Keith McNenly
Special to The Lake Report

When Donald John Trump descended his golden escalator on June 15, 2015 to announce his run for the presidency of the United States, I don’t remember anyone connecting that date with a prior historic event  involving a much earlier famous John — King John of England.  

Exactly 800 years earlier, on June 15, 1215, the tyrannical King John was compelled to accept the Magna Carta (Great Charter), thus placing himself and all future English monarchs under the rule of law, quelling rule by tyranny and grifting, by threat of criminal prosecution.

King John is regarded by historians as one of the most tyrannical English kings, reviled as a coward, tyrant, grifter and usurper of the throne.

His reign is dramatized through the tales of fictional characters Robin Hood and his merry men of Sherwood Forest.

Actually, their theatrical depiction of King John’s character is flattering compared to historic reality.

I find it an eerie irony exactly 800 years to the day later, another future King John would emerge, and even more remarkable he would ultimately become the first president/king of the United States, due to a decision of the Supreme Court. 

The Supreme Court of the United States, dominated by a Republican majority, three of whom were appointed by Trump, granted Trump his request for legal immunity for alleged crimes committed in office as president.

The three Democratic justices opposed the majority Republican opinion. In their dissent, Justice Sonia Sotomayor penned that the Republican justices “invented an atextual, ahistorical, and unjustifiable immunity that puts the president above the law,” and “In every use of official power, the president is now a king above the law.” 

The decision of the Republican justices abrogates in the U.S. the pre-eminent raison d’être promulgated by the English Magna Carta, “no man is above the law,” including a king, or centuries later in the U.S., a president.

The protections established in England by the Magna Carta influenced the drafting of the U.S. Constitution and many U.S. state constitutions.

Stated David Carpenter, professor of medieval history at King’s College London in the U.K., “Magna Carta was important for the founding fathers of the American Constitution, both the state constitutions and the federal … they echo Magna Carta.”

Further and of significant consequence, if re-elected, he will be free to ignore laws every other American must adhere to.

By virtue of his office as president, he would be immune from prosecution. Granting a person legal immunity to perpetrate crimes is two-edged: it imposes on the rest of us the complete inability to avoid being victims of their crimes.  

The curious convergence of consequential moments in history with  the current era heightens the imagination.

Had Donald John Trump not descended on his golden escalator on June 15, 2015 and launched his presidential campaign, he would not have become president.

He would not have appointed the three republican justices of the Supreme Court, and just like all English kings since King John and the Magna Carta, American presidents would still be subject to the full consequence of law and a jury of their peers.  

Having opposite outcomes, the Magna Carta reigned in the power of kings, while 800 years later, the Supreme Court enabled a president to reign as a king.  

Canadians would be especially vulnerable to a Trump presidency according to former U.S. ambassador to Canada Bruce Herman (2014-2017).

In an interview on Sept. 9, he said: 

“Donald Trump has already threatened NATO. He’s threatened Ukraine. He’s really threatened the multilateral approach that the U.S. has had since World War II … and I have gone out on a limb here with the Canadians in saying this is your tsunami warning. If Donald Trump’s elected, you’re going to be under great threat specifically.”

If democracy is defeated in the United States by election of an authoritarian as president, the free democratic world could re-enter a pre-Magna Carta era, a time of unprecedented presidential power not constrained by rule of law.

Unlike kings 800 years ago, the president of the United States has the most powerful military in the history of the planet, including a vast nuclear arsenal.

The U.S. is the only democratic nuclear superpower and if it falls to authoritarianism, all three world superpowers will be authoritarian.

In modern times, Robin Hood and his merry men would not find a Sherwood Forest or any other place so remote as to provide succour against a significant, modern military devoid the backstop of a democratic superpower. 

Niagara-on-the-Lake resident Keith McNenly was the chief administrator of the Town of Mono for 41 years.