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Well, technically the way it would be worded is that the Monarch would preside over the court, and then I could delegate that authority on down. I'm open to having either a dedicated Jarl or having one selected at random, though.

The idea of seniority is interesting because I know the Wisconsin Supreme Court for the longest time had their Chief Justice be their most senior member instead of conducting an election among the Court; I had imagined this to be a similar concept.

Consistency is an important thing to consider in favour of a dedicated position. But for such a ministry to be effective, and to justify its existence, it would require quite a bit more effort toward sustaining peace, not simply coming into action when required for a court case. I can easily see such a ministry struggling to find things to do.

As for delegating such a task to any Jarl, there are definite problems with that too, since (forgive me, Chanku, you're a useful fellow, but you know I don't particularly trust you ) not everyone is perceived as being equally trustworthy within the ministries.

The whole court debacle is something I was quite hesitant in touching upon, since we've never agreed on anything to do with it, and that is indeed what inspired my second proposal, since I just didn't have the energy to debate anyone about it again, and wanted to preserve positions that would easily fit in with the current system.

But on the other hand, in order to really reform and simplify the legislature we have to look at this issue...and at least all we have to consider is membership of judicial panels, not the entire judicial system again. And at the end of the day, I think essentially the presiding judge should come from the Monarchy and the two other judges should come from the legislative body in some fashion. That would seem to best preserve the intention of the original system.

The only real question is where in the Monarchy, and where in the legislative body?

Since the monarchy consists literally out of two people, the answer is clear: the monarch. Unless some sort of spiritual successor to the Overhusen is born.

As for members of the legislature, the Speaker and SPT seem appropriate, unless the Open Assembly decrees otherwise by creating an officer(s) dedicated to presiding over a court case.

I tend to include the entire Cabinet as the Monarchy as well, since it serves the Monarch.

Right now I'm thinking a member of the Monarchy, the Speaker, and a random member of the Storting that has voted on the last three issues (or two, or one if none have fulfilled that criteria). That way we have an appointed member, an elected member, and one chosen at random. We have one representing the Monarchy and two representing the body republic, just as it is now.

I tend to include the entire Cabinet as the Monarchy as well, since it serves the Monarch.

Right now I'm thinking a member of the Monarchy, the Speaker, and a random member of the Storting that has voted on the last three issues (or two, or one if none have fulfilled that criteria). That way we have an appointed member, an elected member, and one chosen at random. We have one representing the Monarchy and two representing the body republic, just as it is now.

I actually quite like that. It's like a fusion of the three ways. One thing, though, would Riksrad members be ok with that, though, since I'm sure some (particularly Pengu) may be too busy? Would it perhaps be easier to just appoint a specific person to serve this position -- sort of like a remnant of the OH?

Either they accept it as a potential responsibility of the position, or we create a new Riksråd Jarl position (the two Thanes would just be the other two justices serving on the court at the time)

I tend to include the entire Cabinet as the Monarchy as well, since it serves the Monarch.

Right now I'm thinking a member of the Monarchy, the Speaker, and a random member of the Storting that has voted on the last three issues (or two, or one if none have fulfilled that criteria). That way we have an appointed member, an elected member, and one chosen at random. We have one representing the Monarchy and two representing the body republic, just as it is now.

I actually quite like that. It's like a fusion of the three ways. One thing, though, would Riksrad members be ok with that, though, since I'm sure some (particularly Pengu) may be too busy? Would it perhaps be easier to just appoint a specific person to serve this position -- sort of like a remnant of the OH?

I think in that case, if we were too busy, we could allow a thane of ours to take our place?  While they weren't directly appointed by the Monarch himself, they were appointed by the Jarl...in which the Jarl directly serves the Monarch.

I tend to include the entire Cabinet as the Monarchy as well, since it serves the Monarch.

Right now I'm thinking a member of the Monarchy, the Speaker, and a random member of the Storting that has voted on the last three issues (or two, or one if none have fulfilled that criteria). That way we have an appointed member, an elected member, and one chosen at random. We have one representing the Monarchy and two representing the body republic, just as it is now.

I actually quite like that. It's like a fusion of the three ways. One thing, though, would Riksrad members be ok with that, though, since I'm sure some (particularly Pengu) may be too busy? Would it perhaps be easier to just appoint a specific person to serve this position -- sort of like a remnant of the OH?

Thought I'd pop in to say that I am fine with this, in-fact it works out quite well for everything Gerrik mentioned. I think it would be quite effective, it is a pretty nice blend of all the positions and ideals, so it should in theory provide a pretty diverse range of opinions, which is what you want for these positions.

I've updated the OP with everything we discussed, and added a few other things.

1) Made it clear that judicial panels can choose not to accept a case (an oversight from the judicial reformation).

2) Updated the Constitutional Amendment section to remove the ratification vote, since everyone would be able to vote in the Storting.

3) Removed the portions concerning initiatives, since any Citizen can propose legislation in the Storting.

4) Set a date for the open assembly going into effect of March 8th to fit into the new system. It would effectively cut the last Underhusen term to one month.

Any thoughts? Any things that still need updating? I'm not going to formally propose it until after the elections, so we have plenty of time to refine if we need to.

A few thoughts that come to mind:

• I realize we still need to debate about the duration-of-citizenship clause and if we need to insert a prerequisite length before becoming a Storting member.
• We need a provision about special elections should any Officer be removed from their post via removal of voting rights or inactivity.
• For the random voter of the judiciary clause, how is this randomness determined?
• Due to the consistent use of "of those voting", it worries me that the idea can be abused so as to prevent a large segment of the population from voting and then passing a law with the few that are left. Thus, it seems necessary to iterate the criminality of vote manipulation.
• Because the Storting would involve the entire electorate, should we perhaps include a set of Storting Procedural Rules in the Fundamental Laws because they'd be tied so closely together?

I'll amend this if I see more clauses that need to be examined.

I'm just going to say that it's a bad idea to give this new body the power to declare war or remove treaties.

3. Article IV Section 2 of the Fundamental Laws shall be amended as follows:

2. Elections shall follow the optional preferential voting system, and the results shall be determined by either via instant runoff in single-seat positions or single transferable vote in multi-seat positions. Elections shall be overseen by the Monarch or the Monarch's designee. No person shall oversee an election in which they are running.

Why must we rank the candidates?

Because of the fundamentals of instant runoff voting: if your first choice has the lowest vote total, your second choice gets your vote instead, and the vote is recounted as if your first choice was never in the election.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Instant_runoff_voting