is latter right was not
vested in the first who held the office, presumably because the
first was regarded as defectively appointed inasmuch as he was not
nominated by his predecessor. Thus this assembly of elders was
the ultimate holder of the ruling power (-imperium-) and the divine
protection (-auspicia-) of the Roman commonwealth, and furnished
the guarantee for the uninterrupted continuance of that commonwealth
and of its monarchical--though not hereditarily monarchical--organization.
If therefore this senate subsequently seemed to the Greeks to be
an assembly of kings, this was only what was to be expected; it
had in fact been such originally.

The Senate and the Resolutions of the Community: -Patrum Auctoritas-

But it was not merely in so far as the idea of a perpetual kingdom
found its living expression in this assembly, that it was an essential
member of the Roman constitution. The council of elders, indeed,
had no title to interfere with the official functions of the king.
The latter doubtless, in the event of his being unable personally
to lead the army or to decide a legal dispute, took his deputies
at all times from the senate; for which reason subsequently the
highest posts of command were regularly bestowed on senators alone,
and senators were likewise employed by preference as jurymen. But
the senate, in its collective capacity, was never consulted in
the leading of the army or in the administration of justice; and
therefore there was no right of military command and no jurisdiction
vested in the senate of the later Rome. On the other hand the
council of elders was held as called to the guardianship of the
existing constitution against encroachments by the king and the
burgesses. On the senate devolved the duty of examining every
resolution adopted by the burgesses at the suggestion of the king,
and of refusing to confirm it if it seemed to violate existing
rights; or, which was the same thing, in all cases where a resolution
of the community was constitutionally requisite--as on every
alteration of the constitution, on the reception of new burgesses,
on the declaration of an aggressive war--the council of elders had
a right of veto. This may not indeed be regarded in the light of
legislation pertaining jointly to the burgesses and the senate,
somewhat in the same way as to the two chambers in the constitutional
state of the present day; the senate was not so much law-maker as
law-guardian,