last reason to believe that it does allow for a new Charter to be voted on is because it doesn't have a specific provision to change the entire Charter. This may initially seem counter productive however it is unusual for a constitution to not have a provision allowing its replacement. Especially on NS where situations change quite often, this would be unusual. It is more likely than not that 7.1 was intended to be broad to encompass all forms of amendment.

[Upper Chantler]

I do not believe that restricting the interpretation of 7.1 to a 'narrow' interpretation would render it 'bizzare' as Ecclestia suggests. It would just mean that the ordinary meaning would apply as it is written.

I would like to focus on the last point raised. There is clearly no clause which calls for a replacement of the Charter. This indicated to me the intention for there to only be small changes and that it was the desire to have the Charter as a fairly rigid document.

I have nothing more to add on these points.

[Ecclestia]

I would like to make this Tribunal aware that there is Judicial precedent in this Region for a broad interpretation of the clause in question.

Raer in 'Librerepublic v Government of Christadelphia [2016]' said in their judgement:
' I have decided to rule in the favor of the petitioner, Librerepublic, that section 3.2c of the Elections Procedure Act violates the spirit of the law and contradicts the Charter.'

I draw special attention to the phrase 'spirit of the law.' This is an overt endorsement of the 'broad' approach which I have been arguing needs to be applied to the current clause in question for the reasons I have previously detailed. I believe that endorsing the narrow approach would be against precedent of the judgement of 'Librerepublic v Government of Christadelphia [2016]'.

I also want to draw attention to the implications of this decision. If this Tribunal were to decide that the New Charter is invalid, it would not only question the validity of the New Charter but numerous sections of the Old Charter. It would then need to question whether any of the amendments were valid. In the worst case, it could be deemed that all of the amendments of the Old Charter were invalid. This would throw the Region into large legal uncertainty. This is not required from the wording of this clause.

[Upper Chantler]

Anfra, I have no other points to raise.

[Ecclestia]

I too have no other points to raise. Anfra, with permission, may we proceed to our concluding statements??

[Anfra]

You may.

Upper Chantler, you are first to give your concluding statement.

[Upper Chantler]

I would like to conclude by summarising the points which I have already made.

I contend that the New Charter is invalid and that the Old Charter should still be in force because:

[*] Section 7.1 of the Old Charter stated: 'Any nation may formally propose an amendment to the Charter.'
[*]The world 'amendment' in the Oxford Dictionary means 'Make minor changes in order to make it fairer or more accurate, or to reflect changing circumstances'
[*]That the power to replace the whole Charter is not granted by section 7.1 as it only allows 'minor changes' as the ordinary meaning suggests
[*]Such an interpretation, by the words used, I believe, would represent the closest interpretation to that of the Drafter of the Original Charter.

As such, I seek the proposed ruling and remedy:
1. That the Charter did not authorise this change.
2. This situation should be remedied by reverting back to the Old Charter.

I rest my case.

[Ecclestia]

It is with much seriousness that I provide my concluding statement to this Tribunal.

This case is one which will significantly impact on our Region and will largely determine the future of it.

Section 7.1 of the Old Charter stated: ''Any nation may formally propose an amendment to the Charter.''
-It is very clear from the wording of the statement that the provisions therein were intended to be broad.
-The word amendment is in fact a synonym for change. law.com defines amendment as: ' to alter or change by adding, subtracting, or substituting.' which implies that in a legal situation, such as this one, the word amend has a much broader context than the ordinary meaning as stated by the plaintiff.
-There is judicial precedent in the Region as discussed by Raer in Librerepublic v Government of Christadelphia [2016] for the adoption of the broad approach to the interpretation of this passage
-That it would not make legal sense to adopt the 'narrow' approach due to numerous democratic checks and balances placed on a proposed amendment in order for it to pass.
-That whilst many provisions did change from the Old Charter to the New Charter, many did in fact stay the same
-That finding in favour of the Plaintiff's argument would lead to large legal uncertainty in the Region casting into doubt every piece of legislation, Decree and amendments to the Charter which have been passed prior to this tribunal
-That it would be unjust and unreasonable for such an outcome based solely on the interpretation of one word which has multiple meanings in numerous circumstances.
-That the legal meaning in a legal context should prevail

As such, I seek the proposed ruling:
1. That the New Charter was changed validly and inline with the stipulations of Article 7, particularly 7.1 of the Old Charter
2. That the broad/contextual approach to interpretation should be that which is adopted in Judicial Proceedings in this Region.

[Kyrusia]

Based upon what I'm reading, this isn't really related to roleplaying or a roleplaying region, it's not world-building or region-building for a roleplaying region - something that is generally allowed on this board, depending on context, it's also not an application thread; it appears to be an entirely Out-of-Character matter of regional business that, otherwise, isn't related to roleplaying. This is something best done on your RMB or an offsite forum. iLock.