They bet they could figure it out if they knew what the goal was!

Well, if there's not enough information for them online for them she can probably come up with something - there's probably an instrument shop someplace, she can look when they get home.

Ooooh!

There might not be one close, but if there is they can take a trip. Most instruments are kind of expensive, though, she thinks.

Oh. Can they get an explanation of money and how it works?

Sure! She can actually go into a fair amount of detail on that, since the farm is a business and she helps with the financial part of it.

Huh. What an interesting system. They have no idea how to acquire any.

Well, they can sell things, or people might pay them to do various sorts of work; both of those pretty much require either paperwork from the government or someone with that paperwork helping them out, though - that's another thing they'll want to talk to the lawyer about.

Okay! In the meantime, singing.

Of course.

The rest of the day is pretty uneventful, though Sam and Shaney do make a point of asking whether the Elves have any more questions about talking to the lawyer tomorrow.

They are still not clear on what the lawyer is for, do they need to know that going in.

They should, yeah. Lawyers know what the laws are and how the legal system works; their job is to keep their clients out of legal trouble, or do their best to get them out of trouble if they've been caught breaking a law or been accused of it. They don't necessarily know a lot about how the prison system works, but it's close enough to what they do that some of them do, and this one does, so he'll be able to answer their questions about how to approach the government about that. And since they work so closely with potential prisoners, they'll also be able to give advice about what kinds of problems the Elves should expect to run into if they bring them to Valinor.

Okay, that all sounds good.

And the next day they have their appointment with the lawyer.

His first question is - the message he got says that they're interested in shutting down 'prisons and institutions'; do they mean prisons and similar things, or do they mean prisons and also mental institutions?

Both those and any other things where people are kept in a place against their will!

...okay. They'll probably want to figure out how to do something about domestic violence and also maybe work with child protective services or something, but that's not his area; he'll have someone look into it to see if there's anything obvious. Mental institutions are potentially very easy to get people out of - there's this law called the Olmstead Act that basically says that if someone in an institution wants to move out and can find a place to go that'll meet their needs, they can do that. Not all the states recognize it per se, but in theory people in institutions still have freedom of movement, and if the Elves will be footing the bill - uh, not making the states pay anything - for taking care of them, it shouldn't be hard at all to get them to let them go. Well, all the adults, anyway.

That's a start. The Elves think they'll like Lórien, Lórien's good for people who've been through horrible stuff and can't tell what's real and other such problems that they take it sometimes land people in institutions. What's the complication for not-adults?

They don't get to make their own decisions, and their parents are often hoping that the programs at whatever institution they're in will fix them. In some cases that's even reasonable, but in others it's really not. They could try offering some of the same programs, but unless they're willing to do even the awful ones - or they can actually cure autism and schizophrenia and such - they're not going to be able to get the kids who most need it out. That might still be worth doing, since mental institutions tend to be pretty awful in other ways, too, but it'd be understandable if they didn't want to make that sort of compromise.

The Valar'd be happy to take a look at curing things - not likely to work, but maybe they can find workarounds? 

Workarounds would be better than nothing, but a lot of parents really want their kids to be normal.

This sounds like something the princesses will fix, they're good at that.

He looks forward to working with them, then.

Prisons are more complicated; the obvious way to approach that is to present themselves as a new corrections corporation - a business that states pay to run prisons - yes of course they get paid for it, they have to buy food for the prisoners somehow - anyway, present themselves as a new corrections corporation, underbid - ask for less money - than the existing ones, and let the states hire them to do that. The downside to this is that they do actually have to keep the prisoners in prison - there are laws about that - but they can be exceptionally nice prisons; there are laws that prisons can't be too bad, but nothing saying they can't be too good, just that inmates have to be kept away from the general public and also safe from each other. If that still isn't good enough, they can try negotiating with the various states; he can advise them about that, but it's a little bit outside his area of expertise; things aren't usually done that way.

...that might be a good start? Depending on the technical definition of a prison, like, does keeping them on an island count? And if the island is the size of a continent?

They'd have to have some way of keeping them safe from each other, and provide them with the things the law says they have to be given, but if they have an island like that that's uninhabited and are prepared to build on it, they can probably make it work.

They have Valinor, but they can wave everyone on Valinor in as prison employees, probably.