Rule of law
Rule of law is the principle that every individual is subject to the law, including the law makers. Black's Law Dictionary defines it as, "the supremacy of regular as opposed to arbitrary power." According to Judge Richard Posner, “The rule of law means that judges decide cases ‘without respect of persons,’ that is, without considering the social status, attractiveness, etc. of the parties or their lawyers.”[1]
Rule of law is a rebuke to rulers who argue that they are exempt from the law from due to divine right or other rationale. The concept was familiar to ancient philosophers such as Aristotle, who wrote "Law should govern".[2] It was a principle followed during the Roman Republic. "We are all servants of the laws in order that we may be free," Cicero wrote. Magistrates were immune from prosecution as long as they held public office. But they could be legally held to account once their terms expired. (Senators were former magistrates who, at least in theory, merely advised their successors. The Senate had neither immunity nor legal responsibility for any policy.) In imperial times, the emperor was declared to be immune from law (legibus solutus).
The Magna Carta of 1215 established the principle that the king of England is subject to the law. The phrase "rule of law" is found in a petition to King James I submitted by parliament in 1610.[3] Samuel Rutherford gave the principle a theoretical foundation in his book Lex, Rex: The Law is King (1644).
References
- ↑ "Errors and Oddities on the U.S. Citizenship Test"
- ↑ Aristotle, Politics 3.16
- ↑ Hallam, Henry. The Constitutional History of England, Volume 1, page 441 (1827).
