Impeachment questionair - voice your opinion part 1

[GodKing]

Impeachment Options:
This poll is to help clarify the will of the people on the issues of impeachment

Question 1
Should we be able to impeach an elected or appointed member of our government?
- yes
- no

Question 2
Should the court system be involved with the decision to impeach an official. Please note that one of the judges may be the one being impeached?
- yes
- no

Question 3
Assuming the court is involved, what role should the court take in the decision?
a) the court should control the whole process by having a trial;
b) the court should look to see if a law was violated (or appears to be so), and if found true, then place a poll for the people to vote;
c) the court should only administer the will of the people, place the issue up for immediate vote of the people with no investigation or trial;

Question 4
Assuming the court is involved, how should the court be voting on the issues?
a) 3 judges hear the case, majority approve
b) 5 judges hear the case, majority approve
c) 5 judges hear the case, 4 must approve
d) 3 judged hear the case, all must approve
e) 5 judges hear the case, all must approve

Question 5
Assuming the people are involved, and the court DOES hear and place in front of the people, the people must confirm with vote by:
a) simple majority (50% + 1 vote)
b) 2/3 majority
c) 75% (3/4) majority
d) 80% majority

[Epistax]

Question four is the most confusing, so let me explain my position on it.

If a charge is brought infront of the court, if a simple majority of the court believes the charge to be just, then it must be acted upon in some way. It is reasonable, however, for a quorum (3 people) not to make the decision due to the seriousness of the accusation, unless they are unanimous. If they are unanimous, then they are a majority of the total court (3/5).

-edit- If it is decided that more than a majority of the court is needed to impeach, then we wll invariably need the ability to circumvent the court if they make a 3/5 or 4/5 ruling, due to the likely hood of the official being convicted by the people.

I will also remind that the court is involved simply to keep frivolous impeachments at bay. If question 3 option C is picked, then anyone could start a poll at any time to get a conviction.


*note, I edited this post twice. the 2nd time was to delete the new word I created, convictment.

[Spiffor]

Excellent poll godking !

I voted b) in most cases : an impeachment should not be easy, because the impeached official should have made a particular offense to get that treatment. However, if we want bad officals to be impeached, we shouldn't have a too decisive (75 or 80%) majority, because these are extremely hard to get : every debatable point will easily lead to a 20 or 25% minority (people who are sympathetic to the official + people who just like to vote against the trend). For example, look at our nearly perfect judicial amendment, it got 10 % no.

Judges should have their say in the legality of the impeachment procedure. But they should have NO POWER (except their vote, as citizens) to decide if an official should be impeached or not. If the official has done illegal things, then the court must tell the impeachment procedure is valid, no matter how they like the official.

In the worst-case scenario, where the whole administration + court is corrupt, I think the decision of the court should be bypassed, and an impeachment poll rise despite the court judgement.

[Kramerman]

Great poll Godking I voted on the other one first, woops. I would also like to state my point one more time on this thread.

Judges should have their say in the legality of the impeachment procedure. But they should have NO POWER (except their vote, as citizens) to decide if an official should be impeached or not. If the official has done illegal things, then the court must tell the impeachment procedure is valid, no matter how they like the official.

I disagree, I think the judges should both have their say in the legality of a case, as described by Captain, and also have a their own vote to impeach, with a citizen vote required on top of this in order to remove an official impeached by the court. I think, just like in the US, an official can be impeached but not necessarily removed. This would happen if the court impeached but the citizen vote showed not to remove. An impeached but unremoved official would remain in office and carry out his duties until the end of the term, were he could run again if he so chooses, but he does bare the mark of his impeachment by the court, whicj is like a condemnation.

Impeachment is a major issue and all judges should be present for a vote. A would prefer a 4/5 judicial vote to impeach, and then a simple majority vote on top of this by the public to remove from office. I believe this is the best combonation to keep merely unpopular officials from being impeached, and also getting truly unworthy officials out of office without a minority of supporters beeing able to keep them in.

If the public wants to go around the court completely and directly remove an official without going through the legal court impeachment process, or if the public disagrees with a court decision to not impeach, then they should be allowed to make a vote on their own to remove an official themselves, but should require a much higher percentage than if they were to go through the court, say a 2/3 vote instead of their normal majority vote if the official had been impeached by the court first.

Kman

[Aggie]

On this I will go with my original belief and plan with some slight alteration. The judges might hear the case but they would not make a guilt decision. They would just see if the accusation was a violation of the law and thus worthy of removal if the official was guilty of it. Basically their job should just be a filter for accusations, to prevent politcal accusations from getting through. To do this I beleive a 5-0 vote should be necessary. The reason for this is very simple. Impeachemnt is a very traumatic and time consuming event. Thus we MUST make it virtually impossible to happen unless the circumstances are of the most extreme kind.
If I am outvoted and the people want the court to involve itself in this issue, Here is a plan I find acceptable and I am sure you will too. I present it in order of events.
1) Accusation made against official.
2) Court hears the case
3) Court votes on case(5-0) to preceed with impeachment vote.
4) 4 day debate period
5) People vote on issue (2/3 necessary to pass)
6) If guilty the person is removed immediately from office.
7) Replacement selected
a) If president, the vicepresident immediately assumes his duties. The new president then selects a new vicepresident from the cabinet and nominates to the people a successor to the old minister position. The people vote on the approval of the person. I don't want a full blown election, only a yes/no on candiate.
b) If vicepresident or other elected official, the presidents appoints a successor using the same rules as above.
c) If judge, the president will appoint as usual, except the new judge will be up for reappointment at the end of the curreent term.


Also the amendment must define what crimes and acts are impeachable. I am sorry if this has all been stated before, but I have been gone for several days and have just returned.
Aggie

[Kuciwalker]

Since it won't let me vote, I'll post it:

1 yes 2 no 3 c 4 b 5 a

[Kramerman]

Skywalker, the court must be involved in someway in the impeachment process. I'm not gonna writ my arguement again, but I suggest all of you go to the discussion thread and read at least the last 2 pages to get caught up on the arguements. impeachment amendment discussion thread

Aggie, I mostly agree with your line of events, except I strongly think it only needs a 4/5 vote of the court. If it required a 5/5 vote, then it would be impossible to impeach a court justices, because it s very unlikely a justice would vote to impeach himself! And there are other arguements against a unanimous vote too, but I dont have time to repeat them, go to the above thread if you are interested.

Kman

[Aggie]

Kman as I said to trip, I could certainly agree with a 4-1 vote. Good point about the judge impeachment part.
Aggie

[Epistax]

Missing Question:

If a court justice is accused, who should take their place for the court's decision?

a) the VP
b) another official
c) appointment by the pres
d) no one

[Kramerman]

Originally posted by Epistax
Missing Question:

If a court justice is accused, who should take their place for the court's decision?

a) the VP
b) another official
c) appointment by the pres
d) no one

No one. But there should be a civilian override of the court, as a cheks and balances. Asking for somesort of check should also be a new question. Before you say anything though, check out the thread i gave a link to earlier. All the arguements are there to look at and argue with some more.

[mtgillespie]

Originally posted by Aggie
Kman as I said to trip, I could certainly agree with a 4-1 vote. Good point about the judge impeachment part.
Aggie

I think the better approach is 3 judges vote, and it has to be 3-0 to impeach. I'm against a judge with a case against them sitting on any trial, but they at least should not sit as a judge in a hearing which affects them. And as stated many times, we should never need all 5 judges for any decision in case RL intrudes in some way. It would not be fair on the impeached to have this hanging over them because we could not get hold of enough justices, for whatever reason.