I do apologize for not posting here until now (though I have been eagerly following it) but I would like to take a second to look at the bill now that it is in a “finished” stage.
I should have that post within the next few hours so there isn’t too much of a lengthy delay.
No problem. Since I made an edit to the bill, it re-started the three day debate period. I won’t treat the motion to vote as in order until that period expires, so you should have plenty of time to comment.
Edit: Given that the statutory debate period has now elapsed, the Chair considers Erstavik’s motion to vote in order and would seek a second.
I second the motion.
We are now at vote!
Is this a bill meant to coup the region?
I urge all Legislators to vote Nay on this bill because it opens the floodgates to lawlessness.
It legally allows the Delegate to appoint Regional Officers, including Border Control, at will (for example, giving only their friends Border Control access). It legally allows the SPSF Admiralty to hire and fire at will with no regard for the established ranks. It allows any and all government institutions to never release Sunshine reports ever again. It allows the Cabinet to establish and repeal treaties at will, without any input from the Assembly. It allows people with Communications powers in-game to send any Telegram to residents, including things like “vote for jeff or get banned”. It allows the Chair to run the Assembly as they see fit, like for example only allowing the bills they approve of to get to a vote in the first place. And so much more.
Even better, this bill as written allows the Court to just act like no Judicial Act exists at all. They can do as they please.
“But How, Roavin”, I hear you ask. Quite simple: Because this bill, as written, makes any act that is regulated not through the Charter or a Constitutional Law completely and utterly unenforceable:
Only Charter or Constitutional Law. The Court is, under this bill, no longer permitted to review anything else. So for all of those wonderful things that keep TSP in check which aren’t either in the Charter or in a constitutional law, tough luck. The Court literally has no power to do anything about it if this bill is passed.
Under the old bill, while it doesn’t explicitly mention Review Requests as a case type, these are generally of the form of legal question and the Court has the power to handle them and declare things void. Under this bill, that’s no longer allowed.
Anyway, time to fire up the popcorn machine for the case that this bill does pass.
(and maybe it won’t pass, I’ll be admitted as Legislator, we can debate it again, and I can argue more about the merits rather than going full demagogue on the loophole 
sensationalist shitposting aside, the bill mostly looks pretty good though I do have some comments and I’ve not read the full thread yet)
I encourage all Legislators to consider this latest intervention in light of the extensive debate that has already taken place on this bill. Read in that context, it will become apparent that concerns about lawlessness are unwarranted.
For starters, the issues that Roavin’s post purports to identify have already been extensively discussed in this very thread. These are important and complex questions, but they are not new. Contrary to the implications of Roavin’s post, he has not uncovered some sinister threat to the rule of law lurking in this bill.
More importantly, the bill makes no substantive change to the status quo regarding the Court’s powers. Roavin suggests that it sharply curtails the Court’s authority to rule on the lawfulness of government action. That is wrong. The Court’s power to decide legal questions remains intact and unchanged from the current Judicial Act. So whatever power the Court currently has to order or block government action in its legal question jurisdiction, it will still have if this bill passes. As for review requests, the limitation that Roavin identifies–that the Court can void government action only if it violates the Charter or other constitutional law–already exists, in the Charter. This too, was discussed in the debate. Since it is codified in the Charter, that limitation will remain in force, regardless of whether this bill is adopted. And, as general legislation, this bill could not expand the Court’s review request authority beyond that which is granted by the Charter. Put simply, this bill does not and could not alter the scope of the Court’s review request authority.
Finally, nothing in this bill forecloses further debate on these topics. One might reasonably ask, as Legislators already have, whether we should remove the Charter’s limits on review requests and empower the Court to affirmatively order government officials to discharge duties required by law. As expressed above, I am somewhat hesitant about that idea; nevertheless, I believe it is worth discussing. But such questions are far broader than the purpose of this bill. Indeed, they go to the very heart of the judiciary’s role in our democratic society. These are worthy issues for the Assembly to debate in the future, but they are no reason to reject this bill, which is focused on improving the Court’s structure and procedures, not on fundamentally reshaping its authority and role in TSP government.
I humbly disagree and upvote Roavin’s reply.
Clearly, I did not abide by my own self-imposed deadline. Thank you for moving along (and thank you @Welly for asking me )
I see nothing that would prove problematic under the proposed repeal/replace.
As Welly has noted, the Court’s authority to declare things void could come from several different sources:
(As an aside, no, I don’t really know what the point of III(5) is when we also have VII(4).)
There is no explicit grant of authority anywhere to ‘void’ actions that violate general law. That authority may well lie within the bounds of ‘judicial authority’ or ‘interpreting’ law. It is certainly necessary to void some law when ‘reconciling contradictions’ between different laws. If any past rulings have voided some action for violating general law, then presumably the Court was exercising some other authority in the Charter, which this proposal wouldn’t change.
I say this as someone who was and still is fine with handling review requests as legal questions (I said as much earlier in the debate). Even so, however, I don’t think adding a category of case somehow changes the scope of the Court’s authority, nor do I think the Judicial Act somehow expands Charter VII(4) to general laws as well just by… not using the words “review request”?