Key Arguments

• Rousseau stipulates a strict limitation: "The tribunate is not a constituent part of the city, and should have no share in either legislative or executive power;" thus it is formally outside the ordinary organs of sovereignty and government.
• He immediately links this externality to its peculiar strength: "but this very fact makes its own power the greater: for, while it can do nothing, it can prevent anything from being done," defining its power as essentially negative or obstructive.
• He gives it a superior moral and symbolic status: "It is more sacred and more revered, as the defender of the laws, than the prince who executes them, or than the Sovereign which ordains them," suggesting that guardianship of legality outranks both making and executing laws.
• To show the practical reverence it commanded, Rousseau cites Rome: "This was seen very clearly at Rome, when the proud patricians, for all their scorn of the people, were forced to bow before one of its officers, who had neither auspices nor jurisdiction," underlining that even socially dominant elites submitted to a tribune devoid of ordinary magistrate powers.

Source Quotes

It serves sometimes to protect the Sovereign against the government, as the tribunes of the people did at Rome; sometimes to uphold the government against the people, as the Council of Ten now does at Venice; and sometimes to maintain the balance between the two, as the Ephors did at Sparta. The tribunate is not a constituent part of the city, and should have no share in either legislative or executive power; but this very fact makes its own power the greater: for, while it can do nothing, it can prevent anything from being done. It is more sacred and more revered, as the defender of the laws, than the prince who executes them, or than the Sovereign which ordains them.

The tribunate is not a constituent part of the city, and should have no share in either legislative or executive power; but this very fact makes its own power the greater: for, while it can do nothing, it can prevent anything from being done. It is more sacred and more revered, as the defender of the laws, than the prince who executes them, or than the Sovereign which ordains them. This was seen very clearly at Rome, when the proud patricians, for all their scorn of the people, were forced to bow before one of its officers, who had neither auspices nor jurisdiction.

It is more sacred and more revered, as the defender of the laws, than the prince who executes them, or than the Sovereign which ordains them. This was seen very clearly at Rome, when the proud patricians, for all their scorn of the people, were forced to bow before one of its officers, who had neither auspices nor jurisdiction. The tribunate, wisely tempered, is the strongest support a good constitution can have; but if its strength is ever so little excessive, it upsets the whole State.

Key Concepts

• The tribunate is not a constituent part of the city, and should have no share in either legislative or executive power; but this very fact makes its own power the greater: for, while it can do nothing, it can prevent anything from being done.
• It is more sacred and more revered, as the defender of the laws, than the prince who executes them, or than the Sovereign which ordains them.
• the proud patricians, for all their scorn of the people, were forced to bow before one of its officers, who had neither auspices nor jurisdiction.

Context

Still in the initial definition of the tribunate in Book IV, Chapter V, Rousseau explains its constitutional non‑integration and paradoxical power, illustrating its sacralized authority through the Roman tribunes.