[Passed] The Rule of Law

[Applebania]

The Rule of Law

Category: Human Rights | Strength: Strong | Proposed By: Sciongrad The General Assembly,

Reaffirming its commitment to fair and equitable treatment of all individuals,

Believing that no institution, including the governments of member nations, should be permitted to act in contravention of its own established laws, and that such institutions, including the governments of member nations, should be expected to behave in a manner both transparent and unprejudiced,

Asserting, with the aforementioned in consideration, that the "rule of law" is a fundamental component of fair and just governance, and a necessary element in preventing arbitrary or discriminatory punishment,

1. Mandates that all persons, entities, both public and private, and institutions, including the state, political subdivisions thereof, and its officials, shall be held accountable under the established statutory laws, judicial precedents, or any other principles or guidelines with the equivalent force of law of a relevant member nation;

2. Declares that reasonable, good faith exceptions may be made in instances where:

• some form of immunity is necessary to ensure that government employees or institutions may carry out essential functions that would not otherwise be possible without the guarantee of immunity or
• relevant officials or institutions extend pardons, amnesty, commutations, or other forms of clemency, provided such actions are in accordance with the spirit of this resolution and extant General Assembly legislation.

[Applebania]

I am in favour.

No-one should be above the law.

[Gradea]

In favour as well.

[Treize Dreizehn]

I'm gonna mirror what I said (IC) on the NS forums here:

Lack of definition has really hurt you here (though not at the vote apparently). Let's examine the phrase "held accountable under the... ...law."

For someone to be "held accountable under the law" would not require that you punish them (we must simply recognize that they've committed a crime, which is what the idiom "hold accountable" actually means). GAR#35 would normally help you with this, but unless we interpret that resolution to enforce mandatory minimums (which we can all agree it does not) having sentencing be between "verbal warning" and "the death penalty" for any crime generally covers your ass here. Most democracies wouldn't have such extreme sentencing guidelines, but it's par for the course in Douria. I imagine other longtime dictatorships would have similar legal codes. And if they don't, they will going forward.

What this does, in tandem with GAR#35, is require me to recognize law breaking regardless of who has committed it. What it does not do, however, is force me to punish lawbreakers in any particular way. Douria has allowed normal citizens to be simply warned for treasonous actions (with my blessing of course), and I have in the past allowed the execution of Dourian elites for relatively minor crimes. These are all possible sentences for those crimes. And therefore within the realm of this supposed Rule of Law.

I could even argue that this doesn't require me to do any of those things either, since there's enough loopholes here to drive a legislature through. But even if I accept the premise and spirit of this law, it's still ineffective in accomplishing what it sets out to do. Ultimately this doesn't do nothing. But it does so little as to be meaningless.

This is an easy nay.

[Transdavisia]

Following that I vote nay.

[Yuno]

(But isn't senpai a dictator...?)

Nay.

[Cormac]

2-3. The Pharaoh switches his vote to against.