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How I changed the law with a GitHub pull request

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Re: How I changed the law with a GitHub pull request

#61

Post by gammateam »

will_brown wrote: post #30
gammateam wrote: post #25

I've been wanting this for a long time, I wanted to take it further though: I want draft laws, I want to see all representatives as contributors and be able to see their contributions and changes to draft laws. the House should have a master branch that submits pull requests to another repository, the other chamber having one too The Governor/President gets to approve PR's from that jurisdiction It would become SUPER…

Here is an example of a platform like what you describe if not exactly, for the Delaware legislature. I am linking to a particular law I followed from inception to passage, an amendment to the Delaware limited liability company Act allowing company records to be kept on Blockchain. https://legis.delaware.gov/BillDetail/26554 You get the name of the Sponsor and co sponsors, additional sponsors, sign status, next steps…

Existing platforms have limitations

My main problem is that many laws are written as: “Hereby strikes section b of USC1788(1)(iii) and replaced the word or with and”

And with this kind of system it would be standardized already on how to see what the modifications look like, or at least jump to that old version of the law easily

When the final laws are all merged together after a passed bill makes simple instructions instead of the plain text law, it would be easy to see the version history of that section of the law, or act

Re: How I changed the law with a GitHub pull request

#62

Post by NicoJuicy »

dgreisen wrote: post #56
baroffoos wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is really awesome and I hope to see something like this come to my country. One thing I was wondering is how you would deal with more tricky issues/pull requests. Obviously we probably won't see people writing whole new laws in the pull requests editor but what if it was something like a sentience was written in an unclear way and someone opened an issue asking for it to be clarified or maybe they made a PR rewr…

We are in talks with several international governments. We would be delighted to help your country! The system does not in any way change the legislative process, so you cannot use a pull request to make any substantive change to the law. That would include rewording, changing punctuation, fixing numbering, etc. If such a pull request were made, it would be immediately closed. As throughout history, the only way to m…

Just a curiosity, but is Belgium included?

Re: How I changed the law with a GitHub pull request

#63

Post by grkvlt »

dgreisen wrote: post #56
baroffoos wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is really awesome and I hope to see something like this come to my country. One thing I was wondering is how you would deal with more tricky issues/pull requests. Obviously we probably won't see people writing whole new laws in the pull requests editor but what if it was something like a sentience was written in an unclear way and someone opened an issue asking for it to be clarified or maybe they made a PR rewr…

We are in talks with several international governments. We would be delighted to help your country! The system does not in any way change the legislative process, so you cannot use a pull request to make any substantive change to the law. That would include rewording, changing punctuation, fixing numbering, etc. If such a pull request were made, it would be immediately closed. As throughout history, the only way to m…

So, essentially, the pull request process is useless. In fact, even changing a typo could be seen as a substantive change since it may not always be 100% clear what the correct change is. For example, in the Colored Object Restrictions Act 2018, Section 12.3.7 it might say "It is not permitted to have purple colored caqs within the city limits." could be talking about 'cats', 'cars' or maybe 'caps', and although it's obvious a typo has slipped through, these possible fixes all have very different meanings. And in the cases where the typo is obvious, and there is only one possible interpretation of the text, it doesn't actually matter and the change wouldn't have any impact...

Re: How I changed the law with a GitHub pull request

#64

Post by derefr »

gamblor956 wrote: post #36
gammateam wrote: post #25

I've been wanting this for a long time, I wanted to take it further though: I want draft laws, I want to see all representatives as contributors and be able to see their contributions and changes to draft laws. the House should have a master branch that submits pull requests to another repository, the other chamber having one too The Governor/President gets to approve PR's from that jurisdiction It would become SUPER…

They have what you describe, and moreover such a thing has existed in paper form since th this country was formed. Real time access to laws as they are drafted is a Really Bad Idea. Good ideas need time to incubate. The system you want would lead to the sound byte version of legislating.

C-SPAN already exists for “sound byte legislating.”

Plus, fine-grained version control doesn’t imply real time updates. It’s fully possible to only release the version history to the public after the law is approved.

Re: How I changed the law with a GitHub pull request

#66

Post by rhizome »

gammateam wrote: post #61
will_brown wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here is an example of a platform like what you describe if not exactly, for the Delaware legislature. I am linking to a particular law I followed from inception to passage, an amendment to the Delaware limited liability company Act allowing company records to be kept on Blockchain. https://legis.delaware.gov/BillDetail/26554 You get the name of the Sponsor and co sponsors, additional sponsors, sign status, next steps…

Existing platforms have limitations My main problem is that many laws are written as: “Hereby strikes section b of USC1788(1)(iii) and replaced the word or with and” And with this kind of system it would be standardized already on how to see what the modifications look like, or at least jump to that old version of the law easily When the final laws are all merged together after a passed bill makes simple instructions…

Yep. Like in the Delaware URL posted by GP, in the first few lines we see, "This section amends Section 18-101..." which is not linked. I don't know if this platform allows one to link to a specific version of a law, but it would seem like a logical next step to help it happen one way or another. A lot of it is probably automatable.

Re: How I changed the law with a GitHub pull request

#67

Post by ironmagma »

derefr wrote: post #64
gamblor956 wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They have what you describe, and moreover such a thing has existed in paper form since th this country was formed. Real time access to laws as they are drafted is a Really Bad Idea. Good ideas need time to incubate. The system you want would lead to the sound byte version of legislating.

C-SPAN already exists for “sound byte legislating.” Plus, fine-grained version control doesn’t imply real time updates. It’s fully possible to only release the version history to the public after the law is approved.

Then the first draft can go out when it would have been normally published. Then, the main value add would be commenting and suggesting changes as well as a centralized place to see comments and suggestions as well as their reactions.

Re: How I changed the law with a GitHub pull request

#68

Post by gammateam »

rhizome wrote: post #66
gammateam wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Existing platforms have limitations My main problem is that many laws are written as: “Hereby strikes section b of USC1788(1)(iii) and replaced the word or with and” And with this kind of system it would be standardized already on how to see what the modifications look like, or at least jump to that old version of the law easily When the final laws are all merged together after a passed bill makes simple instructions…

Yep. Like in the Delaware URL posted by GP, in the first few lines we see, "This section amends Section 18-101..." which is not linked. I don't know if this platform allows one to link to a specific version of a law, but it would seem like a logical next step to help it happen one way or another. A lot of it is probably automatable.

Oh thats too perfect

Thanks! All the other comments have been “hey the system you described has been around for many years, with all the problems you described but I didnt notice those just going to make a rebuttal to your idea for rebuttal’s sake”

Re: How I changed the law with a GitHub pull request

#69

Post by rhizome »

gammateam wrote: post #68
rhizome wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yep. Like in the Delaware URL posted by GP, in the first few lines we see, "This section amends Section 18-101..." which is not linked. I don't know if this platform allows one to link to a specific version of a law, but it would seem like a logical next step to help it happen one way or another. A lot of it is probably automatable.

Oh thats too perfect Thanks! All the other comments have been “hey the system you described has been around for many years, with all the problems you described but I didnt notice those just going to make a rebuttal to your idea for rebuttal’s sake”

I wonder how much this could be genericized to all (or most, or even some) states, let alone the US Code, regulations, etc. Actually, state formats and whatnot could be plugins or compilation switches.

I've actually thought about this for some years, but idly, and I haven't found the time yet to get started. It just seems like an excellent and obvious-to-me use for HTML.

Re: How I changed the law with a GitHub pull request

#70

Post by r00fus »

Svexav wrote: post #47
gammateam wrote: post #25

I've been wanting this for a long time, I wanted to take it further though: I want draft laws, I want to see all representatives as contributors and be able to see their contributions and changes to draft laws. the House should have a master branch that submits pull requests to another repository, the other chamber having one too The Governor/President gets to approve PR's from that jurisdiction It would become SUPER…

I agree but politicians shouldn't be the contributors. Representatives don't actually write the laws. I'd like to see the name of the staffer or lobbyist who wrote the text. Also, it should be a federal crime to falsify the name of the author or make changes for someone else.

Lobbyists would need the ability to write/amend laws or the current system of graft wouldn't work.

I.e., your design if not bug-compatible will be rejected.

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