Valinon is governed within the framework of a constitutional monarchy, with the Monarch as the head of state and the Imperial Prime Minister, or First Minister for Imperial Affairs, as head of government. Executive power is exercised by Her Imperial Majesty’s Government, excluding those powers reserved by the Crown, and by the dominion governments in specific areas of localised devolution. Legislative power is vested in the two congresses of the Diet of the United Star Empire of Valinon, the Congress of Lords and the Congress of the Dominions. The judiciary is independent of both the executive and the legislature, and the highest court is the College of Consuls.
Valinon was originally governed by a charter drafted by the Kingdom of Pholus prior to the departure of the colonisation mission from Sol. However, the kingdom collapsed before the colonists reached their destination. The colonial charter was used as the system of government for 78 years until the colonists discovered the fate of the metropole. After the fate of Pholus was known, then-governor Friedrich Alderman led the creation of a new government and was crowned Emperor of Valinon. Friedrich the Founder encouraged the creation of a new calendar dated from the establishment of the Empire of Valinon, now known as the Imperial Alderman Calendar (IAC).
The empire’s political system is a multi-party system. The three largest political parties are the Unity & Independence Coalition, the Imperial Conservatives Association, and the Centrist Party. Since the formation of the Third Empire, coalition governments or a majority formed by an umbrella party organisation are a common feature in imperial politics.
Valinon is officially a civil law country. However, the application of civil law is frequently refined by the application of customary law. The empire’s system of law is heavily influenced by Old Earth’s legal traditions, most specifically Roman law and the Old French Civil Code. Valinon is unique among the nations of the Raumreich for its absence and abhorrence of trial by jury.
The constitution of empire is uncodified and consists of several conventions, edicts, protocols, and other elements. These documents are referred to as the Constitutional Canon. This means the empire’s system of government is a descendent of Old Earth’s Westminister system, albeit distantly due to specific national differences.
The Monarch
Empress of ValinonFriedelinde of the House of Alderman
- Style
- Heir Apparent
- First Monarch
- Formation
Main Article: The Monarch of the United Star EmpireThe Monarch of the United Star Empire is the constitutional monarch of Valinon and its dependencies. He or she is the empire’s head of state and the reigning monarch of the House of Alderman, which ascribes to succession by absolute cognatic primogeniture (or inheritance by the oldest surviving child without regard to gender). All oaths of allegiance are made to the Monarch and his or her lawful successors. The present monarch is Her Imperial Majesty the Empress Friedelinde.
All decisions of the Government or the Diet that exercise sovereign powers are delegated from the Monarch under the terms of the Constitutional Canon. While the powers of the Monarch are circumscribed by the Canon, Empress Friedelinde possesses political privileges and powers beyond those of a ceremonial figurehead. Some of these powers include:
- The power to dismiss and appoint an Imperial Prime Minister
- The power to dismiss and appoint any Minister of Imperial Affairs
- The power to dismiss and appoint any officials who serve at the leisure of the Crown
- The power to summon, prorogue, and dissolve the Diet
- The power to grant or refuse Imperial Assent to bills, which gives them the force of law
- The power to commission officers of the Imperial Armed Forces
- The power to deploy the Imperial Armed Forces
- The power to appoint members of the Privy Council
- The power to grant the Privilege of Pardon for any and all crimes
- The exclusive power to grant honors and create Peers of the Realm
- The power to ratify and make treaties
- The power to recognise states
- The power to issue or withdraw passports
- The power to credit and receive diplomats and envoys
The ability to exercise some of these powers are modified or limited by the Constitutional Canon. The Monarch has also lost some powers during the empire’s political evolution, such as the power to declare war and the power to unilaterally appoint judges to the Imperial Bench.
The Executive
Her Imperial Majesty’s GovernmentPrime Minister the Archduke Faustus von Metternicht
- Style
- His Grace Faustus von Metternicht,
Prime Minister & First Minister for Imperial Affairs
- Deputy Prime Minister
- Government Type
- Coalition (Centrist-Imperial Conservative)
Executive power in Valinon is exercised jointly by the Monarch and Her Imperial Majesty’s Government. There are, additionally, certain lesser executive powers exercised by the dominion governments on behalf of the Monarch.
The Monarch appoints a First Minister for Imperial Affairs, who is also the Imperial Prime Minister, as the head of the Government. However, the Monarch’s power of appointment is limited by the Constitutional Canon. An Imperial Prime Minister must command the support of the Congress of Lords. This is interpreted as meaning that the Prime Minister is the leader of a majority within this congress--either as a leader of a majority party, as a leader of a coalition of political parties, or as a leader of personal/cabinet alliance. In the advent of a hung Congress of Lords, the Monarch enjoys an increased prerogative in his or her selection of an Imperial Prime Minister. No Monarch has yet used these powers to appoint a minority government that was not produced by the Diet.
While the Prime Minister technically serves at the leisure of the Monarch, the power to dismiss a sitting Prime Minister is greatly diminished. The Monarch may dismiss a Prime Minister at any time, but this does not prevent the Congress of Lords from returning the same government to power. The loss of the Monarch’s support is damaging, but prime ministers and governments survived this trial in the past. Ultimately, the powers of the Imperial Prime Minister, the Ministry for Imperial Affairs, and the Government are derived from the Monarch, as the embodiment of all executive authority within the empire.
After appointment and receiving a Crown invitation to form a Government, the prime minister selects the other 11 Affairs Ministers and other junior ministers and officers. Ministers for the Crown, especially Affairs Ministers, are selected from the Congress of Lords or the Congress of the Dominions. The Prime Minister and Affairs Ministers constitute the majority of the Ministry for Imperial Affairs, which forms the executive. The Prime Minister and the Government are answerable to the Diet and a successful vote of no confidence will force the dissolution of the Government. However, the power to unilaterally hold a vote of no confidence is only held by the Congress of Lords.
Imperial Prime Minister & the Ministry for Imperial AffairsThe Imperial Prime Minister is the most senior member of the Ministry for Imperial Affairs as its First Minister. He or she is responsible for chairing the Ministry’s meetings, selecting the Affairs Ministers, and formulating government policy. The Prime Minister was recognized as the head of government during the Second Empire and is the
de facto administrator of the day-to-day functioning of the imperial government.
However, the Ministry for Imperial Affairs is the collective decision-making body of the Government. Its decision-making and political authority expanded greatly during the Second Empire, but attempts to further this pattern during the Third Empire failed, largely. Substantial powers still reside with the Monarch under the existing Constitutional Canon. The powers of the Prime Minister can also fluctuate, as the Ministry is still a collective body, and largely relate to his or her political standing and personal authority.
Ministries and DepartmentsThe Government contains a number of ministries and departments. The most senior of these ministries are the 11 that are each led by an Affairs Minister. These ministries are directly represented in the Ministry for Imperial Affairs and part of the Ministry’s order of succession. Most of the Affairs Ministers are also supported by additional junior ministers and other officials.
Some of the Affairs Ministries include a permanent civil service, but others are still strongly tied to appointments made by the Imperial Prime Minister and respective Affairs Ministers. Most of the ministries and departments are officially headquartered in New Köln.
The Legislature
Main Article: The Imperial DietThe Diet is the supreme legislative body in the empire, and the Government is drawn from and answerable to it. The Diet is bicameral, consisting of the Congress of Lords and the Congress of the Dominions. It meets in the Imperial Congressional Building in New Köln.
Imperial Congressional Building
City of New Köln, Proxima I, Alpha Centauri
The membership of the Congress of Lords includes hereditary and life Peers of the Realm. The members of the Diet’s upper house are not directly elected, but the dominions are guaranteed proportionally proper representation in the Lords by the Convention of Yalta. The Congress of the Dominions is a democratically elected chamber, with a general election mandated to occur at least every seven years. The two congresses meet in separate chambers. The Constitutional Canon requires all Affairs Ministers to be members of the Diet and thus accountable to it. In practice, the Affairs Ministries are divided between the Lords and the Dominions based on the jurisdiction both congresses exercise. This means empire-wide affairs are left to the Lords and many domestic affairs are left to the Dominions.
The Diet was originally formed by the Declaration of New Köln in 279 IAC. The original Diet consisted of the Congress of Lords and the Congress of Citizens. It was expanded by the accession of Falasmayon under Emperor Rowald and further expanded, briefly, by the accession of the Gregor Sector Alliance states under Emperor Gustav II. The accession of the Gregor Sector states ultimately led to the reformulation of the Diet into its present form by the Convention of Yalta.
Composition & PowersThe legislative authority of the Diet possesses three distinct elements: the Monarch, the Congress of the Lords, and the Congress of the Dominions. An individual may not be a member of both congress simultaneously and Peers are legally barred from voting in any elections for the Archons of the Dominions.
Imperial Assent is required for all bills to become law, although certain delegated legislation may be made by the Monarch as an Order-in-Council. Imperial Assent may also be forced by parliamentary procedures. The Monarch enjoys executive powers that do not depend on the Diet.
The Lords enjoys more significant powers than the Diet’s lower house. All bills are debated and voted upon in the Congress of Lords, and the failure of a bill to be passed in Lords results in its termination. The Lords enjoy the “power of the purse,” which means that it is the only part of the Diet that can initiate a budget, tax, or appropriation bill. In practice, the Lords devolve the drafting of the budget for domestic affairs (including culture, education, environment, health, trade and industry, and transport) to the Dominions. The Dominions compose and introduce these budget proposals, which are then passed on to the Lords as amendments to its budgetary bills. The Lords retain the power to override any amendments introduced by the Dominions, and it drafts the budget for high imperial affairs (including defence, finance, foreign affairs, home affairs, justice, expenditure limit reserve, and the unallocated imperial budget reserve). A proposal of a declaration of war may only be introduced in the Lords, but after introduction to the Lords a declaration of war is immediately introduced into the Dominions as well. A declaration of war must be passed by a majority of both congresses. While the Diet’s upper house retains many ways to block and reject bills from the dominions, these powers were curtailed by the Convention of Yalta. The convention specifically granted the Congress of the Dominions extensive powers concerning future government reform and in the processes used to alter the Constitutional Canon.
The Congress of the Dominions simultaneously represents the dominions, as the sovereign divisions of the empire, and the Citizens of Her Imperial Majesty’s Realm. The Dominions is led by the Archon-Primate, who is responsible for arranging the Government’s business in the lower house. The Archon-Primate is selected from the membership of the Dominions that is part of the Government and is typically elected from the political party with the most Archons that is aligned with the Government. The Voice of the Dominions is the other major office in the lower house. The role of the Voice is parallel to that of the Speaker of the Lords. He or she is elected by the Dominions’ entire membership to preside over the chamber and is considered politically impartial.
The Dominions may initiate legislation, although the Lords enjoy extensive powers to reject those bills that pertain to defence, financial, foreign, or security issues. The lower house’s powers are strictly limited with respects to budgetary and appropriation bills. The upper house enjoys exclusive power of initiation and final approval of all finance bills.
The Judiciary
Unlike most nations created by a series of political unions and annexations, Valinon possesses a single legal system. The imperial government repeatedly made acceptance of the imperial legal system a necessity to secure treaties of accession or union, although it did allow certain political prerogatives and systems to be retained by the individual dominions. This practice resulted in the imperial judicial system evolving into an entity that is more federal in character than the other branches of government.
The Monarch is the fount of justice in the empire as Supreme Consul of Justice and Wisdom, but the powers of this officer are extensively devolved. While the Monarch retains certain rights of pardon and oversight, the College of Consuls is the highest court in the imperial court system and, by extension, the empire’s highest court. This leaves the College as the body ultimately responsible for explaining and applying laws passed by the Diet.
Sune Hall
Chambers of the College of Consuls
Domains of New Köln, Proxima I, Alpha Centauri
The College is one part of the imperial judiciary system, which also includes various inferior courts. The College consists of a number of Consuls appointed for life by the Monarch in consultation with the Imperial Standing Committee for Judicial Affairs. According to the terms of the Morgan Protocols, the number of Consuls is to be decided by the Monarch based on advice from the Ministry for Imperial Affairs and the Judicial Affairs Committee. The College currently consists of 15 consuls and has sustained this number for more than 200 years. The College is headed by the Consul Primate, an office presently held by Sir Hedrick Rosenberg.
The Morgan Protocols instituted a system that divided the empire into districts, jurisdictionally, and created courts to service each district. This system evolved into the modern judiciary through a series of imperial decrees and certain actions of the Supreme Consul-in-Council (a decision or decree produced by the Monarch after consultation with the College of Consuls). The current structure consists of the College of Consuls, eight dominion courts, 387 district courts, and 11 courts of decreed jurisdiction. Courts of decreed jurisdiction are created by the Monarch, specifically, and deal with issues that do not fall under the direct jurisdiction of any existing inferior courts. An example of this type of court is the Court of the Conservancy, which holds authority over matters pertaining to the Crown Commission of the Interstellar Conservancy. The Monarch retains the power to create and abolish imperial courts and determine the number of judges in the judiciary system. However, the Morgan Protocols prohibits the abolition of the College of Consuls.
The College adjudicates cases and controversies that pertain to the Government, disputes between the dominions, and interpretations of the Constitutional Canon. The College can also use powers devolved by the Monarch to declare legislative or executive actions made by the Diet or Government, respectively, null and void. The process of nullification creates a precedent for future legal decisions. The power of judicial review was permanently transferred from the Monarch to the College by the Morgan Protocols.
The Convention of Yalta refined the mechanics of constitutional reform by creating permanent institutions and procedures for achieving reform. The legislature possesses exclusive power to initiate reform of the Constitutional Canon through the Congress of the Dominions, but the formal process of reform is delegated to the Imperial Aulic Council and the Imperial Chamber Court. The Aulic Council and the Chamber Court are effectively hybrid bodies that exist as part of the judicial and legislative branches and supplanted the authority of the College to determine whether future constitutional reform was legitimate or not.
The eight dominion courts are immediately below the College of Consuls. District courts are under the jurisdiction of the dominion court that sits in the dominion a district court is located in. In example, Her Imperial Majesty’s Sixteenth District Court is under the immediate authority of the Dominion High Court of Alpha Centauri. Courts of decreed jurisdiction are directly under the College of Consuls, like the dominion courts.
The imperial judiciary functions according to a strict hierarchy of process. The district courts are general trial courts for imperial law and for inter-dominion controversies and cases. All district courts are also trial courts that possess the power to settle questions of jurisdiction. The practice of establishing jurisdiction mostly focuses on deciding whether a case brought in local courts meets requirements for diversity jurisdiction, which means that a case involves either inter-dominion issues or directly impacts the interpretation of imperial law. A litigant in a case under district court jurisdiction can also request that the case be removed from the respective district court’s jurisdiction and transferred to a local court. A case may only be transferred to a local court by a unanimous decision of a district court.
The dominion courts function as appellate courts that review decisions of district courts within their respective jurisdictions. They also function as initial courts for direct appeals from certain imperial and dominion agencies and ministries. The College of Consuls hears appeals from all eight dominion courts and all local supreme and high courts. The College enjoys original jurisdiction in respects to certain specified cases. The College possesses original jurisdiction concurrently with all lower courts in the empire. The specified cases it enjoys exclusive original jurisdiction over include cases affecting foreign and imperial ambassadors, cases affecting imperial ministers and consuls, cases where a foreign government is a party, and cases where at least one dominion is a party. The College also fulfills this role in the rare instances where the imperial government has a controversy with one or more dominions.
Relationship with Local CourtsThe eight dominions each possess local court systems that are separate from the imperial court system. However, these local courts are not entirely independent of the imperial system. Most are bound to the imperial courts by their respective dominion’s treaty of accession or union with the empire. Each local court system maintains its own court procedures and rules where they are not preempted by the imperial court system. All the local dominion court systems possess a ranking court. Five of the dominions possess a supreme court, and the three remaining dominions possess bodies of similar authority. The Dominion of Archangel’s highest court is the High Triumvirate of Falensarano; the Dominion of Erudan maintains no supreme court instead the Erudan Council acts as the final court of appeals for the dominion’s small court system; the Dominion of Alpha Centauri’s highest court is the College of Valprietza, which is modeled after the College of Consuls.
The College of Consuls is the appellate court for all local court systems’ supreme or high courts. A local supreme or high court is bound only by the College’s interpretation of imperial law, but it is not bound by the interpretation of imperial law by the dominion court or district courts located within the same dominion. This legal anachronism is due to the legacy of sovereignty most dominions possessed prior to accession or union and is based on lingering concepts of shared sovereignty between the dominions and the imperial government. This is also the reason that an imperial district court hearing a question of local dominion law must apply the law of the dominion that court sits in. However, a case of this nature is still regulated by the rules of the imperial court system instead of the rules of the local court system.
Political Parties
Main Article: Imperial Political PartiesImperial political parties began as factions in the Congress of Lords during the First Empire. While none of the original parties survived to the present, some parties claim ideological descent from Valinon’s original political parties. All political parties in the Lords retain the factional nature that was common during the First Empire, but the organisations evolved into genuine parties with attendant organisations as the imperial government developed and expanded. The major parties in the Lords are now differentiated more clearly by ideological differences than cults of personality around faction leaders.
The formalisation of political parties allowed the parties of the Lords to reach out to members of the Congress of Citizens and, later, the Congress of the Dominions for allies and political supporters. This resulted in a system where the political parties of the Lords dominate the discussion of empire-wide politics. However, these parties are supported by like-minded parties and alliances from the various dominions. There are still no pan-imperial parties in the Diet’s lower house, but the overwhelming majority of Archons are affiliated with parties in their dominion who claim association with political parties in the upper house or directly claim a Peer as a party leader. These aristocrats typically are the leaders of their respective party in the Lords.
Despite the increased organisation of these parties from the late Second Empire to the present, most of the parties in the Lords can still be thought of as working alliances of individuals with same basic interests and goals than truly closed ideological systems. Ideas of collectivist discipline within a party are only consistently evidenced by a few groups. Most parties demonstrate effective party discipline in only the closest of votes. This is a legacy of the establishing tradition of voting by conscience that permeates the imperial political process at almost all levels and a deeply-rooted sense of noblesse oblige that is embodied by the majority of the Peerage.
The more powerful political parties in the Lords--and by extension the Diet--are the Unity and Independence Coaltion (U-IND), the Imperial Conservatives Association (ICON), and the Centrist Party (©). The minor parties are the Augustgrad Union (AU), the
Eleni Avacúmanóre (E), Greater Raumreich Alliance (GRA), the Progressive Peers Union (Prog.Peer), and the
Vaterland Defence Party (VDP). Despite the number of parties present in the Lords, there remain a small, influential number of unassociated Peers, who are often critical in the passage of key votes and the formation of governing coalitions.
Constitutional Reform Mechanism
Prior to the Convention of Yalta, there was no formalised amending formula to modify the Constitutional Canon. The amendment process consisted of either modifying existing elements of the Canon through acts of the Diet, refining interpretations of the Canon through the College of Consuls, or the declaration of a State Congress (
Staatliche Kongress) by the Crown with the consent of the Diet. Historically, State Congresses orchestrated major modifications or reforms to the Canon and produced documents like the Declaration of New Köln, the Morgan Protocols, and the Convention of Yalta. Legislative acts and court decisions dealt with minor reforms and adapting the Canon’s elements for contemporary developments beyond the original concepts of specific documents.
The constitutional crises that beset the late Second Empire, as well as the empire’s expansion into a multi-system polity, led the Seventeenth State Congress to add constitutional amendment reform to its agenda and incorporate its decisions in the Convention of Yalta. The convention established a complete amending formula that both adopted new political customs and restoring two institutions that were essential to the amending procedures of the First Empire. The first part of the formula involved abolition of the Congress of Lords powers to dictate and alter future substantial constitutional reform (the Lords did retain the power to institute minor reforms through acts of the Diet) and the transferral of the power to propose constitutional reform to the Congress of the Dominions. The Congress of the Dominions is thus the initiator of what the convention referred to as the general amendment procedure.
However, the delegates of the Seventeenth State Congress were skeptical of the Diet’s ability to address the need for sweeping constitutional reform expediently based on historical delays that necessitated State Congresses. This concern led to the incorporation of a permanent analysis, review, and modification system being established under the Convention of Yalta to supplement the general amendment procedure. This system is known as the aulic amendment procedure and is founded on the restoration of two historic bodies, the Imperial Aulic Council (
Reichshofrat) and the Imperial Chamber Court (
Reichskammergericht).
The Aulic Council is a permanent body that possesses some aspects of a constitutional court, albeit without the College of Consuls’ power of judicial review, and more aspects of a constitutional commission. The Aulic Council consists of 15 members, with three appointed by the Crown, three appointed by the Congress of Lords, three appointed by the Congress of the Dominions, three appointed by both congress of the Diet, and three appointed by the College of Consuls. The Aulic Councillors do not serve a specified term, serving only at the leisure of the Monarch or the body that appointed them, but no more than one-third of the council’s seats may be vacant at any time. In practice, Crown councillors and judicial councillors are appointed for life or until resignation, the Lords’ councillors are tied to the Government, the Dominions’ councillors serve six-year long terms, and the councillors appointed by the Diet as a Whole typically serve 10 years or longer. The councillors elect a President of the Council from their ranks. The president serves a two-year long term and is limited to three terms, consecutive or nonconsecutive.
The Aulic Council’s primary active is an annual review to evaluate the functionality and health of the Constitutional Canon. The councillors compare and review the existing Canon with those legislative acts and judicial decisions that relate to specific documents within the Canon or the Canon in its entirety. Based on its review, the Aulic Council issues a resolution that outlines the Canon’s present status and includes possible improvements or refinements through legislative acts. Both congresses of the Diet may refer draft legislation to the Aulic Council for consideration. A bill may be considered by the council at any time prior to its third reading and may be referred for consideration by an individual committee. The council reviews referred bills during its annual term and prepares a statement from the body. The statement includes the council’s opinion on the bill’s constitutionality and may additionally include recommended amendments or edits for the referring body to consider. The Aulic Council’s may not directly amend or edit any bills referred to it, and its statement does not prevent the imperial judiciary from ruling on the bill once it becomes law. The statement is, at best, a means for the government to assuage concerns regarding a particularly contentious bill.
The Aulic Council’s greatest power rests in its ability to advance the aulic amendment procedure. In the event that the Aulic Council finds the Constitutional Canon is stressed or in conflict with the historic values of the empire, the council’s annual review will be followed by a Call to Court. The Call to Court functions as a declaration that requires a session of the Imperial Chamber Court, the second body reformed by the Convention of Yalta. The Imperial Chamber Court is a temporary body with a term set by the terms of the Aulic Council’s Call to Court. Its functions as a smaller body capable of bringing about more expedient change and reform than the traditional State Congresses. The Chamber Court’s membership consists of four-person delegations broadly established by the Convention of Yalta. For any session, the court is to consist of a delegation representing the Crown, a delegation representing the Government, and a delegation representing each dominion. Additionally, the empire’s Autonomous Communities may send non-voting observers to any sessions of the Imperial Chamber Court. The senior member of the College of Consuls presides over the Imperial Chamber Court, although matters of agenda and procedural issues are addressed by the Aulic Council in its capacity as the court’s steering committee.
The powers of the Imperial Chamber Court are parallel to those of the State Congresses. The Chamber Court may amend existing components of the Canon or introduce entirely new documents into the Canon. However, the Chamber Court significantly differs from a State Congress in its voting procedures. A State Congress required a two-thirds majority of its members or a simple majority supported by a resolution of support from the majority of the dominions. The Chamber Court may add new elements to the Canon by a simple majority of its delegations and may amend the existing Canon as a whole, rather than being required to address each part of the Canon individually. To date, the aulic amendment procedure has not advanced beyond the level of the Aulic Council, but it is widely accepted by constitutional scholars that the aulic amendment procedure will entirely supplant that of the State Congresses.