@CyberiumShadow made an excellent point here that I’d like to address, lest the core principles behind my statement get befuddled by my poor execution. Cyberium stated the following:
if the Magi operated even under the rules of Plurality , the Aye vote would still be lower than the Nay in the context of the Endo Cap amendment to 200
This is true, but I will note that the Magisterium does not operate under the rules of plurality – this misinterpretation of our very clear Standing Orders belongs to the Delegate alone. And yes, it does mean that, still, a majority of all Magisters has not voted in favor, since that is not required for anything to pass and is very rare to find. So I will substitute this argument for another:
In this vote to admit Aster to the Magisterium, only 9/19 Magisters voted in favor. It passed, because our rules are not like the Delegate says, but if we took the Delegate’s word as law, Aster would not be a Magister, or at least shouldn’t. This logic is faulty and dangerous.
In Zuk’s reformatting of the Concordat , once again, only 9/19 Magisters voted in favor. Another victory because abstentions do not count, but one that the Delegate has claimed is indefensible. Despite this, it went on to be approved by Referendum, and now forms the law of the land as a part of our Concordat.
In my Proscription reforms, only half of the Magisters (8) voted in favor, equal to the sum of those voting against, abstaining, or not voting. Despite this, it reached a majority because, again, our procedures are clear that abstentions aren’t counted. This amendment was signed into law by then-Delegate Merlovich. In fact, one would be hard-pressed to find any instance where a Delegate vetoes a proposal in part or in whole because of this flawed understanding of procedure. As far as I’m aware, it has never happened before – Marrabuk’s veto, the last one to be employed, targeted a bill that passed with a 90% majority.
Now on to my final point on this misinterpretation of procedure. If we take the Delegate’s premise as a given – that a decision is only valid if voted upon by a majority of the eligible voters – then he himself is not a valid Delegate. In February, he received 23 votes out of 80 citizens. By the Delegate’s math, that’s only 29% of the vote. He is therefore, by his own logic, not our democratically elected Delegate. Of course, the idea is absurd, because the logic behind it is absurd. We do not go by absolute majorities of a voting body in any part of TEP, and the Delegate is wrong to apply that logic here.
EDIT: I was writing this when the Delegate submitted his post admitting wrongdoing on this point. I apologize for wasting the time of anyone who read this after the Delegate realized his fault.