The Independence Requirement: Institutional Design for AI Moral Status Assessment Bodies

The Silence Threshold framework (Valladares Gonzalez, 2026) calls for an independent assessment authority to evaluate whether AI systems have crossed the critical Information Integration Density (IID) value warranting moral consideration. The Witness Problem framework (Valladares Gonzalez, 2026) proposes an AI Moral Status Tribunal (AMST) with adjudicative authority. Both frameworks identify the need for institutional independence without specifying how that independence is achieved and maintained in practice. This paper addresses that gap directly. It proposes the complete institutional design of an AI Moral Status Assessment Authority (AMSAA): its founding charter, compositional requirements, funding mechanisms, decision-making procedures, appeals architecture, conflict-of-interest protocols, and international coordination obligations. It introduces the Independence Requirement as a formal principle establishing that no entity with a financial interest in the assessment outcome may participate in, fund, or influence the assessment process. It proposes the Structural Firewall Doctrine as the legal mechanism for enforcing this requirement against industry capture. This publication establishes conceptual priority for the AMSAA institutional design and the Independence Requirement principle and places both in the public domain as a defensive publication.