After reading about the utterly astonishing and shockingly monarchical ruling from the Court on 1 July 2024, I was stunned. Nowhere in the laws of this republic for the past 247 years and 364 days is there precedent for declaring a citizen has blanket and general immunity from the Law for their actions, and certainly not immunity before an act has been committed, and never ex officio to such a sweeping and terrifying degree. It is true that prior to the publishing of The Declaration of Independence, there were certain immunities and even some degrees of sacrosanctity that obtained to specific Royal Offices and royal officials, and indeed Royal Persons, but those protections were rarely tested in the histories of the Thirteen Colonies during the time when they were legally in effect. Not even the British King could claim and rely upon Common Law for absolute immunity regarding his official actions, as King Charles I found out so keenly when he was axed by Parliament. Indeed, the precedent of the king being punished for his official misdeeds extended back to the 12th Century and King Henry II, so neither English Common Law nor its American descendant provides for such a precedent.

I was therefore at a loss to understand where this brand-new and sweeping legal interpretation might have its basis. The Law, as a discipline, is immensely reliant upon its history; this reliance has given The Law a degree of stability and consistency which has helped to rein-in tyrants and protect the rights and liberties of both subjects and citizens. It is a demanding and difficult discipline to master, undoubtedly, but it has served surprisingly well for nearly a millennium. Clearly, in the ruling the Court announced yesterday, the needed precedent must have come from some other source than our own legal heritage.

As I lay awake this morning in the wee hours, mulling this decision over in my turbid mind, I realized where the precedent is to be found. The connection is a tad tenuous, I suppose, but not entirely preposterous. The precedent that supports yesterday’s creation of a novel status for our chief executive has precedent in the laws of the ancient Roman Republic. At least in its inspiration and impact. After all, our republic was consciously modeled upon that of Rome by our Founders.

Now one might note that in Ancient Rome, the chief executives (yes, plural; they had two Consuls each year) enjoyed no immunity from prosecution after their one-year term ended. Cicero, notably, was exiled from Rome for his extra-legal execution of Roman Citizens during his tenure as Consul. So Rome’s equivalent of our president was not granted immunity for his acts official or private.

However, there was an extraordinary office in the Roman Constitution that *did* confer both immunity and personal sacrosanctity upon the holder of that office. Even today, the title of that office is a bit chilling: “Dictator.” During times of extreme peril, the Roman Senate could appoint a Dictator to serve a term of six months in order to address and resolve an exigent crisis. Any and all actions of the appointed Dictator during the term of office were completely immune from prosecution or consequences. This was conferred upon the office so that the Dictator could act as a unitary executive without hesitation in his actions, up to and including extra-legal executions of Roman Citizens. As the Roman Republic endured for almost 500 years, there were many occasions that were deemed to justify naming a Dictator, but by the 3rd century of the Republic, the office had fallen into disuse.

However, in the final century of the Republic, two ambitious figures revived the extraordinary office in order to consolidate their power. Lucius Cornelius Sulla received dictatorial powers from a Senate that he controlled with bribery and fear. Sulla held the office for two years after which he voluntarily stepped down, considering the crisis for which he had been appointed to be resolved. The other figure — famous or infamous according to one’s perspective — was the remarkable Gaius Julius Caesar whose legacy not only forever changed Rome and ended its republic, but affects us even to this very day. Caesar took the novel and unprecedented step of having a cowed and subservient Senate declare him “Dictator Perpetuo” (“Dictator with unlimited term) in 44 BC. Self described “saviors of The Republic” assassinated him a few weeks later, to bad effect.

So it seems that our nation’s highest court is reaching back more than 2,000 years into Roman Law to define a principle that has not heretofore existed in the Law of the United States. In so doing, they are clearly declaring their aims and expectations and elevating our Presidency to Royal or Imperial status with the goal of a “Unitary Executive” beholden not to The Law, not to Congress nor the courts, not to the electorate, not to anything but itself. But it won’t be titled “King” or “Emperor.”

“Dictator” will do.

— Jamie Rawson

Flower Mound, Texas