Senatus consultum on provinces of activity (Nova Roma)

SENATUS CONSULTUM ON PROVINCES OF ACTIVITY

I. The Senate of Nova Roma establishes the following process for annually assigning one or more goals to each of the following year’s consuls for the purpose of ensuring the continuance and realization of Senate policy decisions.

II. The Senate Policy Committee (SPC) must annually before September 1st select of items of policy that shall assigned to the consuls for the following year, where such items are determined according to the mandate and scope of the SPC.

III. The chairperson of the SPC shall be responsible for initiating debate on the selection of policy items at II, and shall put all items suggested by members of the SPC during the course of such a debate to the vote. Each item put to the vote shall also have a date of completion appended to it that shall be on or before November 30th of the following year (the year being represented in the A.U.C. format). Members of the SPC will register either YES to include the item, NO to reject it, or ABSTAIN if they wish to make no choice on a particular item. For an item to succeed and be passed on such a vote it must obtain a simple majority of members of the SPC. If all members of the committee vote ABSTAIN on an item it shall not be included at IV. In the case of a tie the chairperson of the SPC shall cast an extra vote to decide the issue.

IV. After the vote at III, the chairperson of the SPC shall be responsible for initiating debate on which of the items that passed shall be allocated to the senior consul and which to the junior consul for the following year. The chairperson shall then put the items to the vote to decide which are allocated to which consul and which, if any, should be shared between both. The members of the SPC shall indicate against each item to be voted upon SC for senior consul, JC for junior consul, SHARED for both consuls, or ABSTAIN if they wish no make no choice on a particular item. For an item to be allocated it must obtain a simple majority of members of the SPC voting to allocate it to a specific consul, or to be shared. If all members of the committee vote ABSTAIN on an item it shall not be allocated. In the case of a tie the chairperson of the SPC shall cast an extra vote to decide the issue.

V. The SPC shall then prepare two draft Senatus consulta titled:

A. “SENATUS CONSULTUM ON THE ASSIGNMENT OF THE PROVINCE OF ACTIVITY TO THE SENIOR CONSUL FOR XXXX A.U.C.”.

B. “SENATUS CONSULTUM ON THE ASSIGNMENT OF THE PROVINCE OF ACTIVITY TO THE JUNIOR CONSUL FOR XXXX A.U.C.” XXXX in both V.A and V.B shall be replaced with the A.U.C. form of the following year.

VI. The text of the draft Senatus consultum at V.A shall:

A. Commence with the following “The senior consul for the year XXXX A.U.C. is instructed by the Senate of Nova Roma to pursue the following items to a successful completion on or before the date indicated during his/her year in office. The senior consul shall post a progress report monthly to the Senate, by means of posting to the Senate list, detailing the steps he/she has taken to bring these items to a successful conclusion. Between December 1st and December 15th of XXXX A.U.C. the senior consul shall post his/her final progress report to the Senate list. If he/she has not brought any item below to a successful conclusion, then he/she will explain in detail to the Senate the reasons for his/her failure to do so.” “XXXX” shall be replaced with the following year in A.U.C. format.

B. The content of the draft Senatus consultum at V.A shall then list those items at IV that received a majority of votes marked SC or SHARED.

VII. The text of the draft Senatus consultum at V.B shall:

A. Commence with the following “The junior consul for the year XXXX A.U.C. is instructed by the Senate of Nova Roma to pursue the following items to a successful completion on or before the date indicated during his/her year in office. The junior consul shall post a progress report monthly to the Senate, by means of posting to the Senate list, detailing the steps he/she has taken to bring these items to a successful conclusion. Between December 1st and December 15th of XXXX A.U.C. the junior consul shall post his/her final progress report to the Senate list. If he/she has not brought any item below to a successful conclusion, then he/she will explain in detail to the Senate the reasons for his/her failure to do so.” “XXXX” shall be replaced with the following year in A.U.C. format.

B. The content of the draft Senatus consultum at V.B shall then list those items at IV that received a majority of votes marked JC or SHARED.

VIII. The process for the Senate voting upon the draft Senatus consulta at V.A and V.B shall be:

A. The chairperson of the SPC shall post the draft consulta at V.A and V.B to the Senate list between September 1st and October 1st inclusive.

B. The consul holding the rods for the month in which they are posted must within 5 days of their posting obtain the auspices for a formal meeting of the Senate in session within the month in which they are posted, the debate period of which must be no less than 168 hours in length.

C. If the auspices are favorable the consul at VIII.B must issue the call to convene for the proposed session for which the auspices were sought, and include the draft Senatus consulta at V.A and V.B as agenda items in that call to convene.

D. The consul at VIII.B must put the draft consulta at V.A and V.B, unaltered in any way, to the vote, which shall be by way of simple majority.

E. On January 1st of the following year:

1. If the draft consulta at V.A succeeded at the vote and passed, then the citizen who was elected senior consul shall be automatically assigned the personal responsibility for bringing each item in the now passed Senatus consultum, as at V.A, to a successful conclusion on or before the date of completion for that item.

2. If the draft consulta at V.B succeeded at the vote and passed, then the citizen who was elected junior consul shall be automatically assigned the personal responsibility for bringing each item in the now passed Senatus consultum, as at V.B, to a successful conclusion on or before the date of completion for that item.

IX. Between January 1st and January 31st each year the consul who holds the rods for that month must issue a call to convene a formal meeting of the Senate in session and must include, in addition to any other items, an agenda item that must be put to the vote by way of simple majority as a proposed Senatus consultum, with the title SENATUS CONSULTUM TO ENDORSE PROVINCE OF ACTIVITY RESULTS

XXXX A.U.C, and the following text within:

C. “The Senate of Nova Roma endorses the fact that the senior consul for the year XXXX A.U.C., AAAA, discharged the requirements placed upon {him/her} to the best of {his/her} ability.”

D. “The Senate of Nova Roma endorses the fact that the junior consul for the year XXXX A.U.C., BBBB, discharged the requirements placed upon {him/her} to the best of {his/her} ability.” “XXXX” shall be replaced with the previous year in A.U.C. format. “AAAA” shall be the full Nova Roman name of the senior consul for the previous year, while “BBBB” shall be the full Nova Roman name of the junior consul for the previous year. “{him/her}” and “{his/her}” will be amended to the correct choice for the gender of the consul concerned.

X. Item IX.A and item IX.B must be put to the vote as separate items. If IX.A or IX.B does not succeed in passing, then the item that fails shall be removed from the Senatus consultum and the one that succeeds shall remain and form the only text in the body of the Senatus consultum. If both items fail then the Senatus consultum fails in its entirety.

XI. In the event that one or both of the items fail to pass the vote at IX, then automatically such a failure shall be deemed to be contempt of the Senate by the former consul concerned at IX.A and/or IX.B for the purposes of the SENATUS CONSULTUM DE RATIONE SENATUS MMDCCLXV. Such contempt of the Senate shall be dealt with by the princeps senatus by the process at section IX of the SENATUS CONSULTUM DE RATIONE SENATUS MMDCCLXV.

XII. The definitions provided at section I DEFINITIONS of the Senatus consultum de ratione senatus MMDCCLXV shall be applicable to deriving meaning of a word or phrase included in this Senatus consultum that also appears in that list of definitions.

XIII. The princeps senatus shall be the final authority on determining the meaning of any part of this Senatus consultum where such meaning is unclear to any member of the Senate, and/or to arbitrate in any dispute between members of the Senate over such meaning.

XIV. In the event of a failure of the consuls to execute the requirements placed on them by this Senatus consultum, then that failure shall be deemed to be contempt of the Senate and shall be dealt with according to the process at section IX of the SENATUS CONSULTUM DE RATIONE SENATUS MMDCCLXV

XV. Upon enactment of this Senatus consultum:

A. The only lawful method of subsequently superseding, amending or repealing this Senatus consultum must be by way of a Senatus consultum that must achieve an extraordinary majority before it can be enacted. Any other method or attempt shall be illegal and forbidden.

B. No other Senatus consultum shall be enacted where the proposed content of which conflicts, negates, overrides, limits or otherwise affects in a negative manner the contents and/or purposes of all or any part of this Senatus consultum, whether directly or indirectly other than by the method at specified at XV.A of this Senatus consultum.