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king charles iii
No More Kings: Time to End Sovereign Immunity
If we’re serious about addressing protections for misconduct and abuses of power, ending these special rights—originally justified as a divine right—should be our top priority.
May 02, 2026
On three major occasions in President Trump’s second term, his opponents, including many elected officials, have taken to the streets under the banner of “No Kings.” And yet just this week, King Charles III spoke before our joint houses of Congress, where his comments about governmental checks and balances drew a standing ovation from everyone there.
A contradiction lies here, between our history and our perception of it. The truth is, the law that made kings untouchable—that “the king can do no wrong”—has never gone away in the United States. Instead, it multiplied. Today we call it “sovereign immunity.”
The Declaration of Independence blamed the King for its grievances, claiming his actions showed an “absolute Despotism” and “absolute Tyranny over these States.” But the taxes it complained about came from Parliament, which in 1688 had subordinated the King’s political role to itself and its Prime Minister. True, the monarch retained a total legislative veto (among other powers), but it last invoked that power in 1708. Colonial complaints about the King not recognizing colonial legislatures suggest the opposite of the grievance—a monarchical commitment against tyranny, by declining to override and usurp Parliament’s powers via royal whim.
Describing the 1789 Constitution, Alexander Hamilton wrote that, except for a few important “particulars, the power of the President will resemble equally that of the king of Great Britain.” Some changes shed the aristocracy; others infused more checks and balances, like making the veto power conditional. As for the right of kings, Hamilton argued that the impeachment power of Congress addressed it, because an impeached president would be subject to prosecution “in the ordinary course of law.” Unfortunately for us, history did not walk that line.
The 1789 Constitution also split sovereign power between federal and state governments. These twin powers then pulled a trick: they successfully argued that the special right of kings had transferred to them. Courts applied this special right to political subdivisions, like counties and municipalities, and to those who act on their behalf, like legislators, judges, clerks, bureaucrats, and police. Tocqueville thought these subdivisions “mitigat[ed] tyranny,” viewing “townships, municipal bodies, and counties” as “concealed break-waters, which check or part the tide of popular excitement.” But by permitting them sovereign immunity, the opposite happened: our myriad government bodies (sometimes four or five to a person) now each hold the right of kings. Instead of ridding ourselves of kingly power, we multiplied it.
Courts continue to expand these special powers. In 2024, the right-wing majority of the US Supreme Court confirmed that presidential immunity insulates the officeholder from criminal responsibility, so long as the alleged acts happened while carrying out official duties. Last March, the Court expanded the immunity available to law enforcement. Now, police officers have immunity from suit for any constitutional violation not explicitly addressed by an appellate or high court. And a federal appeals court recently held that governments have no general duty to compensate a bystander when law enforcement destroys their property in the course of their duties. If police break down your door, in error or not, you must pay for the fix.
We don't need courts to tell us these things. We see government officials acting above the law every day, even in incidents as small as police ignoring parking rules or blaring through stoplights into oncoming traffic, just to then turn their lights off. Rules for thee, but not for me. While we still have the right of kings, we don't have to keep it.
If we’re serious about addressing protections for misconduct and abuses of power, ending these special rights—originally justified as a divine right—should be our top priority. We have the tools to do it. Governments may waive and disclaim their special rights through legislation, and many have done that in limited doses. We should move forward to end the special right altogether, which we can accomplish through legislation at local, state, and federal levels. For a sound first step, Congress could reintroduce and pass the Ending Qualified Immunity Act, which would strip these special rights from law enforcement in civil-rights cases.
And most fundamentally, we should recognize that we have not ended the rule of kings just yet. Abuses of power and protection against accountability under the rule of law aren’t of a bygone era, and the monarchy didn't take its special rights with it when it left. Sadly, the powers of kings and queens were left behind, written into our laws under a different name.
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'Our Broken Hearts Have Been Lifted': Epstein-Linked Prince Andrew Arrested in UK
"No one is above the law, not even royalty,” the family said in a statement. “For survivors everywhere, Virginia did this for you.”
Feb 19, 2026
Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, the one-time Duke of York, was arrested in the UK on Thursday after facing scrutiny over his ties to late billionaire sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
News of the arrest first came when the Thames Valley Police Department announced that it had "opened an investigation into an offense of misconduct in public office" and had arrested "a man in his sixties from Norfolk."
King Charles III subsequently released a statement confirming that Mountbatten-Windsor, who is the king's younger brother, had been taken into custody.
"I have learned with the deepest concern the news about Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor and suspicion of misconduct in public office," said the king. "What now follows is the full, fair, and proper process by which this issue is investigated in the appropriate manner and by the appropriate authorities."
King Charles emphasized that investigators "have our full and wholehearted support and cooperation," while adding "the law must take its course."
The family of the late Virginia Giuffre, who accused Mountbatten-Windsor of sexually assaulting her when she was 17 years old and who died by suicide last year, released a statement expressing relief at the former prince's arrest.
"At last," the family wrote. "Today, our broken hearts have been lifted at the news that no one is above the law, not even royalty. On behalf of our sister, Virginia Roberts Giuffre, we extend our gratitude to the UK’s Thames Valley Police for their investigation and arrest of Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor."
"He was never a prince," the family added. "For survivors everywhere, Virginia did this for you."
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Surging Weather Extremes Fuel Fresh Demands for Biden to Declare Climate Emergency
One campaigner said political leaders must "use every tool in their power to abate the emergency that's no longer at our doorstep anymore, but that has a foot in the door and is already affecting people right now."
Jul 10, 2023
As record temperatures, deadly flooding, and other extreme weather driven by human-caused global heating hammer at least millions of people around the world, activists this week are once again imploring U.S. President Joe Biden to declare a climate emergency.
Over the past week, the planet endured record-breaking average global temperatures, prompting United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres to declare that "climate change is out of control."
Devastating monsoons in India, deadly downpours in Japan, flash floods in Spain, and torrential rains and flooding in the northeastern United States also underscored what climate scientists have long warned are the increasingly severe consequences of a warming planet.
"Now would be another perfect moment for President Biden to declare a climate emergency."
Meanwhile, tens of millions of people in the United States are bracing for an imminent heat dome expected to bring triple-digit temperatures to much of the southern part of the country this week.
The extreme weather chaos around the world has activists sounding the alarm and demanding the Biden administration issue a climate emergency declaration.
"It's terrifying to think that we're already here," John Paul Mejia, national spokesperson for the youth-led Sunrise Movement, told Supercreator Daily on Monday.
"And I think that that puts a lot of urgency to the political leaders of this moment who are endowed with a responsibility to use every tool in their power to abate the emergency that's no longer at our doorstep anymore, but that has a foot in the door and is already affecting people right now," Mejia added.
Jamie Henn, director of Fossil Free Media, tweeted Monday that "now would be another perfect moment for President Biden to declare a climate emergency."
Noting the current chaos, Henn added that "we need political leaders to speak to the urgency of this crisis."
The Congressional Progressive Caucus (CPC) is asking Biden to invoke the Defense Production Act and the Trade Expansion Act to boost domestic production of affordable renewable power and clean energy exports. The CPC also calls on the president to reinstate the ban on crude oil exports that was lifted by Congress and then-President Barack Obama in 2015.
A year ago, amid a previous record-shattering heatwave, Biden—who during his 2020 presidential campaign said that climate change was the "number one issue facing humanity"—reportedly considered making a historic declaration.
"This is an emergency, and I will look at it that way," the president said last July.
Congressional Republicans, meanwhile, are trying to preemptively block Biden from declaring a climate emergency. Late last month, Sen. Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.)—a fossil fuel investor who has received more than $1.4 million in industry campaign contributions—introduced legislation that would "prohibit the president from using the three primary statutory authorities available (the National Emergencies Act, the Stafford Act, and section 319 of the Public Health Service Act) to declare a national emergency solely on the basis of climate change."
According to Climate Mobilization, an environmental advocacy coalition, nearly 200 U.S. cities, counties, and other jurisdictions have declared climate emergencies over the past five years.
On Monday, Biden met with U.K. King Charles III in London's Windsor Castle, where they reportedly discussed the climate emergency and "engaged with a group of leading philanthropists and investors focused on mobilizing finance to address the climate crisis," according to the White House.
The renewed demands for Biden to declare a climate emergency come as new research published Monday revealed that last year's historically hot summer killed more than 61,000 people across Europe.
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