Legislative Framework:: Consistency of Legislation -------------------------- No statute can be constructed, nor continue to stand, which directly contradicts standing and applicable statutes, except that a legislature can repeal and amend laws of its own creation. No one can be held liable for violating a statute if adherence to that statute would preclude adherence to another standing and applicable statute. Hierarchical Applicability of Legislation ----------------------------------------- Standing legislation applies to all people within the scope of that legislature, and constrains legislation made by any legislature with a scope contained by the scope of the legislature which created the legislation. The legislation of a particular legislature does not constrain or apply to legislation created by a legislature whose scope contains and is larger than, or does not overlap with, the scope of the particular legislature. A particular legislature must, therefore, amend or repeal statutes which are rendered inconsistent by the passage of a statute created by a legislature whose scope is larger than and contains the scope of the particular legislature. Rationality of Legislation -------------------------- No instrument of state policy can name, enumerate, be founded upon in whole or in part, explicitly permit or prohibit, honor or disparage, or otherwise refer to any belief or belief system, in whole or in part, which is not founded wholly and exclusively upon the physical laws of nature, the inferred principles of causal logic, and the principles enumerated in this document, principles which draw wholly and exclusively upon the physical laws of nature, the inferred principles of causal logic, and the empirical and inferred nature of the human mind. All instruments of state policy must be accompanied by a document which justifies the instrument and all portions thereof through enumeration of the principles, as expressed in this document, upon which it is founded, and the unbroken logical progression by which the instrument is drawn from these principles. No instrument of state policy, can be enacted or applied if it is not justified satisfactorily by such causal enumeration of founding principles. Retroactivity of Legislative Reformation ---------------------------------------- No one can be imprisoned under a statute which has been repealed, or amended such that the individual could not be convicted under now-standing law. The option of a new trial must be offered to anyone imprisoned under a statute which has been replaced or subsumed. Time incarcerated for a conviction which could not be achieved under now-standing law must be appropriately compensated, through public exoneration and refund/nullification of all payments paid/liabilities assumed by the falsely convicted party incurred through the cost of imprisonment. No one can be charged with violating a statute if that statute was not standing at the time the actions comprising the crime took place. Structure of the Legislatures ----------------------------- An elected, proportionally representative legislature can be associated with each unit of state. Each eligible voter can vote for any one candidate in the election of representatives. Each legislature is characterized by the number of voters eligible to vote in elections for that legislature (definitionally, the weight of the legislature), and by the minimum proportion of votes necessary for a candidate to become an office holder. The proportion determines the absolute maximum size of the legislature, and is furthermore such that the legislature tends in practice to have the desired size, which in practice is far smaller than what is theoretically possible. The proportion must be at most 5%. Legislative elections last for two weeks. At the end of the two weeks, the candidates who remain unelected cease to be candidates, and the remaining candidates become legislators. In parliamentary voting, the vote a representative casts in a particular quorum is given as an integral percentage expressing degree of agreement with the bill at issue. A representative's vote is assigned a weight proportional to the number of voters who voted for him. The unrounded (precise to within one part in one billion) product of the agreement index and the weight of that representative is the definition of a vote-weight. The national legislature is characterized by a minimum proportion for election of .2%, subject to amendment. Creation of Legislation ----------------------- The total weight of a legislature is the number of citizens eligible to vote for a representative in that legislature. A representative can sponsor debate on up to one bill a week but not more. Sponsoring representatives can submit for debate and voting any bill for which they have collected the sponsoring signatures of greater than 10% of the total weight of the legislature (the sum of the representative weight of each signatory, divided by the total weight of the legislature, multiplied by 100%, must exceed 10%). The signatures do not bind the subsequent votes of the signatory representatives, since it is debate that is being sponsored, and amendment is part and parcel of the debate process. Within each series of twenty days of full meetings of the legislature, a representative can consume as he desires, an amount of speaking time before the full legislature equal to his weight (as a fraction) multiplied by the total amount of time of full legislative meeting included in those twenty days, which must be at least 100 hours. Time not consumed thereby is consumed by the president of the house, who can at his discretion put the legislature in recess in lieu of consuming the time. Time is consumed by speaking (often as part of debate) by the controller of the time, or by assigning it (with the possibility of reclaiming remaining time when and as desired) in whole or in part to other legislators or providers of testimony. A legislature approves a bill, making of it a statute, if the vote-weights cast for less the vote-weights cast against exceed 50% of the total weight of the legislature. The bill must then pass court review, wherein a majority of the judges of the highest court within the scope of the legislature is capable of rejecting the bill by formally explaining how it violates existing law - necessarily including a violation of the requirements ofand . If it is not vetoed by this court, then after a one week period wherein citizens can view the final bill and vote for or against the bill; if the votes against less the votes for exceeds 25% of the registered voters within the scope of the relevant legislature, the bill is scrubbed by popular veto. If it is not scrubbed by popular veto, the bill then becomes a statute and must be enforced. A citizen can through any cryptographically accountable logistical means empower legislation of his own creation. There is no limit to the number of bills a citizen can at any particular time be working to pass. If the votes for exceeds 62.5% of voters registered to vote within the scope of the relevant legislature, and the bill passes court review, the bill becomes statute. An identical process can be used to repeal or amend standing statutes. When a member of a legislature votes to create, empower, or enrich a state position, he cannot himself occupy that position until at least two years following departure from membership in said legislature. The Prsident of the House ------------------------- The legislator with the greatest vote-weight is the president of the house. The president of the house directs and orchestrates full assemblies of the house, according to law, and where law provides insufficient guidance, according to his wits.