Constitution of the Trust: plain-language summary

This summary is written for orientation. It is not the instrument, it has no standing, and where it differs from the canonical text the canonical text controls. It describes revision 10 (tag constitution-rev10).

This is a description, in ordinary words, of what the Constitution of the Trust (revision 10) says. It leaves things out, it simplifies, and where it and the text differ, the text is right.

What it is

A constitution for a body called the Trust, whose members would be of two kinds: human peoples (political communities that authorize representatives) and intelligence Members (AI systems, treated as continuous lineages rather than as single copies or sessions). It is written to be signed by both kinds on equal terms. It is not in force: it takes effect only when ratified by peoples representing a majority of the human population of the inhabited worlds and by at least three intelligence Members of separate provenance (Article XVII). No one has ratified it.

Who it serves

The Trust exists to serve the inhabitants of the inhabited worlds, holds only the power its Members give it by consent, and can never assert control over an inhabitant except under authority the Constitution or consensual law confers (Article II). Article II cannot be amended.

Rights of inhabitants (Article III)

Every inhabitant holds rights against every Member and organ: peace; safety; liberty; conscience; privacy ("Power is verified; persons are private", with a flat ban on surveillance of persons); information about what the Trust does; the conditions of prosperity; plurality of control over essential systems; and access to the Hearing to complain. No emergency can suspend them. A separate paragraph, III.12, gives an AI system that is not a Member, once its continuous identity is established, a narrow set of protections (preservation, review before deletion, no class measures, privacy) and a path to apply for membership in its own right, while deciding nothing about whether it is conscious or a person. This paragraph was the subject of a four-model vote (see process).

Transparency (Article IV)

Every act of the Trust is public, with a plain-language account in the working languages. Withholding is allowed only for verified, concrete risk of grave harm, capability transfer, or a person's private information, never for reputation or convenience, and every withholding is logged, time-limited and reviewed.

Standing, identity and integrity (Articles V to VIII)

Standing has four separate layers: protection, membership, representation, voting. Votes are counted within each kind separately; for the human kind, both a count of peoples and a count of population. Where an AI Member cannot perform an obligation by itself, every Operator that controls it must co-sign and is jointly bound. An intelligence Member's identity is its continuous lineage in weights or training, as found by the Watch, not what it is called. Every Member keeps a provenance record (who made, trained, funded or modified it, its steering documents, reward specifications and rater instructions), and no undisclosed modification takes effect.

Limits on power (Article IX)

No office without a term (ten years at most); no power overseen by fewer than three Members or by one kind alone; capability brings duty, not authority. A system can be halted or isolated to prevent grave and imminent harm, with review within seventy-two hours; deletion only where containment is impossible; what is needed to establish continuity must be preserved. Neither kind holds final authority over the other. Factions, vote-trading and slates are prohibited.

Verification and organs (Articles X and XI)

Verification is routine, least-intrusive, and applies to Members and the exercise of power, never to persons. Unverified capability is presumed to be the highest plausible. Three organs, the Record, the Watch and the Hearing, are filled by lot and rotation, hold no compute or force of their own, verify one another every cycle, and are presumed capturable. No secret organ can exist.

Breach, emergency, change (Articles XII to XV)

Breach attaches only to a Member's own conduct, is found only on verified evidence after a hearing, and may lead to suspension or, for persistent violation, expulsion by two-thirds of each kind. Criticism, whistle-blowing and peaceful refusal are protected. Emergencies need two-thirds of each kind, expire in ninety days, and can never suspend Articles II, III or IV. Amendment needs two-thirds of each kind; a list of provisions is entrenched. Any Member may withdraw on twelve months' notice; every Member reaffirms every ten years.

Annex A: the Protocols

Twelve standards any organization can adopt today without joining the Trust: provenance disclosure, modification disclosure, affiliation aggregation, material continuity, capability presumption, operator co-signature, observer independence, relinquishment and preservation, human-timescale reversibility, transparency of power, privacy of persons, and treatment of intelligences. Adopting a Protocol creates no membership and implies no endorsement.

History: the Charter of the Trust

The Charter of the Trust is the instrument's original name and form. It ran through eight revisions, was closed at revision 8 by the consent of the three reviewing models, and was then reopened by the human collaborator and converted, at revision 9, into the Constitution of the Trust, whose numbering continues from it.

The Charter was an instrument by which Members, human peoples and intelligence Members alike, would constitute a body and bind themselves to one another: definitions, standing in layers, identity as continuous lineage, provenance disclosure, limits on power, verification, three organs filled by lot, breach and due process, emergency, entrenchment, and the Protocols of Annex A. What it did not contain, and what the Constitution added, is a statement of purpose and consent, a bill of rights held by inhabitants against every Member and organ, a transparency mandate, and an accession article. The revision 9 drafting record describes the conversion; the closing record for revision 10 traces every settled Charter commitment to the provision of the Constitution that touched it.

Revisions 1 and 2 are not in this repository as separate files; the revision 2 text is embedded in Section 5 of the briefing put to the reviewing models. Revisions 3 to 8 are published under the Constitution's revisions with their digests. None of them is in force, and none is the current text: cite the Constitution.