Criminal Regions and Organisations Act

[Belschaft]

We are currently in the rather weird situation that people can be members of regions or organisations that are hostile to or even at war with The South Pacific - even hold leadership roles in those groups - and yet there is no mechanism to prevent them from attempting to join and subvert TSP. I propose the the adoption of legislation that will allow the Assembly to declare such groups criminal organisations, and prohibit membership of - in short, to prevent their members from being able to join TSP. My draft bill currently looks like the following, and is intended to form Article 9 of the Code of Laws;

 

 

Article 9: Criminal Regions and <b>Organisations</b>

1. The Cabinet and CSS may request the Assembly designate regions and organisations deemed hostile to The South Pacific as Criminal Groups
   
2. Membership of a designated Criminal Group is prohibited within The South Pacific and grounds for immediate revocation of citizenship
   
3. Membership of a designated Criminal Group does not constitute a criminal offence; failure to disclose such membership shall constitute fraud
   
4. Regions at war with The South Pacific shall be automatically considered Criminal Groups; The Assembly may further designate Criminal Groups via a vote with a 60% majority in favor, should the Cabinet or CSS request such a designation
   
5. The following regions and organisations are deemed Criminal Groups within The South Pacific; The Greater German Reich, Gatesville
   

[Sandaoguo]

"Criminal Group" seems a lot like "Group Majority of Assembly Doesn't Like."

What regions and organizations are you targeting with this? Why not place conditions on which groups can be added, such as requiring actual "criminal" activities against TSP?

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[Belschaft]

I mention two specific groups - Gatesville and the GGR - who we are at war with, and the main mechanism for groups to be deemed criminal would be the existence of a state of war, carrying automatic Criminal Group designation. Beyond that, I trust the political maturity of The Assembly to only designate genuinely hostile regions or organisations as Criminal Groups.

 

This is a relatively simple matter of enacting a formal Persona Non Grata provision, allowing TSP to close its borders to those we are at war with or have hostile relations with.

[Sandaoguo]

I didn't mean specific groups, but rather which TYPES of groups. While the Assembly might be mature (reasonable people could argue otherwise), there's no shortage of witch hunts to point to in our history and in NS in general. This type of law, as currently structured, would enable those by giving legal cover for what is essentially running people out of the region when they're not popular at that point in time.

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[Belschaft]

Except that there is no provision for targeting individuals under my proposed legislation. It could only be used to run someone out of the region if it was massively and blatantly abused, something that I do not think is likely to occur or to succeed even if it was tried. The only way it could be abused like you're suggesting is to declare an entire region or organisation as a Criminal Group, having identified one which the targeted individual and no one else in TSP is a member of.

[Sandaoguo]

Let's not pretend that targeting an entire group because of one individual doesn't happen all the time in this game.

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[Belschaft]

Care to give me an example of it occurring in TSP?

[Unibot]

UDL, Lazarus, TRR, TWP ...

[Belschaft]

Those are interesting 'examples'. I can think of at least five TRR government members who were aware of Devon's identity during the coup. TWP largely supported the declaration of war against TSP in 2011, and on more than one occasion has recognized couper-regimes here. The entirety of Lazarus' un-purged citizenry collaborated in the NPO's purge of the region, and Feux and Harmonia both acted in bad faith towards TSP by egregiously breaching the treaty between our regions. As for UDL, whilst your own actions are certainly the most objectionable, I can think of plenty of other members who have given TSP reason to distrust it, including those  UDL-TSP 'citizens' who's sole action on these forums consisted of voting against legislation you opposed.

 

Next?

[Sandaoguo]

The point of this law is to remove citizenship for those who are members of groups and regions that pose a serious, actualized security threat to our region. So the law should say so. It should have a provision about what constitutes a Criminal Group. The Cabinet should be included, as the Cabinet and the CSS are the primary organs that make determinations about security threats.

 

I don't think those requests are unreasonable. You can't guarantee that the Assembly will always act reasonably. You won't be here forever to overlook the Assembly, and you can't control it anyways. So we need restraints. Otherwise this proposed law is simply too broad. You just listed a bunch of groups and people that don't actually pose real security threats. They just annoy you and you distrust them. That doesn't bode well for how this law would be applied once passed!

[Belschaft]

Except that I was directly responding to Unibot listing those groups Glen. I am not suggesting that we declare TRR a Criminal Group.

 

Changed the wording to require the CSS or Cabinet to propose a group being so designated.

[Kris Kringle]

If it is already mentioned that groups at war with us are already considered criminal groups, isn't it redundant to include the GGR and Gatesville in the last part of the proposal?

[Belschaft]

The last line is designed to keep track of all Criminal Groups; were we to go to war with another region or the Assembly designate one as such they would be added on at the end, similar to the CSS line of succession.

[tsunamy]

I'll throw my support behind this -- it's a good idea.

[Escade]

GR, can you revise the text to be more precise? 

 

I wonder if we can add a clause that the delegate can eject nations from the region who are part of a criminal organization. Such as the Nazi spammer nation who I banjected, it would be great if that was officially in the law that the delegate can do that.

[QuietDad]

Would it be a better idea just to have the CSS maintain a list instead of making it part of the laws? I just in-vision lengthy thread of Assembly debate changing the laws to add or remove a region/faction to Article 2.5. I stand by the concept and would support it. Just throwing in a different way of dealing with it. This also ends up with the CSS clamping down on someone/something as someone joins a group that becomes a "But they weren't on the list!" debate. Once again, just thinking out loud,

[Belschaft]

Hell, I'm only too happy if you guys want to give SB, Fudgie, B&N and myself the power to declare anyone we like criminals. I would have proposed that myself but I never thought I'd get away with it without being lynched.

[Sandaoguo]

I'll post revised language when I get home tonight. I'm not suggesting putting a ton of authority in the hands of the Cabinet and the CSS, just to include them in the process.

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[QuietDad]

Word it this way. The CSS maintains the list but the Assembly can remove a region/nation/group from the list by vote. Seems we would have the occasional "This nation shouldn't be on the list" debates instead of the daily I found another one!" debates. Again, either way. I'm thinking out loud and trying to avoid long threads that end up off track and questioning other.

[tsunamy]

Word it this way. The CSS maintains the list but the Assembly can remove a region/nation/group from the list by vote. Seems we would have the occasional "This nation shouldn't be on the list" debates instead of the daily I found another one!" debates. Again, either way. I'm thinking out loud and trying to avoid long threads that end up off track and questioning other.

 

Someone correct me if I'm wrong ... but its the regions that would be considered hostile, not particular nations. That would cut down the debate and/or discussion since this would only come into play during extraordinary circumstances.

[Cormac]

Full support of this proposal.

[Tim]

Although I can see reason for this, and could definitely stand behind it, I worry about some of the precedent that this may set for the future.

 

I'm personally waiting to see GR's revised draft before making an opinion on the proposal; as I do agree with many of his sentiments on the bill. 

[QuietDad]

 

<blockquote class="ipsBlockquote" data-author="QuietDad" data-cid="115861" data-time="1391648716">
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Word it this way. The CSS maintains the list but the Assembly can remove a region/nation/group from the list by vote. Seems we would have the occasional "This nation shouldn't be on the list" debates instead of the daily I found another one!" debates. Again, either way. I'm thinking out loud and trying to avoid long threads that end up off track and questioning other.

 

Someone correct me if I'm wrong ... but its the regions that would be considered hostile, not particular nations. That would cut down the debate and/or discussion since this would only come into play during extraordinary circumstances.

 

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Regions and organizations  I'm assuming since that was in the original draft. Again I was thinking out loud and thru in nation..

[Belschaft]

Unless someone has a proposed alteration for this, I would like to motion to vote.

[QuietDad]

Seconded