The Cosmopolitan Template · Article VII
Ratification and Amendment
Discover the adaptable ratification process that secures essential structures, minimizing consent violations, balancing interests uniformly, and ensuring effective governance.
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The Amendment Rules
What Can Change — and What Cannot
A Fair Constitution ends by protecting itself: the core is fully entrenched, additional articles stay amendable, and every change must still pass the same three tests that make government legitimate in the first place.
The protections only ratchet one way — representation can grow more proportional but never less, and no majority can ever be defined downward. The clauses below say it in the constitution’s own words.
Article VII
Three Clauses That Lock the Foundations
Entrenchment, the amendment path, and the one-way protections — verbatim.
Entrenchment and Amendment Conditions
“A Fair Constitution is fully entrenched and not subject to amendment except by that which can MINIMALLY VIOLATE CONSENT, UNIFORMLY BALANCE INTERESTS, and EFFECTIVILY GOVERN.”
The core of A Fair Constitution cannot simply be voted away. It is fully entrenched, and the only amendments it admits are ones that themselves minimally violate consent, uniformly balance interests, and effectively govern — the same three Legitimacy Tests every government is measured by.
Approval Requirement for Amending Additional Articles
“Amending additional Articles to The Constitution requires the approval of a Supermajority of Constituent Jurisdictions or a Supermajority of The Legislature if there are no Constituent Jurisdictions.”
Beyond the core, the constitution stays a living document: additional articles can be amended — but only with a supermajority of the constituent jurisdictions, or a supermajority of the legislature where no constituents exist. Broad, distributed consent, never a bare majority.
Protection of Proportional Representation and Supermajority Definition
“The default voting method cannot be replaced with a voting method that decreases proportionality in representation regarding collective preferences. The definition of a Supermajority cannot be changed to be less than a majority and a majority cannot be less than half (1/2) plus one (1). Unless otherwise amended, A Supermajority is two thirds (2/3).”
Three definitions are welded shut: the voting method can never be swapped for one that is less proportional, a “supermajority” can never be defined below a majority, and a “majority” is always at least half plus one. By default a supermajority means two-thirds. The rules that protect representation cannot be used to dismantle it.
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A Constitution Built to Last — and to Grow
Article VII locks the foundations while leaving room to build: amendments are welcome, but only ones that keep governance consensual, balanced, and effective. Help us carry the Template to ratification.