Magistrate

See also: Magistrate (homonymy)

The magistrate returns in the term of the Roman antiquity.

Today, a magistrate indicates, in the broad sense, a public servant in position of authority. Thus one often says President of the Republic which he is the first magistrate of the country or the Maire S which they are the communal magistrates. This term born in the ancient Rome, is always used today, but does not recover the same concept.

Ancient Rome

See also: Course honorum

In the ancient Rome, a magistrate ( magistratus in Latin) is a citizen Patricien elected with a direction and of administration of the city. Exerting functions executive, legislative, legal, together or separately, the magistrates are, essentially (and in the order of the traditional political career known as of the Cursus honorum ), the Questeur S, the municipal official S, the Préteur S and the Consul S.

Beyond, one finds the Censeur S and one can also reach the exceptional magistrature of the dictatorship (whose meaning is not the same one as that one currently allots to him). The former praetors and consuls become Propréteur S and proconsuls: they can become governors of province. Lastly, there exists a particular magistrature because reserved for the more modest social class (the Plèbe): they are the powerful orators of the Plebs.

In addition to their load, the Roman magistrates receive, according to their magistrature, other capacities, among which the Potestas (administrative capacity), the Imperium (right of life and dead), right to take the Auspices (consultation of the Gods on various questions of the life of the city by the interpretation of the flight of the birds this is not to in no case the consulation of the future, this private being publicly recognized and even not condemned practice divinatoire when it was suitable for affect the public life (Business of the Bacchannales) -). Except in the case of the dictatorship, all the magistrates come at least per pair, each one exerting in turn and having a right of Cassation ( intercessio ) of the decisions of his/her colleague.

The plebeian magistrates do not enjoy the capacities common to the other magistratures (not of imperium , of right of auspice) but have the right of Veto and of inviolability ( sacrosanctitas ), religious protection which dedicates to dead whoever raises the hand on them while returning this person sacer , i.e. offered to the infernal gods.

The magistrates known as curule (all except the questeurs, the municipal officials and the powerful orators of the Plebs) cover moreover the Toge pretext, toga white broadside of Pourpre.

The magistrature will end with the end of the Roman République. Under the Empire, the spots carried out by the magistrates will be carried out by imperial civil servant, which them will be remunerated by the state.

Modern concept

More specifically, the word magistrate returns to the exercise of the judicial Power. The concept of magistrature , gathering Judge S and Prosecutor S, is unknown countries of Common law (the United Kingdom, the United States or Canada) which offer constitutional guarantees only to their only judges, in a strict sense.

On the other hand, the countries of civil law generally proceed to the constitution of a single body of the magistrates of the seat and parquet floor. It is in particular the case in France, Germany, Italy, Spain and, rather generally, in the French-speaking countries or pertaining to the French-speaking zone of influence: Swiss Belgium, , Africa of the west, Kampuchea. In this case, one distinguishes commonly within the legal order on the one hand, the magistrates of the seat, constituting the sitted magistrature since judgments and judgments are handed down sat, and on the other hand magistrates of the parquet floor, indicated like the state prosecutors - or Public ministry - since the requisitions with the audience are taken upright. In the language running, the magistrates of the seat are the Juge S and the magistrates of the parquet floor, the Procureur S and their substitutes.

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