The Edicts of Nicholas Durant, Magister of Reorganized Falconia:

The following edicts have been promulgated by the new Magister, Nicholas Durant, upon his recent election and accession to the office:

1. The Edict of Financial Security. This prohibits bank tellers and account representatives from assisting anyone with a joint-bank account from closing or emptying said account without the consent of the other account holder(s). The penalty for violation is a hefty fine, a ban on any work in the financial services industry for a minimum of ten years, and a six-month prison sentence.
2. The Edict of Prophylactic Assurance. This prohibits any woman from poking holes in a condom, on pain of a hefty fine, loss of custody of any child to the State, and a one-year prison sentence.
3. The Edict of Youth Services. This creates the Youth Services Organization, which served as a young adults' and youth employment agency intended to provide fuller employment and teach useful life skills.
4. The Edict of Alimony Reform. This limits alimony to one year and caps it at one tenth of all of the payer's income. It also automatically terminated it upon remarriage or cohabitation with someone "providing considerable resources to the payee." It even banned any form of palimony, requiring civil registration of marriage as prerequisite for any form of financial support except for child support.
5. The Edict of Maturity. This returns the drinking, gambling, and smoking ages to eighteen, while requiring public awareness and information campaigns, as well as hefty fines for various offenses, such as public intoxication, drunk driving, etc. The previous age, twenty, had only been in place since 2021 and had been very unpopular with many Falconians, seen as contrary to grand Old World traditions prevalent in Falconia.
6. The Edict of Cannabis Legality. This legalizes cannabis for recreational use (at age eighteen, of course) and set an excise tax for it.
7. The Edict of Paternity Assurance. This requires paternity testing prior to listing paternity on birth certificates and forbids listing any father without his consent.
8. The Edict of Codification. This mandates the compilation and codification of existing as well as new laws into a new formal code, the Code of Acts and Edicts, also known as the Code Durant, after the Magister's surname.
9. The Edict of Tax Reform. This sets up a new formula and system of taxation, meant to both broaden the sources of revenue and counter any regressive effects of such a broadening trend. Excise taxes are now levied upon beer, wine, spirits, cannabis, tobacco, vaping products, playing cards, video gambling software, firearms, ammunition, knives, arrows, bows, crossbows, crossbow bolts, pellets, and air guns. Estate and property taxes are levied in a somewhat more progressive manner, as are corporate, capital gains, and personal income taxes. Sumptuary or luxury taxes are also imposed on certain items, such as yachts and private jets. Fuel taxes are carefully limited to avoid creeping price hikes on food and transportation, with more of public works being funded by means of general revenue. Financial speculation taxes are also established now. It is meant to strike a careful balance between social justice and wealth creation, promotion of investment, etc.
10. The Edict of Reasonable Consent. This law establishes a "reasonable standard of consent, so as to avoid extreme broadness or narrowness in both definition and use." It directly bans marital rape as well as stranger, forcible, statutory, and acquaintance rape, and it defines a new crime known as "fraudulent rape," in which "stealthing" and "prophylactic sabotage" are defined as forms of rape. It requires that sex workers be recognized as having the right to withdraw consent, but that they must refund their patrons should they do so, with the caveat that they must only refund any services not performed. Should a client persist once a sex worker has refused or declined her services, that client may be prosecuted for rape. It explicitly, however, rejects the notion of "affirmative consent, being contrary to the presumption of innocence and due process, as well as potentially criminalizing consensual sex."
11. The Edict of Sex Trades. This law bans the practice of procuring, that is, it prohibits the legal existence of pimps. Brothels are permitted, but they must be owned by the sex workers themselves, in a co-operative manner. This is intended to maintain legal sex work while curtailing abuses that "tend to promote human trafficking and sex slavery." It reaffirms that it is legal both to buy and to sell sexual services, thus rejecting the so-called "Nordic Model" policy. It confirms that such a policy is deemed likely to discourage more desirable clients, to make sex workers more desperate to seek clients and less likely to discern dangers, and make it less likely for more responsible clients to inform on more dangerous ones. It also abolishes the requirement that courtesans in particular wear the traditional red shoes and allows them to be treated as cohabitants rather than sex workers, should both they and their clients so desire or prefer.
12. The Edict of Marital Reform. This law formally permits both polygamy, marriage equality, and "limited consanguinity in matrimony," as well as concubinage. The "limited consanguinity" clause essentially reduces the prohibition of close affinity to ones that forbid parent-offspring marriages and sibling marriages. First cousin and avuncular marriages are now lawful, as "the genetic harm is minimal compared to those categories which remain under legal sanction." It further grants some limited protections to concubines, such as removing the legal status of bastardy entirely under the law, as well as enabling concubines to inherit and to act as powers of attorney and next of kin. While palimony remains forbidden, a one-time "severance" may at times be awarded as a judgment, "provided that it not create undue financial hardship or prove sufficiently onerous to the payer." No-fault divorce is also formally enshrined in law.
13. The Edict of Electoral Reform. This law removes the "household franchise" stipulation and establishes universal adult suffrage in the elections of the signoria and the Grand Conclave. No longer will any man or woman be required to defer to the suffrage exercised by a head of household or have to be heads of households in order to cast ballots. The age of suffrage is set at eighteen and all citizens of that age may vote in any elections held for any office directly elected by the votes. The minimum age of membership in all such bodies is eighteen as well and membership is open to both sexes. The male-only requirement for the office of Magister remains, however, as "only men are subject to mandatory military service, and thus only men should be eligible to command the armed forces." The co-option of members for any vacancies in the Grand Conclave or the signoria is abolished, with by-elections to be held instead. The issue of gender restrictions in the judiciary was not addressed, so it is presumed to remain in effect.
14. The Edict of Abortion and Contraception. The practice of abortion is permitted in general terms, both for surgical and medicinal abortions (including herbal, which are already commonplace), though with a requirement that later-term abortions be carried out in hospitals, "later term" being defined as third trimester. Contraceptives, including the "morning after pill" are to be tax-free and available through the National Health Service.
15. The Edict of Clerical Reform. The practice of parochial and other private, including boarding and charter, schools is permitted, but all citizens must produce proof of such parochial education in order to avoid truancy citations (a civil matter rather than a criminal offense). All students must be examined at the ages of seven, eleven, and fifteen in order to measure progress in their education. No vouchers shall be granted. Parochial schools may charge students for lunches, unlike public ones, but if the student cannot pay, they must transport said students to public school cafeterias for free lunches. Home schooling is formally prohibited, though waivers may be granted in extraordinary cases, though with the caveat of annual examinations and registered tutors. No churches may endorse candidates for office, all church organizations are tax-exempt, and no cleric may stand for public office. Regular inspections of private and boarding schools, including parochial ones, may be conducted by the National Education Service.