proj-liquidRepublic-bylaws-singlePage

This page contains the core text of bylaws or a charter/constitution for Fluid Democracy.

Please note that this core text must be augmented in order to create complete bylaws for an organization. First of all, some types of organizations, such as corporations, may be required by law to address various issues in their bylaws or charter which are not addressed here. Second, this core text purposefully leaves the following key questions unanswered:

• How are votes distributed to people? Is it one vote/one person? One vote/one share? Or something else? The core text refers to the "votes" of "voters" but does not say how the votes are distributed.

The topics in the previous bullet list can be addressed by combining this core text with one of: the for-profit corporation addendum, the non-profit addendum, or the government addendum. However, in your jurisdiction, in order to form valid bylaws or a valid charter, you may still be required by law to address other issues which are not addressed here.

In the following, the phrase the organization refers to the organization in whose charter/bylaws/constitution this text is incorporated.

The bylaws are available as a network of hypertext pages or as a single page.

THE CORE TEXT

Organizational structure

These bylaws define and structure the Organization.

The legislature sets policy by creating rules called "Acts". The Legislature is composed of three "houses", which are the Forum, the Elect Board, and the Delegate Board. The Forum uses direct democracy; the Boards are small bodies composed of representatives.

The CEO implements policy, with the exception of external affairs, which are handled by the EEO. The CEO and the EEO are appointed by the boardmembers.

The Court(s) interprets rules.

The Chairs investigate, with the aim of checking and restraining powerful elements within the Organization to ensure that the rules are followed.

Contents

• Legislative branch
  • Enacting a measure
  • Amending these bylaws
  • board rules of order
  • The three legislative houses
    • The forum
      • The forum's rules of order, for very small groups
      • The forum's rules of order, for larger groups
    • The elect board
      • The councils
    • The delegate board
• Executive branch
  • Executive function
  • the executive team and the external executive team
  • quasi-independent agencies
• Interpretive branch
  • the High Court
  • the Office of Procedure
  • the method of selection of Judges and Parliamentarians
• Oversight branch
  • the Chairs
• Various concepts and procedures
  • Effective group size
  • Electoral Cycle
  • External affairs
  • The Franchise
  • Freedom of voting
  • Major contracts
  • Order of precedence of types of rules
  • Rank
  • Recallable delegates
  • Removal from office
  • Renewable bills
  • Term limits
  • Transparency
  • Tying hands
  • Vote trading
  • Vote thresholds
• Glossary

todo!

under construction...

How ordinary acts may be enacted

An act other than an act to amend the bylaws may be enacted in one of four ways:

1. Adoption by one house with no veto: It is adopted by one of the three legislative houses, and not vetoed by either of the other two within the first 2 weeks that they are in session after the adoption of the first house.
2. Adoption by two houses over the objection of the third: It is adopted by two of the three legislative houses; the second adoption must be sooner than 3 months past the time when the measure was vetoed by the third house, if it was vetoed.

If there is only one house (the case for Small Regime, when there is only the Forum), adoption by one house is necessary and sufficient (there is no other house to veto).

If there are two houses (the case for Medium Regime, when there is only the Forum and the Elect Board), then this procedure is mostly the same, except that with no third house, only "Adoption by one house with no veto" is available.

Adoption by each house must be in accordance with the proper vote thresholds, which differ according to the type of measure.

By a simple majority, any house may refer any measure to the High Court to inquire about its legality. In this case, the two week "veto clock" is paused until the High Court returns its verdict. If the High Court does not return a verdict within 3 months, the measure is presumed legal.

A measure to veto is a standing poll, or main motion without debate, with a threshold of >50%. A successful veto causes the vetoed measure to be scheduled for debate in the house that vetoed; after the debate, if the measure now passes the house that vetoed, in unamended form, then the veto is retracted and the act is enacted (because at this point, two houses have adopted it). Therefore, the initial veto can also be thought of as a delay action.

Prohibited types of acts

The legislature is prohibited from creating or bestowing decorations, awards, or titles of honor, or from using the naming of times or places to call attention to or to honor, or for issuing proclamations, commemorations, recognitions, memorials, or dictating the names or pictures of coins or medals or stamps. The legislature may, however, fund awards which are created and bestowed by the senior Chair.

The legislature may not declare anyone to be guilty of breaking any rule, and may not impose punishment for breaking a rule. In such a situation, the legislature should instead prosecute the offender in the Court.

Definition of a textual length of a bill

In the following, a page of text is defined as 2000 characters (in some alphabet with approximately 26 letters, plus numbers and punctuation). However, parts of a bill which merely strike or eliminate text from existing rules (as opposed to modifying text or adding text) are not counted in this total.

Text quota

Each house of the legislature is associated with a number called its "text quota". Each day, each house's text quota is incremented by 20 pages, until it reaches a maximum of 200 pages. No house may pass any bill which is longer than its current text quota; bills which are "adopted" over quota are not considered to have been adopted, regardless of the views and records of that chamber. Upon the passage of any bill, each house's text quota is decremented by the length of the bill.

Reading time

No bill or amendment to a bill may be debated or voted upon until at least 10 minutes per page, excluding the first page, has elapsed after its presentation to the legislative body in the form in which it is to be voted upon (if a bill is presented and then amended, then, providing the time for reading the initial presented form and the amendments are satisfied, no additional time is needed for the amended form of the bill).

This "presentation" may be via posting in a designated spot on the internet and does not necessitate gaining the floor in any house of legislature.

How these bylaws may be amended

The bylaw amendment process is initiated when the Legislature adopts an amendment, as if it were adopting an Act, except by a 2/3s vote threshold.

Once initiated, the amendment is placed on the ballot. Two electoral cycles with respect to the amendment are defined as follows: the first cycle begins at the time that the amendment is voted upon, and ends after one electoral cycle duration has elapsed since that time. The second cycle begins at the end of the first cycle, and lasts for one electoral cycle duration past that time.

The amendment succeeds if, in the second cycle, the amendment is re-adopted in the same fashion.

Making an exception

By passing an Act with a vote threshold of 2/3, the legislature may make a single, specific exception to the Bylaws. This exception cannot have the effect of making it easier to amend or to make an exception to the bylaws. An exception is not counted towards the text quota. The exception expires one electoral cycle duration after it was made.

The Forum is a direct-democracy deliberative body composed of all of the voters. It is one of the three legislative houses.

Rules of order

The Forum's rules of order depend on the group Size Regime. When the Size Regime is Small, simplified rules of order apply. Otherwise, see the Forum's regular rules of order.

The Forum is administered by the Parliamentarians. Vote thresholds