The Imperial Chamber Court needs reform even more urgently than the Imperial Aulic Council. The estates’ complaints about this court, much more general and much more justified, had already prompted His Majesty the late emperor to propose to the Imperial Diet that the court be audited. There has not been such an audit since the Peace of Westphalia, except for an extraordinary one that began under Emperor Joseph I and ended under Charles VI and did not have much success. One initiated this salubrious work as soon as permitted by the disputes in the Imperial Diet, which were caused by the notorious happenings in Osnabrück, and which completely paralyzed its activity. Among the estates, I initially found much good will for cooperation in this matter. The estates, whose way of thinking is extremely ambiguous, showed the greatest eagerness to support our plans. The matter was decided. The deputies of the first class were called together, and the date was specified. At the time of the opening of this assembly, we first discovered the secret and dangerous intentions of the Protestants, above all those among them who call themselves the "corresponding courts." They constitute a so-called secret union quite similar to that which helped bring about the bloody Thirty Years War at the beginning of the previous century. Their aim was, and still appears to be, to avail themselves of an institution, which, according to its nature, and defined through the wisdom of the laws, is supposed to recreate an honest, impartial, and quick administration of justice and thereby strengthen the imperial authority again. Their aim was, I say, to use precisely this means to make the problem worse and actually destroy the authority or at least weaken the powers that are so necessary for the maintenance of a court of law, which for the majority of them is the only protection against oppression by their fellow estates, who are so powerful that one could not otherwise resist them. Since the opening of the audit, they have been working relentlessly on this unreasonable plan with as much trickiness as audacity. The ministers of Saxony, Bavaria, and the Palatinate are the most stubborn and ill-disposed. Next month, May, may bring about a change here, because the second class will relieve the first. However, that is still quite disputed, although it is founded on law, and it could be that this new controversy will offer a good opportunity to end the entire audit, which has cost a lot of money without being worth anything.
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