The rule of law is defined in the Oxford English Dictionary as: "The authority and influence of law in

society, especially when viewed as a constraint on individual and institutional behavior; (hence) the
principle whereby all members of a society (including those in government) are considered equally
subject to publicly disclosed legal codes and processes."[2] The term "rule of law" is closely related to
"constitutionalism" as well as "Rechtsstaat", and refers to a political situation, not to any specific
legal rule.[3][4][5]
Use of the phrase can be traced to 16th-century Britain, and in the following century the Scottish
theologian Samuel Rutherford employed it in arguing against the divine right of kings.[6] John
Locke wrote that freedom in society means being subject only to laws made by a legislature that
does not apply to everyone, with a person being otherwise free from both governmental and private
restrictions upon liberty. "The rule of law" was further popularized in the 19th century by British
jurist A. V. Dicey. However, the principle, if not the phrase itself, was recognized by ancient thinkers;
for example, Aristotle wrote: "It is more proper that law should govern than any one of the citizens".[7]
The rule of law implies that every person is subject to the law, including people who are lawmakers,
law enforcement officials, and judges.[8] In this sense, it stands in contrast to tyranny
or oligarchy where the rulers are held above the law. Lack of the rule of law can be found in both
democracies and monarchies, for example when there is neglect or ignorance of the law. The rule of
law is more apt to decay if a government has insufficient corrective mechanisms for restoring it.

Antiquity[edit]
In the West, the ancient Greeks initially regarded the best form of government as rule by the best
men.[12] Plato advocated a benevolent monarchy ruled by an idealized philosopher king, who was
above the law.[12] Plato nevertheless hoped that the best men would be good at respecting
established laws, explaining that "Where the law is subject to some other authority and has none of
its own, the collapse of the state, in my view, is not far off; but if law is the master of the government
and the government is its slave, then the situation is full of promise and men enjoy all the blessings
that the gods shower on a state."[13] More than Plato attempted to do, Aristotle flatly opposed letting
the highest officials wield power beyond guarding and serving the laws.[12] In other words, Aristotle
advocated the rule of law:
It is more proper that law should govern than any one of the citizens: upon the same principle, if it is
advantageous to place the supreme power in some particular persons, they should be appointed to
be only guardians, and the servants of the laws.[7]
The Roman statesman Cicero is often cited as saying, roughly: "We are all servants of the laws in
order to be free."[14] During the Roman Republic, controversial magistrates might be put on trial when
their terms of office expired. Under the Roman Empire, the sovereign was personally immune
(legibus solutus), but those with grievances could sue the treasury.[9]
In China, members of the school of legalism during the 3rd century BC argued for using law as a tool
of governance, but they promoted "rule by law" as opposed to "rule of law", meaning that they placed
the aristocrats and emperor above the law.[15] In contrast, the Huang–Lao school
of Daoism rejected legal positivism in favor of a natural law that even the ruler would be subject to.[16]
There has recently been an effort to reevaluate the influence of the Bible on Western constitutional
law. In the Old Testament, the book of Deuteronomy imposes certain restrictions on the king,
regarding such matters as the numbers of wives he might take and of horses he might acquire (for
his own use). According to Professor Bernard M. Levinson, "This legislation was so utopian in its
own time that it seems never to have been implemented...."[17] The Deuteronomic social vision may
have influenced opponents of the divine right of kings, including Bishop John Ponet in sixteenth-
century England.[18]

Middle Ages[edit]
In Islamic jurisprudence rule of law was formulated in the seventh century, so that no official could
claim to be above the law, not even the caliph.[19]
Alfred the Great, Anglo-Saxon king in the 9th century, reformed the law of his kingdom and
assembled a law code (the Doom Book) which he grounded on biblical commandments. He held that
the same law had to be applied to all persons, whether rich or poor, friends or enemies. This was
likely inspired by Leviticus 19:15: "You shall do no iniquity in judgment. You shall not favor the
wretched and you shall not defer to the rich. In righteousness you are to judge your fellow."[20]
In 1215, Archbishop Stephen Langton gathered the Barons in England and forced King John and
future sovereigns and magistrates back under the rule of law, preserving ancient liberties by Magna
Carta in return for exacting taxes.[21][22] This foundation for a constitution was carried into the United
States Constitution.
In 1481, during the reign of Ferdinand II of Aragon, the Constitució de l'Observança was approved
by the General Court of Catalonia, establishing the submission of royal power (included its officers)
to the laws of the Principality of Catalonia.[23]
The first known use of this English phrase occurred around AD 1500.[24] Another early example of the
phrase "rule of law" is found in a petition to James I of England in 1610, from the House of
Commons:
Amongst many other points of happiness and freedom which your majesty's subjects of this kingdom
have enjoyed under your royal progenitors, kings and queens of this realm, there is none which they
have accounted more dear and precious than this, to be guided and governed by the certain rule of
the law which giveth both to the head and members that which of right belongeth to them, and not by
any uncertain or arbitrary form of government ...[25]
In 1607, English Chief Justice Sir Edward Coke said in the Case of Prohibitions (according to his
own report) "that the law was the golden met-wand and measure to try the causes of the subjects;
and which protected His Majesty in safety and peace: with which the King was greatly offended, and
said, that then he should be under the law, which was treason to affirm, as he said; to which I said,
that Bracton saith, quod Rex non debet esse sub homine, sed sub Deo et lege (That the King ought
not to be under any man but under God and the law.)."
Among the first modern authors to use the term and give the principle theoretical foundations
was Samuel Rutherford in Lex, Rex (1644).[6] The title, Latin for "the law is king", subverts the
traditional formulation rex lex ("the king is law").[26] James Harrington wrote in Oceana (1656),
drawing principally on Aristotle's Politics, that among forms of government an “Empire of Laws, and
not of Men” was preferable to an “Empire of Men, and not of Laws”.[27]
John Locke also discussed this issue in his Second Treatise of Government (1690):
The natural liberty of man is to be free from any superior power on earth, and not to be under the will
or legislative authority of man, but to have only the law of nature for his rule. The liberty of man, in
society, is to be under no other legislative power, but that established, by consent, in the
commonwealth; nor under the dominion of any will, or restraint of any law, but what that legislative
shall enact, according to the trust put in it. Freedom then is not what Sir Robert Filmer tells us,
Observations, A. 55. a liberty for every one to do what he lists, to live as he pleases, and not to be
tied by any laws: but freedom of men under government is, to have a standing rule to live by,
common to every one of that society, and made by the legislative power erected in it; a liberty to
follow my own will in all things, where the rule prescribes not; and not to be subject to the inconstant,
uncertain, unknown, arbitrary will of another man: as freedom of nature is, to be under no other
restraint but the law of nature.[28]
The principle was also discussed by Montesquieu in The Spirit of the Laws (1748).[29] The phrase
"rule of law" appears in Samuel Johnson's Dictionary (1755).[30]
In 1776, the notion that no one is above the law was popular during the founding of the United
States. For example, Thomas Paine wrote in his pamphlet Common Sense that "in America, the law
is king. For as in absolute governments the King is law, so in free countries the law ought to be king;
and there ought to be no other."[31] In 1780, John Adams enshrined this principle in Article VI of the
Declaration of Rights in the Constitution of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts:
No man, nor corporation, or association of men, have any other title to obtain advantages, or
particular and exclusive privileges, distinct from those of the community, than what arises from the
consideration of services rendered to the public; and this title being in nature neither hereditary, nor
transmissible to children, or descendants, or relations by blood, the idea of a man born a magistrate,
lawgiver, or judge, is absurd and unnatural.[32]
The influence of Britain, France and the United States contributed to spreading the principle of the
rule of law to other countries around the world.