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I can't recall how many I've made, and I'm too lazy to go back and check, hence the title.

Alright, so at this point, I don't think a single proposal is going to wow people enough to close the convention, but we have to find some sort of common ground, don't we?

It is apparent that many people fear too much democracy, but also don't want the other extreme, which is law made only by bodies appointed by the monarch, or the monarch himself, or absolute veto being put in place. It's difficult to reconcile the two ways of thinking, to be sure.

So this is what I propose:

1. There should be one chamber of the assembly only. And instead of giving absolute veto powers to one person, we adopt a system of absolute constitutional sovereignty. The constitution would be set up to contain the core tenets and spirit of the region, and anything that defies that spirit would be declared unlawful. Who sets up the constitution, you ask? The monarch, of course. As the founder of the region, it stands to reason that he should have some idea of the core tenets of our way of life here.

2. The composition of the assembly would be as follows: at first, 5 people will be appointed into it by the monarch, and another five elected. From that point forward, these members will vote amongst themselves to permit other citizens to join the assembly, while the citizenry can vote for an additional 3 members to be added every 3 months, and the monarch can similarly appoint another 3 during the same time-frame.

This would balance democracy with meritocracy, and prevent abuse by the assembly through the constitution.

It would ensure that the same people don't run things indefinitely, and give more and more people the chance to contribute without throwing the doors completely open. It wouldn't be an open assembly, but it would be a lot more open than it currently is.

Now you'll realise this isn't the most specific and robust proposal you've ever seen. I first want to test the idea, and people's reaction to the idea.

I'll also tag people.

@Wuufu
@Joshua Bluteisen
@Colberius X
@Wintermoot
@Weissrecih
@Barnes
@Pengu
@HannahB
@Point Breeze
@North
@taulover
@Sapphiron
@Aragonn
@Chanku
@VidiLune
@tatte
@Hugsim
@Gerrick
@BraveSirRobin
@xXTheHydraXx
@Rasdanation

... And that's everyone I can think of who might have an interest in this, at present.

Apologies, @Weissreich.

An interesting proposal which I'm curious to see how it would work out as well. However from your wording, it seems as though the number of people serving increases by three every so often but never decreases, eventually leading to a huge assembly which forces just about everyone to join. Either the wording needs to be fixed or I'm reading it wrong.

Yeah, I interpreted it the same way as Aragonn. Its it supposed to continuously grow larger and larger?

I'm intrigued but I share Aragonn's concerns about the wording re: adding members every three months. That said, a single chamber does hark back to the original open assembly proposal, and I'm a fan of that so I can see this working. However, with the suggestion of including Houses in the legislative aspects of the region I would like to see that reflected somewhere.

We could keep the two houses thing, and give each of the noble houses a "seat" in the upper house (confirmed by Wintermoot of course) and then make the lower house slowly be able to grow by X persons per election, with the number X being determined by the Underhusen before the election, in a given range or something. (1-4, 0-3, etc.) That'd incorporate Weiss' desires and would also preserve basically all of our current political infrastructure.

That's basically my idea except with the possibility of Underhusen growth
I do like that growth idea, so long as it doesn't become overwhelming in proportion to the rest of the population. Having the number of expanded seats determined by the Underhusen before the election seems to alleviate that.

In truth, I hadn't thought that far ahead. It would be problematic if it just continues to grow for no good reason. Perhaps add 2 people every 6 months, through elections and via appointments then?

And I haven't yet seen a way to include the familial houses in a way that makes complete sense, and in a way everyone can agree with, so I left that out. If someone can think of a way to incorporate it in a way that sidesteps all the concerns with it, then I'm all ears.

So basically the idea is to have a legislature with appointed and elected members. Other than the fact that this would all be in one chamber instead of two, isn't that basically what we have now?

Nope, because new people could get invited in continuously (I'm thinking this could happen through some sort of application process), and every few months, it would expand through more elections and so forth.

There are a lot of specifics to be worked out, but this does differ quite a bit from the current system, while not being too different for everyone's comfort.

EDIT: Also, the purposes behind the elected and appointed wouldn't be the same as the current system. Currently, the elected serve the people, and the appointed the monarchy. The elected and appointed would serve both in this new system I'm imagining. One group would simply be appointed by merit, and the other group through elections.

Also of importance would be a way to remove people who mess up. That's something we need to discuss.

It just seems rather clunky to me...in order for the balance of power to remain, people would have to be appointed and voted upon to enter at the same rate, and as someone who is very careful with appointments, I'm not sure I can continuously find new people to appoint as this assembly grew. If we were to have appointed and elected/applied positions, it makes more sense to have two chambers. This way, the appointed chamber can be whatever size it needs to be under the circumstances, while the Citizen chamber can be as small or as large as it wants...even open assembly.

Edit: I see your edit. I'm just not sure if I have much faith in putting our system in the hands of a document...no matter how much we try to be precise and enshrine our values and principles in one, ultimately they will still need to be interpreted by people as situations arise. Maybe I'm just fundamentally not getting it though.

Or we could make it so that if there are no appointments, there are no elections either.

What I'm trying to side-step is the concern that our legislature could be used against us. An open assembly can always be used against us, unless the appointed chamber has absolute veto power, and as we've seen, many people are uncomfortable with the absolute veto business.

That's why this balance of power would need to be maintained.

EDIT: And I now see your edit. Yeah, the interpretation of the constitution would be completely at the discretion of the monarch. No one else would be able to use it against us. I foresee some people (ahem, Chanku) having a problem with this, but realistically, the founder already has as much real power as he cares to use. This simply acknowledges that.

Yeah, it is obvious that I would, and do, have an issue with this idea. This is not really what I looked for when I joined this region about 2 years ago. This is not something that I have wanted, and would want, even back when I joined, and this is not why I ended up voting aye for our Fundamental Laws back then. Even though our system does need some change, and it is flawed, I do not believe this is it.

Then by all means, come up with a way to fix it.