UCAS Political Structure, Not US politics, I don't care Options

[CircuitBoyBlue]

How many states and provinces are there in the UCAS? I know North Virginia doesn't get the vote, does the FDC? Also, how many Senators does each state/province get, and what is the size of the H of R?

Also, my game right now is set in 2051, in case anything is different between "then" and "now" (206x).

[Nath]

According to the NAGNA, there are 31/32 states. Seattle is sometimes called a metroplex, sometimes a district and sometimes a state. In the end it has a governor, two senators and representatives, so I'd call it and count it as a state.

Connecticut
Delaware
Illinois
Indiana
Iowa
Kansas
Kentucky
Maine
Maryland
Massachussetts
Michigan
Minnesota
Nebraska
New Hampshire
New Jersey
New York
North Dakota
North Missouri
North Virginia
Ohio
Pennsylvania
Rhode Island
Seattle
South Dakota
Vermont
West Virginia
Wisconsin

Manitoba
New Brunswick
Nova Scotia
Ontario
Prince Edward Island

Only the southern tip of Manitoba and a corner of Sasketchawan got in the UCAS, I made the count with a single state with Winnipeg as a capital. According to the NAGNA, Newfoundland was annexed by Maine, while maps shows Labrador/mainland Newfoundland as a part of Québec.

There are still two senators per state, for a senate of 62 seats, and one representative per approx. 500,000 inhabitants, which doesn't allow precise calculation since we don't have a break-up of UCAS population, just a total figure (175 millions divided by five hundreds thousands give 344).

[CircuitBoyBlue]

Awesome. Also, would I be correct in assuming that the Senate is still presided over by the VP and the House by the Speaker, or is there some other office that presides over these bodies, possibly a PM or something in a nod to old Canadian government?

[Arethusa]

Not trying to derail, but has there ever been any examination of the UCAS constitution?

[CircuitBoyBlue]

Actually, far from derailing, that's closer to the original intent of this thread than I was able to articulate. But I think the answer is "no," because I asked that exact question in a different thread (though I can't remember exactly which one). I think it was a thread that had devolved into "UCAS citizens have this right" vs. "no, the corps would have taken it away." It was probably one of the threads about prisons, but like I said, I think the answer was "no, Fanpro has not released a copy of the UCAS constitution." Which I think is a shame, because it seems like it wouldn't be that hard to do. It would take up just a few pages in a sourcebook and go a long way to settling a lot of questions as to what players and NPCs can get away with, and the work wouldn't be that hard, because I'm assuming most of it is based off of current US and Canadian models.

[Nikoli]

Which at times are diametrically opposed.

[Nath]

Names are given in NAGNA and PoaD for the Speaker of House and the President Pro-Tempore of the Senate. From what I read about it, if the VP was no longer presiding the Senate sometimes, the other guy wouldn't be 'Pro-Tempore' ('President Pro-tempore' meaning 'President for a time' in latin). There are little things that comes from Canada.

The UCAS Constitution is pretty much a revamp of the US Constitution, Canada got next to nothing outside of the name and the flag. When the new UCAS Constitution was written, the old Amendments of the US Constitution suffered various fates, since they were aware of the issues they fix, some were directly included in the Constitution. I'm not a constitutional expert, but for what is known:

Constitution of the US - Amendments
I-X : it is said they were kept exactly identical
XI : no clue (I'm not even sure what this amendment practically means...)
XII and XXIII : dropped. No more electoral college, it is a direct election.
XIII : included in the Constitution ? (or... see below *little evil grin*)
XIV : probably included in the Constitution, and then changed by the new 14th Amendment establishing SIN and thus SINless status.
XV : the new 11th Amendment covers the account of race (and faith), but not the "previous condition of servitude" (might have be included along with the XIIIth in the Constitution, or let open for megacorporations *real evil grin*)
XVI : probably included (Federal incomes taxes)
XVII : probably included (Senate)
XVIII and XXI : dropped (Prohibition)
XIX : it would have make sense to merge it with the XVth Amendment into the new 11th Amendment, but it seems that's not the case. So sex like slavery might have been included directly in the Bill of Rights.
XX : probably included (President and VP terms)
XXII and XXIX : there first was a XXIXth Amendment that cancelled the limits of two terms. The limits wasn't reinstated in the UCAS, so there were no need for those amendments.
XXIV : probably included (failure to pay tax do no affect right to vote)
XXV : probably included (President replacement)
XXVI : probably included (age over 18 do not affect right to vote)
XXVII : probably included, or never ratified since SR timeline diverges before 1992 (IIRC NAGNA was written in 1991).
XXVIII : since there was a XXIX... no clue about what it was, except is came before the following one circa 2020-2024. As I said, I'm no expert, I don't really know what requires an Amendment (corporate extraterritoriality ? creation of the NANs and Denver/front Range Free zone ? use of the word 'metroplex' instead of 'state' when speaking of Seattle ?)

Constitution of the UCAS - Amendments
1-10: remains the Bill of Rights, probably because people are used to it that way
11 : protection of citizenship against account of race or faith
12 : grants new power to local authorities
13 : megacorporation can extradite UCAS citizens for breach of contract
14 : establishes SIN in 2036
15 : grants new power to local authorities
It is stated those are just 'some' of the amendments, but none of the other have been mentionned

[Arethusa]

[Nath]

[Guest_Crimsondude 2.0_*]

[Guest_Crimsondude 2.0_*]

[Snow_Fox]

North Virginia doesn't have representation? It's big enough.

For the most part the UCAS constitution is the old USA constittution. At the risk of dating myself, in the old Neoanarchists guide to North America they said Canada got a few maple leaves on the flag and the name first, and that was it.

Seattle metroplex get represented as the rump of Washington State. The Metroplex is made up of several different towns of which Seattle is the dominant one.

[CircuitBoyBlue]

A lot of things about government, both real-world and shadowrun are counterintuitive. North Virginia may be big enough to get representation, but so is the real life District of Columbia, and it doesn't get representation. It wouldn't even get electoral votes if the Soviets hadn't made fun of us in front of the UN.

[Guest_Crimsondude 2.0_*]

I like the Preamble to the UCAS Constitution in SoNA just because it's so blatanly angry and creates the impression that the entirety of the U.S. and Canada were really fucking pissed off.

[Inquisitus]

Alright, not to detract even further from the discussion because my game has had legal problems before, but doesn't the fact that local/"state" police work is totally delegated to private contractors mean that basically all of the rights expressed in US constitution Amendments IV-VIII are essentially void? I mean the current judicial precedent would seem to indicate that private "police" officers working on a contractual basis with the state (so admittedly none of them have ever worked in the capacity of rank-and-file police officers, but bail-bondsmen who hold fugitives in their legal custody after they have skipped bail are pretty close) have far greater latitude when operating in a police capacity than actual police officers. Or do prior judicial precidents established by the US Supreme Court or the Canadian equivolent even apply to UCAS law (because I could certainly see grounds for challages to their validity occuring when the previous governing apparatus ceased to be)? I never really gave it that much thought, but are actual government agents (ie: FBI, ATF, ect.) even bound to honor detainees due process rights in the UCAS? Do agencies like Lone Star and Knight Errant have to?

[Entropy Kid]

Someone with the LS sourcebook (if it's even covered) would be more qualified to answer, but I can take a guess.

It'd make sense that in order to get the contract Lonestar would have to follow whatever procedures the UCAS decided upon. Of course looking at things very negatively, it'd also make sense if they were only required to have some kind of official process, devised by the corporation itself. So if LS corp rules allow arrest and lockup without charges for a week or two, maybe that's good enough for the UCAS government.

It depends how many American ideals about justice, freedom, (etc) survive the restructuring of the U.S. into the UCAS. If people still take the Bill of Rights seriously, I'd expect LS to have to follow federal and local laws/regulations, and in there somewhere would be treatment of prisoners and rights of the accused. If those are the laws they're paid to enforce, I imagine they'd have to follow them.

[shadd4d]

There's something like that mentioned in Corp Shadowfiles. It states that Lone Star may be out of luck in terms of using UCAS or whatever national laws to get something done, i.e. extradition. On the other hand, they can fall back on their AA-corp status to do corporate extradition, and then try the poor bugger according to Lone Star corp law.

Don

[Inquisitus]

So when it comes down to it, my poor runners will probably be tried in a UCAS court of law even if they were caught by extra-territorial LS?

[Nikoli]

No, more likely they'll receive a 2 :nuyen: trial to the back of the head on the way to UCAS soil, then be dumped overboard, lost in transit, etc. and listed as shot while escaping.

[Inquisitus]

Guess that adds to the expedience of my runners need to escape then....

[Nikoli]

Why do you think soldiers are trained to do their best to not be captured or taunt their capters into killing them quickly?

[Snow_Fox]

no civil rights still allpy because the private corps are contracted to uphold the laws of the land. This does not go on corp grounds if the corp is extrateritorial. Lone Star, for example is contacted to defend the constitutuion and siunce the station houses are owned by Seattle, the civil rights apply, now if the squad car wants to make a stop off at a Lone Star Corporate office before the station house, the runner is SOL.
So doing would violate the runner's civil rights of being protected while in custody so LS probably doesn't want yopu to be able to tell any one but... just incert you favorit mind bending or bnody breaking toy here.

[Guest_Crimsondude 2.0_*]

[Nath]

[Kanada Ten]

Wasn't the Business Recognition Accords modeled on the UCAS interpretation of the Supreme Court ruling? I'd imagine that the 13th and 14th came pretty quickly (just guessing), and both strengthen corporate power. I'm of the opinion that the Corporate Council/Court/Cabal didn't purpose the Accords until they had the UCAS firmly under control as a working example.