Verdict
IN THE FEDERAL COURT OF THE COMMONWEALTH OF REDMONT
Milkcrack v. Commonwealth [2022] FCR 42
I. PLAINTIFF’S POSITION
1. The Best Ballot Act does not constitute a complex change, as the Allegiance Act was declared to not be a complex change.
2. It received at least 2/3 of votes that were cast in the House and the Senate, meeting the supermajority requirement for constitutional amendments.
3. The bill was also put up for public referendum, which it passed.
4. The bill thus met all of the requirements for a standard constitutional amendment, and should have been included in the Constitution from that point on.
5. The bill was not included in the Constitution and marked, incorrectly, as rejected.
II. DEFENDANT’S POSITION
1. The Best Ballot Act is indeed a complex change, as it restricts the constitutional right to run for public office.
2. The bill received only 5 ayes in the House of Representatives, meaning it did not pass the required supermajority.
3. The bill then went on to receive only 18/29 ayes in the public referendum, meaning it also did not pass the public referendum supermajority mandated by the Constitution.
4. By these virtues the bill was correctly marked rejected.
III. COURT’S OPINION
1. The bill in question was a rights and freedoms change. I will elaborate on this further:
- According to the opinion of then-Chief Justice xEndeavour in the ruling on hugebob23456 v. Commonwealth [2022] SCR 2, “I am of the opinion that this was not a complex change as it did not change the nature of the status quo. There bill did not make a change to rights and freedoms, it made a reasonable limitation that is justified in a free and democratic society.”
- The opinion was that the Allegiance Act did not alter dramatically the nature of the status quo. The Best Ballot Act, however, would greatly alter the current state of affairs.
- The Allegiance Act and the Best Ballot Act both seek to establish a higher standard of government, but they go about this in very different ways. The Allegiance Act uses a minor limitation that is solely temporary in nature in order to prevent a direct conflict. The temporality is the important part of this that separates the two Acts. The limitations imposed by the Allegiance Act expire once the individual is no longer holding the office elsewhere. A candidate could be a farmer in Redmont the whole time and then run for President as soon as they are no longer holding said office, since the limit is temporary.
- The Best Ballot Act, by contrast, relies on establishing prerequisite positions to hold before running for certain public office. This is not temporary like the Allegiance Act, and could permanently prevent many individuals from ever running for these public offices. The pool of people who have held or are holding the listed positions that meet the prerequisites is fairly small, compared to the total number of people in Redmont. This by extension drastically limits the number of people who can ever run for the proposed restricted offices.
- By this standard, this bill is a major rights and freedoms change, and thus a complex change.
2. The bill did pass the supermajority in the House of Representatives, as the Legislative Standards Act declares that the quorum will be dynamic to compensate for abstentions. The bill received 5 ayes out of 7 votes cast, meeting the standard for a supermajority.
3. While the bill passed with the required supermajority in the Senate, it failed in the public referendum, with only 18 ayes out of 29 votes cast total. This falls clearly short of the 2/3 supermajority required given that the bill is a complex rights and freedoms change.
IV. VERDICT
I hereby find in favor of the Defendant that the bill was rejected by the standards of the Constitution. The bill will not go into effect.
The Court thanks both parties for their time. This case is now adjourned.