Tribune's Notice and Declaration of Civic Rights

[Erudiche]

[Yet another press-printed pamphlet distributed on the Well's noticeboards by Domhnall Guivarch during the recent ash storm.]

TRIBUNE'S NOTICE

The Voice of the People Cannot Be Denied

Preface

Crowned heads! Vested interests! All you mighty, who have long toyed with the levers of power, who have claimed the mantle of government, who have for so long looked down at the people in the dust, listen! Do you yet hear the chants which have risen up in our city? Do you yet hear the chorus, rising from the gutters, from the Tablet, from the coffee houses and offices and the massed camps of the nameless? The stone which this city rests upon trembles, the giants beneath awaken, the Well swirls as though in a maelstrom. Wiped clean of our great works the giants shall see the sun, yet without the giants there should be nothing but rubble. For too long have the people been subject to perfidious politics, to robbery by the powerful, and the disdain of their guardians. The Sultanate is all of its people, and a crime against any of its people is a crime against its Sultan. A crime against the Sultan is an affront to the Gods, who have justly seen Him to the Sublime Garden. You who denigrate and deride the masses insult the Mother who has given Her tears freely for them. You who see the innocent starve, roast in the desert, or tremble in chains have insulted the very liberty of life on which the Sultanate is built.

But no longer. For too long have the people been silent, Voiceless, with their allies offering quiet pleas or sibilant words whispered in the backhalls of paradise. Now they shall have a Tribune, who shall embody their struggle and shall see their will executed, justice done, the city redeemed, or else shall die. The Voices of the people are manyfold, and for all things they cry, for all things they embody. They cry for the Gods, for their Sultan, for the Water, for their sustenance, for their rights. They call for justice and home and hearth and heart.

Until now, the people have been nothing. Today, they shall be something. And they shall not go ignored again.

RIGHTS OF THE PEOPLE AND THE CITIZEN

1. All citizens are guaranteed the right to live, and all of the materials necessary to live. The Mother cries for all, her waters are the property of all of Her children in perpetuity, as are the fruits of the Wyld, and the shelter needed to escape the bleak claim of Pra'raj. Access to these things must be ensured by whatever means should prove necessary: price controls, a water dole, or however else should a prudent government see fit. Attempts to deny residents of the Well these things is an affront to the Gods and their most beloved Sultan.

2. All citizens are guaranteed the freedom of speech, expression, press, thought, and conscience within the bounds of the Sultan's law.

3. All citizens are guaranteed the right to have their merit legitimately recognized. The present system of purchasing Voices does not reward or recognize the merit of citizens. A pauper might live a life thrice as virtuous and worthy as the wealthiest merchant, yet by our system of stratification they would be spurned to the dust. If we are to persist in such a system of Voices, merit must be recognized holistically, the system of money-mongering put aside in favor of one which does not reward criminals, resource-hoarders, or crypto-Orentids. If the time should come when the political tutelage of the people has ended, and they are in their whole vested with the faculties of self-government, which the great Sultan has sought to cultivate in them, then the system of Voices is to be abolished in favor of universal suffrage of the citizenry and free speech before the Assembly.

4. All citizens are guaranteed the right to a fair trial. Citizens shall not have arbitrary or unfair punishments levied upon them summarily by a Legate or those whose powers emanate from those of a Legate.

5. All citizens are guaranteed a right to education, and must be provided with the basic knowledge necessary to function and productively integrate into society, so that they are not consigned to the margins in bestial idiocy.

6. All citizens are guaranteed a dynamic and living faith. The Temples of the Wheel are our greatest social institutions, and they must see free support from the local government. They must be given autonomy and the resources with which to honor the gods, and federated into an association by which they may assert the faithful's interests free of social section or class.

7. All citizens are guaranteed the right to know who holds power in their city and by what provenance that power is attained. A list of the Voiced, and the provenance of their Voices, must be made accessible for public audit and scrutiny. They are but a small group who should rule over the entirety of the social body, it is the right of the Voiceless to know at least who among the people should be able to speak before the Assembly.

8. All electors are guaranteed the right to withdraw confidence in their elected officials. If an elected official should act out of the bounds of their power, outside of their mandate, or against the faith of the people, electors should have the right to issue the recall of that official.

9. All people are entitled to know their rights. The full and unexpurgated rights of the people, in whatever form that should take, must be posted for public scrutiny. Officials may not conduct themselves in opposition to these rights, and may not lie nor equivocate about their contents.

DUTIES OF THE PEOPLE AND THE CITIZEN

1. All citizens must make responsible use of the Well's vital resources. Water, in the Waste, is a scarce and precious thing. Any who attempt to hoard it, or food, or property, when there are citizens of the city presently dying for their absence, are enemies of the Sultan, People, and Gods. Any who waste with profligate or intemperate actions are anathema and are to be condemned.

2. All citizens are to make responsible use of their rights to speech and expression. Advocating treason, either against the city or the Sultan, is unacceptable. Blasphemy against the Wheel is unacceptable. Advocacy in service of hostile foreign powers is unacceptable.

3. All citizens must support their Temples, as faith is the foundation of the Sultanate and must be protected.