Fellow legislators,

It has come to my attention that there is a certain section of the Legislative Procedures Act, which specifies that repealing a law would require a 60% majority in cases where the specified repeal is about:

Constitutional laws, constitutional amendments, and resolutions dealing with matters of constitutional law 

However, several laws, such as the criminal code, which has 2 sections being repealed lately, have articles specifying that:

(9) The Assembly may rescind a Prohibited Group designation via a vote with a 60% majority in favor.

..and such actions would be done under a repeal of the law. 

In such situations, where the criminal code itself is not mentioned under the first law, it can be argued that when repealing the law you would need either a 50% or a 60% majority. My position on this is that repealing a law which by its repeal automatically does several actions normally requiring a larger majority should not be allowed.

While the possible chances it being abused are low, keeping it at a 50% majority would effectively turn a single action requiring a 60% majority into potentially many of those actions and a repeal of the system itself requiring a 50% majority.

As such, I am suggesting an amendment of the Legislative Procedures Act, which states whether or not laws need a 60% majority to be repealed, to now include this:
Please note! There is a new version! See here! And another dramatic change here! And now another one here! (The version below is wildly different)

Legislative Procedure Act

1. Legislative Rules
...
(4) General laws, amendments, resolutions, and treaties, unless by passing said law, amendment, resolution or treaty an action is executed which would normally require a larger majority to vote, require a simple majority of those voting to pass. Appointments, unless otherwise specified, require a simple majority of those voting to pass. Constitutional laws, constitutional amendments, and resolutions dealing with matters of constitutional law require a three-fifths supermajority of those voting to pass. Any law, amendment, resolution or treaty which by being passed an action is executed which would normally require a larger majority to vote must be passed with said higher majority.

This would simply require laws that execute actions which have been written to require a higher majority to also follow the same higher majority.

Jebediah

(This post was last modified: 11-05-2019, 06:14 PM by Jebediah.)

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I personally believe that this is not a good amendment for several reasons:

1. The law mention was either badly written or it was intentional that the law could be repealed this way, with a lower majority - in either case, protecting that law would be the wrong thing to do.

2. Some laws may specify supermajorities for specific actions, not because it is intended that the law and these actions be constitutional but to establish that there is a broad consensus for these actions. That does not mean that there is an intention to keep the law itself from being repealed/amended without such a majority.

3. The current wording would likely require any law establishing an office subject to the law on recalls (as defined in the charter) to be repealed with a 60% majority because repealing the office would be tantamount to a recall, even if said office is otherwise subject to ordinary law.

4. Creating an amendment that protects bad laws, laws establishing supermajorities without protecting themselves, encourages further bad laws. That is the absolute opposite of what a good legislature should do.

I will oppose this proposal because it encourages bad laws instead of encouraging people to write good laws without such loopholes.

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1. The law mention was either badly written or it was intentional that the law could be repealed this way, with a lower majority - in either case, protecting that law would be the wrong thing to do.

The law said that to repeal this, it would need a 60% majority. The solution to this isn't fixing a loophole that our system causes, it is making it actually mean 60% in the first place so it doesn't make a loophole.

I.E, if a loophole presents itself in a law, we should fix it not in only that law but in all laws, and the easiest way of doing that is with a blanket law.

2. Some laws may specify supermajorities for specific actions, not because it is intended that the law and these actions be constitutional but to establish that there is a broad consensus for these actions. That does not mean that there is an intention to keep the law itself from being repealed/amended without such a majority.

That makes no sense whatsoever. Why would a law require a 60% majority to do an action, but, to be repealed, its intention is to be repealed with a 50% majority?

Remember, repealing something, that by its repeal would normally need a 60% majority to do an action, does mean that that action is taken. The fact it's being repealed makes no difference whether or not said action is being taken, it is being taken. And we can't just individually block the clause and let the rest of it be repealed for obvious reasons.

3. The current wording would likely require any law establishing an office subject to the law on recalls (as defined in the charter) to be repealed with a 60% majority because repealing the office would be tantamount to a recall, even if said office is otherwise subject to ordinary law.

As I've said, that makes sense. The action of a recall is being taken, hence to remove office the same requirements as a 60% removal are necessary.
 

4. Creating an amendment that protects bad laws, laws establishing supermajorities without protecting themselves, encourages further bad laws. That is the absolute opposite of what a good legislature should do.

This is probably the biggest fallacy of the whole argument. This law has perfectly good intent, it just has a loophole, and unlike, say, a car, laws can be fixed by either changing themselves or an overarching clause.

These "laws" aren't individual objects, they are systems, and systems themselves can be clarified or rules created to stop future systems being misinterpreted too.

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1. The law explicitly saif that the 60% majority was needed to remove specific prohibitions, not to amend or repeal the law itself. The legal basis of prohibitions can be withdrawn with a simple majority vote and it would be utterly nonsensical to require a 60% majority for this action unless explicitly required by the law.

2. There are many reasons why such a thing might be wanted. The Assembly may simply want actions taken under the law to have a large consensus without necessarily wanting the law itself to be subject to such supermajorities.

3. That is frankly bullshit. Say we create a law to create a separate office of head editor of some newspaper for TSP separate from MoRA or a new elected position within MoRA. This law would require a simple majority to pass but require a 60% majority for specific recalls. The law might even require a supermajority for confirming any editor to make sure that broad consensus exists.
Disestablishing such a new newspaper or changing the office of head editor to a council or back to an appointed office or whatever - it is not a recall but has the effect of a recall by making the office non-existent in its then present form. There is no bloody reason why the Assembly should be able to create such an office with a simple majority but not be able to alter or abolish it with a simple majority - there is absolutely no reason to require a supermajority for that.
This is an arbitrary example but frankly, there are many other potential offices or other laws that may be established in simple law, require a supermajority for a specific action but that do not, should not and don't intend to require a supermajority for repealing or amending the law.

4. Your law encourages people to be lazy and imprecise in specifying which actions should require supermajorities. You may be closing one loophole but you're really encouraging imprecise language over which laws would require supermajorities and additionally creating the possibility of establishing laws that require very, very large supermajorities. Laws with bad/lazy language on which actions require supermajority might potentially create a domino effect that makes half of our Assembly laws effectively unrepealable because it requires an overly high majority for an ill-defined action.

Furthermore, looking at the language of this law, it would not prevent the possibility of the Assembly first passing an amendment to remove the supermajority and then acting under the reduced majority. Your law therefore does not actually fix the loophole you wanted to fix which makes it another example of the kind of bad and imprecise law we really want to avoid. Precision and thought are valuable tools in crafting laws. To base and interpret laws on "intent" alone simply creates legal ambiguities, quagmires and situations that can potentially no longer be legally resolved because of utterly contradictory laws/interpretations. Carelessly written laws are worthless - if you cannot write a law with a precise definition of what requires a supermajority, you're being careless and that law should be repealed or amended, not protected.

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1. The law explicitly saif that the 60% majority was needed to remove specific prohibitions, not to amend or repeal the law itself. The legal basis of prohibitions can be withdrawn with a simple majority vote and it would be utterly nonsensical to require a 60% majority for this action unless explicitly required by the law.

We are removing several prohibitions. I don't see your argument here.
 

2. There are many reasons why such a thing might be wanted. The Assembly may simply want actions taken under the law to have a large consensus without necessarily wanting the law itself to be subject to such supermajorities.

Well, my law only applies when the law is used. When repealing the law, you are effectively using the law.

3. That is frankly bullshit. Say we create a law to create a separate office of head editor of some newspaper for TSP separate from MoRA or a new elected position within MoRA. This law would require a simple majority to pass but require a 60% majority for specific recalls. The law might even require a supermajority for confirming any editor to make sure that broad consensus exists.
Disestablishing such a new newspaper or changing the office of head editor to a council or back to an appointed office or whatever - it is not a recall but has the effect of a recall by making the office non-existent in its then present form. There is no bloody reason why the Assembly should be able to create such an office with a simple majority but not be able to alter or abolish it with a simple majority - there is absolutely no reason to require a supermajority for that.
This is an arbitrary example but frankly, there are many other potential offices or other laws that may be established in simple law, require a supermajority for a specific action but that do not, should not and don't intend to require a supermajority for repealing or amending the law.

You could easily argue that it is a recall from office, and then the removal of the office itself. How come removing a specific politician from office requires a 60% majority, but according to you, removing an office takes a 50% majority?

And anyway, even if this was fixed if the person simply steps down from office, then it can be removed without being a recall.

4. Your law encourages people to be lazy and imprecise in specifying which actions should require supermajorities. You may be closing one loophole but you're really encouraging imprecise language over which laws would require supermajorities and additionally creating the possibility of establishing laws that require very, very large supermajorities. Laws with bad/lazy language on which actions require supermajority might potentially create a domino effect that makes half of our Assembly laws effectively unrepealable because it requires an overly high majority for an ill-defined action.

1. How does this allow people to be imprecise when describing what needs a supermajority? That's like saying that the Charter of the South Pacific stating its rights and freedoms encourages people to make imprecise laws by not mentioning the exact freedom that each person has.
2. That is ridiculous. If a law is created that specifies that something can only be taken away, by say, a unanimous decision, and the legislature approves it, then the law should be used as it is specified. Even if such a law was created in our current system, and somehow passed, it would have the same problem: more than a majority of the system believe it is a good system. However, if you would like it, it can be changed to simply be a "60% supermajority", which would eliminate such tampering with the system.
 

Furthermore, looking at the language of this law, it would not prevent the possibility of the Assembly first passing an amendment to remove the supermajority and then acting under the reduced majority. Your law therefore does not actually fix the loophole you wanted to fix which makes it another example of the kind of bad and imprecise law we really want to avoid. Precision and thought are valuable tools in crafting laws. To base and interpret laws on "intent" alone simply creates legal ambiguities, quagmires and situations that can potentially no longer be legally resolved because of utterly contradictory laws/interpretations. Carelessly written laws are worthless - if you cannot write a law with a precise definition of what requires a supermajority, you're being careless and that law should be repealed or amended, not protected.

I believe by the words of someone who perfectly summed up the point of the legislature:

Well, this is why all proposals are up for debate! They exist to be improved!

Who said these enlightening words? Why none other than (for it is he) Sasha!

I'll simply dismiss this point then and counter with what you said yourself.

But, in all seriousness:

Legislative Procedure Act

1. Legislative Rules
...
(4) General laws, amendments, resolutions, and treaties, unless by passing said law, amendment, resolution or treaty an action is executed which would normally require a larger majority to vote or said action amended to have a lower majority to vote, require a simple majority of those voting to pass. Appointments, unless otherwise specified, require a simple majority of those voting to pass. Constitutional laws, constitutional amendments, and resolutions dealing with matters of constitutional law require a three-fifths supermajority of those voting to pass. Any law, amendment, resolution or treaty which by being passed an action is executed which would normally require a larger majority to vote must be passed with a 60% majority.

This would prevent people from creating "unrepealable laws", however still require laws that have a higher threshold for voting than normal to stay by those higher thresholds when repealed.

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1. How does this allow people to be imprecise when describing what needs a supermajority? That's like saying that the Charter of the South Pacific stating its rights and freedoms encourages people to make imprecise laws by not mentioning the exact freedom that each person has.

...actually I could make so many analogies with this...

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When creating laws, it is extremely important to consider how it can be interpreted. To assume that everyone will agree with the intent of the author or with the intent you believe to perceive in a law is very foolish. Creating laws requires the ability to consider how other people will look at and use the law.
Furthermore, when creating a law that affects the interpretation and effects of future law, you need to consider whether other people will sufficiently consider your law before crafting their own legal texts. Your law has very wide-ranging effects, trying to fix a very narrow problem caused by badly written laws. When you have a minor cut, the normal response is to put a band-aid on it, not to to put a huge and overly tight bandage on it that may end up cutting off your blood flow,  causing necrosis.

And if you cannot see the difference between recalling an official and removing the existence of an office, it's pretty much pointless to argue with you. Recalls of officials are regulated by a charter, possible for all officials and require a 60% majority and generally lead to the appointment/election of a replacement.
The repeal, abolition of an office is an entirely different act.
The head editor of a possible newspaper was a good example - the Assembly could simply decide to disestablish the newspaper which should only require a simple majority, even if it implicitly leads to the recall of that head editor. It is absolutely not the same as a regular recall (leading to a replacement), as the entire office is disestablished.

Also, since you like enforcing the intent of the law so much, the intent of the law on recalls is to ensure that anyone can be recalled for dereliction of duty in any office (including future ones) but also to make sure that officials aren't randomly recalled for arbitrary political reasons. To turn that law into a general restriction on abolishing/altering offices deliberately defined in general, rather than constitutional law would be entirely contrary to the intent of that law.

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Hmm.

While I see the merits of both arguments, I still think that having this 60% rule protects the law better. After all, especially in the case of the criminal code, where the 60% majority is there to stop a specific prohibition being taken away, your argument effectively says to lower it to a 50% majority.

Even if we were to change the criminal code to have a clause that says "When this law is repealed, it needs a 60% majority because of this reason" that would still be overridden by the LPA.

So while you may argue that it should be written into the law itself, even if we go down that path, we still need a similar amendment.

Whatever way round we go about this (that it applies to the LPA or the current law) we still need some sort of clarification, as many people argue.

Not just because it makes it unclear when repealing a law, but also current laws which have some clause stating a vote needs a 60% majority can have that majority taken away by repealing it.

And current laws still suffer from this. If said political office was repealed, then the same argument in the current repealing would apply.

So, there are either two ways we can clarify this:

Legislative Procedure Act

1. Legislative Rules
...
(4) General laws, amendments, resolutions, and treaties require a simple majority of those voting to pass. Appointments, unless otherwise specified, require a simple majority of those voting to pass. Constitutional laws, constitutional amendments, and resolutions dealing with matters of constitutional law require a three-fifths supermajority of those voting to pass. Any actions which by the repeal of the law are activated, or any said actions having their voting thresholds changed, do not affect the above clause, unless otherwise specified.

This would basically mean, as you say, that when a law is repealed it would stay at the above-defined threshold to vote even if it has an article which requires a 60% majority to do something unless otherwise stated, in extreme circumstances.

Or:

Legislative Procedure Act

1. Legislative Rules
...
(4) General laws, amendments, resolutions, and treaties require a simple majority of those voting to pass. Appointments, unless otherwise specified, require a simple majority of those voting to pass. Constitutional laws, constitutional amendments, and resolutions dealing with matters of constitutional law require a three-fifths supermajority of those voting to pass. Any law, amendment, resolution or treaty which by being passed an action is executed which would normally require a larger majority to vote, or said action is  must be passed with a 60% majority, unless otherwise stated

The exact opposite, where when a law is repealed it does follow the 60% majority unless otherwise stated.

From what you are saying, I am guessing that you would like the first one better, which does make sense. It basically makes all voting thresholds normal, and in extreme circumstances allows them to be a 60% majority.

It also doesn't have nearly as much as an effect on current laws as the second one does, as they are passed as the now are, except allowing for additional clauses to change that without confusion when the law is repealed.

So, this is what I would change it to:

Legislative Procedure Act

1. Legislative Rules
...
(4) General laws, amendments, resolutions, and treaties require a simple majority of those voting to pass. Appointments, unless otherwise specified, require a simple majority of those voting to pass. Constitutional laws, constitutional amendments, and resolutions dealing with matters of constitutional law require a three-fifths supermajority of those voting to pass. Any actions which by the repeal of the law, amendment, resolution or treaty are activated, or any said actions having their voting thresholds changed, do not affect the above clause, unless otherwise specified.

(This post was last modified: 11-05-2019, 02:10 PM by Jebediah.)

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Here's an alternate proposal with better language:

Legislative Procedure Act

1. Legislative Rules
...
(4) General laws, amendments, resolutions, and treaties require a simple majority of those voting to pass. Appointments, unless otherwise specified, require a simple majority of those voting to pass. Constitutional laws, constitutional amendments, and resolutions dealing with matters of constitutional law require a three-fifths supermajority of those voting to pass. This shall not affect other laws otherwise providing for a different majority for their amendment or repeal or for specific actions that do not affect other laws. If by amendment or repeal of a law, a specific action defined in that law is executed, the higher majority shall be required, unless otherwise provided for in that law.

My phrasing is not the best but what it does:
1. It ensures that laws can specify majorities for their own amendment/repeal.
2. It ensures that no domino effect can take place since no law other than this one ("other" being a key word here) may affect the majorities required for the amendment/repeal of any law but itself.
3. It adds language ensuring that specific actions are always protected (while still allowing two-step repeals, unless otherwise specified in the law) but also allowing laws to specify that this should not be the case.
4. Offices established in general law can still be disestablished by a simple majority since "specific actions" are not allowed to affect the amendment/repeal of other laws. This requires laws to actually specify their own majority requirements if they are intended to be different (leaving that to other laws would lead to a confusing mess of cross-references anyway).

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Legislative Procedure Act
1. Legislative Rules
...
(4) General laws, amendments, resolutions, and treaties require a simple majority of those voting to pass. Appointments, unless otherwise specified, require a simple majority of those voting to pass. Constitutional laws, constitutional amendments, and resolutions dealing with matters of constitutional law require a three-fifths supermajority of those voting to pass. However, laws may require a different majority to be repealed or amended if and only if they explicitly state which majority shall be used and which parts of the law this requirement applies to. In cases where there are conflicting majority requirements, the highest shall be used.

Latest version after much bickering

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