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- Culture of Life
- Monday Jan 15 2018, 05:46 PM
Thank you for the update! I have several questions: - It seems that monarchs in the NSUK come and go quite frequently. Why is that, and how are new monarchs selected? Do the monarchs do anything important, or are they mostly for show?
- Who are these "ghost voters," and what would "voter registration" require? Also, would you mind giving me a summary (or a copy-and-paste) of the court's second opinion? Voter registration in NS seems very odd since forum registration and citizenship registration are a sort of voter registration.
- Is the new BBC board of directors part of HM's government, or is it somehow independent?
- Also, back in August, I asked this question: "What are the duties of the mayor and council [of London], and how are they selected?"
Sorry for all the inquiries.  Right to Life is holding a constitutional convention right now (as you might have seen on your forums); and we're debating what to do with regard to our news bureau, etc. Sorry for my late reply!
1. The new monarch is selected by the previous monarch. The monarch will name an heir apparent and usually another after that so that there are 2 in the line of succession. The heir is granted the title of Prince(ss) of Wales. The monarch is mainly symbolic and ceremonial, although they do carry out important functions. They are one of the administrators, they appoint Lords to the Upper House of Parliament and they grant royal assent or veto legislation. They have additional powers which are outlined within the Constitution. However, executive authority is exercised by the Government led by the Prime Minister. The Monarchy provides a symbol of unity and is often what people turn to in times of difficulty in NSUK.
2. Ghost voters are people who are not active throughout a term but suddenly appear when it is election time. The general idea is that they are individuals who only show up at elections and often sway tight elections. Voter registration would require citizens to sign up to vote 2 weeks (or any other specific time) before an election occurs.
I believe this may be the Court's second opinion  IN HIS MAJESTY'S CROWN COURT In the Matter of:
Ex parte Jay Dee Bonaparte, re: Voter Registration Argued: 6 - 10 December 2017 Rearguard: 11 - 20 December 2017
Arguments by: Attorney General William Kudrow Decided: 20 December 2017
BEFORE: HG The Duchess of Bedford & York, C.J., HRH The Countess of Somerset, HL The Baroness Kensington, The Hon. Lord Wessex of Westbury, L.L., & The Hon. Sir A. Talleyrand, J.
BEDFORD & YORK, with whom SOMERSET and KENSINGTON join:
[1] We were initially presented with two questions in this matter: Whether voter registration generally, and a proposal before Parliament to implement it specifically, violate the Constitution’s guarantee of the right to vote. A three-judge panel of this Court, over a dissent, answered those questions in the affirmative. Promptly thereafter, a concerned citizen moved the Court under Rule 15 to alter or vacate its judgment for the reasons stated in the dissent. That motion was assigned to a five-judge panel, comprising every judicial officer in the region. We grant the motion.
I - Motions to Alter or Vacate
[2] We must first consider, as a procedural matter, the standard of review for a motion to alter or vacate a prior judgment. Although Rule 15 plainly provides for this procedure, the guidance on point is scarce and deserving of a written decision articulating the governing standards. Cf. In re UhierPierre’s Warn at [1] (per curiam).
[3] In its most basic form, a “judgment” is merely a final decision of a court. Because Article III allows, and Parliament has implemented, procedures by which this Court may finally decide abstract questions of law (i.e., those arising outside of a case or controversy), a final order announcing a binding answer to a legal question is a judgment subject to alteration or vacatur under Rule 15.
[4] Vacatur or alteration of a judgment has not historically been a common practice in the courts of this region. Our research suggests it has occurred precisely twice, and both times because our predecessor court discovered a defect in its jurisdiction after a judgment had issued. See In re Mikaelson (per curiam) (vacating British Centrist Party v Mikaelson); Blackstone v HM Government at III (describing the vacatur in Ex parte HM Government). But those were different times; our predecessor (the former Supreme Court) was a solitary institution in the judicial branch, and often an under-staffed one. For that reason, our predecessor court rightly showed prudence and restraint by largely allowing its judgments to stand. That way, the courts did not give the sense of caprice. Moreover, our predecessor court never issued an opinion articulating the bases for an alteration or vacatur, which leaves the precedential slate entirely blank here.
[5] The practicalities that made alteration or vacatur imprudent and impractical for our predecessor do not necessarily plague us. Times have changed. By constitutional design, this Court always has at least three judicial officers: the Lords of Parliament, who comprise the highest court under Article III of the Constitution. And in practice we have even more, as the Crown Court has for most of its existence heretofore enjoyed at least two judges. Given this, review of a Crown Court judgment with some fresh eyes is not as impractical as it once was, and our robust staffing would make it appear less imprudent to vacate a judgment than in the days past, when the Supreme Court may well have comprised only a single justice.
[6] That being said, we do not suggest that a Rule 15 motion should be considered (much less granted) as a matter of course. But we can articulate at least one general standard about the motion’s availability: Where a three-judge panel decides an important question of law, over a dissent, on timely motion a five-judge panel may alter or vacate the judgment to correct a legal error. We believe this rule protects three important interests.
[7] First, our rule is limited to situations in which serious debate manifested itself on the panel. Where a three-judge panel splits 2-against-1, in many situations the deciding vote may have been the result of “luck of the draw” for the prevailing side, given the random selection process often in play to select panel members. Important questions of law ought not be left to chance. Our rule allows for further review by an expanded pool of judicial officers to reduce the likelihood that random chance will make enduring bad law. And, of course, the Judicial Power Act plainly contemplates that a five-judge panel may be convened to resolve any legal matter within the judicial power; no doubt the question whether a prior judgment should be altered or vacated is one such matter.
[8] Second, our rule take due account of reliance interests, which we have highlighted as an animating principle of our adherence to prior precedent and to prior advisory legal opinions. See Talleyrand v Fraser at [7]. This is so because out rule requires a Rule 15 motion to be timely, by which we mean filed within a reasonable time of the entry of judgment, with reasonable time being time sufficient to identify the serious legal error and raise it to the Court.
[9] Third and finally, our rule takes due account of the interest in finality by making the intervention of a five-judge panel entirely discretionary. That is, even if a motion is timely filed and otherwise proper, a five-judge panel may always vote, in its discretion, to deny the motion without comment as a matter of pure discretion in order to bring an end to lengthy litigation.
[10] As a final note, we caution that the rule we articulate today is not exclusive. There may be other situations in which a Rule 15 motion is proper, for instance where a defect in jurisdiction is discovered only after entry of judgment. Our purpose today is merely to articulate a situation in which a larger panel of judicial officers may review the work of a smaller panel in order to correct an apparent legal error.
[11] The Rule 15 motion here was made promptly upon entry of judgment. That judgment issued over a dissent. We therefore hold that a Rule 15 motion is procedurally proper here. And a majority of the judges of this panel have determined an exercise of judicial discretion to entertain the motion is proper, given the importance of the constitutional question presented.
II - The Merits
[12] We begin with the text. No doubt, the Constitution secures for all citizens “the Right…to Vote in every Election.” UK Const. Art. VI, Sec. 3, cl.4. But that doesn’t really tell us much. After all, the operative part of Article VI is Section 1. That’s the provision providing that “the government of United Kingdom shall not arbitrarily, capriciously, maliciously, willfully, illegally, or unreasonably infringe” on the rights secured. Ibid. Art. VI, Sec. 1. In other words, the reason the government cannot—in some circumstances—limit the exercise of rights is because Section 1 withdraws that prerogative from all government actors.
[13] Given the foregoing, the correct question is not whether a system of voter registration infringes the right to vote. By erecting a barrier to the polls, such a system would certainly burden the right to vote, and such a burden is properly understood as a limited infringement. The operative question, rather, is whether the burden is arbitrary, capricious, malicious, willful, illegal, or unreasonable. Only infringements of those sorts are inconsistent with the Constitution, per Section 1 of Article VI. Willful and illegal are out—those can really only apply to a unitary actor (like the Prime Minister or King) who infringes a right with intent or while violating positive law. Cf. Beckett v HM King Edward IX. And arbitrary and capricious are out, too—a voter registration system like the one proposed in Parliament would lead to evenhanded and predictable results. Moreover, there’s been no suggestion that Parliament is acting maliciously towards any particular person or group, so that goes, too. And so we’re left with one question: Is voter registration an unreasonable infringement?
[14] Fortunately, we have a framework for figuring that out. See de Clare v Irishmen at II. Using this framework, we identify the government’s interest in the infringement on the one hand, and then ask whether the allegedly infringing statute is too blunt an instrument to facilitate that interest. See ibid. That is, we ask whether Parliament’s remedy is worse than the disease by imposing too high a burden with too little a payoff.
[15] The first question, then, is how strong is the government’s interest here? Precedent supplies a starting point: “The government undoubtedly has the right to provide for fair elections and to enact reasonable regulations in pursuit thereof.” Ex parte Irishmen, re: Voting Rights of Provisional Citizens at [14]. A regulation is reasonable, we’ve held, if it is “tailored to an actual or reasonable threat.” Ibid. For example, we’ve acknowledged that Parliament may well be able to intervene “where there is reason to believe that a particular person is inducing an influx of new citizens to serve his own ends.” Ibid.
[16] The situation here falls squarely within the situation discussed in Ex parte Irishmen. The sponsor of the voter registration law identified a problem—certain powerful members of a political party appear to be inducing people to sign up as citizens for the sole purpose of coming to the polls on election day, with no other tie to our community. To solve that problem, a voter registration system would require these persons to take one extra step: make a single post in a designated area at some point before an election is called. In other words, thirty seconds of time is all it takes to guarantee access to the polls. Such a minimal burden is undoubtedly reasonable.
[17] It sounded pretty reasonable to our predecessors, too. As we have previously explained in an informal legal question, the Second Constitution—like the current one—secured a right to vote for all citizens. And notwithstanding that guarantee, legislation was enacted to create a voter registration regime shortly after the Second Constitution’s ratification, just as one had existed under the First Constitution. That is good evidence that the people who first decided to put the right to vote into the Constitution saw no problem with voter registration. And because those same people soon enacted the Third Constitution, which contained the exact same guarantee, we can infer that this understanding (i.e., that voter registration is a reasonable infringement) carried over. See Blackstone v HM Government at III; Steps v Regional Security Council at I. Finally, the legislative history of the Fourth Constitution makes plain the no substantive changes were intended with regard to the right to vote. Thus, we are governed by Constitutional language that seven years’ worth of citizens understood as permitting a reasonable voter registration system, if Parliament chose to enact one. “Where a challenged practice has deep roots stretching back to our very first Constitution,” we find such history “dispositive.” Ex parte Irishmen, re: Voting Rights of Provisional Citizens at [16].
[18] Further still, our cases are rife with the proposition that we give due deference to Parliament’s understanding of the Constitution because this Court does not have a monopoly on constitutional interpretation. See Blackstone v HM Government at III; HM Government v Carson at III (North, CJ, concurring); British Centrist Party v Mikaelson at I-C (North, CJ, concurring); St.James v Speaker Stewart at II-C (non-precedential); see also Constance St.James, The Supreme Court as Lawmaker? Rethinking the Interpretive Power of the Judiciary at II, UKJLP 1.1 (June 2013); Constance St.James, Constitutional Law: A Guidebook at III. Thus, “courts of this region have long recognized” that “the Constitution should not lightly be read to frustrate the efficient execution of public policy.” Ex parte HRH Prince James, re: Treaties at [8] (citing Vinograd v Mountbatten at [20]).
[19] Everyone seems to agree that if Parliament wanted, it could make posting a requirement of citizenship. That is, Parliament would be well within its power to require everyone to make a post, once per election cycle, in a specified thread, or else lose citizenship. After all, “[t]he Constitution does not set out the criteria for citizenship,” but instead “contemplates that judgments about these criteria will largely be left to the political process.” Ex parte Irishmen, re: Voting Rights of Provisional Citizens at [4]. So if Parliament could strip people of their citizenship for failure to make a particular post, why can’t it use that same criteria to distinguish voting-eligible citizens from others? So long as every citizen has a full and fair opportunity to satisfy the obligation, Parliament can do so. Otherwise, our law would elevate form over substance.
[20] We note finally that our conclusion today is entirely consistent with Ex parte Irishmen and Talleyrand v Fraser. Those decisions dealt with questions about the scope of the government’s power to implement rules stripping the franchise from persons on account of their newness to the region, and we acknowledged in each decision that such adverse action on the basis of a status was incompatible with the Constitution. Here, we decide only that the Constitution allows a neutral system of registration that treats all persons equally without regard to status defined by time in the region, but instead attaches consequences to conduct.
For the foregoing reasons, the judgment of the Crown Court entered in this matter on 11 December 2017 is VACATED, this judgment issues in lieu thereof, and the questions presented are answered in the NEGATIVE.
WESTBURY and TALLEYRAND dissent for the reasons stated in the original panel opinion.
3. The BBC Board of Directors is independent of the Government in their actions, but are initially appointed by the Government. Once appointed, they must act independently.
4. City of London Charter Act The City of London Charter Act (2017)
An Act to establish a municipal government for London.
The Parliament assembled, with the grace of His Majesty King Charles III, hereby enacts as follows:
I. Short Title
(1) This Act may be cited as the "London Charter."
II. General Provisions
(1) There shall be established a municipal government for the London section of the forum, comprising the following subforums:
(a) The West End; (b) The Red Lion; (c) Central London; (d) British Broadcasting Corporation; (e) University of United Kingdom.
(2) Except where otherwise provided by law, the municipal government for London shall have the authority to enact ordinances regulating all activities within its jurisdiction.
(3) There shall be a City Hall established in The West End for the purpose of carrying out the municipal government's business.
III. The London City Council
(1) The legislative body for the London municipal government shall be the London City Council, which shall comprise all citizens of United Kingdom.
(2) The presiding officer for the London City Council shall be the Mayor of London.
(3) The London City Council shall have the authority to adopt its own rules of procedure; provided that the initial rules of procedure may be adopted only after affording at least 24 hours of debate time and 24 hours of voting time.
(4) Upon the enactment of any ordinance by the London City Council, as certified by the Mayor of London, the ordinance shall have effect immediately, unless the ordinance shall specify otherwise.
IV. Mayor of London
(1) The chief executive for the City of London shall be the Mayor of London, who shall be elected in a municipal election five days after the enactment of this Act, and every thirty days thereafter. Any citizen may stand for election as Mayor of London, and the candidate who shall obtain the most votes in the municipal election shall be deemed elected. In the event of a tie, the London City Council shall elect the Mayor of London from among those individuals who tied for the greatest number of votes, with the Prime Minister presiding over such deliberations. The London City Council may enact further provisions regulating the municipal election, including but not limited to varying the length of a term of office, calling for early elections, or removing the Mayor from office.
(2) The London City Council may, by ordinance, establish further executive offices for the London municipal government.
(3) The Mayor of London will not be able to simultaneously occupy any of the following offices: - Member of Parliament - Lord of Parliament - Cabinet, including Prime Minister
(4) Should the Mayor be elected or appointed to any position aforementioned in Article IV, Section (3) they shall cease to hold the office of Mayor of London, with all powers and authority invested in the Mayor transferring to the individual next designated to assume the office by law.
V. London Courts
(1) The London City Council may, by ordinance, establish a municipal court system with jurisdiction over all cases and controversies arising in London, under its ordinances, or under this Act. Such court shall be inferior to the Crown Court and the House of a Lords, both of which shall share concurrent original jurisdiction with any municipal court. In the absence of a municipal court, all cases and controversies that would otherwise fall within the jurisdiction of the municipal courts shall be within the jurisdiction of the regional courts.
(2) Any judgement of the municipal court may be appealed to the regional courts pursuant to the relevant laws and procedures. The Crown Court, by majority vote (or, in the absence of an odd number of judges, by and through the Chief Judge), may promulgate rules respecting the administration of appeals from the municipal court system.
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