Spock: First Vulcan in the Fleet?

[Timo]

Or perhaps she simply decided to stand up during Council meetings, considering a seat beneath her dignity (and bad for her back)?

One might speculate that the Council has members, and then it has seats. Some members are there merely to represent their planets, while others are chosen to sit on special chairs, such as the chair for the Defense Committee or the Economy Committee. Council Member T'Pau might have been the first individual to turn down the offer to chair the Cultural Committee, even though she did accept the Defense Committee chair and later the Colonization Committee chair.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[T'Girl]

Instead of a "seat," T'Pau wanted one of those "Mama~san" chairs. You know, the bamboo frame with the big comfortable pillow. Matching foot stool.

And she wanted to bring that Vulcan sedan chair, carried by the four muscle guys too. And that Sadomasochism dude, with the mask and the big knife.

Just in case anyone on the federation council "showed cowardice."

 

[Nerys Myk]

Perhaps like T'Ed she said "if nominated I will not run. If elected I will not serve."

 

[Pauln6]

It's probable that elected leaders of member worlds are automatically offered seats on the council (up to a certain limit perhaps). T'Pau was the first (and only at that time) elected leader to decline such a postion. She need not have been Vulcan's leader as at Amok Time but could have been at an earlier date.

 

[T'Girl]

^ How would that work? You're elected to high office, you are then offered a seat on the council, given that T'Pau was the only refusal, you accept.

Someone else is elected to replace you, at which time they are offered your seat on the council?

 

[Greg Cox]

Along these lines, I was watching "Mirror, Mirror" again yesterday, and couldn't help noticing that Spock was not the only Vulcan on the Mirror Enterprise. A Vulcan bodyguard is clearly visible in one scene, and Mirror Spock also reminds Mirror Sulu that some of his personal guards are Vulcan . . . .

 

[Pauln6]

^ How would that work? You're elected to high office, you are then offered a seat on the council, given that T'Pau was the only refusal, you accept.

Someone else is elected to replace you, at which time they are offered your seat on the council?

Yep. If you have been voted out by your people why should you still serve on the council? Nothing prevents the elected person declining a place and the natives choosing to elect somebody else (including their previous leader) to the council but the default can be your elected leader. FYI - if the Prime Minister of the UK's party wins the general election but s/he is not elected as the Member of Parliament in her/his home constituency s/he would have to step down automatically and let somebody else be Prime Minister.

 

[Anwar]

So only elected Officials of Member worlds can serve on the Federation Council? It's not possible that the elected leader could appoint someone else from his/her world to serve in their stead so they can focus on their own worlds' issues more?

 

[Pauln6]

So only elected Officials of Member worlds can serve on the Federation Council? It's not possible that the elected leader could appoint someone else from his/her world to serve in their stead so they can focus on their own worlds' issues more?

Elections would be more likely if the Trek universe was truly meritocretous. We have separate European elections to the European Parliament but appointments to the European Commission (which actually drafts the laws). Heads of states or their appointed representatives may have seats on various other institutions. Some representatives will have been elected to their posts, some with have been elected as an MP but appointed to a post, and some may be appointed by an elected official. The Federation could be equally diverse.

However, if T'Pau actually turned down a position it seems logical that it was a position she was entitled to by default, most likely as the head of the Vulcan state.

 

[Anwar]

The Fed President in DS9 said he was voted in by his people even though he never ran as a candidate, I think that you can be appointed to the Fed Council (or even the Presidency) via appointment by your world's government or the people vote for you (though how he was a choice if he wasn't a candidate stumps me).

I don't think T'Pau was the head of state for Vulcan at the time, but rather that the Ruling Council of Vulcan wanted to appoint her as their Rep on the Council.

 

[Timo]

The Fed President in DS9 said he was voted in by his people even though he never ran as a candidate

To be sure, he said he almost (but not quite) refused to submit his name to the election. Yes, he was a candidate.

We don't quite know what election he's speaking about; might be he was part of a political party or similar structure (perhaps the Grazerite world would be represented by the Grazerite party?), and had to decide whether to partake in preliminaries - and once he did, it was one big triumph through several successive elections until he became UFP President.

Also, he never quotes "people" as the group that would have elected him. All he says is that he used to represent his people (the Grazerites?) on the Federation Council - but he apparently left that behind when deciding to run for President. We have no idea who voted for his presidency - the people, the Council Members, an appointed body of electors, a gathering of clergymen?

Timo Saloniemi

 

[T'Girl]

(though how he was a choice if he wasn't a candidate stumps me)

His name could have been put forward at the last minute at a political convention, a compromise nominee. The fact that he wasn't actively seeking the nomination could have made him the perfect choose over others who the convention was deadlocked on.

He was drafted.

Another (less likely) scenario, his name becomes a hot item on the federation version of the internet in the weeks leading up to the election, and he becomes a "write-in" winner on the ballot.

 

[Anwar]

The idea of being "drafted" into politics has happened before in fiction. Matter-Eater Lad from "Legion of Super-Heroes" was conscripted into being a Senator on his homeworld.

 

[Timo]

...But here it has to be acknowledged that nothing out of the ordinary was ever indicated to have happened. Jaresh-Inyo was asked to run for some position (President, or perhaps presidential candidate), and considered declining but did run. And then he got elected, by party or parties unknown.

Whatever seat T'Pau declined (Council Member, or something else only available to Council Members) appears to be unrelated to this.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Pauln6]

I don't think T'Pau was the head of state for Vulcan at the time, but rather that the Ruling Council of Vulcan wanted to appoint her as their Rep on the Council.

I don't think she was head of state at the time of Amok time but she could have been earlier in her career

McCoy's relative ignorance and the fact that M'Benga only knew about Vulcan physiology because he'd interned on a Vulcan ward or some such is evidence that Vulcan physiology is not taught as standard by Starfleet at this point in time. It suggests an absence of integrated vessels until the TMP era.

 

[Timo]

Or possibly restricted access to the existing integrated vessels? The same way there might be, say, vessels with US and Free France sailors aboard, but those would have to obey stricter rules of secrecy within their respective forces than purely US or purely Free French ships would, lest US secrets leak out to De Gaulle or vice versa.

I could see something like this happen with both Vulcans and Trills. Both have dirty physiological secrets to hide: the average UFP citizen wouldn't approve of telepathy, duels-to-death, parasitic existence and the like. Yet Vulcan and Trill are important to the Federation, either as members or as allies.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Anwar]

Frankly, it's kind of silly that the Vulcans would be so closed up over something as relatively trivial as their Mating Rituals but they have no problem letting everyone know that in the past they were more violent than the Klingons.

Heck, after the revelation that the Romulans were actually exiled Vulcans you'd think that'd be more important to cover up than Pon Farr!

 

[Timo]

...But they did cover that up, somehow. Until "Balance of Terror", that is. And, for all we know, beyond that episode as well. It's not as if we ever saw anybody else but our heroes in possession of that fact.

Perhaps that's why the ships were segregated: so that no "politically untrained" Vulcan would blurt out inconvenient truths within earshot of equally "politically untrained" humans. Far better to send out pure Vulcan ships, and pure human ships, even if it meant denying the latter of key intelligence and thus possibly contributing to their loss...

Not all that different from keeping ULTRA facts from lower-level Allied commanders, really.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Anwar]

It just makes it all the more frustrating that no one ever thinks to call out the Vulcans on their hypocrisy and arrogance. They continually condemn humans as barbaric, but they used to be worse than humans EVER were.

 

[T'Girl]

I've always found it strange that some Trek fans assume that immediately following the events of Amok Time, Kirk and McCoy basically blabbed about what they had seen and heard on Vulcan to everyone aboard the Enterprise, then got on subspace and told the entire Federation about it too.

The feeling I received, was that what Spock told Kirk and McCoy was in confidence.

T'Pau effectively got Kirk out of having to file an official report.

And Spock didn't necessarily tell them everything, the whole Katra thing seemed to be a mystery to Kirk in TSFS. Sarek seemed surprised that Kirk didn't know of it. Sarek perhaps underestimated his son's ability to keep the Vulcan People's cultural secrets.

Admiral Morrow said he didn't understand Vulcan mysticism, doesn't sound like he was in on the big secret.