From: christer@sue.komunity.se (Christer Romson)
Newsgroups: rec.org.sca
Subject: Event announcements
Date: 16 Apr 92 09:32:41 GMT
Organization: The Internet
X-Unparsable-Date: Thu, 16 Apr 92 08: 11 MET DST


>X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.3 PL0]
>
>Lindorm takes issue with some of my conclusions about East Kingdom Law,
>and the rights of Seneschals.  I'm gonna do my thing, which is defend myself
>by quoting more law.
>  
>Lindorm says:
>  The laws you quote can hardly place the Seneschal in a position to create
>  policy over more than giving advice. I think most of the seneschal's
>  policies aren't within the scope of the seneschal's office and thus without
>  the force of law.
>
>Well, I could have quoted more Corpora at the time, but I didn't.  I'm
>giving you the whole section, but I only care about the first paragraph
>for this discussion.
>
>-------------------
>  VI.C.2 Duties of Specific Offices
>
>      a.  THE SENESCHAL is the chief administrative officer of the
>  Society for the Kingdom, which includes coordinating the other king-
>  dom officers as required for the smooth operation of the kngdom and
>  for its relations with outside agencies.  The Seneschal is respon-
>  sible for assisting new branches and branch elevations - see V.B for
>  the requirements.
>    The Seneschal shall review all proposed changes to kingdom law to
>  determine compliance with the governing documents of the Society,
>  and advise the Crown accordingly.  The Seneschal shall with due
>  promptness either acknowledge the propriety of the changes by signing
>  them, prior to the Crown's enacting them, or shall state any conflicts
>  in writing to the Crown and to the Great Officers of the kingdom.
>  Once the law has been enacted, the Seneschal shall ensure that the
>  Steward and the Board ombudsman for the kingdom receive current
>  copies, which must include the Seneschal's opinion regarding apparent
>  conflicts, if any.
>    Where registreation with state or national governmental bodies
>  would be beneficial to the Society, the Seneschal shall work with
>  the Steward to initiate the appropriate proceedings, and shall
>  recommend a member to serve as registered Legal Agent for that
>  jurisdiction.  (See Governing and Policy Decision #7.)
>    The Seneschal is authorized to use the title "Regional Vice Pres-
>  ident" in dealing with individuals and organizations outside the
>  Society.
>---------------------
>
>Let's stipulate (so I won't have to repeat) that Corpora takes precedence
>over Kingdom Law.  This means that the Corporation holds a seneschal
>responsible as "chief administrative officer of the Society for the
>Kingdom".  That says to me that they are endowed with administrative power
>over anything SCA related in that region.  I submit that deciding what
>constitutes an event, and requirements over events are legitimate issues
>of SCA administration.  Would you disagree?
>  
>
>Lindorm also says:
>  I guess one could argue that Corpora gives tradition the status of law, and
>  it is a tradition of the East that the Seneschal have the right to make
>  this kind of policies. I don't think I'd buy that argument.
>
>Well, we seem to respect tradition more than authenticity, right (:-)
>  
>I wrote:
>  >Is the Chronicler allowed to control Pikestaff?  Well, the same section
>  >that lists the Seneschal as a Great Officer of State (V.A.1) lists
>  >the Kingdom Chronicler as point V.A.1.e, and the responsibilities
>  >of the Chronicler are enumerated in V.C.5.b where it says:
>  
>  >  "Is the editor of, or supervises the editor of, the Kingdom newsletter
>  >  Pikestaff, and is responsible for publishing all required announcements,
>  >  notices of official events, Kingdom Law, and the like."
>
>Lindorm answers:
>  It's hardly the right to make policies on editing which is relevant here,
>  but the second part. "responsible for publishing all required
>  announcements, notices of officical events ...". Is it clear if the
>  Chronicler is responsible for publishing "all required ... notices of
>  events", "all ... notices of events" or "notices of events"? I don't think
>  so. 
>  
>  The kingdom is required by Corpora to publish laws, announcements and
>  notices of certain events. It makes sense to interpret the law as talking
>  about publishing announcements as required by Corpora, Law as required by
>  Corpora and notices of events as required in Corpora. Thus the Chronicler
>  doesn't have the right to make policies on publishing event announcements in
>  general.
>
>Sure they do.  Firstly, Corpora and East Kingdom Law give the chronicler great
>power over the printed word:
>  Corpora VI.2.g  "THE CHRONICLER supervises all publishing activities of the
>                   kingdom, and is the editor or supervises the editor of
>                   the kingdom newsletter, which is responsible for all
>                   required announcements and notices of Society events,
>                   kingdom law, and the like."
>  EK Law, V.C.5.a "Chronicler: Supervises all official publishing activities
>                   of the Kingdom."
>
>It is kind of confusing what the intent of the law is.  Is the intent here,
>to compell the chronicler to publish things which are already official, or
>to allow them the latitude to decide what is official?  I concede your point
>that the Chronicler duties are not clear.
>
>I would say that you could make either case, but I can more easily make the
>case that the Chronicler is in fact allowed to make this rule.  The Chronicler
>is required to supervise all SCA newsletters in the kingdom, the kingdom law
>is allowed to be more stringent than the corporate.  Governing and Policy
>Decision #1, anything the kingdom's publish except kingdom newsletters are
>not official, and is not a "corporate publication".  The kingdom chronicler,
>therefore, can require that official SCA events be published in the official
>corporate publication of the Kingdom.
>
>Contrariwise, it would be dangerous for legal reasons to allow non-official
>newsletters the latitude to determine what is and is not an official SCA
>event.
>
>However, I would recommend that the Board modify the original wording, and
>require official events to be listed in Corporate publications.  I'm looking
>forward to your (collective) replies.
>
>	Tibor
>
>
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