Vuode Merger

[Baron Alexandreu Davinescu]

In 2015, our Greatest of provinces almost merged with Vuode.  A couple of years ago, we polled the issue, and it was still affirmative here.  Should we get discussions going again?  The terms were mostly sorted in 2015 with a possible constitution written by Vuodean Etho Grischun -- essentially the two provinces would remain independent on the national level, with their own custavais and senators, but provincial-level matters would be handled by a joint legislature.  Thoughts?

[Baron Alexandreu Davinescu]

V seems very open to our Grischun Plan approach. @Ian Plätschisch ? @Antonio Montagnha, Ed. D. ? @Marcel Eðo Pairescu Tafial ?

[Sir Ian Plätschisch]

I am open to this.

[Eðo Grischun]

Bump. 

Are the citizens of MM and VD open to this?

[Baron Alexandreu Davinescu]

100% of the current M-M government supports the overall plan, I think.

[Baron Alexandreu Davinescu]

We should actually make this happen!  Going to put it on my to-do list.

[Üc R. Tärfă]

8 years ago I was vehemently against this idea, and I'm still are. If the provinces wants to merge fine, but they can't merge their provincial government and keeping two senators at the national level.

[Baron Alexandreu Davinescu]

Why not?

[Üc R. Tärfă]

Beacause it's undemocratic and inorganic: merge your Provinçùns (or abolish the senate) otherwise it's like trying to cheat the system of equal representation in Senäts

[Baron Alexandreu Davinescu]

I don't really see how it is cheating the system. There's nothing anti-democratic about it, either.

There's no real reason why national and local representation have to have exactly matching boundaries. When I look at my American representation, none of the following have contiguous boundaries: my fire department district, my town, my state representative district, my state senator district, my congressional representative district or my senator's district.

It might be undemocratic in some way if the voting power of other citizens were affected, but no one's representation will be affected at all, either in the merged provinces or anywhere else.

[Tric’hard Lenxheir]

As a citizen of Vuode (and the elected Senator) I am fully in support of this idea, however I think it will be difficult to get the people of Vuode to vote in favor of such a merger

[Baron Alexandreu Davinescu]

Last I heard, the measure had 100% support among active citizens in both provinces. That's a pretty good start! If all of those people still support it, I bet we can make it happen. We might fail, but it's worth a try.

[Marcel Eðo Pairescu Tafial, UrGP]

I'm in favour of mergers, but not of individual provinces trying to figure out mergers among themselves, and the double Senator thing is a good example of why. If anything there should be a national Merger Convention, and once that's done and there are only 4 provinces left the same Convention can then decide to give provinces two Senators instead of one.

[Miestră Schivă, UrN-GC]

a national Merger Convention

THANKS FOR THE IDEA!

[Baron Alexandreu Davinescu]

Well, the last two times national forces tried to spur along mergers, it didn't work.  It was perceived as an attempt to effect a large-scale change for other purposes.  So I'd suggest trying a new approach -- grassroots from the actual provinces themselves -- might be the best way to go.

[Marcel Eðo Pairescu Tafial, UrGP]

The last merger attempt I remember was the Florenciă-Fiovă thing. Very much a "provinces figuring out mergers among themselves" situation that predictably went nowhere. What I want is to have all 4 mergers figured out in advance and entering into effect at the same time to minimise constitutional weirdness, and the best way to do that is with a Convention.

[Baron Alexandreu Davinescu]

It kind of feels like a big national thing won't happen, like the last time it was proposed with the Council of Governors (back when that existed).  I know that both Etho and V, two significant figures in Vuode, have said that they thought it would be a non-starter to try to nationalize a grassroots effort between provinces.

[Baron Alexandreu Davinescu]

The last merger attempt I remember was the Florenciă-Fiovă thing. Very much a "provinces figuring out mergers among themselves" situation that predictably went nowhere.

It went almost up to the end, with amended constitutions and provincial referenda!  But it became a partisan fight, with the perception that people with larger agendas were just using the merger as a tool to achieve a larger goal nationally.  I think that will probably tend to happen with a national-scale effort.

[Miestră Schivă, UrN-GC]

The last merger attempt I remember was the Florenciă-Fiovă thing. Very much a "provinces figuring out mergers among themselves" situation that predictably went nowhere.

It went almost up to the end, with amended constitutions and provincial referenda!  But it became a partisan fight, with the perception that people with larger agendas were just using the merger as a tool to achieve a larger goal nationally.  I think that will probably tend to happen with a national-scale effort.

Let's not be euphemistic. What happened was that the King and the conservative majority in Florencia were convinced it was a scam by the Talossan Left to "steal" the reliably conservative Florencian Senäts seat - no matter that it would have meant giving up the impregnably leftist Fiovan Senäts seat at the same time, forming a new "swing" seat.

On the other hand, let's face it, the F-F merger was opportunist, in that Fiova was up for a merger, and the then-Governor of Florencia put his hand up to be a partner. A lot of people pointed out that merging non-contiguous provinces wasn't sensible, and in hindsight they were correct. Fiova has since then tried to offer a merger to Maricopa and got shot down flat. No-one (apart from Fiova?) wants to "properly" merge in the sense of giving up a Senäts seat, is the moral of the story - and therefore, provincial mergers won't happen outside Senäts reform.

[Baron Alexandreu Davinescu]

Yes, it became a partisan issue and that killed it.

If you actually want mergers to happen, then certainly a provincial-level merger would be a very very strong first step towards a complete merger of those provinces.