Decree

Abstract: In A.D. 249 the emperor Trajan Decius issued an edict requiring the inhabitants of the Roman Empire to sacrifice to the gods. With this decree, he also inaugurated the first empire-wide persecution of Christians. Previously, persecutions of Christians had always been local affairs determined by local conditions. Thereafter, persecutions were largely instigated by emperors and took place on an imperial scale. It has consequently become common to distinguish pre-Decian persecution, characterized by its local and ad hoc nature, from the centrally organized persecutions of Decius in A.D. 249–50, Valerian in A.D. 257–60, and Diocletian, Galerius, and Maximinus in A.D. 303–13. The importance of the decree as a turning point in the history of Christian persecution is thus widely recognized. Beyond this, discussions of the decree have usually focused on its precise nature and the motivations behind it; given the limited evidence, however, these discussions have tended to be inconclusive. In this paper I will return to a consideration of the decree's effects, but in the context of traditional religion rather than that of Christianity. I will argue that, seen from this perspective, the decree was a highly innovative and important step towards a radical restructuring of religious organization in the Roman world.

Abstract: It was Harold J. Laski who said “the road from Constance to 1688 is a direct one,” and he did so when speaking of the constitutional theories enunciated by the Conciliar thinkers and put into practice at the Council of Constance. These closely related theories had their roots deep in the corporative thinking of the medieval canon lawyers but sprang into prominence during the years after 1378, when the Western Church was divided first into two and then into three “obediences” under the sway of rival claimants to the Papacy. Basic to all the Conciliar theories was the central insistence that the final authority in the Church lay not with the Pope but with the whole body of the faithful and that the Pope possessed, therefore, not an absolute but merely a ministerial authority delegated to him for the good of the Church. This belief made it possible to appeal from the obduracy of the rival pontiffs to the decision of the faithful as expressed through their representatives assembled in a General Council of the whole Church, and such a possibility was actualized at the Councils of Pisa (1409) and Basel (1431-1449) and, most strikingly of all, at Constance (1414-1418). There it found expression, not only in the judgment and deposition of popes, but also in the promulgation of the decree Sacrosancta (1415), which declared:This sacred synod of Constance, forming a General Council … represents the Catholic Church and has immediate power from Christ which anyone, of whatsoever status and condition, even if holding the Papal dignity, is bound to obey in matters pertaining to the Faith, extirpation of the schism and reformation of the said Church in head and members.

Abstract: Introduction: the journee of 20 June 1793 in Cap Francais and the abolition of slavery 1. A colony in revolution 2. Municipal revolution in a colonial city 3. French Jacobins and Saint-Domingue colonists 4. Creating revolutionary government in the tropics 5. A model republican general 6. The powderkeg explodes 7. Freedom and fire 8. The road to general emancipation 9. Saint-Domingue in the United States 10. The decree of 16 Pluviose An II Conclusion.

Abstract: The emerging literature on executive decree authority has generated important insights, but it has tended to select on the dependent variable (decrees), rather than view decrees as one of several possible ways that presidents can initiate policies This article examines the conditions under which presidents resort to extraordinary rather than ordinary means of legislative initiative Unilateral action theory claims that presidents will resort to decrees in unfavorable political environments, while delegation theory claims that decrees will flourish when the president is more politically secure A study of four Brazilian presidents between 1988 and 1998 yields inconsistent support for both theories Presidential popularity is only weakly related to the use of decree authority, but executive-legislative relations—especially coalition management via multiparty cabinets—is a more reliable predictor Neither unilateral action theory nor delegation theory can fully account for the wide variation in the legislat