In a move that further strengthened the authority and power of the "magister", sometime in the early 340s he was made inspector-general of the "cursus publicus", the State Post. Perhaps at the same time, senior "agentes" were appointed as heads ("principes") of the staffs of the most important provincial governors: the praetorian prefects, the vicars of the dioceses, and the proconsuls of the provinces of Africa and Achaea. The placements gave the "magister", and by extension the emperor, on-the-spot "watchdogs" over the upper echelons of the administration, as the "princeps" was a key position: his role was to control the staff, not to do paperwork; he composed confidential reports directly for the "magister officiorum", without the praetorian prefect's involvement, and vetted all business coming in and going out of the office and countersigned all documents. A law of 387 forbids the legal staffs of the prefects and vicars from instituting legal proceedings without the "princeps"s permission or order (as an additional means of determining the validity of a legal suit.