Asgardian Constitution notes:
Citizenship: should we mention if citizenship can be acquired by birth? If one of your parents is Asgardian, do you automatically are one? Or do you have to ask for it to be granted?
Article 8. Civil rights? What is this? Do we have a definition? And when we say entitled, do we mean these rights are granted?
Article 8.x : All persons shall have the right to freely express their opinion and to communicate their ideas verbally, in writing, in print or with images, within the limits of the law and civil morality;
Can we just say “freedom of expression”? Or “A person’s right to freedom of expression is guaranteed by this constitution.”
Now, the problem that I have is that this language assumes that rights are being granted, rather than protected. I think the law should be more along the lines of “the government should not infringe on the rights of freedom of expression…”
The language must make it clear that a person already possesses these rights by virtue of being born and that this document is ensuring that those right won’t be oppressed by the power of the government.
I don’t think we should include censorship in the constitution. Any matter of censorship should be left to legislation. This is just too dangerous a concept to be codified in the constitution. Just make sure to guarantee freedom of expression and later on we deal with when it is appropriate to censor information.
Can we please add the right to personal security against unreasonable search and unusual punishment.
I think it would be good to also add this: The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.
Article 9.iii Is this taxation? Taxation should not be codified in the constitution.
You should not force people to give money to the government by constitutional law. I would never agree to that. We can create a tax code later on but this is unnecessary because we already pay taxes in the States we live in.
Also, automation might render work obsolete, and rather than citizens paying taxes, the state might have to pay citizen by sharing the economic profit with the population. This should be removed.
As a matter of fact, all obligation should be removed. All of the things in there sound like either forced labor or compulsory military service. And I disagree with both of those.
Let defense to the state itself and simply add a clause in regards to protection and the formation of a militia.
Article 10.iv: why 10 judges? What’s the reason behind this? I’m not opposed, I just need to understand the reason for this particular number.
So the constitutional court will have a president? What will be his role? It sounds like overkill and too much bureaucracy. Ten judges are quite a number of people. Also, if we are going to decide that the constitutional court will have a president, can we create a separate section making this declaration.
Human resources? I don’t know why this is here either. I think it is unnecessary since we are already defining the government role of “human resources” as judges, presidents, etc.
Article 12. “Colonized by Asgardians” shouldn’t this be "Asgardia." Since this implies that the government will have automatic ownership on any territorial discovery or colonization a citizen makes. The government shouldn’t have an automatic claim to citizen discoveries. Unless if the discovery is made while acting as an agent of the government this shouldn't apply.
Article 13.i The State shall exercise sovereignty over mining on celestial bodies and over any energy produced in Asgardia by any means. This sentence is too broad. I get the feeling it might be in violation of some international space law. We are claiming rights to mining celestial bodies. We could keep it there, but I don’t think other states will be happy about it.
ii)All the Humankind will also have a right to a share of the dividends and/or benefits obtained with mining on celestial bodies and energy exploitation, according to the law. This is very unrealistic. Unless we are talking about a guaranteed basic income, I cannot see this as actually doable.
And any dividends and gains should be shared among Asgardians only since they are the ones subject to Asgardian laws and responsibilities. Yes, anyone can become and Asgardian, but until they have done so, they shouldn't be presumed Asgardians.
Article 14. Taxation should be left out. Let legislation take care of that.
v) Rent for leasing Asgardian territory as base for homes, laboratories or spacecraft parking to Earth states with spacial programs <— we have to pay rent by constitutional law? No, I disagree.
Taxation shall pay for all the shenanigans -- in addition to any economic activity like energy production and mining. Stop trying to bleed citizens dry, we are not slaves!
vii)Annual fee to UN or Earth states for space protection of Earth against space-born threats.
So we are like some sort of contractors? We are going to charge the whole planet for protection and we still have the gall to charge rent to Asgardians, on top of taxes and revenue from resource exploitation? What the heck is this? A mafia operation? Plus, I already pay a lot of taxes to IRS. I am too poor for so many taxes. I believe in reverse taxation.
Merchandising? Seriously? We are going to include merchandising in the constitution.
To tell you the truth, if Asgardia truly is capable of creating an economy based on mining and energy and all that good stuff, this will be the first government that actually produces anything ( apart from the government of Alaska in the US that actually shares the revenue of oil sales with its residents).
If we can pull this off, we’ll most likely end up with reverse taxation. So I would like to encourage to remove all taxation and financial legislation from the constitution and actually deal with it with separate legislation.
vi) Commerce and trade shall be free inside the State within the limits prescribed by law; the admissibility of exclusive commercial and trade privileges for a specified period of time and territory shall be regulated by law. <— I need to understand “admissibility of exclusive commercial and trade privileges for a specified period of time and territory.” Is this legalese for “monopoly protected by the state”?
Article 17.
iv) Criminal law will not have retroactive effects if they are not favorable.
How do we define favorable? what exactly is it we have in mind when we say this.
Article 18.
Sundays and holidays recognized by the State shall be observed as public days of rest, without prejudice to the legal provisions governing rest on Sundays and holidays. I find this very strange, why Sunday specifically? So, if I want to work on Sunday and I go ahead and actually work, I am breaking the law?
I don’t know if labor laws should be encoded in the constitution. Maybe take it out and leave it to legislation?
Article 20
Healthcare should be a guaranteed right. Education should be a right. Agree with all of these statements here.
Article 21. I don’t think it is needed to have this included in the constitution.
Article 26. If we have no official language, please, refrain from naming English anywhere in the constitution. Simply estate that there is no official language.
Although I must say, I agree that we should have a neutral language like Esperanto as our language since it is not a language that is native to any place on Earth. I am also OK with not having any official language.
Article 29
“I swear/promise that I will be loyal to the Asgardian people, that I will obey the laws, and that I will strictly observe and defend the Declaration of Unity and the Constitution” Instead of “/“ add “and” because with a slash it sounds like the person under oath has the alternative to either swear or promise.
Article 31. I like “Jarl” as well. Since most likely we’ll have consulates around the Earth, consul might be reserved for those exercising this position in a consulate.
Maybe instead of one Jarl we can have two Jarls who are both elected in alternate 2-year blocks. It is much more difficult to corrupt a body when it has too many moving parts. Just a thought.
Article 32.
i) Parliament shall consist of all registered Asgardian citizens with at least 18 years old and not deprived by Courts of their voting rights. They will be called Members of the Parliament.
I love this. I love the fact that a young person can get engaged early on. However, we most define the term for which a parliament member can serve.
If you don't like representation, what is the role of parliament then? We don’t have a parliament in my country, but I was under the impression that parliament members were, in addition to lawmakers, also representatives? Are you thinking about explicitly restricting this role to just law making? If so, can you please spell this out.
I also agree with direct democracy. Cybersecurity most be a priority to avoid electoral fraud.
The Ministers must be citizens of Asgardia and eligible for election according to law. Aren't ministers appointed?
Article 34.
ii) A Cybersecurity Corp* is created to keep safe the Asgardian public informatical systems and to patrol in Internet.
To patrol the internet? How will this affect my internet privacy?