Citizens Assembly
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Citizens Assembly of Deseret | |
|---|---|
| 1st Congress | |
| Type | |
| Type | |
Term limits | 6 terms |
| History | |
| Founded | June 6, 2022 |
| Preceded by | Deseret Congress |
New session started | June 6, 2022 |
| Leadership | |
President of the Assembly | |
Speaker of the Assembly | |
| Structure | |
| Seats | 419 |
Composition of political parties | |
Political groups | United Socialists of Deseret (212) |
Length of term | 1 year |
| Salary | $105,000 $155,000 (Speaker) |
| Elections | |
| Ranked Voting | |
Last election | 23 May 2022 |
Next election | 22 May 2023 |
The Citizens Assembly of Deseret, often shortened to the Assembly, is the unicameral legislature of the federal government of Deseret. The Assembly was created after the reorganizing of the legislative branch in 2022, during which Congress was consolidated into a single chamber with more explicit powers with the goal of creating a more unified, streamlined, and representative government. Members of the Assembly represent the national population.
The Assembly is unique in that the voters themselves officially introduce and vote on legislation, with the Assembly itself taking care of specific issues outlined in the Constitution and as directed by the President. The Assembly is led by the Speaker of the Citizens Assembly and is composed of multiple political parties.
History
The first idea for a unicameral legislature dates back to the drafting of the Constitution, where a single body similar to the United States House of Representatives was proposed. Unicameralism was thought to be to prone to corruption and abuse of power, and so was never implemented. Despite this, support for a single, more powerful legislative house to more efficiently and effectively vote on legislation and respond to immediate issues continued to hold is small portions of society. The support for a unicameral branch was strong among historically disinfranchised groups, who viewed a single house as being more open and quicker to react than two separate chambers, and rose steadily in the wake of heated debates on slavery and the American Civil War.
In 1860 Frederick Cook, a representative, introduced an amendment to combine Congress into a single legislative body with the goal of weakening the power of pro-slavery American immigrants in the Senate and responding quicker and more decisively to the pressing issues of slavery, American, Mexican, and British aggression, continued population growth, and national cohesion. Critics were quick to publicly shun the amendment, calling it un-democratic, un-republican, un-Christian, and both pro-slavery (by anti-slavery activists) and anti-slavery (by pro-slavery activists). The amendment was never voted on as the more pressing matters of the American Civil War and Mexico's aggressive military actions, but was reintroduced in 1873, 1900, 1915, 1930, and 1946.
A national movement to intoduce a unicameral legislature came about in 1983 after the Senate blocked a House-passed bill that would have recognized same-sex couples as domestic partners. The bill was blocked by Senators from Bountiful, Ephraim, Mojave, and Utah, all low-population states which were seen as being over-represented in the Senate. The support for a unicameral legislature came from the ideas that the Senate under-represented larger states and over-represented smaller states, that Congress was prone to partisan gridlock, and that it's powers were too separated, as both houses were seen as being different and distinct rather than similar and unifying. The most popular idea of unicameralism in the 80s and 90s was a chamber much like the House of Representatives; however, critics of the House claimed that, since representatives were apportioned among the states by population and geographic areas, a House-like legislature would continue to have districts of unequal size, would continue to encourage regional divides instead of national cohesion, would separate similar people along state lines and lump disimilar people together into districts, and would increase gerrymandering. Public opinion was swayed by prominant congresspeople and politicians in favor of a proportional system, although many critics attacked the idea of a party-based system as opposed to a "person-based" system.
The idea for the currently-implemented Assembly came about in 2014, where it was championed as being the "people's chamber" and was aimed to reduce costs, political gridlock, the dominance of two or three larger parties, gerrymandering, and corruption. The idea for the assembly was authored by senior political analyst Kristinna Hsu and was endorsed by the Deseret Union Party, several smaller political parties, and by many in the Reform Party. Hsu's proposal placed most legislative power into the hands of the general populace, with the Assembly being mostly ceremonial and voting on issues of impeachment, war, taxes, the budget, and treaties. The name 'Citizens Assembly' was coined by Hsu in 2015.
Public support for the Assembly rose to around 60-70% during the 2020 presidential election, where Nicole Young, then Speaker of the House of Representatives, endorsed the idea. An amendment to implement the Assembly was submitted on 14 August 2020, with a deadline on 31 December 2021. The Deseret Union-Reform coalition held a 2/3 majority in Congress and passed the amendment on 2 September 2020. Three-fifths of states (eight) needed to ratify the amendment before the deadline for it to take effect, six states (Columbia, Arizona, New Israel, California, South Madison, and North Madison) ratified the amendment within two weeks after it passed Congress. Sonora ratified the amendment on 12 February 2021. Colorado became the eighth state to ratify the amendment on 7 April 2021. The amendment's ratification was verified and put on record on 9 April 2021. The following election on 23 May 2022 was the first using the new voting and Assembly system.
Qualifications, elections, and apportionment
Apportionment
The amount of Assembly seats is directly tied to the national population. The number of seats changes every year based on the population data available for the previous year. Currently there is one seat for every 139,900 people; this is due to the fact that, upon switching to the Assembly, there was a maximum capacity of 419 seats in the Capitol. After renovation of the Capitol building in 2022 allowed for more seats to be held, one seat was changed to eventually represent every 100,000 people. The number of people per seat will decrease each year so as to not drastically increase the size of the Assembly in the span of one year. There ratios are: 135,000 (2023), 125,000 (2024), 115,000 (2025), 100,000 (2026). Seats do not represent specific districts, but the population at large.
Qualifications
Assemblypersons must be at least 16 and no older than 65 by the time they are sworn in, must be citizens of Deseret, and must currently reside in the country.
Party elections
Anytime prior to the general election, the parties hold their own elections in which party members and/or delegates (depending on party rules) vote for several party members to be placed in the Assembly. Elections usually take place around March or April, but party candidates must have been selected prior to the first Monday of May, when general election ballots are sent out. The system of voting varies by party, but the most popular are ranked-choice voting done by all party members or delegates and instant-runoff voting done by delegates; several parties have senior officials select candidates without voting. Regardless of system used, all parties have a pool of candidates selected from which to draw from after the results of the election. The candidate with the most votes or highest priority is selected first, followed by the second, and so on until candidates have been selected to fill all won seats. Exact election/selection procedure, including ties, are left to the parties.
General election
The general election occurs every year on the second-to-last Monday of May, where all seats in the Assembly go up for election. Deseret uses a ranked-choice party-based voting system, in which voters vote for their preffered party and rank as many other participating parties from highest (1) to lowest. Ranked voting does not affect the election outside of being used to determine the placement of loose seats and being used when a party is disqualified after the election, and is mainly used to gauge public opinion on the various parties.
Vacancies
When a vacancy occurs due to death, resignation, or removal from office, the President selects someone to fill the vacancy until the next election. There are no rules on who the president may choose, other than the constitutional qualifications, meaning someone from any or no party may be selected to fill a vacant position, regardless of the party that held that seat.