The Government as Fiduciary: A Practical Demonstration from the Reign of Trajan

This article addresses the potential objections to applying fiduciary standards to higher government functionaries by exploring a case that proved it feasible: the government of the Roman Emperor Trajan. The author asks, if fiduciary government was practicable in a narrowly based regime governing a multicultural empire -- where communication was slow and information expensive -- why is it not achievable in America today. The author concludes that the principles by which Trajan governed are a rebuke to our own, less exacting, standards of public law today and that holding government to fiduciary standards, even in a huge multicultural empire, is not merely a noble ideal--but an attainable one