Is the Federation a True Democracy? And How Did It Reach That Point?

[Timo]

What is both here and there is that Samuels wasn't contemporary to the UFP. So at most we could argue that the structure of the UFP government might be influenced by the example of the historical United Earth one. But it might just as well be that mankind took the transition from UE to UFP as an opportunity to get rid of a system it found unworkable, replacing it with something free of any and all elements of parliamentarism.

Timo Saloniemi

[Guy Gardener]

The United Earth Government rules Earth. The Federation Council rules the Federation. Both have their administrative headquarters on Earth, but Humans can't give up their rights to be self ruled any more freely than all the other member worlds which doesn't have the Federation seat in residence. Federation membership supposedly helps their member worlds be themselves, it doesn't annex or assimilate so blatantly.

Does the Mayor of Washington DC, the Governor of Colorado (is that right?)and the President of the USA get into jurisdictional pissing contests about control?

Maybe?

[T'Girl]

Captain Shatner wrote:

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Not enough Trek fans are aware of this show

Plenty of Trek fans know about "nuBSG," it just not all of us were impressed by it.

As far as I know, the Enterprise was never hacked in TOS.

The Enterprise's records were hacked by the Talosians in the first pilot.

Tyler: I can't shut it off. It's running through our library. Tapes, micro-records, everything.

[R. Star]

Guy Gardener wrote:

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The United Earth Government rules Earth. The Federation Council rules the Federation. Both have their administrative headquarters on Earth, but Humans can't give up their rights to be self ruled any more freely than all the other member worlds which doesn't have the Federation seat in residence. Federation membership supposedly helps their member worlds be themselves, it doesn't annex or assimilate so blatantly.

Does the Mayor of Washington DC, the Governor of Colorado (is that right?)and the President of the USA get into jurisdictional pissing contests about control?

Maybe?

Maryland is the state DC is in/adjacent to if you want to be technical. But yes, you make a good analogy with that one comparing it to a looser form of the US.

[T'Girl]

R. Star wrote:

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But yes, you make a good analogy with that one comparing it to a looser form of the US.

The District of Columbia does have a mayor and city council, but the US Congress maintains supreme authority over the district and may overturn local laws.

So the federation council may have more power over Earth than it does over any other federation member, because of the council presence here. The federation president's ability to order a state of emergency on Earth may have been unique to this one world.

[Guy Gardener]

Although we learnt in DS9 that all security/defense forces in the federation for every member world is Starfleet.

Which the Federation Council has complete power over, and local world governments can make reasonable requests of. Now a request vs an order isn't too difficult to tell which is more powerful, but the specific civilian authorities on any member world would have lateral, and equivalent powers to a highly starfleet officer, possibly that when the Prime Minister of Earth gives a star Ship Captain an "order" it's little difference to an Admiral laying down the law, although with all field orders, they have to eventually if not be quickly be ratified as legal orders back at Starfleet Command.

I remember once on the West Wing after someone was shot that a nurse tried to stop Josh from going to see one of the victims, and he says something like "Ma'am I have the Diplomatic clearance of a two star general, so please get the hell out of my way."

Who ruled Vulcan in TOS? Was T'Pau in charge or just Bossy?

[Sci]

T'Girl wrote:

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The District of Columbia does have a mayor and city council, but the US Congress maintains supreme authority over the district and may overturn local laws.

And that's a deeply oppressive, un-democratic system that needs to be abolished -- hence, for instance, House Republicans' attempt yesterday to pass a federal law that would ban women in the District of Columbia from seeking an abortion after 20 weeks, with no exceptions for the health of the woman or for cases of rape or incest.

If there's one thing the U.S. does which the Federation should never imitate, it's the practice of denying equal rights and an equal vote to the citizens of its capital. It's nothing less than tyranny.

[R. Star]

Sci wrote:

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And that's a deeply oppressive, un-democratic system that needs to be abolished -- hence, for instance, House Republicans' attempt yesterday to pass a federal law that would ban women in the District of Columbia from seeking an abortion after 20 weeks, with no exceptions for the health of the woman or for cases of rape or incest.

If there's one thing the U.S. does which the Federation should never imitate, it's the practice of denying equal rights and an equal vote to the citizens of its capital. It's nothing less than tyranny.

I will say that the District of Columbia should be entitled to a self local government that isn't answerable to a body that is elected by people outside of their constituientcy and usually changes every two years, yes.

If that means making them part of Maryland/Virginia respectively then I don't see the big deal. I am against them getting full benefits of statehood, mainly representation beyond what they have in Congress.

Though on the flip side, 600,000 people getting three electoral votes is a nice perk.

[Captain Shatner]

T'Girl wrote:

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Plenty of Trek fans know about "nuBSG," it just not all of us were impressed by it.

The Enterprise's records were hacked by the Talosians in the first pilot.

Tyler: I can't shut it off. It's running through our library. Tapes, micro-records, everything.

Despite never having watched the old BSG, I am firmly convinced that the new one is good, and I will pigheadedly and stubbornly defend that belief to the death!

As for the Talosian hacking, that would raise the question, how does one hack a computer that is (as far as I can tell) primarily analog? I mean, how could the Talosians run through "all" the tapes if one has to physically insert the tapes into the computer to view the data?

PS - You have to admit, Christopher Pike would have made a pretty awesome captain!

[Captain Shatner]

[QUOTE=iguana_tonante;6735341]

Captain Shatner wrote:

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The butler did it.

Curses! And I was betting the Cylons did it! And I apologize for accidentally mocking loyal BSG fans! I'm a johnny-come-lately on Netflix...

[Sci]

R. Star wrote:

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I will say that the District of Columbia should be entitled to a self local government that isn't answerable to a body that is elected by people outside of their constituientcy and usually changes every two years, yes.

If that means making them part of Maryland/Virginia respectively then I don't see the big deal.

The big deal is that we're not Marylanders. (The territory from Virginia that D.C. once included was given back to Virginia in the 19th Century.)

And if you make us part of Maryland, then you end up doing the exact opposite of what you just said -- you take away our right to self-government that isn't answerable to a body elected by people outside our constituency. All you've done is made D.C. answerable to the Maryland General Assembly instead of Congress.

I am against them getting full benefits of statehood, mainly representation beyond what they have in Congress.

There is no representation in Congress. We get a Delegate to the House who is allowed to vote in committee and not on the floor. This is not representation; this is a joke.

And meanwhile, we outnumber the population of the State of Wyoming. Tell me, why is Wyoming entitled to representation in the Congress, but not us? Why is Wyoming entitled to statehood, but not us?

And the supposed justification for denying D.C. a voice in Congress -- that we're too small in number -- wouldn't even apply in the Trekverse, where United Earth constitutes an entire planet, plus more. Surely one can't argue the UFP should deny United Earth representation in the Federation Council, or its own government within the UFP.

[T'Girl]

Guy Gardener wrote:

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Harry Groener played "Minister" Nathan Samuels in Enterprise, a representative of the Earth government ...

A ministers could also be a diplomat. A minister is someone below the level of ambassador, but still with plenipotentiary powers to represent the government. I believe the title has fallen out of use in the last few decades, but in a century and a half could be back in full force.

Diplomatic ministers are not the same thing as government ministers, and don't solely come from parliamentary based governments.

Nathan Samuels was presiding over the discussions in San Francisco between delegates from several planets about membership within the future Coalition of Planets. Samuals' activities would seem to be more in line with a diplomat, rather than a elected government official.

R. Star wrote:

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If that means making them part of Maryland/Virginia respectively then I don't see the big deal. I am against them getting full benefits of statehood ...

The two states of Maryland and Virginia donated land to form the federal district, Congress returned a third of Washington DC to Virginia in September of 1846 (and six month later Virginia accepted it).

This is called retrocession.

Simply continuing the process with much of the rest of Washington DC would solve many problems, keep some kind of (much) smaller federal reservation for strictly federal government buildings. Residential areas would definitely go into Maryland.

[Sci]

T'Girl wrote:

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A ministers could also be a diplomat. A minister is someone below the level of ambassador, but still with plenipotentiary powers to represent the government. I believe the title has fallen out of use in the last few decades, but in a century and a half could be back in full force.

It would depend on what kind of relationship United Earth has with foreign planets. The term "ambassador" used to be reserved for the representatives of monarchs; republics like the United States would proudly send ministers plenipotentiary because they had no kings, while monarchies viewed the title of "ambassador" as more prestigious.

Eventually, the title of "ambassador" came to be applied to the heads of even republican diplomatic missions, because this was a way of the international system coming to acknowledge that republics were the equals of monarchies.

So it would really depend on the prestige associated with titles like "minister" or "ambassador."

But we do know this much, too: Both Vulcan and Andor sent ambassadors to United Earth, not ministers. And Samuels briefed Archer on political decisions made by the U.E. government -- which is not something one would think a minister plenipotentiary, whose job it would be to represent United Earth to foreign states, would do. But which an actual member of the U.E. Cabinet might.

For whatever it's worth, the ENT novels have established that Nathan Samuels was the United Earth Prime Minister throughout the Earth-Romulan War.

The two states of Maryland and Virginia donated land to form the federal district, Congress returned a third of Washington DC to Virginia in September of 1846 (and six month later Virginia accepted it).

This is called retrocession.

Simply continuing the process with much of the rest of Washington DC would solve many problems,

Not really. You have a politically distinct population that you'd be trying to shoe-horn into someone else's state. Would you advocate trying to integrate Louisiana and Texas just because they happen to be adjacent to one-another? Ohio and Michigan? New York and Vermont? Nevada and Utah? The idea is just offensive on its face.

[Uxi]

Non sequitur since None of those adjacent States ceded their territory to the central Government for the purpose of the Capitol. Retrocession of everything outside the Mall,White House, Supreme Court, Capitol, Monuments, etc would be the best way to deal with with the proper representation. Definitely preferable to Statehood, which is offensive enough to need a Constitutional Amendment to be legal and patently unfair for other States, especially the larger ones, as well or the very idea that a Capital State should have been formed from the territory of other members. I'd prefer to create a new Capitol in the very center of the nation from ceded territory.

As far as the Federation, definitely seems representative democracy, though the size of the Federation Council has never been established has it? Trek Apocrypha like Spock's World had T'Pau as the head of Surak's House and Spock as it's heir after Sarek. That same novel had several explicit references to representative democracy, though there was also a public referendum. None of it is in any way Trek canon, of course.

[T'Girl]

Uxi wrote:

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Retrocession of everything outside the Mall,White House, Supreme Court, Capitol, Monuments, etc would be the best way to deal with with the proper representation.

Foreign embasscies too. I would want all the buildings housing the machinery of the federal goverment outside of Maryland. Outside of any state was the intent of Washington DC in the first place.

I'd prefer to create a new Capitol in the very center of the nation from ceded territory.

A fine idea, people on the west coast feel very disconected from a government located so far away. North west Kansas seems real nice, carve out a piece of that for a new DC.

though the size of the Federation Council has never been established has it?

In DS9, Sisko said at some point that Bajor would have to select representitives to the council, representitives plural. So perhaps each member world has a team on the council, and not a individual.

That same novel had several explicit references to representative democracy..

I believe that reference was of Vulcan's government.

though there was also a public referendum.

Which might just be the way the federation is run, at least on big major issues and overall policy. There would be the council to carry out the people policies, and for emergency high speed decisions, and the bureaucracy for working the fiddly little details of the membership peoples referendum choices

Direct democracy.

None of it is in any way Trek canon, of course.

Well, none of the novels are.