Imagining the Federation governmental structure

[Penta]

Well, I don't know how to put this. I'm deeply bored, and parents are going to be home soon with a puppy only they want, so I'm thinking.

And my thought basically is this.

What we know about the Federation's governmental structure from canon is a jumbled, confused mess.

I disagreed with T'Girl positing Starfleet as a fourth branch of government when she mentioned it in the thread on this forum postulating a possible structure for Starfleet Command/levels above the individual starship, but I could see where it comes from: The disturbing lack of mention generally given to non-Starfleet organizations throughout the TV series and the movies.

This thread aims to fix that - to posit and debate what the Federation government might look like.
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For the record, some starting points:

Because if you try to figure out things in the time of TOS it gets confusing at best and downright insane at worst (partly because the Federation wasn't even invented until during the series run), I mean to look at the government as it might exist in 2383; hence, the TNG/DS9/VOY era.

I'm going to call the novels "helpful but not authoritative", because I haven't really read the novels.

My sources of inspiration here will be, in no order, canon such as it exists and is not contradicted (which, sadly, eliminates much of it), RL political science and other social sciences (more than RL governments or polities themselves), plus a good deal of speculation.

I will admit here that my knowledge of canon is not encyclopedic.
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Starting assumptions about the universe:

1. Humans and the Federation have economies, use money, and so forth. This is a hotly-debated point in Trek canon, but numerous governmental systems would not work at all if money did not exist and was not important. Over in the Trek Lit forum, me and Myasisichev (apologies if I misspelled that) brought up contracts law and torts law - and Myasisichev put in absolutely hilarious terms what a lack of monetary remedies would do to products liability law. The point is that without money, bad things happen.

2. Earth is a paradise, sort of. As are Vulcan, Andor, Tellar, and similar "inner core" systems, sort of. How this occurs will be analyzed, briefly. Note the specificity and qualifiers. These matter.

Finally: Occasionally, I will put things in []'s (brackets). These are "Margin notes" - not part of the document as such, but intended to be explanations, clarifications, and commentary.
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So, starting from the top. That is, the foundational documents of the UFP.

First off, what are they?

The Articles of Federation go by a variety of names. However, this is the fundamental treaty, the accession to which officially makes a Member State a part of the Federation. Yes, you read that right - it's legally a treaty. There are states, as subjects of interstellar law (such as it is) beneath the Federation.

The Articles set out the fundamental aims of the Federation, and establish a temporary structure "until the Member States may decide to institute between them further instruments".

The Federation Constitution is one of those further instruments - adopted by each Member State upon entry to the Federation, it is entrenched law that sets out the fundamental governing structure of the UFP. It is, in other words, strictly a "structural" document; rights and the like are not generally mentioned.

The Federation Charter of Rights actually handles the "Bill of Rights" functions seen in some constitutions. It's a separate document from the Constitution, but is entrenched to the same degree.

[Constitution/Charter difference is in part one of in-universe practicality - the initial drafts of the Constitution alone, if RL documents are any indication, probably weighed in at the dozens if not hundreds of printed pages. Debating, let alone understanding, would be greatly impeded if you combined the Constitution and Charter. Partly it's to avoid the problem constitutions which combine the roles frequently have in real life - where they might gradually accrete hordes of amendments. -Penta]

All officers of the United Federation of Planets, civil and military alike, swear or affirm to support the Constitution and the Charter.

[That little paragraph is vital. It shows where loyalty lays: Not to the government of the day, but to the institutions established by the document.]
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The Articles of Federation are mostly a historical document by 2383 - In daily life, they've long since been superseded by the Constitution and the Charter in importance.

It's important to stop for a minute and note why the structure was designed as it was, with a fairly makeshift government under the Articles replaced by the Constitution and the Charter within a year: The Articles were an exercise in "getting something built for now", with the idea all along of replacing it later. It was negotiated and acceded to by the initial members during the Earth-Romulan War, and nobody was quite sure it'd survive. Either the Romulans would win, or the infant Federation would tear itself apart; either was figured to be much more likely than actually pulling through to the call of the Convention of States which birthed the Federation Constitution.

As it is, they never managed to agree on abrogating the Articles, and so new members still accede to the Articles, then the Constitution and the Charter. By 2383, you probably could come up with reasons to formally consign the Articles to history, but nobody really wants to expend the legal and diplomatic energy that would require.

[Made sense to me, anyway. After 200+ years of the current system, it'd probably take years (and open up numerous cans of worms) to formally abrogate the Articles to history.]
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The Constitution of the UFP, written in its first drafts in 2161 during the closing stages of the Romulan War, takes its cues in many regards from Terran constitutional and political theory. This is largely intentional - there was no way you could get the Andorians to agree to Vulcan forms of government or the reverse. The Tellarites argued everything. It helped that Earth had by far the most diversity of active cultures among the founding species, and the government of United Earth was a working exercise in making cross-cultural government effective. It might also be mentioned that governmental and constitutional change was happening most rapidly for Earth and its colonies - Vulcan, Andor, and Tellar had had centuries with their current systems in broad form, while Earth had gone from nation-states to a single world government to, now, a multi-species government in only a few generations. To be wholly frank, the ever-pargmatic politicians who negotiated the Constitution knew that if it was to be accepted by humans, they couldn't change things too much. Especially since a law had been passed in the UE parliament requiring the approval of the Federation Constitution by popular referendum - something regarded with intense nervousness by everybody else, even the Tellarites.

[I never liked the idea that change could happen as fast, and as dramatically, as posited in Trek without what would really happen in politics: A not-insignificant population getting suspicious of the deals being worked out behind closed doors, the third massive change to Earth's politics in only a few generations, demanding things slow down, at least. See the Lisbon Treaty in RL Europe for a good example.]

In the event, it was approved by a resounding majority, but still. The law remains on the books, meaning that Earth and its colonies go to the polls whenever it's proposed to amend the Federation Constitution.

[Because power is an aphrodisiac, I don't see Earth and its colonies giving that up any time soon.]
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Structurally, the government of the Federation is based, with some adaptations for scale and cross-species issues, upon the government of United Earth.

There are three branches, as learned by every Federation child in grade school social studies, inspired by Anglo-American consitutional theory: The executive, the legislative, and the judicial.

The judicial branch is headed by a (currently) 9-member Supreme Court, formally known as the Supreme Court of the United Federation of Planets. Sitting in Paris, this is the last stop for any case in the Federation - there are no appeals of its decisions. As a rule, the size of the court may change as decided by the legislative branch - however, the constitution stipulates that there must be an odd number of seats upon the court. Members of the court (collectively known as "The honorable, the Chief Justice and Associate Justices of the United Federation of Planets", and individually as "<gender title> Chief Justice" and "<gender title> Justice", such as "Mr. Chief Justice" or "Mr. Justice" for human males) serve for life on condition "of good behavior". The Court generally deals only in major issues - on an average year, it only takes (formally, grants certiorari to) 80 to 100 cases. While the death penalty has not been imposed in Federation civilian jurisprudence since the 23rd century, and in Federation military jurisprudence since the early 24th century, it still remains on the books for very limited offenses under the Uniform Code of Military Justice which governs Starfleet - in such cases, all death sentences must be explicitly confirmed by the Federation Supreme Court after oral arguments. It was formerly the practice of the Justices, when announcing their decisions in capital cases, to wear scarlet robes, as opposed to their ordinary black robes.

[The number of cases is taken from RL US Supreme Court caseloads. The robes thing is a touch I recall from somewhere that seemed fitting to the solemnity and "difference" of a capital case.]

Below the Supreme Court, the Constitution does not speak to the Court System, except in prescribing life tenure for Federation judges - however, the Judiciary Act 2163 was one of the first laws passed by the newly-assembled legislative branch, and it quickly established a series of judicial circuits, headed in each case by a Justice of the Supreme Court assigned by the Chief Justice (who, besides his duties managing the Supreme Court, also is President of what is known as the "Judicial Conference of the United Federation of Planets" or Federation Judicial Conference, a body which handles much of the administration of the court system), and staffed also by circuit judges. Generally, the number of circuits has always at least matched the number of associate justices on the Supreme Court, plus the Chief Justice acting as chief circuit judge of the special "Federation Circuit", which handles appeals from lower courts in civil cases involving the Federation government. Circuits are, other than the Federation Circuit, arranged on "geographic" lines. Despite the name, members of the circuit courts have not "ridden circuit" for over a century in most circuits, instead sitting in a permanent location. The exception comes on the frontiers, where it's a rare planet which could permanently support a circuit court's infrastructure burdens. In such cases, the circuit judges travel in starships flown by the Federation Marshals Service, and convene aboard ship or, where possible, on planets for a brief period. Circuit courts generally hear cases in panels of 3 judges, except when appeal is made to the court from the panel, in which case it is heard "en banc" - with the entire court hearing arguments. This is rarely granted, however.

[The Federation Judicial Conference is based upon the Judicial Conference of the United States - such a body seems almost required given the size of the UFP. The circuit courts are based off US practice - except that in the US, circuit courts haven't been mobile for over a century.]

Below the circuit courts are Federation District Courts and Federation Magistrates' Courts. District Courts cover multiple star systems in most instances, and sit as the court of First Instance in most cases brought under Federation law, as opposed to the law of a Member State. (A vast majority of matters, civil and criminal alike, are handled by the court systems of Member States of the UFP, with no involvement from the wider Federation. Appeals from Member State supreme judicial bodies go the local Federation District Court, and up from there.) Judges on Federation Disticr Courts serve for life, and generally sit alone, not in panels as at the appellate levels. However, there are usually multiple district judges per district, headed up by a Chief District Judge. Federation Grand Juries are also empanelled at the District Court level. Each Member State is guaranteed at least one judicial district by common practice - Earth, Vulcan, and other heavily-populated regions often have multiple judicial districts, particularly where a large number of colonies are involved.

Federation Magistrates do not serve for life - on the other hand, they're not appinted in the usual manner, either. Federation Magistrates act as sort of "sub-judges", serving to expedite the judicial process by taking on such duties as assigned by the district court who appoints them. Particularly where the caseloads are dense, there's frequently a number of magistrates per district -where districts cover multiple star systems, there's generally at least one magistrate assigned per planet. Federation magistrates may be either full or part-time in their duties, depending upon the volume of work and other factors. In exchange for all this, magistrates are appointed for terms of between four and twelve years.

[The district courts and the Magistrates are drawn from US practice, though US Federal magistrates are full-time to the best of my knowledge.]

All felony criminal proceedings in the Federation civilian system must begin with the voting of an indictment by a Grand Jury. The Grand Jury is 23 citizens appointed from the Judicial District that serve much the same functions as Grand Juries of previous ages - with one exception: For the year in which the Grand Jurors are appointed, they generally act with a great deal of independence -Grand Juries in the Federation courts are nothing like the Grand Juries parodied by a Terran judge in the 20th century, wherein the Grand Jury would "indict a ham sandwich" if the prosecutor proposed it. Instead, Grand Jurors are in many cases fearsome investigators of the matters put before him - it is often nervewracking for prosecutors to put a case before the Grand Jury's investigation: Grand Juries are given their own limited investigative resources (subject to the limitations of the distict court), and Grand Jury service actually begins in most cases 3 to 6 months before the jury is formally empaneled, as jurors are selected and receive a basic legal education.

[The grand jury is, yes, a major change from RL grand juries - bringing them back to their historical functioning a great deal, and restoring a lot of the independence lost over the years IRL. This is made possible by the high standard of education received by most Federation citizens, and makes the process a lot less certain than in RL courts.]

Felony criminal trials are heard before a single judge and a jury of 12. These proceedings would be recognizable instantly to the legally-interested person of the 20th and 21st century as something familiar - even though the process now involves much greater use of technology and remote communications, much has not changed. All criminal cases in Federation courts are brought in the name of the United Federation of Planets (the case is captioned, for example, "The United Federation of Planets v John Smith" with a short caption of "Federation v Smith"), and prosecuted by the local UFP Attorney's Office (more formally, the "United Federation of Planets Attorney for <district>"), with defendants being represented either by the Federation Defenders' Service (public defenders) or private counsel. While the Federation Defenders Service has lawyers of high caliber, the volume of cases the average office (and therefore the average lawyer within the office) undertakes is greater than the average private attorney, somewhat reducing their effectiveness.

English Common Law's system of precedents and general structure is the basis for the court system of the UFP, and this shows in the structure of cases: The adversarial system is strictly enforced. On the other hand, juries are (with a great deal of reluctance on the part of the court, granted) given free reign to use resources beyond formally submitted evidence, subject to the judge's restrictions, and jury nullification, while not strictly approved of, is not illegal. At the same time, judges are also given a great deal of freedom, subject to the appellate process, including near-absolute freedom in sentencing. (Some judges, particularly in frontier districts, can get very creative indeed.)

[Again, when one presumes a much higher standard of education among Federation citizens, the jury can do so much more, plausibly. On the other hand, because mandatory sentences and "sentence guidelines" can occasionally result in manifestly unjust outcomes, giving judges back their historical freedom in sentencing helps check the jury and the prosecutor. Frontier judges, naturally, are a good deal less straight-laced than their more settled counterparts. For all UFP judges, I see sentencing guidelines as a suggestion, not a rule - but this is especially true for out on the frontiers.]

After sentencing, convicted offenders are placed in the custody of the Federation Prison Service, which maintains penal settlements throughout the Federation, including entire prison colonies, at varying levels of security. A great deal of emphasis is placed upon rehabilitation for non-violent offenses, and the general regime would be utterly insane to the average Terran of the 20th or 21st century. On the other hand, Federation penal colonies are frequently in very remote and difficult to access systems, and attempted breakouts and unrest are met by both the Prison Service and Starfleet with a great deal of force in reaction.

Death sentences in the civilian system, when they were carried out, were conducted by hanging for human prisoners. Currently, the maximum sentence imposable by a Federation civilian court is Life Imprisonment without possibility of parole. (And in the Federation, Life imprisonment means precisely that.)

[This is sort of the harder to explain bit of Federation justice - how the hell do they keep crime low without being Orwellian? Answer: While the system is focused on rehabilitation for most prisoners, for those who use violence or who pose a real threat, the Federation is totally ready to make your imprisonment for life (as in, "until you die and we make sure you're dead"), and enforce that term of imprisonment harshly. They don't have to be as harsh within the prisons because getting out is difficult - should you somehow manage to escape, they're completely ready to use lethal force. Unrest is also met with the same rage - particularly violent unrest.]

Civil cases are even more recognizable to Terrans of a former era - Federation civil cases work in pretty much exactly the same way as cases in the United States or United Kingdom in the 21st century. The details may be different (juries are a lot less common, for instance), but the broad strokes are the same.

[Plus ca change, all I can say. The civil court system works remarkably well in broad strokes - I can't see the Federation not borrowing where things work.]

[Next post will move out of the judicial system. It was supposed to be the shortest part, sadly.]

 

[indolover]

The Federation is essentially the USA (or any real life presidential system of government) in space.

So much so that the Founding Fathers probably came back from the dead, and wrote word for word the Federation's constitution.

The President of the Federation is independent of the Federation Council, just like Obama in the real world is independent of Congress, and the Federation Supreme Court performs judicial review and is the highest court of appeal (just like the US Supreme Court in real life).

 

[Penta]

Yeah, pretty much, BUT. Figuring it'd be that simple is no fun. Ergo I want to detail stuff out a bit more.

 

[Myasishchev]

1. Humans and the Federation have economies, use money, and so forth. This is a hotly-debated point in Trek canon, but numerous governmental systems would not work at all if money did not exist and was not important. Over in the Trek Lit forum, me and Myasisichev (apologies if I misspelled that) brought up contracts law and torts law - and Myasisichev put in absolutely hilarious terms what a lack of monetary remedies would do to products liability law. The point is that without money, bad things happen.

Fwiw, I still don't think they do have money, in a conventional sense (they probably have an accounting system, that uses kilowatt-hours, but I doubt these are alienable). It's a lot more fun, I think, to try to imagine a fundamentally different society and economy than simply just admitting that the Fed is America in Space.

Regarding PL, I was being glib (but I am glad I was funny ), but there are other potential methods of negative feedback than pecuniary ones. If you want to embrace the idea of the Fed as a socialist institution, much commercial and industrial activity will be undertaken by state enterprise, which should be vulnerable to the same democratic feedback any government agency.

Affirmative injunctions (never make something like this again!) could work too. Indeed, such could be binding on the world, not just the parties to the case (effectively, warranty, negligent design and failure to warn cases are already binding on the world).

The Articles of Federation go by a variety of names. However, this is the fundamental treaty, the accession to which officially makes a Member State a part of the Federation. Yes, you read that right - it's legally a treaty. There are states, as subjects of interstellar law (such as it is) beneath the Federation.

Sounds fine to me. I'm curious if it's ever outright stated that the Fed Constitution is contemporaneous with the Articles. The United States' failed confederal government existed for, what, a decade before the U.S. Constitution presented the possibility of a stronger central government. A similar, but longer, confederal period might have existed for the Federation. It helps explain the bizarre inconsistencies within TOS and between TOS and the 24C series, if you assume the Federation planets are more than American states, and more than nominally sovereign.

Phrases like "Earth ship," aliens that treat one another more like potential enemies than compatriots in "Journey to Babel," and hellhole Federation planets like Adana and possibly Vulcan which are clearly not following the Charter in "The Cloud Minders" and "Amok Time" all make a lot more sense if the Federation is more like the European Community or even the NATO of the 1960s than the America of today. It is of course clear that a very strong, America-like central government exists in the 24th century, and it seems like the shift was going on in the 2280s, during the films.

the judiciary

Why a common law, specifically American judicial system?

Common law is not even the most widespread system of law in the Western world (especially if you count Russia, although you probably shouldn't), and there's no reason to assume that a common law-like system was in use on Vulcan, Tellar, Andor, etc. And I'm not sure a bunch of established species would bow to the legal system of a bunch of dorks who barely have warp drive.

It was formerly the practice of the Justices, when announcing their decisions in capital cases, to wear scarlet robes, as opposed to their ordinary black robes.

Actually, this reminds me of Q the judge from the post-atomic horror in "Encounter at Farpoint" and "All Good Things." It occurs to me that we've never seen any other civilian judge in Star Trek--only a Starfleet flag officer presiding over a judgeless court martial (which is all kinds of fucked up).

It pleases me to think that Federation judges, or at least Earth judges, maintaining continuity with the past, comport themselves in the style originated by the only force for order we're aware of in the aftermath of 600 million dead and economic and ecological catastrophe.

Including the hover-chairs!

juries given free reign to use resources beyond formally submitted evidence

I'll grant this is interesting. Why have rules of evidence at all, if jurors can google stuff? It would make trials more fun, to be sure. Probably not more fair, though.

After sentencing, convicted offenders are placed in the custody of the Federation Prison Service, which maintains penal settlements throughout the Federation, including entire prison colonies, at varying levels of security. A great deal of emphasis is placed upon rehabilitation for non-violent offenses, and the general regime would be utterly insane to the average Terran of the 20th or 21st century. On the other hand, Federation penal colonies are frequently in very remote and difficult to access systems, and attempted breakouts and unrest are met by both the Prison Service and Starfleet with a great deal of force in reaction.

Something I really, really, really liked about TOS was its extreme take on the rehabilitative model of imprisonment. This was very, very, very sadly abandoned to some extent in the 24th century series. But then, I guess that's probably consonant with the times--in the 1960s, rehabilitative imprisonment was still a going concern. You might as well be talking about Stalinism, as talk about a primarily rehabilitative purpose for the penal system these days.

Actually, what I found even more interesting was the emphasis on treating criminality as a mental illness. The potential for danger is clear--when crime is mental illness, becomes easier to treat mental illness, or even nonconformity, as crime. In the 23d century, it's entirely possible that Barclay would be spending a lot of his time under the neural neutralizer...

Then again, I like a darker, even potentially totalitarian side to my Federation.

I also wonder about their substantive law (and the substantive law of their federal subunits). What are crimes in the Federation? Well, genetic engineering, apparently. Mark my words, in ten or twenty years, "Space Seed" will have all the chauvinist repellance of "Turnabout Intruder" or "Code of Honor." All right, maybe not "Code of Honor."

 

[Penta]

I went with common law because, while civil law is more common even in Western societies, common law is a lot more adaptable - at least IMHO. It's also harder to reconcile a civil law system with the federalism we see practiced within the UFP. (I will also admit that a lot of the judiciary system I proposed makes a lot more sense when you see the legislative system I'm drawing up.)

Re juries: A good point - to be honest, I see the jurors as given freedom and discretion - but within limits set out by the judge. Yes, it enables juries to undertake court-monitored googling - on the other hand, I posit that Fed citizens are a lot savvier about information literacy than their counterparts today. To be honest, in part I'm drawing from my own experiences with the legal system (I'm a paralegal in training): The jury system isn't fair. It's biased as hell, it occasionally produces weird results, and (unless you match the salary jurors aren't making while they serve, something I presume the Federation does but forgot to state) tends to draw very low-quality individuals to serve.

That all being said, the jury system has a huge advantage over non-jury methods: It reflects the popular will wonderfully. It may not be fair - fairness in a trial is assured by the judge. What it does is makes justice a popular function, and that makes the law a lot more likely to be vountarily adhered to - and makes punishments that much more acceptable to the populace when they're imposed.

I still go with a heavy rehabilitative impulse for prisoners in my UFP - but it has limits. I'll explore "What are Federation crimes" in the legislative section.

 

[Myasishchev]

Indeed, and rules of evidence are there to prevent twelve idiots from deciding based on passion. If they can just look at anything, they may and might well decide criminal cases based on substantially unfair and prejudicial bases like what porno the defendant prefers, or bogus science that the jury believes in but was never vetted by the judge, or even more worryingly public opinion.

Likewise, in civil cases, highly dispositive evidence like subsequent remedial measures to a design flaw or broken sidewalk could get in, although the rule exists so that litigation doesn't serve as a strong disincentive for people not to fix situations that could easily harm more people if left in their pristine, dangerous condition. Or people could decide things based on how much insurance a person carries (or mercifully decide in favor of the defendant if they don't carry insurance).

 

[T'Girl]

First, please lay aside my idea of combining the departments of defense and state into a fourth branch of government,
it was just an thought.

Concerning the structure of the Federation government you need to address the question of sovereignty. How much do the individual planetary states still retain? Is the Federation a union of sovereign nations that possess independent authority over their territories, with a weak central organizing body (the Federation), an analogy to the current UN?
Or are the member states little more than "the provinces"?
Does your Federation Charter of Rights have the equivalent of the US tenth amendment?

You're obviously putting a lot of thought into this, please continue.

 

[Penta]

And now the legislative section. [Buckle your seatbelts - things get weird in this section.]
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The Federation is as often explained as "The UN in space" as it is "The US in space" or "the EU in space".

The reality is a good bit weirder.

One alarming feature to the UFP is that there's a severe "democratic deficit" - there's no popularly-elected part of the legislature.

The Federation Council, which sits in London, is unicameral - and generally far more powerful than its given credit for.

Each delegate to the Council is in fact an accredited ambassador to the Federation from the Member State - appointed variously depending on the Member State. There are about 150 member states, so about 150 delegates. (For reasons of internal sanity, the Federation tries very hard to admit new states in groups - nobody in the Federation establishment likes what happens when you admit a member here and a member there - it tends to paralyze the Council)

[Yes, that means exactly what you think it does. FedCouncil delegates have diplomatic immunity from Earth justice (except for the poor delegate from Earth), have embassies, and so forth. Does this mean that delegations perform espionage on each other? Maybe.]

The Council is headed by the Speaker, who is appointed by a secret vote of the House. It should be noted that each delegate is generally presumed by law (and slowly by custom) to have a great deal of freedom not to take instruction from the government back home - of course, in day to day politics, some are more dependent upon their homeworlds than others, but the general rule is that delegates are supposed to be free to vote their consciences on any issue; it has become customary since the late 23rd Century for delegates to swear an oath to that effect, after swearing the usual oath of allegiance to the Federation Constitution that formally makes them a member of the Federation Council. It is an oath taken very seriously by members of the Council, also.

[Yup. Essentially, the only power the home folks get over their delegate is the power to hire and fire.]

The main functions of the council are: To make laws, to decide the budget of the Federation and its agencies, to oversee the activities of the Federation's executive agencies, to confirm the appointments of all civil and military officers of the Federation, to advise and consent with regards to treaties, and generally to keep the Federation bureaucracy accountable to someone.

The Council acts largely through its committees, which are aided and abetted by professional and powerful (some would say too powerful) staffs, both for individual members (put in place and funded by the member's home government) and committees as a whole (employed by the Council as an entity).

[You can see where...conflicts can arise.]

There are dozens of committees, covering a wide variety of issues. The system is fairly rational, with minimal overlap between committees, but that requires a reform of the system about every 50 to 60 years - a process described by one delegate, not for nothing, as "pruning back the kudzu".

Among the notable committees:

Committee on Ways and Means - The tax-writers. The Federation largely funds through the operations of state-owned enterprises and taxes on trade between members, but it also levies taxes on Member States. This committee handles all of that.

Committee on Appropriations - the budget folks. With subcommittees for every function performed by the Federation bureaucracy, the members of this committee take the power of the purse very seriously. In no small part because it represents, to a very real degree, one of the few levers of power the Council has over the bureaucracy.

Committee on Foreign Relations - The committee responsible for diplomatic matters, including oversight of the Federation Diplomatic Service.

Committee on Security and Defense Affairs - a bit narrowly chosen of a name, but it's stuck by now - the CSDA oversees Starfleet. The most secretive of the normally-open Council's committees, most hearings are held behind closed doors, particularly when it involves the super-secretive Intelligence Subcommittee.

[They don't know about the existence of Section 31...officially.]

Committee on the Judiciary - Committee overseeing the judicial system, the Federation Code (the statutes of the UFP), the Federation Investigative Service, and the like.

Committee on Interstellar Travel - Usually, transportation is handled by the Federation's Member States. However, this committee has jurisdiction over matters that effect everybody in that regard.

Committee on the Admission of New Members - Want to join the Federation? Look here.

Committee on Investigations -You do not want to appear before this committee. This committee is where Bad People go to. It's remit was best described by one Chair as "Whatever the hell we feel needs inquiring into", and the members of this committee, even more than on most committees, relish the ability to look into whatever draws their attention. Usually, if you wind up before these folks, your career is about to go down in flames in a very spectacular fashion.

There are, as said, any number of other committees - some with standing since the first days of the Federation Council, some new and faddish. Some are permanent in nature, some are only authorized by the Council for a limited time.

[The Committee names above are drawn, by my quirky sense of history, from the US Congress and British Parliament. The Committee on Investigations has its analogues in any number of committees, but the point remains the same. It's sort of the "Miscellaneous we need a hearing and we need scalps NOW" committee.]

A few words of note:

There are no political parties in the Federation Council. Not formally, anyway - trying to establish a coherent political platform across species is even harder than it sounds. Every so often, people try. The variety of appointment methods and constituencies the delegates serve makes it difficult.

More commonly, the Council divides into issue-by-issue blocs. The guy who was your ardent opponent on one issue might be your best friend on another, as politics demands.

Federation Council delegates are not by planet. They are by Member State. There are 150 or so Member States; there are many, many more planets which are a part of the Member States.

This means that just as there isn't a delegate from Mars (it's a colony of the United Earth Government), neither is there only one human delegate; nor must the delegate from Earth necessarily be human. Plenty of Member States are single species (or a single dominant species) by accident of history. Plenty of Member States are incredibly diverse, too.

Federation law deals basically with whatever doesn't fit under Member State jurisdiction - they tend to interpret that conservatively, as well. There's not necessarily a "commerce clause" in the Federation Constitution to give the UFP jurisdiction over everything, though the courts have been creeping towards finding one.

There's also no explicit incorporation of the Federation Charter into member state law - Andor bans two religions despite Federation guarantees of religious freedom, for example.

[That tidbit re Andor comes from the Last Unicorn Games RPG sourcebook on the Andorians, which was used in part by the ENT crew as source material, I'm given to understand.]

That said, most of the Charter is incorporated into "domestic jurisprudence" by Member States, but only insofar as it fits their culture.

A dizzying variety of matters fall under Federation law but are never enforced, such as environmental law.

This is because of one thing: Where domestic law and Federation law conflict, Federation law provides a "floor". Example: The UFP has environmental regulations. The UEG does, too. The UEG may happen to not regulate where the UFP does - in that case, Federation laws apply. Where the local law does deal with matters, local laws apply.

Local laws also apply within the star ystem of a member state - Federation laws apply in "Deep Space", areas outside the gravity well of the system star. Local laws do not apply to Federation installations, either on planet or in space, such as Starfleet bases or starships.

[Trying to figure out how local laws and UFP laws interact given canon evidence alone would make heads explode. Especially mine. Therefore, I'm ducking the question. It's Law Review material.]

It should be noted - there are only a few guarantees in the interaction between Federation and local jurisprudence. Most resolve in favor of the power of the Member State. For example: The Federation does not have the death penalty on the books, except for limited circumstances under Starfleet jurisdiction.

That does not mean that a Member State may not. Some do. Some of those enforce it quite vigorously.

Next up - Finally, the executive.

 

[Penta]

First, please lay aside my idea of combining the departments of defense and state into a fourth branch of government,
it was just an thought.

Concerning the structure of the Federation government you need to address the question of sovereignty. How much do the individual planetary states still retain? Is the Federation a union of sovereign nations that possess independent authority over their territories, with a weak central organizing body (the Federation), an analogy to the current UN?
Or are the member states little more than "the provinces"?
Does your Federation Charter of Rights have the equivalent of the US tenth amendment?

You're obviously putting a lot of thought into this, please continue.

It's a pretty fundamental question - one canon evidence applies either way depending on the episode. I've attempted to address it in the legislative section, but I fully admit that some of it goes way past my competence.

My response is thus: It depends. It really depends.

I know, that's not satisfying. It drives me nuts.

But canon contradicts itself horribly, even within TNG/DS9/VOY.

 

[Ra'min]

Hi all (my first post on trek BBS)

I've been thinking on a nearby topic : how independent are federation members?

Clearly, each have a government. Each have laws : for exemple, Trill has a set of specific laws regarding symbiots.

I believe they also have at least a police force. All democratic states make a distinction between army and police. Americans don't have the US army policing the streets in their town : state or city police do that.
My guess is that each federation homeworld, and presumably colonies too, have at least a small police force for the daily law enforcement.
We see in TNG "Gambit" that the vulcans still have an independent intelleligence service,called the V'shar. If they have intelligent service, they must at least have a police!

Also, we have a couple of vulcan ships. I'm not talking about the USS T'Kumbra in DS9 : it's a starfleet vessel (USS prefix, starfleet uniforms, nebula class : no doubt) whose crew is Vulcan.
But in DS9 "Vortex" we have a vulcan science ship coming back from the gamma quadrant, and it's clearly not starfleet : the captain have a uniform completely different from starfleet's.

We also have various apparitions of or references of tellarite, trills, andorian and so vessels.

Also, we know that the artificial vortex projet (DS9 "rejoined") is a joined Starfleet-Trill ministry of science project, while the MIDAS array (VOY pathinder) is a joined Vulcan-Starfleet project.
So the members (at those two) still have research entities, which can on occasions work with starfleet.

Strange thing is, that doesn't seems to apply to earth. AFAIK, we've never seen a earth/terran/human vessel after the federation was born, or heard of a specific earth, non-federation, institution.

Perharps some members are more involved in federation than other, and the vulcans chose to keep their own fleet, while the humans decided to transfer all their space program to starfleet.

It seems there are several degrees of memberships : the evora in first contact applied to be a "federation protectorate", not a plain simple member.

 

[Sci]

Political Science major that I am -- or was, before I graduated -- I love threads like these. Good job on a well thought-out system, Penta! I don't agree with everything you speculate on, and I'll probably have some friendly debates with you about some points, but it's a very well-thought-out system that's very interesting.

I'm going to start by outlining how the Federation government has been established to work in the novels.

There are six principal novels that establish most of what we know about how the Federation works: A Time to Kill by David Mack; A Time to Heal by David Mack; A Time for War, A Time for Peace by Keith R.A. DeCandido; Articles of the Federation by Keith R.A. DeCandido; A Singular Destiny by Keith R.A. DeCandido; and The Next Generation: Losing the Peace by William Leisner.

To start with, AotF established that the Federation Charter, Federation Constitution, and Articles of the Federation are all different names for the same document, and that its formal name is "the Articles of the Federation." The Articles are established to outline how the Federation government functions, and to enumerate the rights of sentient beings under Federation law (the "Guarantees" established in TNG's "The Drumhead").


The Federation Council is established to be comprised of one Federation Councillor from each Federation Member State. Federation Member States are depicted as retaining embassies on Earth, but the Councillors have their own staffs not based out of the embassies. Each Member State gets to determine for itself how its Councillor will be determined; Betazed's is popularly elected, Andor's is appointed by the Chancellor on the basis of which political party or coalition wins the majority of seats in the Parliament Andoria; Bajor's is appointed by the First Minister with the advise and consent of the Chamber of Ministers; etc. However, Federation Councillors are not considered "ambassadors" from their Member States and do not receive instructions from their Member States -- they're a bit like United States Senators in that regard.

The Federation Council is comprised of a number of different committees for a given issue, and each committee is referred to as the "Federation [Subject] Council." Members of each committee are nominated by the Federation President and approved by a vote of the full Council. The Federation President him/herself is required by the Articles to preside over sessions of the full Federation Council except in "extraordinary circumstances," which is most commonly interpreted to mean unless the President is off-planet.

The President has the option of, but is not required to, preside over committee sessions, and generally presides only over sessions of the Federation Security Council and important cases before the Federation Judiciary Council. The Federation Security Council, unlike most committees, is always comprised of the Councillors from the five founding Member States (United Earth, the Confederacy of Vulcan, the Andorian Empire, the United Planets of Tellar, and Alpha Centauri), but the President nominates the "back eight." The Judiciary Council is depicted in AotF as being the Federation's highest legal authority, deciding the question of B-4's sentience, but this seems to contradict "Dr. Bashir, I Presume?" 's establishment of there being a Federation Supreme Court possessing judicial review.

The President is popularly elected, in a process that takes over one week for all votes to be tabulated by two independent auditing firms. The President serves a four-year term of office, with no term limits, though no President has served for more than three terms. When the President resigns or dies in office, the Federation Council elects one of its own members to serve as President Pro Tempore for one standard month and call a special election. For any presidential election, candidates' names are anonymously submitted to the Council; the full Council then determines whether or not those potential candidates fulfill the requirements to serve as President (those exact requirements going unestablished), at which point approved candidates accept the nomination. Special elections occur over the course of one month, with the new President taking office immediately upon their winning being determined. With a normal election, the President takes office at the beginning of the calender year following the election.

The Federation Council and Federation President both operate out of the Palais de la Concorde, a vast, 15-story tall cylindrical structure located in Paris on the site of the former Place de la Concorde. The Council Chambers are on the first floor; the second floor contains the Palais de la Concorde Press Liaison's office and press briefing room, and a transporter bay. (The Press Liaison works for both the President and the Council, which can make for an interesting time for him when he's serving two masters.) Floor 3 houses the Palais legal counsel office. Floors 4 through 11 house the offices of the Federation Councillors and their staffs. Floor 12 houses the Roth Dining Room, the Federation's state dining room, and its support facilities. Floors 13 and 14 house the President's staff, with 14 housing the offices of the Chief of Staff and of the Cabinet members. Half of Floor 15 is comprised by the Presidential Office (the Federation's equivalent to the Oval Office, seen in Star Trek VI), with the remaining half comprised of the lobby, a private study, and two meeting rooms, the Ra-ghoratreii Room (which Jaresh-Inyo used as his office, as seen in DS9's "Homefront"/"Paradise Lost") and the Wescott Room; each is named after former Federation Presidents. One of the basement floors of the Palais also contains the Monet Room, which is the Federation's equivalent to the White House Situation Room.

The Federation government is depicted as having the legal authority to place Member States' worlds under martial law in states of emergency (DS9's "Homefront"), and also has the authority to federalize Member States' industries and forcibly re-distribute their resources in times of crisis (as established in Losing the Peace, where the Federation President threatens the Alpha Centauri Governor with federalizing Alpha Centauri's mines if worlds devastated by the recent Borg invasion don't start receiving more resources from Alpha Centauri's mines).

I'll be by later to post some of my thoughts on your setup, Penta.

 

[T'Girl]

It seems there are several degrees of memberships : the evora in first contact applied to be a "federation protectorate", not a plain simple member.

The United States has states, territories, protectorates. Also while the United States is a member of the United Nations, it is also a member of the Organization of American States.

Some Federation members may be "Full Members." Others may choose a more limited role, agreeing to the Federations laws to become "Trade Only Members." There could be a member who only wishes to send a observer to the council, not an ambassador, a "Non-voting Member." There would be "Starfleet Protected Members" who perhaps pay lower taxes because they receive the entree, not the full menu. Other members may have pre-existing political alliances with multiple worlds who have no interest in ever joining the Federation.

I wonder if say United Earth, could be a member of the Federation and also be a member of another separate political organization? As long as the two (or more) commitments don't overlap.

What happen to Mars when it reaches the point that it's inhabitants no longer consider Mars (or themselves) to be a colony of United Earth? Certainly some colonies would in time become independent political entities. With many dozens of colonies (former colonies) this could in time result in a permanent Human voting bloc in the Federation council, in other words, a political party. There could be difficulties if Mars join a separate interstellar government other that the Federation.

Different races will possess various reproduction rates, the Horta's is very slow. Masao Okazaki's The Starfleet Museum postulate a Federation history where the Human race reproduces so fast and founds so many colonies, that it begin to cause problems with other Federation members, especially given that Humans dominate Starfleet and use it to assist their colony expansion.

http://www.starfleet-museum.org/

 

[Myasishchev]

^I always thought of protectorates as all the pre-warp societies that Federation policy demands our explorers skips over.

I mean, yeah, the Prime Directive sez "Don't interfere," but you might still want to shield them from people who don't have a Prime Directive, like the Klingons, etc. I mean, the market forces that would drive anyone who had 24th century technology to go to a bronze age world and be worshipped as a god would be absolutely unbeatable without a law to curb them.

There wouldn't even necessarily need to be a coercive element on the part of the potential exploiter, so the Federation can't even really have these pre-warp peoples make a free choice--I mean, if two groups of advanced aliens came to Earth, and one said "We'll give you fusion power technology that will increase your economy by 50% within ten years and medical technology that will permit you near immortality," and the other group said, "It is best that you develop your society along its own idiosyncratic lines and suffer accordingly, until you reach the point where you figure out how to go faster than the speed of light and we can no longer ignore you, a scientific breakthrough which you don't even recognize as a theoretical possibility, you're so stupid"... well, whom would you want to deal with?

The unaligned pre-warp civilizations in Federation territory would be Klingon, Romulan or Cardassian subjects by the end of the year. And presumably, they'd have every right to declare themselves so, because the species, in the aggregate, presumably does have the fee simple interest in their own planet. Hence it's probably best that Starfleet interdicts any Klingons or egomaniacal/benevolent humans from showing up on Mintaka or wherever, before they can negotiate with the evil forces of oppression.

(On the other hand, absorbing a pre-warp civilization into the Federation economy would probably be like North Korea joining the United States.

Hey, Sci?

The Federation Security Council, unlike most committees, is always comprised of the Councillors from the five founding Member States (United Earth, the Confederacy of Vulcan, the Andorian Empire, the United Planets of Tellar, and Alpha Centauri), but the President nominates the "back eight."

They actually have Alpha Centauri in the novels as a founding state of the Federation? Who lives there? Is their representative named Londo?

The Federation Council is established to be comprised of one Federation Councillor from each Federation Member State. Federation Member States are depicted as retaining embassies on Earth, but the Councillors have their own staffs not based out of the embassies. Each Member State gets to determine for itself how its Councillor will be determined; Betazed's is popularly elected, Andor's is appointed by the Chancellor on the basis of which political party or coalition wins the majority of seats in the Parliament Andoria; Bajor's is appointed by the First Minister with the advise and consent of the Chamber of Ministers; etc. However, Federation Councillors are not considered "ambassadors" from their Member States and do not receive instructions from their Member States -- they're a bit like United States Senators in that regard.

Also, what a bunch of undemocratic losers. Although I could've called it. As noted above, rabbit-like humans cannot be trusted with proportional representation. This is probably especially important for Janus IV, which may occasionally have an aboriginal, citizen population as low as one.

 

[Sci]

Well, I think we need to pause and remember a few things.

First off, a protectorate is not a member of the nation to which it is a protectorate. A protectorate is a legally independent, sovereign state who allows a stronger state to protect it, militarily and/or diplomatically, from other states. That Evora wanted to become a Federation protectorate meant they wanted the Federation to agree to protect them from other worlds, not that they were going to become legally part of the Federation. Being a protectorate is not a type of membership in the stronger state.

Secondly, groups like the United Nations or the Organization of American States (OAS) are not governments or states in their own right. They are international organizations to which states may be members, the same way the Rotary Club is not a person but is an organization to which people may be members. The Star Trek universe has no real equivalent to that, except maybe the Coalition of Planets from ENT.

The United States has states, territories, protectorates.

It does, but it won those territories by conquering them, and then not fully integrating them into the Union as states. I'd hardly think the Federation does the same thing -- though the UFP probably has colonies that aren't full Member States or Member State colonies and which fall under Federation jurisdiction directly. I'd imagine that those colonies are only started on uninhabited planets and that those colonies become entitled to Federation Member State status if their population grows to a certain level.

Some Federation members may be "Full Members." Others may choose a more limited role, agreeing to the Federations laws to become "Trade Only Members."

But that idea makes no sense. You're either part of the Federation or you're not; Federation law either applies to you or it doesn't. Why become "Trade Members" -- gaining some of the obligations of Membership but not equal representation in the Federation government -- when you can just negotiate a trade treaty but remain independent?

There could be a member who only wishes to send a observer to the council, not an ambassador, a "Non-voting Member."

Which, again, makes no sense. The territories in the U.S. that have non-voting members of Congress are all trying to change that, because they don't want to be rendered unequal before U.S. law and resent being subject to federal law without having equal say in federal law. No one would willingly choose to subject themselves to Federation law without getting equal say in the government.

There would be "Starfleet Protected Members" who perhaps pay lower taxes because they receive the entree, not the full menu.

Again, why go for any form of "Membership" when they could just negotiate a treaty where they'd pay the Federation in exchange for protectorate status?

I wonder if say United Earth, could be a member of the Federation and also be a member of another separate political organization? As long as the two (or more) commitments don't overlap.

Well, the United States allows its states to be members of international groups and parties to international compacts, subject to federal regulation. I'm sure the Federation would allow the same of its Member States, provided that sovereignty remain with the Federation.

What happen to Mars when it reaches the point that it's inhabitants no longer consider Mars (or themselves) to be a colony of United Earth?

The novels Enterprise: The Romulan War - Beneath the Raptor's Wings and The Genesis Wave, Book II establish, actually, that the Martian colonies fought for independence against Earth before United Earth was even founded. The War of Martian Independence was fought in 2105, just a few years after the colonies were established, leading to the establishment of the Martian state, called the Confederated Martian Colonies. United Earth, by contrast, was not founded until 2130 according to Articles of the Federation. So, ironically, Mars was never a colony of United Earth -- it was only ever a colony of one or more of the pre-United Earth nation-states. Later, the Confederated Martian Colonies became a Federation Member State after the UFP was founded, according to Genesis Wave 2.

Certainly some colonies would in time become independent political entities. With many dozens of colonies (former colonies) this could in time result in a permanent Human voting bloc in the Federation council, in other words, a political party.

1. What makes you think that those colonies would necessarily all be Human colonies? They might well be colonies with mixed-species populations that were descended from multiple species who were citizens of United Earth. Earth isn't just home to Humans, after all. There could easily be huge populations of Vulcans, Andorians, Tellarites, Rigellians, etc., all living on United Earth as U.E. citizens, and any number of them might move to a U.E. colony and be U.E. citizens in their own right before those colonies achieve independence from U.E.

2. What makes you think that there aren't plenty of other Member States doing the same thing? There might be any number of Federation Member States out there that began as Andorian colonies, who later rejected staying part of the Andorian polity and became separate Member States of the UFP in their own right. And any number of these other Member States' former colonies might themselves have mixed-species populations.

3. What makes you think that former United Earth colonies would be politically allied with one-another? A former U.E. colony would probably have never sought separate Federation Membership if that were the case; if they felt strongly enough about it to separate themselves from U.E., they probably don't agree with U.E. on most major issues.

There could be difficulties if Mars join a separate interstellar government other that the Federation.

If that separate interstellar state is hostile, sure. On the other hand, if they're peaceful, I'm sure it would be no more of a problem than the Most Serene Republic of San Marino being surrounded by the Italian Republic, or than Canada and the U.S. having numerous cities located adjacent to one-another.

Hey, Sci?

You rang? < / Lurch >

The Federation Security Council, unlike most committees, is always comprised of the Councillors from the five founding Member States (United Earth, the Confederacy of Vulcan, the Andorian Empire, the United Planets of Tellar, and Alpha Centauri), but the President nominates the "back eight."

They actually have Alpha Centauri in the novels as a founding state of the Federation? Who lives there?

Yep. Alpha Centauri was originally established as a colony of United Earth that declared independence from U.E. in the 2150s. Alpha Centauri and United Earth later both participated separately in the Coalition of Planets, were militarily allied during the Earth-Romulan War, and both were amongst the five states that founded the United Federation of Planets in 2161. It's comprised mostly of Humans, but of course, as a Federation core system, there are numerous other species that live on its worlds.

Is their representative named Londo?

As of the 2380s, it's actually a Human female named Huang Chaoying.

The Federation Council is established to be comprised of one Federation Councillor from each Federation Member State. Federation Member States are depicted as retaining embassies on Earth, but the Councillors have their own staffs not based out of the embassies. Each Member State gets to determine for itself how its Councillor will be determined; Betazed's is popularly elected, Andor's is appointed by the Chancellor on the basis of which political party or coalition wins the majority of seats in the Parliament Andoria; Bajor's is appointed by the First Minister with the advise and consent of the Chamber of Ministers; etc. However, Federation Councillors are not considered "ambassadors" from their Member States and do not receive instructions from their Member States -- they're a bit like United States Senators in that regard.

Also, what a bunch of undemocratic losers.

Well, sort-of. On one hand, no, not all Councillors are popularly elected. On the other hand, possessing some form of liberal democracy seems to be a requirement to even become a Federation Member State in the first place. So it depends on your definition of "democracy" as to whether or not, say, the Federation Councillor from Andor is considered to be undemocratically chosen; if I'm an Andorian citizen and I know that if I vote for a member of the Modern Progressive Party in the elections to the Parliament Andoria, that means I know who's the MPP's chosen person for Federation Councillor in their Shadow Cabinet, after all.

Although I could've called it. As noted above, rabbit-like humans cannot be trusted with proportional representation.

Well, one, like I said, there's no reason to think that Humans are going to be a unified bloc within the Federation, especially if they feel strongly enough about their political differences to declare independence from United Earth and seek separate Membership in the Federation the way, say, West Virginia declared independence from Virginia and sought separate membership in the United States.

And who's to say there aren't other species who are equally prolific? The Denobulans may be far more prolific than Humans, for instance.

 

[Penta]

Sci: Thanks for the canon (and novel-canon) info. I too was a poli-sci major, so this remains a labor of love on my part.

I'll confess to liking my setup better for the simple fact that it's simpler to grasp for most people and respects separation of powers (something I find sci-fi writers ignore to their detriment; there's a reason why, for example, even the Europeans (and I mean that nicely) have basically said the British-style "legislature as judiciary" form is a no-go; I may not agree with their rationale, but I definitely see where they're coming from), but the novels' setup works well enough, I suppose.

I'll confess that, in parts, I did borrow/steal from the novels, or what I've seen of them discussed here on TrekBBS. This was generally with the legislative section - the judicial branch we know nothing about, so I basically lifted the US Federal Courts (for lack, to be honest, of any other system that seemed likely to work on an interstellar scale) and ran with those. The executive I'm still writing, but it's going much easier than the legislative did.

I'll note that the more I think about it, the more I become very alarmed at the "democratic deficit" present in the FedCouncil, or would be alarmed if the polity existed. Without a popularly-elected component to the legislature there's a huge risk of the structure becoming captured by the bureaucracy and established interests very quickly. On the other hand, there's no real canon justification or evidence for there being a "House of Commons" in the mix, only the unicameral Federation Council.

I think it was T'Girl who brought up the Tenth Amendment as an issue - The more I think about it, the more I suspect the UFP works off of a pendulum - ordinarily, the power resides with the Member States, except when all hell breaks loose, which is when the pendulum swings, very roughly, very quickly, and very forcefully, to invest power in the central Federation bureaucracy. Post-crisis periods then see power returning to the Members, who are traditionally very jealous of their power.

Despite my comments on a democratic deficit, I do agree in one regard that popular representati fon would work badly - humans, who breed like rabbits, would hold a very dominant position. On the other hand, they're accused of such on-screen, so.it'd make sense if that was something everybody in the UFP knew, but hated when others pointed it out. To put it very crudely: "Well, it's not my fault Vulcans only mate once every seven years!"

 

[Myasishchev]

Yeah, but WV was an unconstitutional (if eminently fair) creation that served the needs of the federal government and the northern states. That instance of Senate-padding was very much accomplished, against a quasi-sovereign state, by force majeure.

I mean, when burning cities to the ground wasn't considered a politically viable option, the admission of free states like Maine came at a distinct and unpleasant price...

If the Romulan War so totally broke the other big three, it would make sense, but it still seems like such an overweening move by the human race to make. I mean, so what if the UE and AC were technically different states? If Australia were still sovereign in 215x, would they get a vote too?

Kind of a shame AC isn't run by Space Austrians, too...

 

[Sci]

Sci: Thanks for the canon (and novel-canon) info. I too was a poli-sci major, so this remains a labor of love on my part.

I'll confess to liking my setup better for the simple fact that it's simpler to grasp for most people and respects separation of powers (something I find sci-fi writers ignore to their detriment;

I tend to agree that I prefer the setup where there's a separate and independent judicial branch instead of a judicial committee within the legislature. Heck, even the United Kingdom has abandoned the Law Lords and established its own Supreme Court of the United Kingdom.

Having said that, I don't think that a stronger working relationship between the President and Council is inherently a bad thing. It's a situation where the Presidency itself is like the American Presidency, but the relationship between the President and Council is more like the relationship between a Prime Minister and Parliament.

I'll note that the more I think about it, the more I become very alarmed at the "democratic deficit" present in the FedCouncil, or would be alarmed if the polity existed. Without a popularly-elected component to the legislature there's a huge risk of the structure becoming captured by the bureaucracy and established interests very quickly.

Well, the first thing I'd point out is that there are Federation Member States whose Federation Councillors are popularly elected. We have no information on whether or not they make up the majority of the Member States, but they do exist.

The second thing I'd point out is that, again, the other Member States' practices are not exactly undemocratic, either. Parliamentary democracy is certainly a well-established form of democracy, and if you're an Andorian voter, you know which party will have which person serving as Federation Councillor when you got to vote for your constituency's Member of the Parliament Andoria.

Ultimately, I'd probably argue that granting each Member State the right to decide for itself how it will determine its Federation Councillor, and the resultant democratic deficit, is probably just the price of organizing an interstellar state as fundamentally vast as the United Federation of Planets. In terms of how many people any given Federation Councillor represents on the Council, the only real comparison I can think of in a democracy would be the Lok Sabha in India, whose members have so many constituents that there are serious questions about how any one person could possibly represent so many people or be democratically accountable. I'd consider it almost inevitable that you'd end up with some Member States with populations so large that they might opt for a form of indirect democracy with their Federation Councillor.

I think it was T'Girl who brought up the Tenth Amendment as an issue - The more I think about it, the more I suspect the UFP works off of a pendulum - ordinarily, the power resides with the Member States, except when all hell breaks loose, which is when the pendulum swings, very roughly, very quickly, and very forcefully, to invest power in the central Federation bureaucracy. Post-crisis periods then see power returning to the Members, who are traditionally very jealous of their power.

I think it's probably much steadier than that. The Federation clearly practices federalism; there are probably certain key areas where it's enumerated that the Member States have exclusive jurisdiction, and other areas where the Federation has exclusive jurisdiction. I do, however, think it's safe to say that the Federation has become a much more integrated polity over time -- it was on the verge of civil war over the issue of Coridan's entry as a Member State in "Journey to Babel," for instance.

I think it's safe to say that the Federation probably rushed Ardana into Membership -- possibly to give themselves a territorial bulwark against the Klingons or Romulans? -- without fully analyzing their society to determine whether or not any form of classism or de facto slavery existed. As for Vulcan -- I see no reason to think that there's anything there happening in violation of Federation law or principles, as I would argue that participation in the kal-if-fee constitutes consent to allow one's self to be killed if one loses the battle. And surely a free society would recognize the right of a sentient adult to have his or her life ended if he or she so chose.

Despite my comments on a democratic deficit, I do agree in one regard that popular representati fon would work badly - humans, who breed like rabbits, would hold a very dominant position. On the other hand, they're accused of such on-screen, so.it'd make sense if that was something everybody in the UFP knew, but hated when others pointed it out. To put it very crudely: "Well, it's not my fault Vulcans only mate once every seven years!"

Eh, I'm a bit skeptical of that idea. Sure, Vulcans probably don't reproduce as often as Humans do, but who's to say that Tellarites, or Denobulans, or Rigellians, or Deltans, or Zakdorn don't reproduce even faster than Humans?

Yeah, but WV was an unconstitutional (if eminently fair) creation that served the needs of the federal government and the northern states. That instance of Senate-padding was very much accomplished, against a quasi-sovereign state, by force majeure.

Whether or not the creation of West Virginia was constitutional, the point remains that West Virginians in Congress did not contribute to any sort of Virginian bloc or Virginian domination; the very act of separating had created two populations that no longer had loyalty to one-another. So it would likely be with U.E. colonies that split off from United Earth; they wouldn't contribute to any sort of U.E./Human dominance within the Federation, because they'd be unlikely to be political allies.

If the Romulan War so totally broke the other big three, it would make sense, but it still seems like such an overweening move by the human race to make. I mean, so what if the UE and AC were technically different states?

But, again, what makes you think they'd even be allies within the Federation? I mean, heck, what if it turned out that Alpha Centauri's Federation Councillor tended to side with Tellar's more often than United Earth's?

The other Member States presumably were enlightened enough to understand that simply being the same species did not mean that A.C. and U.E. were any more likely to get along or try to dominate the new Federation than were Andor and Tellar or Earth and Vulcan.

If Australia were still sovereign in 215x, would they get a vote too?

If it were to join the Federation, yes. Of course, in that instance, the Federation would have the option of refusing to accept as a Member State a polity that did not have sovereignty over at least one planetary body. (Although the Federation didn't exist in the 2150s.)

 

[T'Girl]

The United States has states, territories, protectorates.

It does, but it won those territories by conquering them, and then not fully integrating them into the Union as states. I'd hardly think the Federation does the same thing ...

And would the Federation compel the return off un-integrated territories? I'm sure after the war the Romulans would love to get their Earth-conquered territories back.

Some Federation members may be "Full Members." Others may choose a more limited role, agreeing to the Federations laws to become "Trade Only Members."

But that idea makes no sense. You're either part of the Federation or you're not; Federation law either applies to you or it doesn't. Why become "Trade Members" -- gaining some of the obligations of Membership but not equal representation in the Federation government -- when you can just negotiate a trade treaty but remain independent?

I quess it would have to do with who has the power, hypothetical situation: There's an existing interstellar government, ten species, ten home worlds, hundred colonies (round numbers).The Federation really wants this union to join the Federation, they have dilithium, technology, trade, and culture. They would be an asset to the Federation in every way. Oh, and they have a sizable fleet in a time when the Federation is facing a problem on it's far frontier. The union generally wants to join the Federation. But only under their terms, they don't want a trade agreement or a mutual defense pact, they will become a Federation Member. The Federation has conditions and so do they.

Which, again, makes no sense. The territories in the U.S. that have non-voting members of Congress are all trying to change that, because they don't want to be rendered unequal before U.S. law and resent being subject to federal law without having equal say in federal law. No one would willingly choose to subject themselves to Federation law without getting equal say in the government.

A non-voting member would be a specie who have no cultural experiences with representational governments. Being in the Federation brings them security and happiness, they enjoy the social interaction with other species. They're perfectly content to let others take care of the messy business of government. Sci, they don't vote because they don't want to, and no one's going to make them.

The Federation after all isn't just it's government.

Well, the United States allows its states to be members of international groups and parties to international compacts, subject to federal regulation. I'm sure the Federation would allow the same of its Member States, provided that sovereignty remain with the Federation.

You're assuming that a potential member is agreeing to surrender their sovereignty upon joining the Federation. Or is it just a case of their agreeing to abiding by Federation law only in cases of their interacting with other Federation members? To provide for the common defense (starfleet), to establish justice (interstellar courts), to insure domestic tranquility (agree not to fight with each other), hopefully they will be wise enough not to put a "general welfare" clause in.

It goes back to my question about who has the power, do the members tell the central government what to do, or does the Federation tell the members what they can do?

The possibility exists Sci that the Federation is powerless inside the domains of the individual Federation members. They remain internally sovereign. The episode Journey To Babel suggests that the Federation's power over it's members is in fact weak. A Federation member, in addition to being a member of the Federation, may also be a member of another interstellar government, or multiple governments, as many as they choose, to the degree they choose. The Federation would have no say in this because of one important fact:

The Federation is it's members.

If a member world is on the boundary between the Federation and a second interstellar state, it may be encouraged to join both governments, the world would be a important diplomatic players between the two states.
__________________________________________________ _

I personally think that the Federation will be more of a melting pot of governmental ideas, not simply a analog of a Earth western-style democracy, and it would likely be altered every time a new member was admitted, here's an example of what I mean.

Years ago I wrote a story of the growth of the interstellar government, Earth, Vulcan and the others formed The United Planets (from Forbidden Planet), after decades of exploring space they came upon The Federation, after a period of conflict and friendship the two large republics merged, the UP didn't join the Fed and the Fed didn't join the UP. Again they merged, forming The United Federation of Planets.

If the Federation admits a single world that's one thing, but the Federation is going to be admitting on occasion large republics, empires, confederacys, merging with them. The Federation has to be offering more than "Come be our willing thralls."

 

[TerraUnam]

In the case of the Federation, it would be a neat point to say that a Federation Councillor must be one of two things:

a) Directly elected by the planet they represent.
b) Chosen by the planetary government, and responsible to that government.

Parliamentary government places a heavy emphasis on responsibility to the cabinet, legislature, and voters at large instead of separation of powers.

So Andor's councillor is just as accountable as Betazed's is, just in a different way. Given the diverse political systems the Federation likely has, this makes sense.

Plus since United Earth is apparently a Parliamentary democracy, it seems that its councillor is more like Andor's than Betazed's.

In later books the authors have taken greater pains to refer to parliamentary forms of government, which is a nice change.

 

[Penta]

And now the executive branch. Not necessarily the end of my package. Stylistic note: For the President, Secretaries, etc. I use the masculine pronoun. I was taught that when gender is unclear, you use "he" or "they" and so forth - not "she". Obviously, there's no gender barriers in the UFP.

----
The executive branch, unlike the legislative branch (which, consistent with its British sitting-place, is officially dubbed "The Most Honorable and Excellent Council of the United Federation of Planets"; Councillors are referred to on the floor of the Council as "Honorable Member", "Honorable Councilor", or occasionally "Ambassador" or "Excellency". It depends on preference.) has no collective name in formal use.

That said, the structure is generally known as "the <PresName> Administration", or "the <presName> Government" - the former is more commonly used by Terrans and those from human colonies, the latter is used by everybody else. Occasionally, the whole system will be referred to as "Paris" or "The Plalais", much like how those of a previous era would refer to "Washington" or "The White House", "London" or "Downing Street".

At the top of the Executive Branch is the President of the United Federation of Planets - officially, "His Excellency <Name>, the President of the United Federation of Planets". Most commonly, he is referred to is as "The President" or "President <name>", with a personal reference style of "Mr. President"; on very, very formal occasions, he MIGHT be referred to as "His Excellency" or "Your Excellency", but most Presidents positively squirm with discomfort at that. It hasn't died out at the insistence of the Vulcans, who insist on being more formal.

The President is the head of the Executive Branch - serving as both Head of State and Head of Government, he is the Federation's Chief Diplomat (all ambassadors are accredited from and to the UFP in his name), Commander in Chief of all military forces called into Federation service (most especially Starfleet), and so forth. Among his duties, the Federation Constitution charges him with "making sure that the laws are faithfully executed", smong other things.

In style, the Federation Presidency takes after the American President, generally - They don't use "Hail to the Chief", but that's because it was taken. In powers, the Federation President would make an American President jealous.
Among his powers (not an exhaustive list):

The President officially nominates all military and judicial officers of the UFP (the topmost Admirals of Starfleet are hired and fired by the President personally, and Supreme Court justices are nominated by the Palais), as well as all diplomatic officers from the United Federation of Planets of any rank, most especially Ambassadors heading missions. All civil and military commissions are formally issued by the President.

The President nominates all Governors of colonies directly subordinate to the UFP, where provision has not otherwise been made. (In most cases, it has, but the President reserves the power to remove the Governor.)

The President may issue pardons, reprieves and commutations of Federation civilian and military prisoners - this authority, like under the American President, is absolute and unchecked.

The President may declare martial law on any planet of the UFP, directly ruling the world from Earth. He may also nationalize any industry in an emergency.

The President may preside over sessions of the Federation Council, subject to custom and the convenience of the Council. In his absence, the Speaker presides.

The President must approve all laws before they enter force, or may veto them (subject to a 2/3 vote of the Council for override).

Among his more unusual powers:

The President formally owns all whales on Earth that have not been found sentient.
[A homage to the plot of STIV, as well as to the British Monarch's "ownership" of swans.]

The President is the honorary chair of numerous organizations, among them the Federation Red Cross and the Federation Scouts.
[IRL, the US President appoints members to the Board of Governors of the American Red Cross - he also is the honorary President of the Boy Scouts of America, and I believe also the Girl Scouts.]

The President personally awards the Federation Medal of Honor and certain other military and civil decorations.

The President and the Executive Branch are generally headquartered out of Paris on Earth, most particularly out of the Palais de la Concorde. Of course, the Palais cannot even hope to hold central offices for most Federation Government entities, nor (in some cases) is this even advisable. Starfleet, for example, is utterly paranoid about putting the President, the Secretary of Starfleet, and the Chief of Staff in the same location more than they have to. Whenever they do come together, security is usually extremely high. Hence, the Palais de la Concorde is the preserve of the President and his family on the upper levels of the 15-story tower, with the lower levels (and the numerous underground levels) being the offices of the Executive Office of the President, the Federation Security Council, and other agencies tasked with the direct support of the President. In the deepest levels under Paris is the Presidential Situation Room. Central offices for Federation institutions and agencies are scattered around Paris, in some cases wherever they can fit in the crowded environs of the greater Paris region.

In order to become President, the requirements are as follows:

The President must be a citizen of the Federation, either 35 Terran years old or the species equivalent (There is a massive "Table of Chronological Equivalencies", covering every species known to the Federation, which is approved by the Federation Council for every election cycle, compiled by the Federation Health Service and Starfleet Medical), certified as never having been judged insane, bankrupt, or a convicted felon, and resident upon their homeworld of record for at least 5 years.

[An age req is pretty controversial, but forces time to do its work upon bright young things.]

Under the President in the executive branch is the Cabinet, more formally "The Federation Executive Cabinet". The Cabinet is composed of the President and the heads of the principal executive departments. On most occasions, they merely advise the President, either collectively or individually.

When the President is incapacitated or dead, the Cabinet temporarily assumes his responsibilities collectively, for the purpose becoming known as the "Executive Council". This is temporary; a special election must be held within three months.

[As a practical matter, even with warp drive, proper campaigning on an interstellar scale in one month is not likely to be practical or desirable. Or healthy for the candidates. (It's basically admitted that in real life that the insane pace of Presidential campaigning in the US puts an incredible toll upon candidate health - that process lasts the better part of a year.) Three months isn't great, but makes it slightly less insane.]

However, compensating for the shortened time period in which to campaign, the winner only serves until the next regularly scheduled change of administration, presuming they do not run again.

There are nearly 20 executive departments whose heads are considered members of the Cabinet, many more officials are deemed to be "of cabinet rank" and eligible to attend cabinet meetings.

Among these various officials:

Members of the Cabinet

As noted above, there are nearly 20 executive departments whose heads are considered members of the Cabinet.

Among them come the "Big Five" Cabinet members, listed here in their traditional order of departmental seniority:

[Names are in many cases placeholders.]

Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs - Heads up the Federation Diplomatic Service, and the wider "foreign ministry" housed in the Department of Foreign Affairs. Known by the geekily-minded as the Foreign Secretary,

Secretary of State for Starfleet - the Starfleet Secretary does basically what the title suggests - provides the day to day civilian control of Starfleet.

Attorney-General of the UFP - Heads up the Department of Justice, which oversees the Federation Investigative Service (FIS), not unlike the FBI in the old United States. Also oversees the Federation Prison Service and the activities of the many UFP Attorneys' Offices. This Cabinet position is one of the few with job requirements written into the enabling statute - The Judiciary Act 2163 requires that the A-G be "highly learned in the law", which later law expands upon as being a lawyer in good standing, admitted to practice law before the UFP courts for at least 10 years. Also responsible for providing legal advice to the President, as it pertains to official matters.

[You could use any number of names for the A-G. I went with this because it makes it obvious what the guy does.]

Secretary of State for Health and Social Services – This Cabinet Secretary is responsible, among other things, for the UFP’s extensive system of health care and social services provision. Under him, the Surgeon-General of the UFP, also dubbed “The Federation’s top doctor” is also ranked as the Assistant Secretary for Health.

[Again, Name Simplicity Rule in effect here.]

Secretary of State for Commerce – In truth, something of a sinecure post, because the organizations under Commerce basically run themselves. Commerce gets stuck with a dizzying collection of agencies that don’t fit anywhere else and sometimes have only the vaguest notion of relatedness to commerce: The Federation Census Service, which runs the decennial census required by the UFP Constitution, is one of them; so is the Federation Space Control Agency, which acts as something like “air traffic control” for Federation Space, and the Federation Merchant Marine. It’s often debated whether the Secretary for Commerce belongs among the top rank of Cabinet officials; however, the fact has been that the being who runs the Presidential campaign of the incumbent President usually gets this post, giving the department a truly out-sized influence.

[The Federation Communications Network (the folks that maintain the subspace relay network) probably is part of Commerce.]

Cabinet-rank officials

These officials are not members of the Cabinet formally, but are often invited to attend Cabinet meetings. There are potentially dozens of officials at this rank – only the major civilian officials are listed.

Director, Federation Security Service – Sort of the MI5 of Federation law enforcement, the Security Service is responsible for civilian counter-espionage, anti-terrorism, civilian security clearances, and internal security. Not nearly feared or even well-known about, FSS usually takes a back seat to Member State internal security services such as the V’Shar on Vulcan. Day to day, he reports to the Attorney-General; FSS agents do not have the power to make arrests.

[Not a cover for S31. It really did seem to me that this was one of the more obvious things in the Federation civil structure. Most of its work, to be honest, is probably taken up with security clearances and background checks.]


Director, Federation Intelligence Agency – The civilian counterpart to Starfleet Intelligence, there’s often a degree of turf war between these two agencies. On the one hand, nobody outside of Starfleet really likes the idea of SF Intel becoming the sole “foreign intelligence service” of the UFP; On the other hand, SF Intel is something of the 800-pound gorilla of the two, and controls about 70 percent of the joint intelligence budget. Day to day, the FIS reports to the Secretary for Foreign Affairs.


[Because having just one intel agency both isn't as fun and has a nasty habit of groupthink.]


Director, Federation Investigative Service – The Federation’s key law enforcement agency, The FIS is responsible strictly for criminal activity that affects more than a single Member State, or that contravenes Federation law on matters of exclusive jurisdiction such as treason and espionage.


[Less like the current FBI, more like the FBI pre-Lindbergh Baby. They only intervene if it "crosses state lines".]


Director, Federation Protective Service – The FPS is responsible for the protection of Federation dignitaries in the executive branch, up to and including the President (though in that case they work closely with Starfleet Security, preventing either agency from becoming a Praetorian Guard); the members of the Federation Council (and the Council precincts in London) are protected by their own small agency, the Council Guard, and the Justices of the Supreme Court are protected by the Federation Marshals Service. FPS also protects Executive Branch facilities throughout Earth.


[The Secret Service, more focused on the protective mission, without the mandate to protect the currency.]
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Some minor notes that fit nowhere:

The way I figure it, the Federation bureaucracy as of 2383 is two things – gigantic, and moving at a positively glacial speed. The honest truth is that even at subspace speed, messages that cross the Federation may well take weeks or months. (6 months according to the chart at http://www.startrek.com.sg/warp.html, which claims to come from the ST Encyclopedia) This functionally limits how big the UFP can get, and would slow bureaucratic processes to a crawl.

There’s also something…Well, what I’m going to say next may well be explosive, though I doubt it (because if you’re reading this thread, you probably aren’t naïve.) If messages across the UFP take 6 months to get from point A to point B, and 3 months (assuming an equal circumference circle with Earth at the center) to get from the outer edges to Earth, then there’s…Well, there’s a lot of room for corruption and waste and God-only-knows what else. That’s for subspace messages – it gets worse for personnel transport. The conclusion I am very reluctantly coming to? Corruption would be absent in the core worlds. Okay. At the most, it’d be negligible. Roddenberry’s perfect society holds up, so far.

But out on the frontiers, I can’t help but see corruption as, if not rampant, then very common. Not massive running-the-place-as-your-own-fiefdom corruption, not normally…But the authority of the UFP would, of necessity, be kind of frayed at the edges. 3 months is about how long it used to take in the Age of Sail to get from Europe to America – if the currents and winds were on your side.

To answer T’Girl’s comments re the tenth amendment, then: I don’t see one as being necessary – you couldn’t run the Federation as a unitary state in any case. While I do see her point in positing that the real UFP might look nothing like posited, her speculation assumes a lot of…not-particularly-organic development. I preferred to examine what might happen were things to develop organically.

Finally, some notes:

This whole package was designed by someone for whom Star Trek, these days, is mostly consumed in RPGs. I write with that sort of detail in mind. Ideally, it’ll help novel and fanfic writers, too, but the novels have set up their own thought process re the Federation governmental structure, which I totally respect (and just wish books like Articles of the Federation were still in print!). I disagree in points and agree in points, as those who’ve read this package can see.

I haven’t tried to go into too much detail after the judicial section – in part because writing to that level of detail would be exhausting, in part because it works mostly invertedly to what we are ever likely to see on-screen and in novels. The executive has been seen plenty. The legislative, somewhat less. The judicial gets nothin’ from most people, and that’s fine. I can attest that studying the legal system can be terribly boring at times.

There’s definitely stuff I haven’t covered. This package is probably not over, but this is the end of my “planned” segments, where I sat down and thought deeply about things.

It is imperative to me to note, as a concluding thought, where to place this. It’s not canon. It should never be regarded as such. It’s innocent speculation – if you can come up with a better system that makes sense and tells stories better, you’ll have my awe.