of five () suspects that a case currently before it may raise a question of law of wider importance () and that existing Supreme Court case law in the matter is ambiguous or inconsistent, the panel has to add an additional six members, for a total of eleven. A case that raises a question of law of wider importance also requires a panel of eleven () if the verdict is going to overturn a large body of existing Supreme Court case law () or a verdict handed down by another panel of eleven. The Court only rarely meets in plenum; a plenary session is mainly required to authorize the yearly activity report. History Absolutist era Between shortly after 1300 and shortly before 1800, the Habsburgs had gradually transformed their empire from a personal union of numerous independent realms and territories into a highly centralized unitary state. Feudal structures had been replaced with rules-based bureaucracies, hereditary local potentates with professional civil servants. The consolidation and modernization of jurisprudence, on the other hand, had been allowed to lag. Civil and criminal procedure as well as the criminal code proper had made great strides forward during the reigns of Maria Theresa and Joseph II in the late 18th century, a period of rapid and profound reform. In the early 19th century, Emperor Francis II had revolutionized the civil code. In terms of its organizational structure, however, the Court system was still essentially medieval. Original jurisdiction over most civil and criminal matters resided with local princes () in some regions, with the estates of the realm () in others, with petty landlords in parts of the countryside, and with proto-democratic municipal governments in certain cities. Clergy, aristocracy, transients, or members of guilds could be subject to claims of jurisdiction based not on locale or subject matter but purely on social class. There was no systematic separation of powers between judiciary and administration. The State as such mostly only exercised a limited amount of appellate jurisdiction. The Supreme Judicial Office () in Vienna, created by Maria Theresa in 1749, functioned both as a token court of last appeal and as a rudimentary ministry of justice. Constitutional era The Revolutions of 1848, whose goals included constitutional rule, equality before the law, and the abolition of outdated remnants of the feudal system, finally forced the Habsburgs to take drastic action. The first milestone was the Pillersdorf Constitution