Topic: Are "long worded" constitutions or "overly large lawbooks" undemocratic?
Blayne Bradley
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posted
Someone on msn says the following:
"Blayne says: do you honestly ever hear a constitutional scholar complain that the Constitution is "too long and wordy?" "
"F says: actually, yes"
"F says: most constitutions in the world are very long winded Blayne says: for good reason F says: most constitutions are therefore undemocratic F says: the common people do not understand their own rights F says: allowing the elite to oppress them"
Is there actually in any Western Country a valid argumement that our various Constitutions are undemocratic because they take up more then a page?
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Blayne Bradley
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He further makes the argument that because countries like the USSR have "vastly more laws then the USA" as proof of this, citing an example that "F says: I was talking about number of laws versus the actual lawfulness and egalitarianism of society"
I know that the US justice dept has actually lost track of the number of civil/tort laws, I find the above thesis a bit of a stretch.
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posted
I believe the first draft of the Constitution read, "Just be nice to everyone and don't be a greedy jerk, I'm looking at you Hancock!"
Posts: 3950 | Registered: Mar 2006
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posted
Actually, Blayne, I think "F" has a point. Certainly the trappings of legalism can choke out the intent of law and/or the willingness and ability of the public to participate in the process. The idea that putting up hurdles and obstacles between the people and the system is undemocratic in principle is a fairly old and not at all uncommon one.
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
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I'd say F is partially right. Normally the more you put into the Constitution, the more restrictions you place on the people's ability to alter the law - meaning the less democratic it becomes.
F seems to be assuming that's a bad thing though. That's not necessarilly the case. After all, a country could write a one sentence Constitution that declares there is a simple majority vote for every law, but I'd think such a government would be at least inefficient and at worst pretty tyrannical.
Posts: 2432 | Registered: Feb 2001
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Although I think this is possible, I don't think it applies to the Canadian Constitution.
I certainly prefer having certain things included in the constitution, rather than having a more vague document with most things omitted.
Posts: 8473 | Registered: Apr 2003
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Blayne Bradley
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posted
the argument has resulted out of a philosohpical argument over a Constitution for a roleplayed supernational body we're founding in a certain strategy game of ours, basically I'm China, hes an enlarged Georgia (all of former persian empire), Russia, India, and a massive indonesian power and a modest Japan, my argument is for a long and detailed constitution, to take care of the all the important details and to ensure its effectiveness and robustness to most situations.
ie having a number of articles devoted to the situations that made the previous attempt at a UN/NATO like institution fail, with provinsions to deal with between game session issues, and during game issues.
He just wants something less then a paragraph to deal with "all" situations and maybe some sort of body to deal with emergancies. Even if I could codense everything I wrote, it misses the point that I want what I wrote to RESEMBLE a real world Treaty/Charter/Constitution for the sake of roleplaying with maybe an addendum for the sake of summarizing it.
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I'd agree with TomDavidson and I don't think there's anything particularly special about the Canadian constitution in that regard that distinguishes it from the US one.
Posts: 7593 | Registered: Sep 2006
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quote:Originally posted by Teshi: I certainly prefer having certain things included in the constitution, rather than having a more vague document with most things omitted.
Being around lawyers all the time, it's pretty clear that a lot of the 'fancy' wording is put in place to protect rights (not speaking specifically of any constitution, just legalese in general). There's a fine line between protection of one party and oppression of another. Still, I'd rather a little more to it, too, just in case of XYZ.
Posts: 691 | Registered: Nov 2008
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