SB 8601: Party Organization Act (Final Vote on House Ver.)

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

The presence or absence of these laws and the continual administration of them after they have existed is certainly a problem that needs to be discussed. However, the matter of whether or not having these in place in the first place (and by extension enforcement of such) in terms of the pros and cons is a debate all of its own and a it is a debate should occur.

It is my belief that as long as party affiliation is a process administered by the federal government and thus sanction by and subject too the laws that govern and limit that of the federal government's power, the act of affiliating oneself by registering with a party constitutes an act of free speech on the individual basis.

If the rosters and registrations of the organizations in question were administered by the organizations themselves then the rules governing membership would be up to the bylaws of said organizations and as long as basic non-discrimination is adhered to, anything goes.

The same cannot be the case for the government. And therefore allowing for others to engage in and allowing for the government act upon wishes of a select number to alter the political expression of another individual runs contrary to the spirit of Article I. The Government and the constitution should act to protect and preserve minority whims from the tyrannical wishes of the majority. That is what separates Democracy from the lynch mob.

This is especially heinous when it comes to the act of dissolution. In this situation the people who have given up are dictating the outcome to those who are committed to seeing the matter through. The survival of both the RPP in 2009 and the Feds in 2015 is testament to the misguided nature of allowing such a practice. If a party loses steam or falls out of favor, the voters will over the course of time determine its fate. No one ever took away Angus right to be a PLPer long after that party ceased to exist. And the no one deprived Smoltchanov of being a Liberal long after that party ceased to exist.

The idea that we are going to place the burden on those who wish to maintain their affiliation, upon whom the greater burden already falls by nature of the contrary political winds, strikes as being perhaps among the greatest injustices as well as the greatest slap in the face that the government could possibly endorse, sanctify and legitimize. It is the simplest principle in the world, if you think a party is doomed, you are free to depart at any time. You shouldn't try to impose that view on those that disagree with you. We have also seen people hop on bandwagons, outside meddling, people joining parties just to vote to dissolve them. This level of corruption that is produced by allowing party dissolution should leave anyone deeply disturbed.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Yankee, are your concerns primarily connected to dissolutions and mergers or do they extend to name changes as well?

My concerns extend to all of the above, but I am most concerned about dissolution and mergers yes since those shift an allegiance without consent of the affected person.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

I must disagree, we are thus placing the burden on the infringed minority.

You guys keep referencing dead parties and masses of zombie voters, that rarely happens.

The concern we should be focused on are those like the UA in 2017, like the RPP in 2009 (almost) and like the Feds in 2015 (almost) where there was a group that had essentially given up on the party and wanted to essentially force their will on the rest who had not given up.

Why do we keep coming back to this notion of treating the minority as the "nuisance" and putting the burden on them?  This is a very dangerous precedent and one we should not be conceding to in any way. It should be the other way around, the burden of dissolution and merger should fall 100% on those who are pushing for it. There is no burden placed on those seeking to change the party presently, that is remotely equal to the burden that would be place on those opposed to such under the provisions being proposed. We are thus engaging in a direct violation and substantially greater burden on one group, just to fancy the whims of taste on the party of another group. Very dangerous indeed and one we should all be rather deeply disturbed by.

I would point out that in this game, "parties" predate the creation of the government and the constitution itself. The Atlas Forum Democrats and Republicans existed before the first constitution was created, therefore the existence of parties both large and small have always been an integral force in the existence of the game. Furthermore the parties act not just as political parties but also as social movements and philosophical movements as well all contained into one. Furthermore their membership is sanctioned and administered not by the organizations themselves, but by Federal law and thus as Federal law we have an obligation under the constitution both in letter and in spirit to respect the constitutional rights to freedom of speech, assembly and association when it comes to the affiliations of the citizens with the parties. As I have long said, if this were merely a case of membership administered by the parties themselves, then yes it would fall under the guise of that very same freedom of association for that group to make its own rules concerning membership, but even there those are regulated often by anti-discrimination laws and equal protections. But that is not the framework we are dealing with here and thus it remains my contention that the voters decision t affiliate themselves on the federal rolls should constitute an act of free speech and assembly, a state sanctioned statement of ones views and thus should be protected as such.

The parties should compete for and earn membership and only if it fails to do so should it cease to exist on the rolls. The Liberals have had a consistent presence on the rolls since 2012. No one took away Smoltchanov's right to be a liberal.  The PLP (renamed from the Populares) had a consistent presence on the rolls from 2010 until 2017 and no one ever denied Angus' right to be a PLPer.  The ones favoring a party change should be the ones burdened by actively changing their registration, not the ones who want to maintain their present alignment.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

But let's look at what's arguably the "tamest" point here, name changes.

Let's say that Alliance decides to rename itself "Moderate Party". I'd assume the following:

1. People whose registrations are changed to "Moderate" are in fact staying in the same party, while those who keep the "Alliance" registration are effectively creating a new splinter party.
2. People who vote against the name change aren't saying they'd want to remain registered as the old name even if the party changes its name, rather, they want to remain within their party but believe it should keep the same name.
3. People registered in a party, in general, would prefer to stay in the same party even if it changes names rather than keeping their registration while leaving the party.
4. People who care enough to leave a party if it changes its name will do so anyway - it's not that much of a burden considering that if you care that much you're probably paying attention to the game. Again, most people who vote against a name change would still want to stay with the party even if it changes its name.

For name changes yes, I was talking about dissolution and mergers above though.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Let's say that Alliance decides to rename itself "Moderate Party".

Don't give me any ideas.

After the RPP was forced to engage in a dual suicide pact with the JCP because bgwah couldn't grow up, one of the splinter parties that formed was the Moderate Party consisting of people like Afleitch, Franzl, etc. A large number of them would later form the nucleus of the original The People's Party. Coincidentally, their color was orange (yes actually orange), though this had no bearing on the selection of our color, which was mainly inspired by the colored used on wikipedia for several years to depict Federalists in the early Presidential Elections (though it was changed a few years back to this creamy orange thing: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1796_United_States_presidential_election)

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

The aim statement in italics of the bill probably shouldn't be "to ensure preservation of employees' tips". That won't affect the substance of the bill when changed though, so I motion for a final vote, as we should get this over with and I think the bill is pretty clear, no amendments are being offered and people have made up their minds.

I was under the impression that Sestak was getting ready offer an amendment based on his line of questioning, but that probably got stalled by the LOA.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

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[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

I am offering the above amendment to address one of the two major concerns that I have with the bill. As I stated in the previous paragraph it is my solid opinion that people's registrations, being administered by the Federal Gov't and not the entities in question" should in fact reflect and respect the constitutional rights to freedom of speech and assembly that is invoked when they opt through a personal choice to affiliate with a political party. This affiliation is thus a statement of their values and it should be altered by another person or group of persons.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

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[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

A Final vote is now open on the Party Organization Act, Senators Please vote Aye, Nay or Abstain.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Aye Ftr

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

I would point that even the Party Renaming Act's provisions of requiring a majority quorum proved too much for the RPP To manage, even with a week long vote period. At least twice we failed to change the name of the party back to RPP from PCP, because we were short of the threshold. Part of the problem was that large numbers of the party members were basically Populares in all but name and took orders from Hamilton and thus didn't participate. Many more were just inactive.


So therefore I completely understand the reasoning behind not being ridiculous with the quorum requirements for many of these things.


AYE