[ON HOLD] Ban on World Assembly Conscription

[The Ice States]

Civil Rights, Mild. Update: This is on hold as per this legality challenge.

Recognising the harms caused by conscription to innocent civilians, such that it has already been restricted for member nations through GA #660, "Protecting Objectors in Combative Military Service";

Wishing to extend these protections to conscription by the World Assembly itself, while further noting that, as conscription is not a "law enforcement action" inasmuch as it does not enforce any actual law, GA #698 does not bar the World Assembly from prohibiting the creation of such a law or extralegal action by itself;

The World Assembly enacts as follows.

1. Neither the World Assembly nor any committee or agent thereof may coerce, require, or otherwise compel any individual to:
   
   
   1. serve in any military or police force; or
      
      
   2. serve in any role in an armed conflict wherein that individual would be required to attempt to directly cause physical harm or injury to any other individual, should that individual have expressed a bona fide conscientious, moral, or religious objection against serving in that role.
   
   
2. No member nation, or administrative or political subdivision thereof, may penalise any individual for any act or omission, with regards to a World Assembly-run military or police force, for which the World Assembly is prohibited from penalising an individual under Section 1.

[The Ice States]

Drafts conscripted into the IEC.

[Tinhampton]

Support. Note that this does not mean I support the IEC or IPF as entities or concepts. Even if those resolutions are repealed, I would still not support the repeal of this resolution, lest future generations attempt to overpower WA Military Police 2.0.

[Tigrisia]

Full Support

For the Tigrisian Delegation
Brigadier General Michael Beier
Military Attachee

[Simone Republic]

Because IEC is itself a committee, isn't this a violation of the committee rule that a proposal cannot define who can/cannot staff the committee? The conscripted people are still "staff" of the committee.

[The Ice States]

Because IEC is itself a committee, isn't this a violation of the committee rule that a proposal cannot define who can/cannot staff the committee? The conscripted people are still "staff" of the committee.

Obviously I would recuse myself from ruling on this, but I do not believe that it violates Committees as the resolution does not prohibit conscripts from serving in the IEC; rather it says that the IEC cannot compel someone to serve within it.

[Simone Republic]

Because IEC is itself a committee, isn't this a violation of the committee rule that a proposal cannot define who can/cannot staff the committee? The conscripted people are still "staff" of the committee.

Obviously I would recuse myself from ruling on this, but I do not believe that it violates Committees as the resolution does not prohibit conscripts from serving in the IEC; rather it says that the IEC cannot compel someone to serve within it.

The wording is: "[a] proposal cannot define: who can/cannot staff the committee"

I take that as absolute.

[The Ice States]

Obviously I would recuse myself from ruling on this, but I do not believe that it violates Committees as the resolution does not prohibit conscripts from serving in the IEC; rather it says that the IEC cannot compel someone to serve within it.

The wording is: "[a] proposal cannot define: who can/cannot staff the committee"

I take that as absolute.

Yes. There is a difference between banning a committee from having X in its staff and banning the committee from forcing X to be in staff.

[Lieutenant Columbo]

"Isn't this all prohibited under section 4b of the Convention on Heinous Crimes?"

[The Ice States]

"Isn't this all prohibited under section 4b of the Convention on Heinous Crimes?"

"Thank you for the comment; I had also taken note of this argument in the repeal text. However, we do not believe that our earlier resolution would block this one, as conscription is not a 'law enforcement action' inasmuch as no actual law is being enforced. Nor is the creation of such a law itself a 'law enforcement action'. Therefore it would none of this would seem to fall under 4b."

~Robert Desak,
World Assembly Ambassador,
The Eternal Union of Devonia and the Ice States.

[The Ice States]

Bump.

[Mesogiria]

No member nation, or administrative or political subdivision thereof, may penalise any individual for any act or omission which the World Assembly is prohibited from penalising an individual for under Section 1.

Read one way, I understand this to be a prohibition on the World Assembly bypassing the prohibitions in this resolution by having member states carry out conscription on their behalf, but read another way, it seems to also ban purely domestic conscription by making it impossible for a member state to enforce any penalty on a person who fails to comply with a conscription act. Is that deliberate, or have I over-interpreted?

[The Ice States]

No member nation, or administrative or political subdivision thereof, may penalise any individual for any act or omission which the World Assembly is prohibited from penalising an individual for under Section 1.

Read one way, I understand this to be a prohibition on the World Assembly bypassing the prohibitions in this resolution by having member states carry out conscription on their behalf, but read another way, it seems to also ban purely domestic conscription by making it impossible for a member state to enforce any penalty on a person who fails to comply with a conscription act. Is that deliberate, or have I over-interpreted?

The intent is the former; I support a full ban on member conscription, but this particular proposal is not intended to do that. Do you have any suggestions for how to make this more clear?

[Mesogiria]

The intent is the former; I support a full ban on member conscription, but this particular proposal is not intended to do that. Do you have any suggestions for how to make this more clear?

Ban the World Assembly from accepting the services of any conscript.

"Further, neither the World Assembly nor any committee or agent thereof may engage or accept the police or military services of any person who has been coerced, required, or otherwise compelled to render that service by a member nation."

Doesn't ban conscription and doesn't create a blocker against future legislation.

[The Ice States]

The intent is the former; I support a full ban on member conscription, but this particular proposal is not intended to do that. Do you have any suggestions for how to make this more clear?

Ban the World Assembly from accepting the services of any conscript.

"Further, neither the World Assembly nor any committee or agent thereof may engage or accept the police or military services of any person who has been coerced, required, or otherwise compelled to render that service by a member nation."

Doesn't ban conscription and doesn't create a blocker against future legislation.

I'm not too keen on this largely because of the Committees rule; however I have qualified Section 2 to apply only to "a World Assembly-run military or police force".

[Fachumonn]

I would be more specific about whether or not military drafts are allowed. (I would assume not)

Also, if a nation gets attacked, how are they going to be able to defend themselves? Do you think anybody wants to go to war as a soldier? The nation simply would not be able to do anything.

I like the overall premise, but this is too short to address everything that needs to be addressed.

[The Ice States]

I would be more specific about whether or not military drafts are allowed. (I would assume not)

Also, if a nation gets attacked, how are they going to be able to defend themselves? Do you think anybody wants to go to war as a soldier? The nation simply would not be able to do anything.

I like the overall premise, but this is too short to address everything that needs to be addressed.

As above, this does not ban all conscription; just conscription enforced by the WA or to WA armies/police forces. Conscription itself, as enforced by member nations, is addressed by GA #660, although that allows further restrictions, none of which have been enacted yet.

[Fachumonn]

I would be more specific about whether or not military drafts are allowed. (I would assume not)

Also, if a nation gets attacked, how are they going to be able to defend themselves? Do you think anybody wants to go to war as a soldier? The nation simply would not be able to do anything.

I like the overall premise, but this is too short to address everything that needs to be addressed.

As above, this does not ban all conscription; just conscription enforced by the WA or to WA armies/police forces. Conscription itself, as enforced by member nations, is addressed by GA #660, although that allows further restrictions, none of which have been enacted yet.

Thanks for clarifying.

[The Ice States]

Any further comments? I will likely submit this next.

[Comfed]

There is no need to qualify the mandate in s 2(a) with the requirement "should that individual have expressed a bona fide conscientious, moral, or religious objection against serving in that role," when your goal is to prohibit conscription by the WA entirely.

I would make this minor change to s 2 to make it somewhat easier to read:

No member nation, or administrative or political subdivision thereof, may penalise any individual for any act or omission, with regards to a World Assembly-run military or police force, for which the World Assembly is prohibited from penalising an individual for under Section 1.

[The Ice States]

There is no need to qualify the mandate in s 2(a) with the requirement "should that individual have expressed a bona fide conscientious, moral, or religious objection against serving in that role," when your goal is to prohibit conscription by the WA entirely.

Thanks for the comments! That particular provision isn't about conscription as much as a (voluntary) WA soldier objecting to a particular conflict.

I would make this minor change to s 2 to make it somewhat easier to read:

No member nation, or administrative or political subdivision thereof, may penalise any individual for any act or omission, with regards to a World Assembly-run military or police force, for which the World Assembly is prohibited from penalising an individual for under Section 1.

This is done.

[Simone Republic]

The wording is: "[a] proposal cannot define: who can/cannot staff the committee"

I take that as absolute.

Yes. There is a difference between banning a committee from having X in its staff and banning the committee from forcing X to be in staff.

I take the words

A proposal cannot define: who can/cannot staff the committee, how members are chosen, and term lengths

as absolute, i.e., the WA cannot write a resolution to force the WA itself from not conscripting people. Because the wording is not "who can staff" but "who can/cannot staff", so conscription, i.e., forcing gnomes to be used as cannon fodder, comes under "cannot" be used as staff. In addition, the word "members" is not defined (as a committee's structure is not defined), therefore it is not clear if the conscripts are actually "members", in which case "how members are chosen" is also violated because you are preventing members from being chosen via mandatory conscription. (Members of the World Health Authority, if are included, are probably in the zillions category given the number of gnomes needed to staff it).

In addition, 1(b) also specifically conflicts with 698 since 698 clause (4)(a) implies that there is a component of using force if necessary (say if they face attacks from non-WA states).

[The Ice States]

Yes. There is a difference between banning a committee from having X in its staff and banning the committee from forcing X to be in staff.

I take the words

A proposal cannot define: who can/cannot staff the committee, how members are chosen, and term lengths

as absolute, i.e., the WA cannot write a resolution to force the WA itself from not conscripting people. Because the wording is not "who can staff" but "who can/cannot staff", so conscription, i.e., forcing gnomes to be used as cannon fodder, comes under "cannot" be used as staff.

I don't think it does as the gnomes can "be used as cannon forder", they just can't be forced into it.

[qipte\In addition, the word "members" is not defined (as a committee's structure is not defined), therefore it is not clear if the conscripts are actually "members", in which case "how members are chosen" is also violated because you are preventing members from being chosen via mandatory conscription. (Members of the World Health Authority, if are included, are probably in the zillions category given the number of gnomes needed to staff it).[/quote]
This is an interesting point worth raising; I can't find any precedent on Committees as to this question, the only precedent I can find (both Moderator and Gensec) is about the Committee-Only aspect of the rule. The Consortium thread seems to imply that "members" means "staff", but then that raises the question -- are soldiers truly staff? Wikipedia seems to define "staff" in a military as meaning only high-level commanders, officers, etc; not just regular soldiers.[1]

In addition, 1(b) also specifically conflicts with 698 since 698 clause (4)(a) implies that there is a component of using force if necessary (say if they face attacks from non-WA states).

That applies only to IEC officers "acting per this mandate", and, further, is a restriction not an authorisation.

[Fishelle]

Against, what if a war happened?

[The Ice States]

Against, what if a war happened?

This doesn't restrict conscription into member nation militaries, just WA ones.