The Galactic Republic v. Chancellor Palpatine

[Baal]

Whether or not Master Windu fully trusted Jedi Skywalker is completely irrelevant.

What are you talking about? Windu went to arrest and murder Palpatine solely based on what Anakin Skywalker says. And what did Skywalker tell him? "I think Chancellor Palpatine is a Sith Lord." And this coming from an unreliable person he sensed "a great deal of confusion in you." Whether or not Windu trusts Skywalker is absolutely imperative, because that is the only proof they have that Palpatine has done anything wrong.

[

Wrongo. We must have seen two different movies. Mace was specifically goingto see Palapatine to "request" that the Chancellor give up his emergency powers since with the death of the General and a destruction of a large portion of the CIS fleet the emergency was over and thus it was time for Palpatine to legally step down.

Only after what Anakin said did Mace even realize that he was walking into sucha dangerous situation.

[TC Pilot]

Reread my post before you post, please.

[Shannon]

Exactly. Master Windu's intent only changed to arrest after Jedi Skywalker, the Supreme Chancellor's personal representative on the Jedi Council, informed him that Palpatine was a Sith Lord, or in the words of the novelisation, "Palpatine is Sidious". Even then, restraint was shown. The fate of the Chancellor was to be in the hands of the Senate. Master Windu did not contemplate execution until after three Jedi Masters had been slain in under a minute.

[TC Pilot]

Master Windu did not contemplate execution until after three Jedi Masters had been slain in under a minute.

And combined with "He has too much control of the Senate and the Courts. He is too dangerous to be kept alive," one can't help but

[montypython]

Mace Windu should have mentioned the deaths of the other masters instead of '"He has too much control of the Senate and the Courts.' That would have registered better.

[Darth Fanboy]

Mace Windu should have mentioned the deaths of the other masters instead of '"He has too much control of the Senate and the Courts.' That would have registered better.

Mace Windu shouldn't have gone on his own with three other Jedi Masters. He should have found a way to broadcast the arrest for the public record, but marched in half assed without a plan and ended up falling further into the trap. The Ep III novelization showed how Palpatine manipulated the evidence into making it seem as if he were the victim, when it obviously was not the case. Mace fucked up bad.

addendum: I think he mishandled the Skywalker thing too, if he still didn't trust Skywalker at that point, he should have had one of the other Jedi keep an eye on him during the arrest.

[lord Martiya]

By the legal point of view, Palpatine WAS the victim. A video could prove that Mace had indeed his reasons and possibly broke the Senate, but the only recording was audio, and the trap was a legal one, make the Jedi enforcing an illegal arrest.

[Vaporous]

Picking up in Labyrnith of Evil after Anakin and R2 have unlocked and disarmed the Mechno Chair.

At the same time, a high resolution blue hologram projected from the chair's holoplate.

R2-D2 mewled in alarm.

And to the meter-high figure in the hooded cloak, the unmistakable voice of Viceroy Nute Gunray was saying:

Yes, yes, ofcourse. Trust that I will see to it personally, my Lord Sidious.

The Jedi, and the GAR have a recording of Sidious directly speaking to Nute Gunray!

So technically it isn't illegal for the Chancellor to be a Sith, but outing him as Darth Sidious combined with this evidence is enough to show that Palpatine is guilty of treason! Is treason no longer a "real crime"?

All that proves is that Sidious is behind the CIS. It does not technically link Palpatine to them in any way because they do not have evidence that they are one and the same, other than the testimony on Anakin.

[TC Pilot]

So they have a recording of an unidentified human talking to Gunray, who just happens to go by the name "Sidious," who they know happens to be controlling the Senate because Dooku told the Jedi.

Somehow I don't think that's going to convince anyone in a Republic court.

[Darth Massacrus]

In the Republic: Bloodlines storyline, it is revealed that two Jedi had approached Palpatine with a plan to identify Sidious: simple midi-chlorian tests from all the Senators and senior government officials. Sidious, in his role as Palpatine, arranged for the deaths of those Jedi before they could tell anyone of their idea. Furthermore, in Labyrinth of Evil, Yoda reveals that the Senate had been questioned about Darth Sidious, and nothing had been found about him (likely because he was actually Palpatine, who had not been questioned). My theory is this: couldn't it have been easy to prove that Sidious was Palpatine simply by testing for midi-chlorian counts?

[Anguirus]

Well, if hiding in plain sight from the Jedi Council was doable, passing an MC test would be doable. All he'd have to do would be to mind-trick a few people to breeze by that. I'm surprised he bothered committing murder to suppress the idea.

[Tiriol]

Well, if hiding in plain sight from the Jedi Council was doable, passing an MC test would be doable. All he'd have to do would be to mind-trick a few people to breeze by that. I'm surprised he bothered committing murder to suppress the idea.

There are several possible reasons, the most notable being that beings of strong mind and will (like the Jedi) are hard, ridiculously hard or impossible to affect by simple mind trick and most certainly the Jedi would personally administer the sample taking. As Qui-Gon Jinn and Obi-Wan Kenobi demonstrated in The Phantom Menace it doesn't take long to produce results. Why would the Jedi allow some easy-to-influence mundane invidual to administer the said test when they can very well do so themselves?

However, just because someone's midi-chlorian amount is staggering, it does not mean that he or she would actively use the Force or even have any comprehension about it. One of the Senate Guardsmen in Honor and Duty had enough midi-chlorians so that Master Kenobi noted that the Guardsman had a strong connection to the Force (the reason that he was not trained as a Jedi was because he was discovered too old) and apparently he hadn't used the Force in any manner or way; Death Star's dramatis personnae includes an Imperial soldier who has a high concentration of midi-chlorians and suffers from nightmares because of it (visions of future etc.) - however, the existence of high midi-chlorian concentration merely reveals potential, not the skill or ability. As such Palpatine's midi-chlorian amount would only serve as circumanstantial evidence.

[Ziggy Stardust]

"Darth Bane: Path of Destruction" explicitly states that the Sith Order is an illegal organization. The Jedi Order's tolerance of vaguely Sithist cults is irrelevant, as they are not strictly part of the Sith Order. The Order itself is illegal, thus the claims that the religious leanings of the Chancellor are irrelevant in the attempted arrest are inaccurate.

[Publius]

"Darth Bane: Path of Destruction" explicitly states that the Sith Order is an illegal organization. The Jedi Order's tolerance of vaguely Sithist cults is irrelevant, as they are not strictly part of the Sith Order. The Order itself is illegal, thus the claims that the religious leanings of the Chancellor are irrelevant in the attempted arrest are inaccurate.

The Jedi Order's toleration of anything is irrelevant, seeing that they are not officers of the law. It is the Republic whose tolerance is relevant, and when Palpatine played his transcript for the Senate (sanitized or not), he included the claim that the Sithian religion was constitutionally protected. No one objected then or subsequently that this was untrue, and there is no compelling reason to believe that it is false. You have no grounds to believe that a thousand-year-old statute from a time of war is applicable.

[lord Martiya]

My theory is this: couldn't it have been easy to prove that Sidious was Palpatine simply by testing for midi-chlorian counts?

Well, they would prove that Palpatine a big had Force potential. Then they had to prove that Palpatine knew how using it in the Dark Side and that he learned that from a Sith...

[Darth Massacrus]

"Darth Bane: Path of Destruction" explicitly states that the Sith Order is an illegal organization. The Jedi Order's tolerance of vaguely Sithist cults is irrelevant, as they are not strictly part of the Sith Order. The Order itself is illegal, thus the claims that the religious leanings of the Chancellor are irrelevant in the attempted arrest are inaccurate.

The Jedi Order's toleration of anything is irrelevant, seeing that they are not officers of the law. It is the Republic whose tolerance is relevant, and when Palpatine played his transcript for the Senate (sanitized or not), he included the claim that the Sithian religion was constitutionally protected. No one objected then or subsequently that this was untrue, and there is no compelling reason to believe that it is false. You have no grounds to believe that a thousand-year-old statute from a time of war is applicable.

The transcript Palpatine played did not have him specifically saying that the Sith beliefs were protected under Republic law. All he said and claimed to Windu was that his philosophical views were irrelevant, and that the Republic had 'strict laws' against religious prosecution. He never specifically claimed that it was legal for him to be a Sith Lord.

[Publius]

False, sir.

MACE WINDU: You're a Sith Lord!

PALPATINE: Am I? Even if true, that's hardly a crime. My philosophical outlook is a personal matter. In fact -- the last time I read the Constitution, anyway -- we have very strict laws against this type of persecution. So I ask you again: what is my alleged crime? How do you expect to justify your mutiny before the Senate? Or do you intend to arrest the Senate as well?

Palpatine specifically calls being a Sith Lord "hardly a crime" and calls the attempt to arrest him on the charge of being a Sith Lord -- regardless of its truth or falsity -- a type of "persecution" strictly prohibited under the Constitution.

[GrandAdmiralJello]

It's also worth pointing out that the Jedi treason goes far beyond Palpatine.

Kl-ADI-MUNDI: If he does not give up his emergency powers after the destruction of Grievous, then he should be removed from
office.

MACE WINDU: That could be a dangerous move ... the Jedi Council would have to take control of the Senate in order to secure a peaceful transition . . .

Kl-ADI-MUNDI: . . . and replace the Congress with Senators who are not filled with greed and corruption.

YODA: To a dark place this line of thought will carry us. Hmmmmm. . . . great care we must take.

They don't simply show great disregard for the laws of the Republic or its institutions in their illegal arrest attempt, but they also very pointedly favor restructuring the entire government to serve their own interests.

[Shannon]

Publius has shown that the Jedi had no legal authority beyond what was granted them by the Senate and the Office of the Supreme Chancellor. Palpatine's own words in the novelisation seem to imply that we cannot rely on the ancient enmity between the Sith Order and the Republic as grounds for the Jedi to arrest him as a Sith Lord.

Yet I wonder whether such authority exists 'by default' as it were. We already know that the Jedi were engaged in a hunt for Sidious in conjunction with Republic Intelligence, implying that it was indeed sanctioned, since it had Senate Oversight. If such a hunt is sanctioned by the Senate, surely the apprehension of the target must also be sanctioned?

This should be true particularly because Sidious was guilty of crimes against the Republic by virtue of being at the very least an enemy agent in time of war. You might be able to argue that in that case he is an enemy combatant (who also happens to be Supreme Chancellor). In this case, whether or not Sidious is a Sith Lord is irrelevant. The fault lies not in his identity, position, or office, but his deeds, where it should be.

As to the oft-quoted 'mere philosophical and religious differences', let's examine that, shall we? We need to remember what we are talking about here - a SITH LORD. This is a being who by definition has reached the pinnacle of his Order, an Order whose teachings mandate the pursuit of power and the use of that power to subjugate or destroy all others. The philosophy of 'live and let live' can't work with such a being. Religious tolerance was certainly not a feature of Order 66! Even if one would argue that retaliation was justified, there is such a thing as massively disproportionate use of force. Against a Sith Lord, the conventional options available to the Republic are limited. One suspects that their first response to a threat from a Sith Lord would be to mobilise the Jedi, who are the only beings capable of tackling a dark Force user of such power and skill without massive collateral damage.

We need to remember that in our world, and in the world of non-Force sensitives to which Sidious was appealing, 'religious and philosophical differences' are mere words - sure they can engender hate and destruction, but the philosophies themselves are empty air unless they're acted on. But to the Jedi and Sith (and probably other Force users) their religion/philosophy is a very real power that can be triggered by a mere thought or stray emotion, a power that can corrupt more intensely than the most addictive drug. This power is a verifiable, repeatable, scientifically proven phenomenon in the SW Universe, so minimising a conflict between two sects of Force users as a 'mere religious difference' does it a serious disservice (but a useful one for Sidious to use in his defence to those who know no better because they have no first-hand experience of the Force).

Perhaps that is the reason why the Jedi were mobilised as the officer corps of the Grand Army of the Republic, when their enemy was led by another Sith Lord, Darth Tyranus (a former Jedi, which was PR gold for Palpatine - but that's off-topic). As has been noted, their previous role was as special agents of the Judicial Department and other arms of the government. I seem to recall that the Army itself was conditioned to follow the Jedi. No one spoke up against this (to my knowledge), indicating that it was widely accepted that what others in this thread have characterised as a 'religious order' would and did serve the Republic legitimately. This I think perhaps puts the Jedi beyond the status of simple mercenaries, but it is still less than actual government officials, as they have effectively been deputised into the role.

That said, I agree with those who have stated that the Jedi were arrogant and that they 'jumped the gun' in attempting to confront Sidious as they did. They fell into a well-planned, well-orchestrated trap. I believe that their fall is due, at least in part, to the way in which Yoda (and probably others) had prepared and focused the Jedi Order to fight not the present war, but the last Sith War 1000 years before. This is stated in Yoda's musings in the novel. They were prepared for a direct assault, but not an attack from within combined with political and legal maneuvering that was out of their league. Master Windu and the other Jedi on the Council, with the possible exception of Master Kenobi (despite his distaste for politicians), seem to have a case of tunnel vision. Their vision of the Republic was challenged, and they responded the only way they knew how. The fact that their opponent was a Sith was an irresistible bait that pushed them into the Abyss that much faster.

[Tiriol]

My own personal take has always been that the Jedi have no right to casually arrest someone for holding Sith beliefs or practicing their philosophy or quasi-religion. However, actually belonging to the Sith Order might be a different beast altogether, since that organization has been an enemy of the Republic for its entire existence (that the Republic would know of). So long as the Jedi have no conclusive proof that Palpatine is indeed Darth Sidious, the reigning Jen'ari of the Sith Order, it would very much appear that they are acting out of petty spite against someone with different moral and religious outlook than they.

However, we must remember that Darth Bane re-created the Sith from the ashes. And while it is obvious that the Sith are still very much in the thrall of the dark side and have the same ambitions and cravings as before, it could be argued that they are not de jure the same organization that fought against the Republic and the Jedi. That organization died on Ruusan along with its last Jen'ari, Kaan. Bane created a new organization along with his own philosophical and ethical (or lack thereof) views. Of course, de facto the only change was that the Sith would now on only number two and would work from the shadows. This argument could be presented to the courts - that Bane's Sith are not the Sith of old, merely holding somewhat similar views and sharing the same name - and tie them up in legalistic debates. Of course, should evidence come to light that Palpatine was orchestrating the entire Clone Wars, not to mention the atrocious crimes he commited elsewhere (the invasion of the sovereign nation of Naboo; the murder of the previous Senator of Naboo; the murder of former Supreme Chancellor Finis Valorum etc.) the fact that it could be next to impossible to prosecute him for his Sithian ways would be inconsequential when compared to the charges of murder on multiple accounts, high treason and several war crimes.

However, there is no doubt that the Jedi in their hubris failed to take into consideration that they might not have the soundest of legal standings and that any action against the Supreme Chancellor would be extremely hard. As such they played right into their nemesis's hands with their vigor to stop him. Like the protagonist of a Greek tragedy their hubris was their downfall even more so than the power of their opponent.

[Darth Massacrus]

False, sir.

MACE WINDU: You're a Sith Lord!

PALPATINE: Am I? Even if true, that's hardly a crime. My philosophical outlook is a personal matter. In fact -- the last time I read the Constitution, anyway -- we have very strict laws against this type of persecution. So I ask you again: what is my alleged crime? How do you expect to justify your mutiny before the Senate? Or do you intend to arrest the Senate as well?

Palpatine specifically calls being a Sith Lord "hardly a crime" and calls the attempt to arrest him on the charge of being a Sith Lord -- regardless of its truth or falsity -- a type of "persecution" strictly prohibited under the Constitution.

Even if true? Hardly a crime? Palpatine is just using the old OJ defense method.
Palpatine does not specifically say that he is a Sith Lord in that quote, and he does not specifically say that it is legal for him to be a Sith Lord. He just walks around Windu's statement.

[The Original Nex]

He says quite clearly that EVEN IF HE WERE A SITH LORD it is HARDLY A CRIME.

[Isolder74]

But being Darth Sidious the leader of Separatists IS.

[TC Pilot]

Well, duh. What's your point?

[Illuminatus Primus]

In the Republic: Bloodlines storyline, it is revealed that two Jedi had approached Palpatine with a plan to identify Sidious: simple midi-chlorian tests from all the Senators and senior government officials. Sidious, in his role as Palpatine, arranged for the deaths of those Jedi before they could tell anyone of their idea. Furthermore, in Labyrinth of Evil, Yoda reveals that the Senate had been questioned about Darth Sidious, and nothing had been found about him (likely because he was actually Palpatine, who had not been questioned). My theory is this: couldn't it have been easy to prove that Sidious was Palpatine simply by testing for midi-chlorian counts?

Since quite a few of Palpatine's aides and favorites - who later made up his inner circle - were Force sensitives, it stands to reason that evidence that a member of the Congress or a member of a staff belonging to a Senator would necessarily have to be a closeted Sith Lord.