Rule bydecree is a style of governance allowing quick, unchallenged promulgation of lawby a single person or group of people, usually withoutlegislative approval. Rule by decree is often a key feature ofdictatorships.[1] Governments often issue decrees in order to bypass the conventional means of making laws.[2]
One of the first examples of rule by decree was in the ancientRoman Republic. After theassassination of Julius Caesar in 44 BC, his successor Gaius Octavian (Augustus), generalMark Antony and succeedingpontifex maximusAemilius Lepidus seized power in theSecond Triumvirate, officially recognized by thesenate by theLex Titia decree. The resolution, which gave the three 'triumvirs' authoritarian powers for five years, was enacted and reinstated consecutive in 38 BC. It finally collapsed in 33/32 BC, after the downfall of Lepidus, leading to thefinal Roman Republican civil war and the total collapse of republican government.[3]
The most prominent example in history is theReichstag Fire Decree in Germany, passed in 1933, after theReichstag wasset on fire. ChancellorAdolf Hitler successfully convincedPresidentPaul von Hindenburg to invokeArticle 48 of theWeimar Constitution, indefinitely suspending basic civil rights. Resultantly, authorities could freely suppress or imprison any opposition, paving the way for the one-party rule of theNazi Party.[4] The ensuingstate of exception, which suspended the Constitution without formally repealing it, lasted until the end of theThird Reich in 1945.[5]
During theIndian Emergency in 1975, Prime MinisterIndira Gandhi pressured thePresident of India to declare a state of emergency, giving her absolute powers to rule by decree. Using these newfound powers, she nullified a regional court ruling which invalidated Gandhi's election to parliament due to fraud and banned her from participating in elections for six years.[6] After assuming near-dictatorial powers, she arrested thousands of opposition politicians, suspendedhabeas corpus and clamped down on press freedoms.[7] In 1977, she agreed to hold elections again,[8] which shelost resoundingly. She subsequently resigned as prime minister and party leader.[9]
From 23 September[10] (given actual effect from 4 October after thearmed disbanding of theSupreme Soviet) to 12 December 1993, rule bydecree (ukase) was imposed in Russia byPresidentBoris Yeltsin, during transition from theRussian Constitution of 1978 (which was modelled after the obsoleteSoviet Constitution of 1977) to thecurrent 1993 Constitution.
VenezuelanPresidentHugo Chávez was granted executive power by theNational Assembly to rule by decree multiple times throughout his tenure, passing hundreds of laws. Chávez ruled Venezuela by decree in 2000,[11] 2001,[11] 2004,[12] 2005,[12] 2006,[12] 2007,[13] 2008,[11][13] 2010,[11][14] 2011[11][14] and 2012.[11][14] Between 2004 and 2006 alone, Chávez declared 18 "emergencies" to rule by decree.[12]
Chávez's successor,Nicolás Maduro, has also ruled by decree multiple times since he was elected in April 2013. President Maduro has ruled Venezuela by decree for the majority of the period from 19 November 2013[15] through 2018.[16][17][18][19][20]
Some democracies, such asMexico,[21]France andArgentina, permit presidential rule by decree in time of a national emergency, subject to constitutional and other legal limitations.[citation needed] In France, this power has been used only once, byCharles de Gaulle in 1961 during theAlgerian War.[22]
Similar concepts exist in other countries, such as in Ireland, where theEmergency Powers Act allows the government to rule by decrees calledEmergency Powers Orders in any aspect of national life, if theparliament invokes the emergency clause in Article 28(3) of theConstitution. The Act however allows theDáil Éireann to void specific EPOs in a free vote or end the state of emergency at any time.[23] In the UK, theCivil Contingencies Act 2004 allows for emergency regulations to be made by statutory instrument to deal with that emergency.
Other political concepts, such asFrench decrees,orders in council in theCommonwealth, andexecutive orders in the United States are partially based on this notion of decrees, although they are far more limited in scope and generally subject tojudicial review.
Some legal scholars have argued that in the United States,Donald Trump's extensive use of executive orders during his first term (2017–2020) as president and more prominently during his second term (2025–), bypassing theUnited States Congress to enact budgetary and personnel changes, amounts to rule by decree.[24][25][26]
Italian philosopherGiorgio Agamben has claimed that there has been an explosion in the use of various types of decrees (decree-law, presidential decrees, executive orders, etc.) since World War I. According to him, this is the sign of a "generalization of thestate of exception".[27]