Electoral Reform Amendment (Passed)

[windjammer]

Griffin's amendment has been adopted.

[Talleyrand]

A possibility of what a map under this system could look like.

The blue and purple districts have 36 residents, while the other three have 35 residents.

[Senator Cris]

My amendment:

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Article V, Section II, Subsection VI is hereby amended to read:

You must be logged in to read this quote.

[/quote]

Changes are in green.

The members of the commission that will select the Districts are 6 (5 Governors + SoFE) and the Governor seat can't be vacant. The required majority is of 4/5 and 4/5 of 6 is 5. I think we should clarify it and that's why I inserted this in my amendment.

About the special elections: I think the date for stopping special elections should be two weeks before the election date and so I inserted fourteen days instead of thirty-five.

[Cranberry]

That map looks quite cool, Talleyrand. Me in the same district as Massachusetts and Nova Scotia and the lot sounds interesting

[bore]

Sorry Cris, but I don't think either of those changes are improvements.

Firstly it's not 35 days before the election but 35 days before the end of the lame duck term, which is only about 3 weeks at most before the election. With that election we could have special elections for 7 days of a lame duck term.

Secondly I don't think the 5 of 6 is necessary. There will undoubtedly be occasions where a governor just disappears and that shouldn't sink the process. 4 of 5 is nearly as steep a hurdle as 5 of 6 and gives the commission much more flexibility.

[Senator Cris]

I withdraw my amendment.

[HagridOfTheDeep]

Either way, I congratulate my colleagues on turning this bill around. Great work. I'd be eager to support this change, and I hope it will help make the game a little bit more interesting for those people who are beginning to find it stale.

[homelycooking]

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Is the intent here to allow Canadian provinces to be divided between districts? The Canadian provinces are not states. Puerto Rico and Oceania, on the other hand, are.

[Talleyrand]

You must be logged in to read this quote.

I propose this amendment.

There's really no need for that provision to be in there at all. The goal of this is not to mimic the regions as much as possible with these districts.

[windjammer]

Senators have 36 hours to object.

[Cranberry]

Yes, homely raises a good point, we will have to change that clause further to include provinces and territories.
I do also support Talleyrand's amendment, I see not really point in this. Actually, I'd be quite fun to have Puerto Rico in the same district as Alaska, for example.

[homelycooking]

Yes, homely raises a good point, we will have to change that clause further to include provinces and territories.
I do also support Talleyrand's amendment, I see not really point in this. Actually, I'd be quite fun to have Puerto Rico in the same district as Alaska, for example.

Are there any Territories of the Republic of Atlasia? Puerto Rico and Oceania are both states. I'm not sure about DC's status - has it ever been recognized officially as either a state or a territory?

[Cranberry]

Yes, homely raises a good point, we will have to change that clause further to include provinces and territories.
I do also support Talleyrand's amendment, I see not really point in this. Actually, I'd be quite fun to have Puerto Rico in the same district as Alaska, for example.

Are there any Territories of the Republic of Atlasia? Puerto Rico and Oceania are both states. I'm not sure about DC's status - has it ever been recognized officially as either a state or a territory?

Not that I know, but Yukon, the Northwest Territories and Nunavut are.

[Adam Griffin]

I obviously do not agree with Talleyrand's amendment, if only because the problem he is proposing to fix isn't one. If the districts on balance do not look like the regions, then the non-contiguous states (my bad) won't necessarily be confined to the same region. For instance, if one state in the Pacific Region were drawn into a district that comprised a chunk of the Midwest, then Hawaii could be added to that district (because non-contiguous states only "must be in a district with territory from the same Region").

This was designed to be a mechanism to prevent lazy/sloppy map-drawing where people just lump all of the non-contiguous territories together and tack them on the tail-end of the last agreed-upon district, as well as a nominal risk reduction for gerrymandering.

[Fmr President & Senator Polnut]

I obviously do not agree with Talleyrand's amendment, if only because the problem he is proposing to fix isn't one. If the districts on balance do not look like the regions, then the non-contiguous states (my bad) won't necessarily be confined to the same region. For instance, if one state in the Pacific Region were drawn into a district that comprised a chunk of the Midwest, then Hawaii could be added to that district (because non-contiguous states only "must be in a district with territory from the same Region").

This was designed to be a mechanism to prevent lazy/sloppy map-drawing where people just lump all of the non-contiguous territories together and tack them on the tail-end of the last agreed-upon district, as well as a nominal risk reduction for gerrymandering.

I agree - I don't see any issue with making instructions/expectations crystal clear.

[Talleyrand]

I definitely disagree; you put too little faith in our regional executives as doubt people will become that lazy and do what you're describing there. If they want to set such standards, they can do it among themselves.

[Cranberry]

I would agree to Talleyrands side of the issue here.

[Talleyrand]

I would agree to Talleyrands side of the issue here.

Another thing to note is that it's definitely not a good idea to put such specific guidelines in the constitution anyway.

[Fmr President & Senator Polnut]

I would agree to Talleyrands side of the issue here.

Another thing to note is that it's definitely not a good idea to put such specific guidelines in the constitution anyway.

As someone who was one of those governors once, it's not an easy task. But I do take the point that we need to separate the intention from the operation. I would be a touch hypocritical, as someone who hates extraneous detail in the Constitution. But I would not be at all comfortable with the group being able to place their own standards each time they meet... which is something that could happen and I would argue is not at all desirable.

What I would hope we could do, is have a Bill that outlines the operation of this reform, in concert with the amendment that institutes it.

[Talleyrand]

But that raises the conflict of interest concerning whether the Senate should set the qualification for the electoral boundaries affecting half its body. I'm not opposed to it in the right circumstances, but I would have to hear more about what exactly you would suggest in this instance.

[Fmr President & Senator Polnut]

But that raises the conflict of interest concerning whether the Senate should set the qualification for the electoral boundaries affecting half its body. I'm not opposed to it in the right circumstances, but I would have to hear more about what exactly you would suggest in this instance.

I would need to think more about it.

[windjammer]

Talleyrand's amendment has been adopted.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Article V, Section II, Subsection VI is hereby amended to read:

You must be logged in to read this quote.

[/quote]

[Adam Griffin]

I'm confused: why does the current text still have all the bolding and strikes from my amendment? This text in full has been adopted, no? Perhaps I'm a nazi when it comes to updating formatting for amendments once they're adopted...but really, I just want to make sure there isn't some new amendment in there that has been proposed or recently adopted (besides the most recent one by Talleyrand, which, shame on all of you).

[bore]

I think this is ready and I think the 7 days without comment suggest most people agree with me, but does anyone have any more comments before we go to a final vote?

[bore]

After final consultation with homely I'd like to propose one more amendment, to stop canadian provinces being split between two districts:

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Article V, Section II, Subsection VI is hereby amended to read:

You must be logged in to read this quote.

[/quote]

I'm open to suggestions on the wording, but hopefully we can get this finished as soon as possible.