Who Holds the State? A Framework for Testing Claims After Support Ends

Many institutional claims are measured while the support relation that produces them is still present, then priced or governed as if the state had transferred. The custody framework introduces the State Claim Record — a compact instrument for testing such claims by naming the claim class, inventorying the support relation, specifying withdrawal at the claim's implied horizon, measuring what survives, assigning the holder of continuity, and comparing that holder to what the claim promised. A claim matches custody when the promised continuity is supported by the holder, state-path, and evidence standing; otherwise it is mismatched, opaque, or unprobed. The framework is descriptive before critical: it does not punish dependence, but it exposes dependence sold as transfer, durability, independence, or ownership. Three applications — AI compute commitments, household wealth as custody, and gene therapy durability — demonstrate the record's reach across capital, demography, and clinical pricing. A companion launch registry (State Claim Registry v0.1, schema SCR-v0.1, 12 launch rows) applies the record across distant domains. Companion website: https://ambra7592.github.io/who-holds-the-state/