5. A Fresh Order

President Wilson Clay had a more active role involving the Senate during his time in office. A lot of legislation was brought up now that the visionary views of Romulus Peace were fulfilled. Peace helped advise Clay as the Head Advisor of Political Matters for the administration. Clay only introduced a few items himself.

The Clay-soil Acts

The laws that Clay proposed were called the "Clay-soil Acts" as a pun on his namesake. Only three were formally introduced in the Senate.

The first one was an amendment to Peace's Corruption Correction Act. Clay proposed a new governmental enforcement task force that would focus on making sure the CCA was still upheld, even including arresting violators. Violations would include bribing police, government officials, judges of law, etc., as well as companies laying off employees for the sake of profits, as another provision required employers to file paperwork prior to a firing or layoff. Any person who accepted bribes offered were also in violation, as Clay felt all things needed to be fair, not bought. Another violation would be threats made for a person to get their own way. A special branch of courts would judge over corruption allegations, and special judges and lawyers would be set aside for such proceedings. The Senate passed this law, but it was repealed soon after the President after Clay's successor got into office.

The next act was an attempt to remove the strict isolationist policies of his predecessor. Peace would disagree with this, but Clay even stated on live TV that, "With a global economic world, we can't afford to just rely on ourselves. We need allies to keep our country afloat." Obviously, the Senate threw this idea out almost unanimously because of the popular opinion that Panem had to build themselves up before they attempted to help others. Since the nation was still new, the government needed a solidified decade before the nation is fully recognized internationally as the power they were. This act was never attempted again.

The final proposed law by President Clay was the Infrastructure Reconstruction Act. He felt that the fixation of infrastructure after Peace War and beforehand damages were too slow to compensate for a growing nation. This would propose the government to fund construction of new buildings and repairing old buildings, as well as demolishing and rebuilding sketchy infrastructure for future use. Of course, this was government mandated and had a timeline set up. The bulk had to be completed by 2065 because the fund would run out. The Senate confidently passed this and it was completed prior to the deadline.

Media Interactions

The media began to make a comeback after the Peace War when Clay came to power. Fox and CNN began speaking politics as the normal routine, just like prior to the war. President Peace was under fire from the isolationist views, so when Clay presented his ideas to remove it, the media pulled for support. Of course, it didn't influence the Senate one bit from rejecting the law, but it showed that the media was going to be an influential mouthpiece for time to come. Because of his fears that the government will be divided again, Clay created a state-run media system, one that would survive until during the Mockingjay Rebellion. The station was called "Capitol News Television (CNTV)" and was controlled first in Milwaukee, Minnesota and was moved to the Capitol in 2069. This put Clay under fire from the other media, as they weren't disbanded, claiming he's attempting to force a "communistic state agenda" on Panem. CNTV came out with a bang and shot down these allegations. Clay didn't run the media, but his advisors kept tabs on it. They tried to keep the news going without causing political debate or propaganda from being constant. That only lasted his presidency.

The Thirteen District Act Introduced

The one thing that was very controversial for President Clay's term was the Thirteen District Act. This would be talked about on the media, on the Internet, on newspapers, books at the time, etc.

The law involved changing the setup of the borders inside the nation to help stimulate travel and eliminate unemployment. This law was proposed by an unmarked petition sent to the Senate in 2060 with 100,000 signatures. The bill was formally introduced by senator Jacobson Lieanto of Ohio to the floor. Clay already disapproved of the idea. It meant eliminating the states and creating thirteen districts with new borders and new governmental provisions, as well as reforming the whole Capitol government to fit the needs of thirteen large districts. The media began to pick sides on the whole matter. Fox supported the President in saying that it would mess up President Romulus Peace's visions for a freedom-filled nation. CNN refuted with the fact that unemployment needed solved, especially because it helped lead to the Peace War. Clay tried to state that unemployment had other safe solutions that didn't involve changing the national layout, but the Senate passed the bill. Luckily, Clay had a veto and the overrule vote was not high enough not pass the law. It was discarded until Clay left office, where it was reintroduced. Clay's veto would be the hot topic in the media for a few years.

As we all know, this was passed into law in the future. The most controversial fact wasn't the unemployment prevention or even the borders, but the inclusion of district-specific industries. The idea was deemed by President Clay as "A Totalitarian attempt at codifying control over the workforce of Panem, a very unpleasing and disgusting idea." He wished to know whose actual idea this was, so he could see why this idea was brought up. If it would have violated his provisions of the CCA, it would have led to justice action. Since it was petitioned in, the real author was never discovered. Several state judges deemed the idea unconstitutional, and claimed that it removed states' rights.

Abdication

After those few laws and ideas, President Wilson Clay hadn't done much in terms of the economy or foreign relations. He let the economics figure itself out. With the nation being distracted on the debate of the Thirteen District Act, he had no room to attempt to table the debate in the Senate. Most of the other legislation was either not very important, or was pigeonholed early on in debate. In 2063, with a nearly a quiet year after the debate of the district act calmed down, Clay abdicated his position, being succeeded by Secretary of the Treasury, Edwin Morris.

Morris would bring the Thirteen District Act back to the table, and the large amount of the debate on it would really begin. Also, he begins to put Panem on the path towards the nation falling into chaos, though it doesn't happen during his reign.