"I feel the general Sense of this Committee is that a Judiciary independent of the Nobility is desirable. The Churches may perhaps have a useful Role; I agree that a Truthtelling at least may ensure Integrity."

Thanks Lluisa, bringing this back to the actual topic. Which is also a safer one.

”I had an idea in another committee, letting people go to good churches to appeal a judgment. I think that would stop anything obviously evil and unfair.”

"What would it mean to have a judiciary independent of the nobility? The nobles have the power to both make the law and enforce it. ad what magistrates there are more servants of those nobles than their masters. If we want to check the power of those nobles, we need stronger nobles to do it, and we should think about how to make that happen. Maybe we require them to send records of all their judgments to their superior and an archive in Westcrown, where the Queen might review them, and the fear of what she thinks of their judgment will cause them to be fair."

He looks at Enric. "I don't know the good churches well enough to trust them all. Isn't one of them a drunkard?"

Lluïsa is nothing if not a centralizing hyper-royalist.

"Cailean the Drunk is a Chaotic deity and perhaps unsuited. Yet perhaps not; it turns on whether he would wish Justice over Drunken Violence or instead Approve of it."

"The Independent Judiciary would, in my view, study the Queen's Law, beginning with the very Constitution itself, and swear to the Queen, and be answerable to Royal Oversight. The unrighteous Nobility should quake in fear at the Justice of the Queen's Judiciary, and if they exceed Lawful Authority, be made to Answer before her Majesty's representative the same as before her own Person."

"That sounds good if the Queen is good and terrible when the Queen is Evil, like she's been for the last seventy years."

"I think probably even if Cheliax gets a bad queen she won't be as bad as the Thrunes? Not that that means you don't need safeguards or anything."