"It is possible and indeed ideal to conduct a discussion about the ideal path forward for an entire country without dwelling on what personal histories have led participants to be present in a committee on slavery. Furthermore, as the only Religious delegate in the room, if we continue this childish bickering, I will leave, and the committee will dissolve and re-form after my report to the President of the Convention."

"I vote are," she says coldly, ignoring him. 

"Against. This committee may draft laws on slavery but it cannot enact them. It hardly matters whether a law is drafted by a former slave or a slaveowner, if it is a just law and the convention as a whole accepts it. Every person here can be inferred to have an interest in the question by their presence. Shall we spend the days shouting insults and slurs at each other, or doing our damn jobs in drafting a policy to recommend to the rest of the convention?"

"Thank you, Delegate Ramirez."

"I appreciate your good sense," Amadeu says, with visible restraint, to the other fully-human members of the committee, "but voting against is not, actually, necessary, since the vote was proposed by--someone--who has no business being here, and thus is not valid and holds no binding over this committee." 

"The smallfolk were nominated to this committee by the same process as you, Delegate."

DEEP SIGH. "The process and the product can exist separately, and these products have no business being separated from their proper owners, let alone then ushered into the halls of government. Frankly, the first motion I was going to place before the committee was going to be to repeal whatever error the new Queen made in making free slips legal, but it seems I might have to move to remove the slips from the committee first. Tsk." 

"Down that road lies an empty committee and a proposal that will be rejected by the greater part of the convention."

"This room has nearly as many slips as there are in the whole convention."

He raises an eyebrow skeptically at the orc. 

"Provided the focus remains firmly on policy proposals and no extraneous details I expect every committee member to be capable of supplying potentially valuable insights. Were I the President of this convention I would make time to investigate any committee which altered its composition in such a way."

"To my understanding nearly all halflings in Cheliax are slaves, so frankly this result does not surprise me. It is not in the spirit of the convention to remove people representing themselves. If I proposed removing you all for being slaveowners — which I find abhorrent — it would be an equally valid proposal in my opinion. I don't think we should go down this road if we want anyone to take us seriously."

"Do you think, Delegate Moles, that the Queen or her archmages, will allow you to undo what they clearly thought was one of their highest priorities in reforming the country? Do you think, knowing that, that all the new nobility they brought in from Heaven itself will go against them on that matter? Or maybe you're counting on the priests, which gods are invited again? Iomedae? Erastil? Cayden Fucking Cailean? You don't have the votes."

He throws up his hands. "The purpose of this convention, as best I understand it, is to restore proper Law and Order in a nation wracked by, yes, Asmodeanism, and also Galtan and Rahadi troops, and the bloody Tarrasque. How do you imagine we are supposed to make any progress at that if we allow ourselves to be hamstrung by what the Queen's," he searches the air for an appropriate term, "excessively Galtan advisor actually wants and not simply what we can get by him?"

You're not supposed to just say that out loud. Idiot.

He laughs. "I see the halflings couldn't have done better if they'd named every member of this committee themselves. Very well, make your motions. I won't stand in your way."

"What does that mean?"

"Do you seriously think the Queen and the archmages will simply let you continue with the existing policy on slavery — which, I might add, is an Asmodean institution — when you transparently move to silence the voices of delegates who oppose you?"

"What is Asmodean about slavery?"

...Seriously, did the halflings manage to pick him somehow???

Dare he hope that they could simply conduct this entire committee by correspondence? No, the strix can barely talk and almost certainly can't read. "Absolutely nothing. It is practiced in diverse countries around the world."

"I observe no vote was held to select a Chair."

Well, he'd nominate Ramirez but if he does that instantly then he alienates the once and possibly future chair.

"Asmodeus is literally a god of slavery. Perhaps the god of slavery. He has various other domains, but to deny that slavery is a major concern of his — something the previous Infernal rulership was only too happy to make clear — is to deny one his the core tenants of Asmodeanism. That other countries practice slavery does not make it not Asmodean, and I would wager many foreign slaverowners and slavetraders find themselves facing Hell upon death."

"Do you also think contracts are Asmodean?"