[Q] SC Proposal Legality

[Dawn Denac]

I'm not entirely sure where to put this (or if to flag it as R or Q), and the GHR isn't for inquiries so here we go.

viewtopic.php?p=40130858#p40130858

NPU points out that: "This raises an interesting question regarding the legality of the proposal at vote. Rule 1(b) states "If your proposal is a Repeal it must address the contents of the resolution it is repealing." Since one of the central clauses appears to have nothing to do with #326 and goes off on a tangent about #236 that has nothing to do with the latter resolution, I would argue that the at-vote proposal is illegal since it doesn't comply with 1(b). It would be interesting to get moderator input on this."

Given moderators need to give the nice green seal for proposals, and the sentence in question is a rather small part that seems to of been overlooked, can there perhaps be a secondary look at this proposal to determine its current legality?

EDITED: First sentence.

[Saint Tomas and the Northern Ice Islands]

Obviously, not a moderator, but I do not believe it is illegal. The proposal clearly deals with the contents of the proposal in every other clause. By default, it addresses the contents.

[Dawn Denac]

Obviously, not a moderator, but I do not believe it is illegal. The proposal clearly deals with the contents of the proposal in every other clause. By default, it addresses the contents.

Yet, it doesn't technically do that due to the mention of 236.

"Respecting that the writing of SC#326 is excellent and up to modern standards of quality, though nevertheless unconvinced that the nominee is deserving of recognition by the Security Council for their alleged misdeeds,

Recognizing that SC#236 mentions Souls’ involvement and leadership in numerous raiding organizations, though contending that their career in the multiverse is primarily viewed through their role in The Black Hawks specifically,."

Moving to the end:

"Hereby repeals Security Council Resolution #326 “Condemn Ever-Wandering Souls”."

The proposal in question thus, is either: Addressing SC#236 "Commend Ransium" as shown here and somehow linking it to SC#326 "Condemn Ever-Wandering Souls" or, by its own writing, is now using SC#236 as a basis to repeal SC#326, when the two have no discernible links. Alas, will wait for a mod to post here for their judgement.

[Varanius]

Also clearly not a moderator, but has it ever been the case that the entire proposal has to be dedicated solely to the contents of the resolution it’s repealing? Well uh, no. If you even bother to look at proposals like Repeal Condemn Jakker and Repeal Commend Solorni. Just examining it from a position of precedent, this is clearly not illegal.

[Dawn Denac]

Also clearly not a moderator, but has it ever been the case that the entire proposal has to be dedicated solely to the contents of the resolution it’s repealing? Well uh, no. If you even bother to look at proposals like Repeal Condemn Jakker and Repeal Commend Solorni. Just examining it from a position of precedent, this is clearly not illegal.

Yes, while it's very helpful to have the obligatory 'not-a-mod' posts, it would appear that only moderators actually have the ability to reserve judgement on site matters.

Also, using Repeal Condemn Jakker huh? We all know why that passed the way it did, and why it was so short and sweet, but good try.

[Sedgistan]

It's a silly mistake but does not make the proposal illegal.

[Dawn Denac]

It's a silly mistake but does not make the proposal illegal.

Cool, thanks for the clarification Sedge.

[NPU]

It's a silly mistake but does not make the proposal illegal.

I'm a bit curious about the reasoning behind this (since I'm one of the ones that initially gave feedback on the issue in the SC thread before Dawn posted it here I hope I'm not out of line).

The mods are not spell-checkers, so simple misspellings aren't illegal (I for one am glad for this because the resolution I passed was "Coathored by Milograd" ), but the SC rules give the caveat that "So long as your spelling and grammar don't inadvertantly cause a rule violation or descend into spam, it's up to WA members to decide whether they want to pass a resolution filled with errors."

The error here goes far further towards changing the meaning of the resolution than a simple one like "coathored" does. Since #326 is correctly mentioned in the clause above the one in question I think its not unreasonable to substitute in the resolution names for the number to make this clearer.

Respecting that the writing of ["Condemn Ever-Wandering Souls"] is excellent and up to modern standards of quality, though nevertheless unconvinced that the nominee is deserving of recognition by the Security Council for their alleged misdeeds,

Recognizing that ["Commend Ransium"] mentions Souls’ involvement and leadership in numerous raiding organizations, though contending that their career in the multiverse is primarily viewed through their role in The Black Hawks specifically,

So the text of the resolution is clearly factually inaccurate, Commend Ransium makes no mention of Souls' raiding.

Now the SC rules also state that "Factual inaccuracies: Moderators are not arbiters of truth. It may come as a surprise to some, but real-world nations can occasionally be liberal with their approach to the truth. The same applies to NationStates nations, and it's up to you to distinguish your facts from the alternative facts", which may be well and good when discussing C/Cs and declarations, but is less easily applied to repeals. For moderators to declare a repeal legal/illegal on Rule 1(b) they have to make some kind of factual judgment.

So the question is this: Can a proposal to repeal 'Condemn Ever-Wandering Souls' "address the contents of the resolution it is repealing" while it makes the claim that 'Commend Ransium' mentions Souls’ involvement and leadership in numerous raiding organizations?

Under the GA's stricter ruleset, the answer would clearly be that the proposal was illegal for violating the Honest Mistake rule, since it is a "factual inaccurac[y], misrepresentation, or content that doesn't address the resolution"; even a single clause such as the one here would be enough to trigger this. Since the SC doesn't have the rule concerning the extent to which a repeal must address its target either as strictly-held or as fleshed-out as the GA I think there's real ambuguity here. I'm not necessarily asking for the legality ruling to be reversed, I just hoped it would be more comprehensive.

Even proposals mentioned above such as "Repeal: Condemn Jakker" and "Repeal: Commend Solorni" address their targets even if the reason for repeal had little to do with the targets themselves (see the BELIEVING clause of Jakker's repeal and the NOTING through DISMISSING clauses of Solorni's repeal).

As I said above, I'm more asking for the legality ruling to be clarified or expanded on than overturned, because when I saw this in the SC thread I genuinely thought it was likely illegal and am now a little mystified.

[Sedgistan]

I don't think it's reasonable to read from the "Questioning" clause onwards as referring to SC#236. The typo at most strikes out the "Recognizing that SC#236" clause, and there is still more than sufficient content addressing the original resolution in there for it to satisfy Rule 1b (addressing the contents of the resolution it is repealing).