In the Phantom Menace we were introduced to the concept of Midi-chlorians and how these
microorganisms were essentially the force itself.
In the same movie we are also told how the Jedi of the Republic confirm a child’s connection
to the force with their midi-chlorian count from a blood test.
If they possessed a certain amount of midi-chlorians, usually in the upper thousands, then they
would be taken back to become a Jedi.
In Attack of the Clones, Count Dooku tells Obi Wan of the fact that hundreds of senators
were under the influence of a Sith Lord named Darth Sidious.
After being rescued Obi Wan later informs the Jedi of this.
So with this startling new information you would think the Jedi would immediately go
out and start testing all the senators and everyone in the chancellor's office, including
Palpatine, for their midi-chlorian counts in an effort to discover or at the very least
pinpoint the few individuals who have a strong connection to the force.
This would have allowed the Jedi to keep a close eye on the few individuals with exceedingly
high midi-chlorian counts and to investigate them whenever they did anything suspicious.
So why didn’t they do this?
Well there are a few reasons to why they didn’t go out testing everyone’s blood.
First was that they believed this revelation from Dooku was a trick that’s purpose was
to have the Jedi cause inner turmoil within the Republic as they looked for this so called
Sith Lord.
Also the Jedi were pretty arrogant at this point in time and believed that they would
surely have sensed a dark side user let alone a sith lord within the senate building, so
many of them probably didn’t take Dooku’s warning too seriously.
But there were a few Jedi that did take his warning seriously, but they then had another
barrier to overcome.
The thing is even if the Jedi wanted to take on the task of testing every senator’s blood,
they wouldn’t have the authority to just do it without legal approval.
Remember, the Jedi serve the Senate not the other way around.
They would need the senate to approve of their investigation and blood tests before they
could legally perform such a task.
And there’s no way the Senate would allow such an investigation to take place, whether
it be for privacy reasons or out of spite against the Jedi.
Not every senator liked the Jedi, actually many disliked them or were frustrated with
them.
Sure the Jedi were dispatched to settle conflicts on Republic worlds, but they didn’t always
settle the conflict the way the senator or governor of the world wanted them to.
So they of course wouldn’t trust or want the Jedi to go anywhere near them with such
a intruding assignment.
There were 2 Jedi that had an idea on how to get around this barrier however.
Jedi Master Ronhar Kim and his padawan Tap-Nar-Pal presented their plan on finding the secret
sith lord to Palpatine by suggesting they use the midichlorian blood testing devices
to uncover the hidden menace.
Palpatine of course explained to them why such a task wouldn’t be feasible, as it
could cripple the already fragile republic from within and cause even more anger towards
the Jedi as they tried to reveal something most senators didn’t even know or fully
understand.
And that other senators like Bail Organa would refuse solely on principle alone.
To counter his arguments, the Jedi suggested that Palpatine be the first one to be tested
and to have him set an example for all the other members of the senate.
Unlike the Jedi, Palpatine’s approval ratings were at an all time high and he was widely
respected.
Any senator to not follow his lead would greatly risk harming his or her own political career.
They made a good point, too good of a point.
Palpatine then asked if they told this plan to anyone else on the Jedi Council.
They did not, believing it be best to go over the plan with him first before telling the
Council.
What a fatal mistake that was.
Palpatine then told the two Jedi that he would think it over and requested for them to not
tell anyone of this plan in hopes of keeping it a secret from the supposed sith lord.
The Jedi agreed to keep the plan to themselves and that they would meet with the chancellor
again to discuss it further once they got back from their mission to Merson.
When they left, Palpatine secretly contacted Dooku and warned him of the Republic’s attack
on Merson and ordered him to ensure that all the Republic forces, including the Jedi, were
to be killed.
Dooku did as his master demanded, reinforcing the separatists on Merson over 5 times more
than what Republic intelligence believed to have been there initially.
And thus when the Jedi confronted the droid army there they were completely overwhelmed
and later killed.
Their plans on uncovering the sith died with them.
And then pulling a classic Palpatine, he went on to publicly mourn for their deaths and
boosted himself up even more as a caring leader who was going through the same anger as everyone
else affected by the war.
His secret of being the dreaded sith lord the Jedi were looking for was now safe again.