Separatist Peoples wrote:I don't believe I voted on Count 3.
My apologies. Do you have an opinion?
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by Sierra Lyricalia » Thu Mar 16, 2017 6:04 am
by Separatist Peoples » Thu Mar 16, 2017 6:07 am
by Separatist Peoples » Thu Mar 16, 2017 6:45 am
by Bears Armed » Thu Mar 16, 2017 11:12 am
Separatist Peoples wrote:My Dissent. I accidentally posted it on the regular forum, but deleted the post. Thats what I get for keeping a bunch of windows open.I strongly dissent with my colleagues on this matter, not on the doctrinal question of legality, but on the structural and procedural inconsistencies this ruling creates.
Here, a clear majority of GenSec found this illegal. Though there isn't a majority, there is a clear plurality, and we have, in the past, had a plurality decision dispositive of legality without creating binding precedent under the principal of stare decisis. See National Control of Elections, [url=Secretariat Archives]https://forum.nationstates.net/viewtopic.php?p=30341749#p30341749[/url] (8 November 2016). Deviation from this is unsettling, and here it allows a proposal that was deemed illegal by four of six members to pass.
Admittedly, we are not bound blindly to stare decisis; we can overrule ourselves when necessary. In this case, however, the majority's deviation has built in a dangerous disparity between the threshold of legality for Legality Challenges and GenSec's Control Panel votes. For Panel votes, a proposal need only be found illegal by a majority. Our reasons need not line up. We could easily have six different rationales and still the proposal would be removed.
If the Legality Challenge voting procedure doesn't reflect the Panel procedure, a structural incentive for using that difference is created, as the threshold for an illegal proposal is different. For an identical proposal, it is now more likely that GenSec will find it Legal if it's assessed through Legality Challenges mechanism, and conversely more likely that it will be found Illegal if it's assessed via the Panel. That isn't fair, and is potentially exploitable.
For this reason, I dissent with my colleagues.
by Christian Democrats » Fri Mar 17, 2017 12:34 pm
Leo Tolstoy wrote:Wrong does not cease to be wrong because the majority share in it.
by Separatist Peoples » Fri Mar 17, 2017 2:30 pm
Christian Democrats wrote:The analogy with the National Control of Elections case is inappropriate because, in that case, a majority agreed that the challenged proposal complied with the Blocker Rule. If we are erring on the side of holding proposals legal, as I believe we should, there is no inconsistency between that decision and this decision. Next, there was only one count in that case; in this case, there are three counts. In that case, four councilors agreed that the proposal complied with the Blocker Rule while disagreeing on the more technical point of the Blocker Rule's breadth.
by Glen-Rhodes » Sat Mar 18, 2017 9:25 am
by Separatist Peoples » Sat Mar 18, 2017 10:48 am
Glen-Rhodes wrote:NCE was legal without GenSec reaching a true majority opinion because *the default status of proposal is that they're legal*. If we hold a vote and each outcome is "legal", then it's common sense that the proposal is legal. We shouldn't be bending over backwards to find a reason to declare a proposal illegal, when a majority of us can't agree on a reason.
by Christian Democrats » Sat Mar 18, 2017 11:35 am
Separatist Peoples wrote:Glen-Rhodes wrote:NCE was legal without GenSec reaching a true majority opinion because *the default status of proposal is that they're legal*. If we hold a vote and each outcome is "legal", then it's common sense that the proposal is legal. We shouldn't be bending over backwards to find a reason to declare a proposal illegal, when a majority of us can't agree on a reason.
Four players found it illegal. Out of six. I've already outlined the reasons why this is undesirable.
Leo Tolstoy wrote:Wrong does not cease to be wrong because the majority share in it.
by Separatist Peoples » Sat Mar 18, 2017 11:59 am
by Christian Democrats » Sat Mar 18, 2017 12:16 pm
Separatist Peoples wrote:It's important to note that we aren't depriving people of liberty here.
Separatist Peoples wrote:We're enforcing a ruleset on a game. The reasons aren't as compelling as in a trial.
Separatist Peoples wrote:A majority of GenSec found it illegal. That's good enough for the Panel tool. I don't see why that should be different elsewhere.
Separatist Peoples wrote:Doing so creates an imbalance in the system. It's now easier to find something illegal via Panel than by challenge.
Leo Tolstoy wrote:Wrong does not cease to be wrong because the majority share in it.
by Sciongrad » Sat Mar 18, 2017 1:46 pm
Christian Democrats wrote:Voting on the questions separately, as a jury would do, gives an advantage to authors -- an advantage that is warranted.
by Christian Democrats » Sat Mar 18, 2017 4:19 pm
Leo Tolstoy wrote:Wrong does not cease to be wrong because the majority share in it.
by Glen-Rhodes » Sun Mar 19, 2017 3:34 pm
Separatist Peoples wrote:It's important to note that we aren't depriving people of liberty here.
by Bears Armed » Tue Mar 21, 2017 11:00 am
by Glen-Rhodes » Tue Mar 21, 2017 1:30 pm
by Christian Democrats » Thu Mar 23, 2017 11:01 pm
Christian Democrats wrote:Maybe, we should handle this decision with a per curiam opinion.At the end of the opinion, note the individuals who join. For instance:
- Section I -- the standards for striking down proposals; a majority agrees that a particular rule has been violated.
- Section II -- Open Internet Order does not violate the enforcement clause of Resolution 2.
- Section III -- Open Internet Order does not violate the investigation clause of Resolution 2.
- Section IV -- Open Internet Order does not violate the Operative Clause Rule.
Section I is joined by Christian Democrats, Glen-Rhodes, Sciongrad, and Sierra Lyricalia. Section II is joined by Bears Armed, Christian Democrats, Glen-Rhodes, and Sciongrad. Section III is joined by all members of the Secretariat. Section IV is joined by Christian Democrats, Glen-Rhodes, Separatist Peoples, and Sierra Lyricalia.
Any concurrences and dissents would be listed separately and below.
Leo Tolstoy wrote:Wrong does not cease to be wrong because the majority share in it.
by Sierra Lyricalia » Sat Mar 25, 2017 7:23 am
Christian Democrats wrote:Christian Democrats wrote:Maybe, we should handle this decision with a per curiam opinion.At the end of the opinion, note the individuals who join. For instance:
- Section I -- the standards for striking down proposals; a majority agrees that a particular rule has been violated.
- Section II -- Open Internet Order does not violate the enforcement clause of Resolution 2.
- Section III -- Open Internet Order does not violate the investigation clause of Resolution 2.
- Section IV -- Open Internet Order does not violate the Operative Clause Rule.
Section I is joined by Christian Democrats, Glen-Rhodes, Sciongrad, and Sierra Lyricalia. Section II is joined by Bears Armed, Christian Democrats, Glen-Rhodes, and Sciongrad. Section III is joined by all members of the Secretariat. Section IV is joined by Christian Democrats, Glen-Rhodes, Separatist Peoples, and Sierra Lyricalia.
Any concurrences and dissents would be listed separately and below.
Thoughts?
by Separatist Peoples » Fri Mar 31, 2017 6:35 am
by Sierra Lyricalia » Fri Mar 31, 2017 7:47 pm
by Separatist Peoples » Fri Mar 31, 2017 8:05 pm
by Sierra Lyricalia » Tue Apr 04, 2017 10:13 am
The proposal at hand was challenged on three separate counts. On all three counts individually, the proposal has been upheld. Yet a majority of the Secretariat believes it is illegal. We must decide which is more important: keeping marginally illegal proposals from reaching the floor; or protecting proposal authors from the apparent whim of a draconian and schizophrenic board of overseers who can't even agree amongst themselves why, exactly, they are invalidating a given proposal. We believe the Secretariat has an obligation to authors to come to a majority agreement on what rule is actually being broken before invalidating a challenged proposal.In the GA forum, the Secretariat has been compared to the United States Supreme Court, and to constitutional courts in general, in that our job is to interpret the underlying rules' application to particular cases so as to judge whether a given proposal is legal. If the similarity is close enough, we then ought to use similar procedural rules: a simple majority vote by the "court" in favor of one result should be enough to base a verdict on - regardless of the underlying reasoning for the members' votes.
Ignoring for a moment the fact that even the U.S. Supreme Court has trouble with that sometimes, the plain fact is that the Secretariat is not the Supreme Court. SCOTUS's main job is to keep unconstitutional laws from oppressing the populace, and to prevent constitutional laws from being applied in unconstitutional ways. They do not have any obligation to the other branches of government to make sure their feelings don't get hurt; they are not there to promote a community of legislators that would otherwise wither; they're not tasked with helping congresspersons write better laws, and they are certainly not supposed to be commenting on bills during drafting, nor boosting authors' confidence and ability. The Secretariat has all of those obligations, and taken together they make the SCOTUS model of procedure inappropriate for our use.
While it is undeniable that the Secretariat's primary job is to keep illegal proposals from reaching the queue in lieu of having moderators do it, we also have an obligation to keep the GA community engaged. When SCOTUS overturns a law, that does not put a damper on the community that writes U.S. laws. They strive for consistency, but when they flout it ex cathedra that doesn't cause congresspersons to ragequit their paid jobs. The Secretariat, on the other hand, must always be accessible; and we have even a higher obligation to be consistent, since the community we're serving isn't being paid to be here.Practically, then, that boils down to one procedural necessity. An overly simplistic plurality-concurrence model of overturning a proposal will not work for the current GA. By NS historical standards, the General Assembly right now is positively anemic, in great danger of becoming a desolate old-man bar way out in the boonies, with nobody but the regulars ever there, nobody doing anything besides drinking the same drinks and rehashing the same old arguments for the Nth time. In order to bring in new blood, then, the game must be appealing. In order to be appealing, the game must be learnable, and in order to be learnable it must be consistent. Maximum consistency can only be achieved if the Secretariat is as conservative as possible in deciding when to strike down proposals for marginal illegalities. We may not always agree on precisely how a proposal violates a particular rule (see the opinions in the Peacekeeping Charter case), but in order to knock it down we must at least agree on what rule is being violated. There, all six of us agreed that the proposal contradicted Article 10 of GAR #2, even if we thought so for different reasons.
The alternative to that is an utter mishmash of lockdowns. If a challenged proposal can be struck down because four different secretaries have three different opinions as to what is going on with it, proposal authors will have little chance of ever hearing a consistent story about how to proceed. Marginal proposals will have a nearly random chance of being upheld vs. struck. If Proposal X is struck down on two different concurrences, with two secretaries each subscribing to a Count A violation and a Count B violation, that's it for Proposal X. But say Proposal Y comes along next week, containing the same Count A violation but lacking the Count B violation. The Secretariat votes 4-2 that it's legal, and it goes to vote and passes. Now you have a resolution on the books containing an illegality that helped get another proposal scrubbed a week ago. Author A has no expectation of consistency from this body. To be consistent, we must allow either all of these marginal cases to go through, or none of them. But allowing none of them to go through would be utter tyranny: a single secretary could strike a resolution he doesn't like, and nobody could do a damn thing about it. Therefore we must have majority agreement on what rule to use to strike a proposal; and let the others through even if all six of us think it's illegal for differing reasons.
by Separatist Peoples » Tue Apr 04, 2017 10:36 am
by Sierra Lyricalia » Tue Apr 04, 2017 11:05 am
Separatist Peoples wrote:Shouldn't your majority opinion be in regard to the substantive legality? This seems to ignore the substantive arguments made.
by Separatist Peoples » Tue Apr 04, 2017 6:04 pm
Sierra Lyricalia wrote:Separatist Peoples wrote:Shouldn't your majority opinion be in regard to the substantive legality? This seems to ignore the substantive arguments made.
Those are addressed in Sections II-IV. I wrote out a proposed unanimous opinion in Sec. III (Count 2), and my dissent for Section II (Count 1). Others must write the majority for Sec. II and any dissent for Sec. IV; or else come up with a wholly different structure than the one CD proposed, I agreed to, and nobody else commented on.
I'll keep hacking off bits of the job if nobody else has time to write anything out, I suppose... nobody has a strong opinion on the three remaining items (majority sec. II, majority sec. IV, dissent sec. IV)??
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