Why is the constitution this broken?

Firestone Discussion
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The section in question is Article III - Judicial Operations, Section 1.

In the old Constitution before “An Amendment to Facilitate Bailiffs” it read:

SECTION I.
The Judicial Branch shall contain the Supreme Court and the District Court. The Supreme Court shall consist of the Chief Court Justice and six (6) Associate Justices of the Supreme Court. The District Court shall consist of at least four (4) District Justices, otherwise simply regarded as Court Justices. Further courts may be created by Congress through appropriate legislation. The Chief Court Justice is merely the head of the Judicial Branch, however, does not hold any extensive power over its members. The terms “Justice” and “Judge” refers to any member of the District Court, or the Supreme Court. The term “Judiciary” refers to the Judicial Branch, which shall be composed of only and all of Judges.

In the newest Constitution since that amendment, it reads:

SECTION I.
The Judicial Branch (also referred to as the Judiciary) shall be established; and shall contain the Supreme Court and the District Court. Congress may establish subsidiaries of the Judiciary through proper legislation that are not court circuits. The Supreme Court shall consist of the Chief Court Justice and six (6) Associate Justices of the Supreme Court. Further courts may be created through further legislation. The Chief Court Justice shall be the official head of the Judicial branch- however they shall not retain any special power over any judge within the Judicial Branch that is not dictated by the Constitution or further law. The terms “Justice” and “Judge” shall refer to any member of a court within the State of Firestone.

This amendment was designed to recognise bailiffs and could not even do that. It removed the need for ANY person to serve the District Court. It did change that the Judiciary shall be made up of more than just Judges but, of whom else. It also then raises the questions of:

  1. What are the powers instilled in Bailiffs, and
  2. Do they to belong to a single Court or the entire branch.

It also means that if they are a member of any court, they should be referenced as “Justice” or “Judge”. How is this even facilitating Bailiffs in any sense? The entire amendment is absurd, and I am concerned it managed to pass through congress.

How someone can write an amendment that completely fails at its intended role just astounds me, because it also means the Courts can operate without a single District Court Judge ever serving the court. It could operate purely from Supreme Court Justices and the Chief Court Justice, which makes absolutely no sense. I simply ask lawmakers to work with the Courts to find a fix to this bizarre mess, danke.

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Yeah, who cares. Technically the Supreme Court should also consist of 6 Justices, obviously that hasn’t happened – adding unachievable requirements doesn’t do anything.

This was supposed to be expanded on by legislation, and rightfully so. There shouldn’t be a bailiff section in the Constitution. As the amendment states, this should facilitate bailiffs. A few years ago I had proposed/prepared a bailiff law but that’s since fallen through the cracks as bailiffs are practically useless now.

To be defined by Congress.

They belong to a subsidiary under the Judiciary, not to a court. Court =/= Judiciary.

A court is not the same as being a member of the Judicial Branch, a court is a circuit established by the Constitution or an inferior court (like the County Court) established by legislation. They are not members of a court, rather a member of a subsidiary of the Judiciary.

Yup. Sure is. An Amendment requiring a minimum number of DCJs doesn’t do anything and doesn’t help at all. Theoretically this can happen, but who cares. This is also what happened when Skye and Jef were literally the only Justices on the Court.

It’s not really a mess. As I’ve explained, this is facilitating the creation of legislation to create a bailiff subsidiary under the Judiciary. This never happened but before the Amendment the defining of bailiffs was impossible as the realm of the Judiciary could not be expanded on by legislation other than the creation of inferior courts. The old section also detailed that the Chief Justice did not have any power over the members of the Judiciary so even if Congress had established a bailiff ‘court’ the Chief Justice could not regulate them under the Constitution.

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Admittedly then the issues falls to, why did the bill never come to fruition? If this much effort was put into an amendment.

But you see, this isn’t remotely the attitude to be had. If you permit the DCJ to operate with Nil justices, you cause a direct backlog for the Supreme Court, or you cause the District Court to become a ghost town. Now while it’s unlikely, a preventative measure would be to place a minimum requirement, like there was initially. It also means that the Judiciary can plan for the future when members leave so that recommendations can easily be made for the next best person.

Again, if this is the attitude you take, then there’s an issue. Your colleagues, Ogax and Skye, had recently made comments regarding the workload and a waning desire to keep on the Bench because of it. If you’re now here to say “Yeah, who cares” to a requirement which would force work to be spread out so that the courts can operate smoothly, then by god why is the Judicial Branch thinking that’s acceptable?

I also take issue to “unachievable requirements” when it can be easily achieved. There used to be an old Judicial Mentorship Program, it could easily be restarted especially coming up to the start of the Judicial Branches 5th term in late March, which could see many new faces be brought up for discussions of joining the Supreme Court. This could very easily extend to the District Court.

This is from someone who wants to aid the branch so you aren’t carrying 28 cases constantly on your docket, and so that there are more people to help work and keep the workflow smooth.

Again, yes there was needed changes to the constitution, but this facilitation amendment has made it easier for the District Court to fall into a poor state, and I’d like to also say yes the Supreme Court should have it’s 6 seats filled. So yes it needed to be changed but, no change actually came from it, and as you said they’re “practically useless now”, so why not focus on dealing with other things that are useful, like not creating a major backlog in the Supreme or District Courts?

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but then there won’t be any District Court Judges anymore…

I don’t think you realise that Judges don’t just appear out of thin air. Sure you could probably appoint a few more attorneys as judges, but then you have practically no private attorneys or attorneys in the DoJ. In that case you could also have a situation where every licensed attorney is working for the DoJ or the DA’s Office, which is also not a very desirable situation.
If you want to have more judges, you need more licensed attorneys. If you want more licensed attorneys, you need more people who are capable of passing the bar exam. You can’t just make people who are able to pass the bar exam appear, and no a law school or law classes also won’t help fix this issue, as people need a few skills that can’t be taught to be good attorneys.

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Why is the constitution this broken?

because it was written in 2016 when firestone was still a very small developing state by people who at the time didn’t have the same comprehension of the government and firestone as we have now.

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Literally no one cares and no one will follow random ‘minimum requirements’. They are unenforceable.

Because it’s not enforceable and won’t help at all? What are you gonna do? Sue the Judiciary for not having enough Judges? Even when this was in the Constitution there were still barely enough DCJs to fulfill the requirement, because it doesn’t matter. Judges don’t appear because they HAVE to serve. Ridiculous.

I don’t think the JMP is recruiting Associate Justices. But yes, DCJs are seekable through the program. I don’t know how it operates.

You’re not aiding anything by saying that apparently putting a few clauses in the Constitution rEqUiRiNg this many DCJs will help activity. Are you listening to yourself?

LOL you’re blaming the poor-ish state of the Judiciary on this random Amendment which barely anyone has even noticed? Idk what you’re on about man, this has nothing to do with it… To be honest I completely forgot this even existed

Wtf? You do realize this amendment was passed more than a year ago, this is a completely irrelevant Section of the Constitution and has nothing to do with the Judiciary anymore???

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I’d say I do realise that Judges don’t just appear out of thin air.

I have to say, there are definitely a lot more people in FS capable of being attorneys, and then being appointed as Justices. But the thing is, the BAR exam is quite inaccessible. Ask most people in the community and they have no clue where to find it or who to speak to about it, you open up to more people and hopefully that’ll encourage those capable to do it. Yes there is the high standard required, but there should be more of a Mentorship program as was run previously, as well as a proper school.

Will it fix every issue? No, but it can definitely help to try solve the issue of the ever decreasing amount of BAR certified individuals. But yes I do understand there is an element of balancing who works where so that we still have actual attorneys and Judges, but I do also believe that the branch has been quite walled off to the world, and usually harsh on critiques of it. Not that it’s a bad thing but, there can be some definite changes to it without compromising the skills and abilities of Judges.

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It’s not an issue with the actual constitution given when FS was founded, it’s the amendments to it. As such they’re considered a part of the constitution thus “Why is the constitution this broken?”.

But yes, there is a definitive change between the two, and can be seen through the calls for an entirely new constitution to be drafted and put into affect with everything we’ve learnt.

I’ll just tack on my response to kerbal here too:

@thekerbal

Your entire response seems both quite heated and missing the mark. It might be a “irrelevant section of the constitution” but it definitely has an impact on the Judiciary, under Article 3 Section 1, which literally sets the Courts.

No. I’m saying this amendment could make it much easier to fall into a poor state not that it’s been the reason for it’s recent state. Please read what is typed. To respond to your other sections, I bring it up not as “oh if you bring it up it’ll help”, its to say, all parts of the constitution should be acted upon. If you don’t reasonable think it can be done, then amend it like they did. Because either way, you can look at it and disagree with what is written and change it, or disagree, complain and then have someone go and enforce it later.

Regarding the JMP, I was suggesting it be extended to include recruiting Associate Justices either from DCJ’s or completely new individuals.

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Then do the bar and consult with Skye.

…Because the majority of the community doesn’t want to be involved in the legal spectrum? It’s literally announced and @ everyone’d every month and is always the 1st-7th of every month, how hard can it be? If you have trouble following that then you probably shouldn’t be a lawyer

Partly agreed.

People don’t want to become bar certified because they don’t want to input the effort required for it and Firestone is becoming ever more like nUSA – the division between the game and the community is starting to show and people don’t like the legal community anymore. A law school could help, but people who join a law school to learn Firestone law often don’t put enough effort into learning on their own and will probably never be really great lawyers.

There’s barely enough BCAs who both want to and are capable of becoming judges and who clearly aspire to become one. We’re harsh on critique because the majority of claims levied against us are unfounded and made by people who have little knowledge of our branch.

I don’t really know what this means, but sure

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Considering it’s been in place for over a year now… no. This won’t impact a thing.

Sure, progressive amendments to fix issues is the responsibility of Congress. Rescinding a 4-year old document completely is not the responsibility of Congress or any authority, but apparently no one cares

Idk

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“Not that it’s a bad thing (to be harsh on critiques)” I’m saying that sometimes you should take them onboard, instead of just constantly battling them.

Last Bar exam was hosted December 2020, before it, August 2020. It’s not every month, it appears to be bi-yearly now shifting from the monthly schedule. By doing that you limit members who join between those months who might come for the legal side but get turned away because there is no chance to get in between them.

You’re absolutely right, but the division isn’t just against the legal community, it’s against most of the state (in regards to departments and the Cops vs Robbers mentality of FS). So I do also understand that feeling, but have there been steps taken to make people want to be in the legal community? Can’t just say “yeah they don’t like us anymore, guess it’s over” when it isn’t even over yet.

Again true, but it ties into the point you partly agreed with, there needs to be a better system to entice people in being bar certified, again either mentorship of a law school.

In an ideal world it wont, but do you want it to the defense for half a year down the line when people are asking “why aren’t there any DCJ’s at all anymore, and why is the District Court just sorta lying there, lifeless in the backroom?” It may be slightly far-fetched but, it doesn’t hurt to take preventative measures, even just the inclusion of “The District must house at least one (1) District Court Judge”.

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That is… blatantly false. There has been a bar exam every month the 1st till 7th. 5 days ago the January results were announced. There were exams in December, November, October, September, and so on. I don’t know where you got that from…

If people don’t like the legal mentality they shouldn’t be lawyers. There’s nothing we can do to change that. It’s the way Firestone works.

Yes, the law school is a missed opportunity, but there aren’t many people willing to lead it as far as I know. iirc, the students also weren’t really too engaged in law.

People are judges because they want to. If no one wants to be a judge, no one WILL be a judge. There’s nothing to change that. There’s no encouragement we can give. If the District Court is lazy or inactive, so be it. Each judge is their own judger, they make their own decisions and resign if they no longer enjoy it. Putting that in the Constitution is pretty much a fancy way of saying ‘pls guys pls keep 1 judge ty’, it has no effect. If judges use that as an excuse then so be it. They resign because they dont want the job. There’s no hard politics here, that’s the end

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M’lad, that is but blatantly false. Also before you go and use the defense “but it was in the Courts Discord” thats the problem, not many people will just instantly go and join it, even if they’re involved in the legal side of things. Christ I used to hold a bar cert and I definitely did not join the discord prior to me applying for it. It needs to be announced in the most public of all places in FS, the main discord for everyone.

Not asking you to re-invent the legal system to appease them, but I’m talking more about community outreach, talking and enabling better sharing of knowledge from Judges, BCA’s to citizens. It can give them a better insight into the job and more often than not people will be more intrigued. I started discussing the work of ASB to multiple people and I have a shortlist of at least 7 who I would like to bring onboard if required. Talking seems to work, even for a role that may only experience an investigation once every 1-2 months.

It does fall on the students to want to be engaged too, but was there anything we can learn from it to use for another attempt? In regards to willing to lead, what if it was directly run by the Judicial Branch, or ex-members from it. Gather the likes of hecxtro, Aidan, Ogax even and get them to run it or to build a curriculum for it so that others can take it and teach new members. Wouldn’t require a direct head but it needs at least some form of Mentorship.

You’re right, making the requirement won’t instantly fill it, nor will it make people want to just keep going or take it. But what it can do is set the minimum for a functioning Judicial Branch, which is what it should do. Not the hypothetical best case scenario, but to say “To make sure the role of the Judicial Branch is done to fulfill the basic needs of the people, you only need x number of Judges in these Courts to suffice.” Which, as I said before, means you can plan for if people are planning or looking to resign. So the CCJ can shuffle around people or request they take on more or less as required.

But as you say, “If no one wants to be a judge, no one WILL be a judge.” which is why I proposed the Mentorship program be looked into, the law school be restarted, and again to open up discussions more with the community. It could even see some crims go legal and want to become lawyers, adding in just that touch of bitterness for the system they need to do it well. The Judicial Branch, like the Banks, should be insured so that they cannot just instantly fail on the people, so I’d have to say if absolutely no one wanted to be a judge, someone would damn well be appointed for it.

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If you want to be a lawyer you should probably be in the DOJ Discord. It’s announced there every month and tagged.

I and I assure many of my colleagues would love to, but it’s both ethically and physically difficult to really do anything of the sorts.

If they want to lead it, they can absolutely. But every time it’s been attempted it just fell into a pit of inactivity.

/shrug, there’s many things the Judiciary could do to improve it but the reality is I don’t think many people would want to even be a Judge or lawyer. I’m going to make a quick poll to see what the community thinks.

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dawg they’re just words, aint this deep

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Fun fact: someone has actually sued the judiciary before.

Also, the Supreme Court of the United States has been sued on several occasions in U.S. District Court… (it does bring up the question… can SCOTUS as an entity sue/be sued?)…

Mireles v. Waco, 502 U.S. 9, 112 S. Ct. 286, 116 L. Ed. 2d 9, 1991 U.S. LEXIS 6225 – CourtListener.com (where a judge told cops to rough up someone who skipped court and was held not liable [of the resulting beating] because of immunity)

Supreme Court of Virginia v. Consumers Union :: 446 U.S. 719 (1980) :: Justia US Supreme Court Center (where the VA Supreme Court was sued on the basis of its rules in the U.S. Supreme Court…)

I’m trying to find one where SCOTUS was an actual party… they are all dismissed but its somewhere in the U.S. Court filings…

@dannybec do you know the cases I’m talking about?

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Unfortunately many half completed things such as this are pushed. The fact that this was passed without corresponding laws to make it complete just goes to show that the Legislative branch isn’t just about passing things but making sure the things you’re passing have been checked, and completed so that half done legislation that leave much to be desired don’t slip through while their counterparts fall through the cracks.

As far as discord goes, I know fed likes to say you should be able to participate in anything without being in discord but that’s just not possible with the current state of things, whether it be departments, or the courts. Almost every case is handled in discord and as such if you’re not in it you have no clue what’s happening. Trials aren’t often announced to the public, and even when they are not many are willing to sit and monitor a 3 month back and fourth, that has no real schedule and just kind of happens when things happen. The courts procedure have no appeal at all unless you like sitting and waiting to debate for months, and not many members of the courts care to help that nor can anyone force them.

It’s crazy that the courts haven’t been a lesson to the congress(In terms of public outreach), considering they’re adding sections in the new constitution to completely bypass having to have a quorum. So buckle up and get ready for things to have the possibility of passing with 1-2 people voting on trello with no meeting at all as long as 24 hours passes. Game sessions surely will happen less often once and if it passes.

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It was meant to remove the constitutional issue of bailiffs serving under the Judiciary. What Skye did with it was her prerogative, seeing as there haven’t been many in-game trials it hasn’t been an issue.

It’s not a bizarre mess it’s just something left open for revision later. There’s many other reasons to comment on why our Constitution is shit but my amendment isn’t one of them

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I think every judge on the bench agrees that in game trials are better, and I personally am trying for every case, it just doesn’t work out

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I appreciate that some of you at least try.

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