The Martians(91)

A group of little red scientists advocated a subtle double intervention. Archaea would be released onto the surface, in salt containers that would look to them like ocean liners. These would get into the water, and would slip easily into the bloodstream when introduced into human hosts. Here even smaller vessels would carry some of these archaea across the blood-brain barrier—special varieties, genetically engineered by the little red scientists to create certain electrical fields, triggering the excretion of beneficial hormones and other brain chemicals.

Some of the little red people decried this as no more than drug therapy. The group of little red scientists defended it as such. State of mind was in great part chemical condition, as all admitted. Chemical intervention could be defended on that score. This was an emergency; very possibly humans were in the process of overrunning Mars, devastating the planet for all its unseen indigenous life. Meanwhile the archaea were experiencing a population explosion, and spoiling for a fight. A solution that neutralized both sides would be very welcome. The archaea would see it as the freedom of the surface; the little people would see it as drug therapy; the humans would see it as a deliberate mutation in their values. If no one ever suspected otherwise, where was the harm? Why not let them think so?

So all over Mars streams ran red with silt and salt, across the rain-soaked land. Eventually some of these streams combined to become rivers, and ran out estuaries into the burgeoning new ocean. Since the northern sea had been pumped up out of deep permafrost aquifers, its water at this point was still extremely pure. It was in effect an ocean of distilled water, while the streams and rivers were salty. Humans never failed to comment that this was the reverse of the situation on Earth.

A fair number of the new streams fell off cliffs right into the sea; in these places it looked like someone was pouring red paint into a clear pristine pond, where it spread out on rings and dabs of foam. That looks awful, the humans said to each other, though they didn't know the half of it. Then they would take a swim in the ocean nearby, and get out and eat their lunches, and on their way home feel funny and resolve to be nicer to people that week.





The Constitution of Mars

We the people of Mars have gathered here on Pavonis Mons in the year 2128 to write a constitution which will serve as a legal framework for an independent planetary government. We intend this constitution to be a flexible document subject to change over time in the light of experience and changing historical conditions, but assert here that we hope to establish a government that will forever uphold the following principles: the rule of law; the equality of all before the law; individual freedom of movement, association, and expression; freedom from political or economic tyranny; control of one's work life and the value thereof; communal stewardship of the planet's natural resources; and respect for the planet's primal heritage.

Article 1. Legislative Department

Section 1. The Legislative Bodies

1. The legislative body for Martian global issues will be a two-house congress, consisting of a duma and a senate.

2. The duma will be composed of five hundred members, selected every m-year by a lottery drawn from a list of all Martian residents over ten m-years old. It will meet on Ls=0 and Ls=180, every m-year, and stay in session for as long as necessary to complete its business.

3. The senate will be composed of one senator from each town or settlement on Mars with a population larger than five hundred people (changed by Amendment 22 to three thousand people), elected every two m-years, using an Australian ballot system. The senate will remain permanently in session, aside from breaks of no more than a month out of every twelve.

Section 2. Powers Granted to the Congress

1. The duma will elect the executive council's seven members, using an Australian ballot system.

2. The senate will elect one-third of the members of the global environmental court, and one-half of the members of the constitutional court, using an Australian ballot system.

3. The congress will pass laws enabling it: to lay and collect taxes equitably from the towns and settlements represented in the senate; to provide for the common defense of Mars; to regulate commerce on Mars, and with other worlds; to regulate immigration to Mars; to print money and regulate its value; to form a criminal court system; and to form a standing police and security group to enforce the laws and defend the commonwealth.

4. All laws passed by the congress shall be subject to review by the executive council; if the executive council vetoes a proposed law, the congress can override the veto with a two-thirds vote.

5. All laws passed by the congress shall also be subject to review by the constitutional and environmental courts, and a veto by these courts cannot be overridden, but shall be grounds for rewriting the law if the congress sees fit, after which the process of passing the law shall begin again.