[Amendment] Voting Majority Requirement

[Justinian]

Supporters: Major Darling, Acco, Elzabar

Section II, Article III

Each version of the bill requires named support from three Citizens. The final draft of the bill must be debated for at least three days in the Prothalamos before the proposer can request the bill be moved to vote. When a bill is moved to vote, the debate thread is left open, and the Curator shall post the newest draft of the bill, the name of the Proposer, the Bill's three named supporters, and a link to the debate, as a new poll in the Curia Votes forum. All bills shall be voted on for one week. Subsequent posts in this thread are limited to notification of having voted. Messages lobbying to vote for or against, including via signatures and avatars are prohibited; however, posts lobbying to vote for or against are allowed in the original debate thread and in the Curial Commentary Thread. All bills shall pass on the basis of a two-thirds simple majority of non abstaining votes in favour. If any bill fails a vote, no re-vote on a substantially similar bill will be permitted within twenty-eight days.

It's been probably about a year since this was brought up, but come on. People complain daily about how the Curia is stagnant and never gets anything done -- yet they overlook the fact that this is partly due to the fact that it's very hard to get things done because everything requires a whopping 66% majority. Imagine if to become President of the USA you needed 66% of the people to vote for you; we would never have a president. In legislative systems, 50% + 1 is all that is required to pass a bill; I know this is true in the United States, I don't know if it is true elsewhere.

The requirement of such a high majority stagnates the Curia. Decisions can't be passed without almost complete approval. With such a small sample size, a two-thirds majority is less indicative of the people's will than a simple majority. If we had 500 citizens voting, than a 66% majority would make sense. But we don't. We have between 50-70 voters on most bills. We are a supposedly democratic system but more people can vote yes then vote no and something still doesn't happen. Is that okay? I don't think so.

Bottom line: if you want there to be more of a possibility for change, the voting requirement should be lowered to come in line with real-world governments.

Note: if you would prefer I use "50% + 1" terminology rather than "simple majority" terminology, then I will.

Extended rationale:

Looking at the last few pages of finished votes, almost all failed ones had a majority. This is frustrating, since more people wanted those amendments/bills passed than not.

I used to agree with you guys. I was skeptical of making it any easier to change the Curia and how things were run. When the heavyweights (Asterix, Kelso, others) offered up sweeping changes to the system, I was part of the loud chorus that shot them down one by one. Recently I've thought, why? This is a play government for a video game fansite forum. Why do we have to be so strict? Why can't we open the gates a little bit, to allow for a wider range of ideas? If they don't work out, fine, we can always go back.

From what I've seen, the Curia goes through sporadic bouts of potential reform that typically get majorities, but not enough votes to pass. It then promptly goes back to handing out awards and making minute wording changes to the constitution. Why don't we try breaking the cycle this time, and actually let the Curia earn some substance?

[M D]

Very Strong Support, this is a good point, several popular votes which are lets say a few away from 66, still won't pass... Even though the majority supports them..

[Hotspur]

Opposed, for all the same reasons given in the three attempts to change this last year.

[Justinian]

Opposed, for all the same reasons given in the three attempts to change this last year.

You expect me to look up year old threads? Rubbish!

People have been trying to change this probably since the 66% majority was introduced years and years ago. You have to commend our tenacity at least.

I think it's ironic that the bill the bill had a majority but not a 66% majority, which is itself indicative of the problems with stagnation.

[Elzabar]

Support completely. I was considering proposing this myself.

[Viking Prince]

Opposed, for all the same reasons given in the three attempts to change this last year.

See! Sometimes we can agree.

I oppose this for the obvious reason that a slim majority of one vote means no concensus. It also means those in the opposition will come back and attempt to reverse the result asap.

Even though I have seen many a propposal go down in flames by lacking a 2/3 super majority, I can see no reason to change the requirements for support. I simply need to do a better job of convincing the citizens of the value in the proposals.

[Hotspur]

See! Sometimes we can agree.

I oppose this for the obvious reason that a slim majority of one vote means no concensus. It also means those in the opposition will come back and attempt to reverse the result asap.

Even though I have seen many a propposal go down in flames by lacking a 2/3 super majority, I can see no reason to change the requirements for support. I simply need to do a better job of convincing the citizens of the value in the proposals.

Support then.

I keed! I keed!

[Acco]

Support.

[M D]

Exactly, there aren't enough people voting in the Curia compared to the amount of active citizens.. At least because of that make it easier for supported bills to pass with a simple majority.

[Raglan]

on the fence, i'm against a simple majority system, but would instead suggest that the majority be reduced. a 60% majority shows that it wasn't just onw person who decided it, and is achievable

[Justinian]

on the fence, i'm against a simple majority system, but would instead suggest that the majority be reduced. a 60% majority shows that it wasn't just onw person who decided it, and is achievable

One person can decide a vote just as much now as under this proposed change; it's not rare for votes to pass with only one more vote than 66%.

[Legio]

cdec support

[Hotspur]

cdec support

I really wish CdeC members would stop this. The CdeC is not a legislative body and support is not required for Curial legislation. CdeC support is only required when awarding medals that also confer citizenship - Divus, Novus, Opifex and Phalera.

[Squid]

Oppose, it should be difficult to pass stuff not easy.

EDIT: The reason people say the curia doesn't do anything meaningful is not because bills don't pass, but look at the bills that are proposed, with few exception they don't do anything for the site.

[Hader]

But...this would need a 66% majority to pass...



Humorous observation.

[Evariste]

Licensed Class C driver support.

I think that hex veto is a strong enough counter to this if something truly ridiculous passes, which it shouldn't, since a simple majority is still a lot.

[the Black Prince]

@Hotspur, its only Legio that does it!

Oppose, very very strongly.

An amendment should be able to command the support not just of 50% +1 of voting citizens but of a large proportion of the citizenry. A strong consensus that the amendment should be made.

The fact that few citizens vote is not a reason to lower the pass rate, its a reason to investigate why this occurs and work what can be done to change it.

[Augustus Lucifer]

I'm indifferent. On one hand it's true that a simple majority is about all that can be expected when considering staunchly opposite points of view, and that requiring further is in deference to an equilibrium which is not beneficial in and of itself. On the other hand a simple majority will be affected more by week-to-week voter attendance, since voter turnover only needs to be 2 votes rather than 10-20 when it comes to repealing a passed amendment or setting it back to previous bounds. That in turn may cause more stagnation, because the Curia sends mixed messages to Hex and the site about what "it" wants or how things should be.

I would also agree with Squid that the complaints about Curial stagnation have to do with the meat of the proposals, not the requirements for them to pass. When I look back through the last few pages of the Tabularium, I can't pinpoint one proposal which would have passed on a simple majority that could be considered of appreciable value to the site as a whole. There were a couple which sought to create new forum areas, a couple about changing the default skin, and really that's all I can see as having any effect at all on the site as a whole(going back to last July). Interestingly, very few proposals don't get a simple majority in favor, which begs the question if there's some facet of voting that makes support more likely than opposition if someone is indifferent, and which in turn would mean everything passes all the time under this system if it isn't reprehensible.

I will probably Abstain.

[Squid]

In order to get 66%, any petitioner is actually gonna have to get 7 out of 10 votes, that are cast. Is it only feasible to get 6 out of every 10?
I dunnow....Have'nt really thought about it. But others have. They say...

1. Low voter turn out. We need to change to 6 out of 10.

2. Others say that if the petition holds merit, 7 out of 10 can be had.

3. If changed to 6 out of ten, it will only encourage counter petitions.

"Scratches head"...Uuuuh, Where's the water fountain and the restroom?... "Hello, Mom, I don't know about this."

How do you figure you need 7 out of 10 votes? On average from my observation there's ~65 votes per bill/election. 60% of that is 39 yes votes, while 2/3rds is 43 votes and 70% (7 out of 10) is 46 votes. This of course doesn't take into account, abstentions which reduce the number of votes required to pass. Quite frankly if, at most, 4 of the no votes cannot be convinced to vote yes, then the bill doesn't deserve to pass in its current form at the current time.

Even if 20% of the votes are abstentions meaning you need 66% of 52, that still means that 66% (35 yes votes) is still less than 70% (37 yes votes), and I can't remember the last time that 20% of the ~65 regular voters abstained (or didn't vote).

I would also agree with Squid that the complaints about Curial stagnation have to do with the meat of the proposals, not the requirements for them to pass. When I look back through the last few pages of the Tabularium, I can't pinpoint one proposal which would have passed on a simple majority that could be considered of appreciable value to the site as a whole. There were a couple which sought to create new forum areas, a couple about changing the default skin, and really that's all I can see as having any effect at all on the site as a whole(going back to last July). Interestingly, very few proposals don't get a simple majority in favor, which begs the question if there's some facet of voting that makes support more likely than opposition if someone is indifferent, and which in turn would mean everything passes all the time under this system if it isn't reprehensible.

I think part of the reason why most things that go to vote get at least a simple majority is that 3 supporters are required before a bill can go to vote, and usually even with the required support if there's strong negative sentiment the bill gets abandoned.

[Viking Prince]

I think part of the reason why most things that go to vote get at least a simple majority is that 3 supporters are required before a bill can go to vote, and usually even with the required support if there's strong negative sentiment the bill gets abandoned.

A very good point. The bill votes are usually close to passage even in a failed attempt if there is merit to the proposal (citizen support is a guage of this) and the proponant has an ear to the ground before agreeing to bring it to a vote. Not getting the required super majority may be frustrating, but I cannot see it as a flaw.

Taking a look at the 65 vote example -- if 33 votes carries the day, do you really want another poll on the question to attempt reversal? Only one vote need change. This close of a Curial poll is not a stable solution to move on.

Take a recent poll result:
(25-22-3) Poll: [FAILED] [Amendment] Citizens Initiative 1 - Adding fluidity and fairness to the Civitates system

Under this proposal for a simple majority, the above amendment would have passed. I did indeed support this and sponsored a prior attempt. But if this passed, would the opposition accept the result or come back with another amendment? I want these ideas to both pass and stay passed. A simple majority vote will not achieve that goal.