The Weight of the Crown | Does Power Really Corrupt?

In 1887, Lord Acton wrote one of the most famous lines in political philosophy:

"Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely."

Most of us have heard the quote.

Few of us have ever stopped to question it.

In this episode of The King's Court, King Roberto revisits a lesson from his first political science class that has shaped the way he views leadership for decades:

Question everything.

Does power truly corrupt, or does it simply reveal the character that was already there? Why do we entrust people with authority in the first place? And what happens when leaders stop listening to the people they serve?

From George Washington to volunteer organizations, businesses, families, and everyday life, this conversation explores the true weight of leadership—and why the greatest leaders create owners, not followers.

Because a crown isn't a prize.

It's a responsibility.

👑 Royal Decree:

A crown is not a prize to be worn. It's a responsibility to be carried. Question authority. Question systems. Question your own assumptions. But above all, question whether your leadership creates more owners or merely more followers. Because kingdoms endure not through control... but through stewardship.

Long live the Kingdom.

🎙 About The King’s Court

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

In eighteen eighty seven, Lord Acton wrote one of the most famous lines in political philosophy. Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. My first political science professor taught us that quote. But he taught us something even more valuable. Question everything. So tonight, I'd like to question Lord Acton. Now before we start rewriting history, let's give Lord Acton his due. He wasn't writing those words as some catchy one-liner for social media who is warning that no person, not a king, not a politician, not a religious leader, should ever be considered above accountability simply because they hold power. And honestly, history has given us plenty of examples that seem to prove him right. We could spend all night naming dictators and political leaders from every ideology, but that's too easy. The more interesting question is this. What about us? What happens in a business, a church, a nonprofit, a volunteer organization when the people making decisions stop being questioned? I was 18 years old that fall when I heard that quote and the request to question everything for the first time. I've been raised in a family in a house where questioning everything was not really on the table. When you were told to jump, you simply said how high. Does power corrupt? Or does it just appear to do so? And if it does, when does it happen? At what point? Was it when somebody gained power? Or was it the moment nobody around them could say no? Why do we give those people the power? And sometimes that power brings with it, carries with it a weight. Sometimes that power carries with it pressure. But perhaps power isn't really pressure. Pressure doesn't create character, it reveals it. Power removes restraints and guardrails. When somebody gets that power, if someone is humble, maybe they become more humble. If someone is selfish, maybe they become more selfish. If someone refuses criticism, power simply allows them to stop listening. So it brings back that question, does power corrupt? Or does it simply amplify what's already there? We generally don't give people or leaders authority because they're special. We give them authority so that they can accept responsibility. And that is why authority exists. It's not to elevate a person or satisfy an ego. Sure, ego is a lot of times involved, but that's not why the authority is there. It exists so someone can accept responsibility for outcomes. Think about that for a minute. Let's go to one of my favorite authority figures, Mr. George Washington. He was elected and given the authority as the first president of the United States. Why? He was trusted. He was a leader, led the country to freedom. But he also lost along the way. He learned humility. He learned what it meant to serve people. And when it came time to elect somebody to be the president and who to trust as the authority figure, he put himself right at the top of the list, not because that's where he wanted to be, but that's because it was a result of his actions. Nobody could argue that there was not a better person to accept responsibility for the outcomes of decisions than Washington. For all he wanted growing up in his younger years was to be given that authority, to be given that responsibility, not as an American, but as a British soldier, as a British officer. But he was held back by his education or lack thereof, which, to our great benefit, swung him over to the American side. And that man, Washington, was elected twice to be president. And after the second time, he certainly could have stepped into a third term, fourth term, and led forever as long as his life went on. But he did something that was even more amazing. He stepped away from that responsibility. He showed what a leader really is in that moment. Because leadership is stewardship. He knew his position wasn't a reward. It was a burden. Because the fact of the matter is, the more authority that someone has, the greater their obligation to serve the people affected by their decisions. Whether they realize it or not, that is the truth of the matter. People put people in positions of authority so that they accept the responsibility. And the ones who are great leaders accept that and make the decisions based on will this ultimately benefit the people I serve more in the long run. As I've gotten older, I've started wondering if we aren't asking the wrong questions. The questions are usually to other people. When the reality is that the questions need to be to the person in the mirror. General human behavior when they're given authority is to do what? How am I going to make decisions that benefit everybody? No. We are human, we're not perfect. And the first thought for most people is more than likely, what can I do to benefit me? It's just human nature. Whether it's around money, success, leadership, business, parenting. Maybe you're on a HOA board or in a volunteer organization. All of those create opportunity for not only authority, but a concentration of authority, concentration of power. What happens when you're in charge of your household finances when you are the person that a spouse trusts with the household finances that you both contribute to? Are you responsibly saving? Are you responsibly spending? When nobody's looking, does a little bit more of the money go to your side of the checking account? And it's not for me to answer those questions. It's for you. Do you share your successes with the people who help make you successful? A lot of business leaders do. But do they all? Now there's people that are gonna argue that sure they do, but they don't share enough as far as I'm concerned. That's a different discussion for a different day, isn't it? Because we're not talking about that, we're talking about how those people are affected and how they act when they are in a position of authority with concentrated power and control over a situation. One of my favorite examples is being a parent because that's truly a concentration of power. You are the parent, you are teaching your children how to live, helping them grow up. But what are you teaching them? Really? What are you teaching them? Are you teaching them to seek counsel from everybody before making a decision? Are you teaching them that making a decision isn't a bad thing as long as it's well thought out? Are you teaching your kids that when their decisions affect other people, they need to consider how it impacts those other people? I've been a volunteer for various organizations for most of my adult life. And recent history has painted a tail of volunteerism declining. People just don't do it anymore. They're not active in their communities, they're not active in giving back, it's just not important. When I was a kid, it was very common though. Yeah, that could be years ago, you know. Dirt might be a little bit younger than I am, or maybe not, you know, it wasn't that long ago that I didn't think dirt was that young at all. And times change, but organizations change as well. We sit back and ask why people won't step into leadership. Why is that? And maybe the answer isn't that people care less. Maybe we've unintentionally removed ownership. Because while we're here, we're stewards of that leadership, we're stewards of those organizations, we're stewards of those associations. We are stewards of our businesses, our families, our churches. All of it. It's easy to look at other people and say, no, it's yours. Well, hate to break it to you, but it's also yours, not just mine. People naturally invest in what they help build. They protect it, they improve it, they fight for it, and they want to pass it on to the next generation. But when people are expected to carry responsibility while losing meaningful influence, something changes. Initiative fades, creativity disappears, and eventually people stop volunteering. It's not just volunteering, it's at work, it's at your business. It's not that they stop caring. It's that they stop feeling like they mattered. Why is that? People want to feel like they matter. They want to feel like they are contributing and in order to show them that they do matter, that they do contribute, you have to take steps as a leader of that organization. You have to listen. Whether you agree with what they say or not, you have to listen. Because when you stop listening, people see that, they see that concentration of authority, how it affects you. They notice, and this isn't about just one organization, you know. Every organization eventually wrestles with the same questions: a business, a government, volunteer organizations, families, churches, you name it. How much authority should be centralized? And for what reason? And if that authority's given, how will it be handled? Who's going to ask the hard questions and how will they be responded to? Who's going to hold those leaders accountable? Who protects the mission when the leadership changes? And they aren't attacks. They're healthy questions. Healthy organizations, healthy families, they don't fear honest questions. Rather, it's the opposite. The great ones, they welcome the questions. They welcome the discussion. They welcome the disagreement. All those things do is build a stronger organization, whatever it is, whether it's your family, whether it's your HOA, whether it's your volunteer organization you're volunteering at. Those discussions all matter. But before you can get to those discussions, circle right back around to where we started, to that person looking in the mirror. Because it's easy to criticize leaders, you see it happening all the time. That person has power, that person has influence, they don't have to answer for anything. Because they're so and so, their opinion carries more weight than mine. Does it though? Are those leaders really worthy of that criticism? Because imagine if it was you in those shoes. Imagine if it was you in that CEO chair. What if you had the complete authority? Or better yet, when you ask the question, ask it like this. What if I had complete authority? What would I do? Would I invite the discussion? Would I invite the disagreement? Would I listen to what people have to say, to their opinions and their thoughts on whatever the topic is? Or would I slowly convince myself that my way was the only way? Every person who's in a position of leadership should ask those questions, especially the ones who believe they already know the answers. And I'm not going to sit here and tell you that's easy. When I was 18, in my 20s, off at college, learning the ways, I thought I had the answers. I didn't need to ask the questions, I already knew what I wanted to know. But as I got older and learned, and I learned the power of introspection and how it can be so useful and beneficial to look in that mirror and ask those questions. What are you doing about it? Are you doing the best that you can for the people who count on you? Because it it's it's the Spider-Man quote, right? With great power comes great responsibility, and it's true. And we sit here and we listen to people talk about Lord Acton's quote power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely, and that's all they hear. They don't look at it from the perspective of the person in the mirror. Because the truth of the matter is that we all have authority in our lives. Whether we realize it or not, we all are authority figures to somebody in our lives. How do you handle that? There comes a point when everybody needs to be a leader. You've got the general on the field. You know, in sports, maybe it's the quarterback or the point guard. In the military, it's literally the general or the colonel. When they take action, they depend on the people around them to follow their lead and take similar action. And the people aren't going to follow them or take that similar action if they don't trust them with the power that they've been given and the authority that they've been given. So yeah. Maybe power does corrupt. But maybe just maybe power reveals the person that's really underneath. That authority that is given removes those guardrails. And while the selfish person may get more selfish, the person who is humble may also get more humble. And maybe that power and authority does a little bit of both. Maybe it corrupts and it reveals. Because history teaches us some important things. I said it earlier. Human beings are imperfect. All you can do is the best you can do. And if that's not good enough, at least you know you did the best you could do. And that's why accountability matters. It's why transparency matters. And it's why ownership matters. The healthiest organizations aren't built on trusting perfect leaders, they're built on systems that encourage questions, distribute stewardship, and ensure that no one forgets who they are ultimately serving. And if you're not sure who that is, and you're the person in charge, I have a hint for you. They're not serving you. Today's royal decree is this. A crown is not a prize to be worn. It's a responsibility to be carried. My challenge to you is to question authority. Question systems. Question your own assumptions and what you think is the truth. But above all, question whether your leadership creates more owners or merely more followers. Because kingdoms endure not through control, but through stewardship. Through making sure that it is passed on to the next generation. Long live the kingdom. This is King Roberto and the King's Court coming to you from the King's Lair. If you like this episode, you want to give some kudos, or you hated it and you want to roast me, find me on Instagram, X, YouTube, or just hit the old email button and send me a message. I'd love to hear from you. If you're interested in coming on the show, we can talk about whatever it is you want to talk about. Because I love to listen to the different opinions.