Electoral Reform Amendment/Statute

[Peter]

Once again, this draft amendment contains provisions that really ought to be statutory. The 25-post rule should not be in the Constitution as I can see us getting about a month down the line and then everybody suddenly thinking - Thats too much or thats not enough. This once again leads us on the labourious endeavour of amending the Constitution (which frankly I'm really tired of now).

The 25 post rule is fine as part of the statute as it simply defines what the word active in the constitution means and is subject to further revision by the Senate at a later date.

[Peter]

Ooops. Good to know I still make mistakes.

My point still stands that using the Constitution to define active is a bad idea. Allow the Senate to define what active is, don't use the Constitution.

[Peter]

So, your suggestion is that we just remove the current Constitutional definition of "active" and then redefine it later in the statute?

My suggestion would be to strike the present definition of active and then say that the Senate shall have power to define what an active voter is by appropriate legislation. Then get the Senate to do it by appropriate legislation.

It should be noted that as a scholar of this sort of stuff I have a bias towards a constitutional structure that leaves as much to the legislature as possible. I'm a great believer that the constitution provides the skeleton of the law and the legislature provides the flesh of it. There are certainly viewpoints out there that disagree with my methods, so don't necessarily defer to me all the time (but certainly don't let me stop you!)

[Peter]

With seven votes in favor to one against, I hereby declare both the amendment and the statute to have passed.

I'll go post the poll for the amendment.

Perhaps it might be in order that you transmit the relevant statute to the President so that he can sign it.