Is Ned a traitor by westerosi law?

[GallowsKnight]

Yes .One could argue harboring Jon was treason, in spirit if not law. Though the case would be hard to prove.

The severity of his complicity however depends on what edicts Robert issued and when Ned swore his particular oaths of fealty to Robert and moved from peer to vassal-liege relationship.

Sort of treason-by-omission versus directly disobeying Robert's commands.

[erra]

As far I know, there is only one witness to the TOJ, and only one way Robert could find out, and that's through Howland Reed's testimony. 

Defense: Howland is crazy / delusional / vindictive about something and is making up a story.

Jon doesn't look like a Targ, he actually looks a lot like Ned. If it's just Robert asking / accusing Ned, then Eddard could easily talk his way out of it. He's been lying to Robert about Jon this whole time, he could just keep spinning the yarn a bit if a single eyewitness made a pretty wild claim that's not supported by evidence. Robert's much more likely to trust his bff, than Howland Reed the mud man. Everybody knows they breathe mud and smell like moss. 

If Ned stood trial, I wouldn't even let him testify. Just badger Howland Reed, make him look unhinged, make a final statement about the known facts (lineage + family traits is a huge part of Westerosi society).

It might be hard for Ned to throw his other bff under the bus, but it's also hard to imagine Howland testifying against Ned after all this time. Why, except for some kind of personal gain, or revenge ... it wouldn't be hard for Ned to protect his entire family over this false friend.   

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I read what GyantSpyder wrote about the wall aspect, which I haven't even thought of:

  " You could also argue legally that once Jon has taken the black he has renounced all lands and titles, and that by encouraging him to take the Black, Ned was not aiding or abetting a threat but removing it. And thus it is not treason." 

That's a really good point, even Aemon Targaryan is allowed to be up on the wall in Westeros. Robert never makes a sideways comment about it, that we know of. 

 

 

[1000th Lord Commander]

And I expected this to be a post about the succession in GoT.

I could defend this quite easily, by saying that Robert never expressly outlawed or sought the deaths of Dany and Viserys. He wanted to, but Jon Arryn persuaded him otherwise. Futhermore, Ned never tells Jon about his parentage, therefore Jon isn't a threat to the reign of Robert and/or his heirs. As well as letting Jon take the black, which further removes Jon as a threat.

Prosecuting it would be a lot more difficult. If Robert outlaws all Targareyans, then Ned could argue that Jon, as a bastard, is no true Targ. I could argue that even keeping a secret of this magnitude from the king is treason enough, but that's very shaky territory.

[GallowsKnight]

21 minutes ago, 1000th Lord Commander said:

I could argue that even keeping a secret of this magnitude from the king is treason enough, but that's very shaky territory.

Oh I think it's most certainly treason. The decision certainly weighs heavily on Ned. But as everyone as pointed out. It would be difficult to prove and it doesn't harm Robert. But it's still treason.

If you commit a victimless crime and leave no evidence. You might be morally in the right and safe from prosecution. But it was still a crime.

[GyantSpyder]

It gets even more complicated when you consider that the unified legal system of Jaehaerys I the Conciliator collapses during the course of the story and is replaced by several different vying legal systems.

So, under the unified law of Jaehaerys, the only people who should be finders of fact in trials, and the authority that dispenses punishment, are the lords of the lands where the cases arise, and then, we can presume from events like Ned hearing the case of Willem Darry and proscribing the Mountain, and Robert sitting in judgment over the dispute over Nymeria biting Joffrey, the Hand of the King and the King. The Master of Laws is not actually a judge or magistrate, the Master of Laws is a civilian policy advisor on matters of law and justice and a bureaucrat who manages the City Watch and the gaolers of King's Landing and such.

This is a system ready to fail, because it does not provide a clear way that we know of for Lords Paramount or Kings to stand trial for crimes that works within the rules of the political system.

Ned sheltering Jon was most likely a crime under the legal code of Jaehaerys, but it would require somebody to raise the case somewhere, and Ned is the highest legal authority in the North - the equivalent of a Lord Paramount (although the Starks are not created Lords Paramount because they were kings at the time of the Conquest - what exactly this means legally I do not know) - so where to bring the case is a problem.

The tensions between the Westerosi consolidated legal system and its devolved political system do not seem able to handle the trial of a Lord Paramount or a family member of a Lord Paramount against the will of their House - they can use their relative political independence as a remedy against their de jure obligation to the laws of King Jaehaerys. When the kings of the Seven Kingdoms bent the knee to Aegon the Conqueror, Aegon did not change their local legal systems. So it's not clear how much obligation royal homage really requires of Lords Paramount to follow and administer Jaehaerys's unified code of law in their own territories. Everybody loved Jaehaerys, but Jaehaerys has been dead for a long time and everybody is no longer enjoying the prosperity he presided over.

So, when Catelyn brings Tyrion to the Vale for a trial before Lord Robert Arryn, technically that's legal, but politically, it sparks a civil war between the Westerlands and the Riverlands.

And when Joffrey accepts Ned's confession but doesn't mete out the mutually agreed upon punishment, that is seen as a huge breach in feudal obligation and also starts a civil war.

And going back from there, when Mad King Aerys executes Rickard Stark and Brandon Stark, even if he is within his legal authority as king (which is debatable, since the whole "fire is my champion" thing is hogwash), and proscribes Robert and Ned, that also starts a civil war.

It's more of a political problem than a legal problem. And the political and legal systems are not up to the task and collapse.

So, from there, we see four different legal systems come into force, sometimes in different places, sometimes overlapping each other:

There's the Kingsmoot and the Old Way, which is mostly discussed here for amusement, as it's unlikely that, if Ned were to survive, he would be tried in the Iron Islands for harboring Jon rather than for the death of Balon's sons, and also because Euron seems to less run his government by law and more run it the way he would airbrush it on the side of a sweet van. I guess you could argue that if Gylbert Farwynd were feeling particularly litigious, he could bring Ned to Aeron Damphair on Pyke during the Kingsmoot and someone would rule that, because Ned took Jon by force, Jon belongs to Ned, and the Seastone Chair's authority cannot or does not generally strip possessions from people when they are won by raiding, which is what Ned did at the Tower of Joy.

We see the imposition of Northern custom and the Laws of the First Men by Notherners, including Robb Stark and Jon Snow, where the King in the North has the authority to personally execute anyone who violates their oaths of obedience, by beheading, wherever it happens (not only on his own land). Rickard Karstark is executed by Robb personally without trial, which you get the sense is not how King Jaehaerys the Conciliator would have done it. Jon Snow executing Janos Slynt is also more of a problem to everyone else than it looks from his POV, because while he first sentences Slynt to hang at the top of the Wall, which seems like the official Night's Watch punishment for insubordination, he changes his mind and instead beheads him personally in accordance with Stark custom and the laws of the First Men, which, to the rest of the Watch, might have seemed horrifically barbaric and illegal. At any rate, that's not how it's supposed to be done in that context. Later, we hear from Roose Bolton about the First Night, and how the practice isn't actually prohibited as much as it is against the letter of illegitimate foreign law, signaling a further gap between the Laws of the First Men and Jaehaerys's.

We then later see the creation of the role of "Justiciar," which is not a Westerosi or Targaryan office, but appears to come from the Free Cities (like "Prince" as a title of sovereignty), and also from Dornish Law (We know that Doran Martell uses appointed justiciars, rather than petty lords, to decide judicial matters in his absence), which in turn is presumably derived from Rhoynish culture. If we note that the title is used throughout the Free Cities, but not by Valyrians, we can extrapolate that it might have come from the Old Empire of Ghis. (Which reminds me - do we know who lived in the Great Pyramid of Meereen before Daenerys did? Daenerys just assumes it's a palace and treats it like a palace, but Meereen didn't have a king or queen, right? It had the Great Masters. So what was the Pyramid for? Do we even know? Did anyone care to ask?)

If all the families in Meereen kind of ruled by committee, like the 13 rule in Qarth, that would also point to the Old Empire of Ghis having either an oligarchical structure or some sort of magistracy or both, which would mean that Daenerys hearing petitions and cases in the Great Pyramid, in line with what would be expected by the law of Jaehaerys I, might be a very foreign sort of legal structure in those cities, further pointing to Daenerys being way out of her depth.

The shift of the administration of justice by the Iron Throne from Westeros-style feudal law to an Essos-style magistracy, like both of our final two huge upheavals in the legal system, is done by Cersei, likely at the suggestion of Taena of Myr (since her husband is the first Justiciar appointed). Cersei appears to have no idea what she has done or the significance it will have down the line.

Cersei decides to rename the Master of Laws "Justiciar," unknowingly giving the role a magisterial authority to hear cases and hand down punishments outside of the feudal order that it did not previously have under the laws of King Jaehaerys.

This seems like kind of a minor thing at the time, but later in A Feast for Crows, Brienne meets Randyll Tarly, the new Justiciar, who is holding hearings and dispensing punishments in Maidenpool, far from any lands he holds, independently of the King or the Iron Throne -- all of this would be unheard of, I think, under the laws of Jaehaerys. Tarly isn't even a Lord Paramount. He's certainly not The Hand. And he's nowhere near the Big Chair.

And the last one is of course The Faith, which Cersei also empowers without knowing - the Faith Militant re-impose a reinvigorated, Wahhabi-ish version of the ancient theocratic laws of the Andals, which, it turns out, are really harsh. That's where trial by combat comes from, it seems, and trials of seven, and also trials by septons - none of which any of the other political groups in the world seem to have.

So, to recap, if Ned Stark does not die, but is instead arrested and charged with treason for harboring Jon Snow, here is what happens under each legal system, I think:

- Jaehaerys I (default code of law for most of Westeros at the start of the series) - Ned has committed a crime, but it is unlikely he will be punished for it, because it is difficult to find someone with standing to accuse him. It becomes a political problem more than a legal one. Ned taking the black and renouncing his political authority is a good solution.

- The Laws of the First Men - It is debatable whether treason against King Robert is a crime if you don't recognize the legal authority of the Iron Throne over the North, even if you still do things like pay taxes or send troops to war for him as part of bending the knee. Ned's promise to his sister and the taboo against kinslaying probably weigh in the balance here over his political obligation to the Iron Throne. Also there is no legal authority that can bring charges against the Stark in Winterfell, who is judge, jury and executioner. Jon taking the black and renouncing his claims on any thrones is a good solution.

- Justiciar magistracy under the legal traditions of the Essos, which Cersei installed stupidly - The justiciar has no obligations to honor feudal relationships. If Randyll Tarly is Justiciar, Ned and Jon are probably both executed. Taking the black is not a good solution - the nobility don't necessarily have any special rights to a justiciar to worry about, and while Randyll lets his son take the black for the crime of being a nerd, he seems to mostly execute the outlaws he judges.

- The Laws of the Andals and the Faith - Ned is pressured into confessing that Jon is Lyanna and Rhaegar's son rather than his own son. Ned refuses to do this and is executed. Or, Ned is forced to confess to his sins of adultery and then has to do atonement. Or, Ned fights a trial by combat, or a trial by seven. Or Ned is judged by septons who most likely condemn him to death for treason.

- The Old Way - Ned gets to keep Jon as his property because he paid the iron price for him. He also gets to keep Dawn, and a longship is sent to Starfall to go get it for him. Then Victarion hits him in the face with the sharp end of an axe for killing his nephews and for a variety of other relevant or irrelevant reasons. Victarion then takes Dawn for himself. Euron then starts painting his nails and singing Ronnie James Dio. 

Or, of course, there's Stannis, who appreciates that Ned is a good and honorable man as well as a traitor against his brother. So Stannis probably just chops Ned's [BLEEP] off and makes him wear it as a belt buckle.

[Protagoras]

Do anyone really think Robert will care about things like law or rules?

If he think Ned has done wrong he will send for him and if Ned doesn´t show Robert will try to get him - at the front of a Big-ass army (Not certain if he actually could muster an army of sufficient size (At least 150000 troops so he gets 3-1, which he needs considering the defensive terrain),  but he sure would try).