Galactic Constitution/Legends

The Galactic Constitution was the founding document and highest set of laws in the Old Republic. The Constitution was written c. 25,000 BBY to unify the Core Worlds, and it is implied that the same Constitution existed throughout the Republic's existance; however, it certainly underwent drastic revisions at times (for example, the Ruusan Reformation). There is evidence that, as time went on, the Constitution was continually modified to grant more power to the central government.

The Constitution invested executive and legislative powers in the Galactic Senate, and judicial powers in the Supreme Court. It placed the Republic's capital at Coruscant, set its official language as Galactic Basic Standard, and made its official currency the Galactic Credits Standard. The Senate was granted the authority to levy a military and to regulate trade.

Two notable clauses of the Constitution was the Rights of Sentience and Contemplanys Hermi. The former provided for the rights all citizens in the Republic were entitled to, and included the formal outlawing of slavery; the latter provided for a system to enact temporary autonomy in exchange for withdrawl from the Senate.

The Galactic Constitution presumably was the basis for the governing document of the Empire, no doubt with several major changes including the nature of the executive branch, military and law enforcement, and Rights of Sentience. Whatever constitution the Empire used was presumably overridden by the state of emergency declared in 0 BBY. Later, the New Republic would develop a new constitution that, although somewhat different, was based on the Old Republic's.