[Draft] Constitution of the Osiris Fraternal Order

[Cormac]

I'm just wondering how that kind of judicial organisation would work. Empowering the Atef with some judicial responsibility, in practice if not in law. And why would the Vizer need to appoint Scribes?

He could appoint deputies; whether he calls them scribes or not would be up to him, and it would be up to the Pharaoh whether to call his deputies scribes as well.

The Atef will need to maintain a citizenship list, run citizenship checks for citizens who no longer have nations in the region, and of course someone will need to run the admin security check on citizenship applicants. The Vizier could appoint a deputy or a couple of deputies to help with those tasks, for example.

In regard to how that kind of judicial organization would work, I think we need to stop thinking of it as a judicial organization at all, to be honest. This would be for obvious crimes, not some of the more questionable "crimes" we find in the criminal codex. Things like forum destruction, trying to coup the region, etc. -- things that are easy to prove. We don't need a lot of judicial procedure and technicalities for that. We need the Atef to simply decide whether or not to remove citizenship, and if it's removed, for the Deshret to consider the individual's appeal if they make one.

[Tim Stark]

I'm in support of using English titles for legal simplicity. We can always do something like what Spiritus does and rotate our Government Themes whenever we feel like it via Executive Order, or something of the like.

[Cormac]

I'm in support of using English titles for legal simplicity. We can always do something like what Spiritus does and rotate our Government Themes whenever we feel like it via Executive Order, or something of the like.

I've gone with English words for everything but Pharaoh and Vizier, which are pretty recognizable even in English and the latter is used by other regions (e.g., The East Pacific).

[Seker]

Given my position as Scribe of Justice, I will abstain on expressing any opinion or official vote on the changes pertinent to my position, unless asked. Just wanted to let you all know I'm following this.

[Lord Ravenclaw]

In reference to titles: The East Pacific uses Magisterium, Directorate and Conclave, for Legislature, Executive and Judiciary respectively. With the titles of Provost, Arbiter, Vizier, Minister, Commissioner, General and Delegate. Provost referring to the Speaker of the Magisterium, Arbiter referring to their version of Judges, Vizier being a high influence nation involved in regional security, Minister being a member of the Directorate, Commissioner being the leader of the EPPS, General being overseeing officer of the EPSA and Delegate obviously being the delegate.

I think that your example would work best if you mentioned TNP or TSP instead, if we're looking at plain English speak xD

[Seker]

By the way, I think the delegacy should not have a term -- each month or month and a half, there should be a confidence vote or some similar measures. With the expectation that inactive or boring delegates don't last. Keep people paying attention, imo.

[Seker]

[OOC: Forgive my breaking character -- I realize that's a very :milograd: thing to say, but I'm serious. I'd say it regardless of my persona's stances, because it's central to activity and fun.

If you're not cooking, get out of the kitchen and let someone else make sure people get food. We should do something that sets us far apart, and for our own good. The idea may need tuning.]

[Cormac]

My concern with the confidence vote is that when we had challenge elections here previously, challenges were taken very personally. I feel that a confidence vote would be taken even more personally.

Just a note to everyone that I've made slight changes to the draft to ensure that all officers and deputies must be citizens of the OFO.

[Ainocra]

I agree with regular elections and no term limits. I think we should keep the names we have now for the positions, we are after all Osiris and they fit with our theme.

I would still prefer that terms for the Pharaoh and Vizier be a part of the constitution itself rather than statutory. Since these are office that are called for by the constitution
I feel that for the sake of consistency they should be defined within it.

[Cormac]

I agree with regular elections and no term limits. I think we should keep the names we have now for the positions, we are after all Osiris and they fit with our theme.

At the same time, we do want to make sure that newcomers can understand the regional government and the forum. While terms like Deshret, Hedjet, Atef, Scribe of Isis, Scribe of Horus, etc., are cool with the theme, several foreign observers who have been playing NationStates for years and are heavily involved in gameplay have expressed to me since I began drafting this that they have to work really hard just to figure out who is what in our government. If it's that hard for them, it's at least that hard if not harder for newcomers, which discourages participation here.

I feel that we should be more concerned with encouraging participation, which includes encouraging understanding of our system, than we should be with the theme. There are other ways to pursue the Egyptian theme that aren't so confusing to newcomers.

I would still prefer that terms for the Pharaoh and Vizier be a part of the constitution itself rather than statutory. Since these are office that are called for by the constitution
I feel that for the sake of consistency they should be defined within it.

The thing is, we may want to change the length of term later. I don't see any reason why changing the length of an elected officer's term should require a three-quarters majority vote; we won't be changing anything essential about the office itself, only the length that someone holds it. We don't want to include things that we may want to easily change, if they aren't working, in a constitution that will require a three-quarters majority vote to amend.