INDEPENDENCE OF THE ROMAN BISHOPS

A1t the election of Zacharias, the customary form of obtaining the consent of the exarch was discarded, and discarded to be never afterwards revived. Henceforth the popes may be considered as independent of the Eastern Empire; henceforth begins their connection with the West; henceforth they hold no longer an exclusive ecclesiastical position, but the papacy has become a political dukedom. After the Sixth General Council, they had claimed the title of “universal priest,” and vindicated that claim by soon afterwards reducing to submission the last of the great archbishops of the West. After the appeal to Charles Martel and the independent election of Zacharias, they aspired to political sovereignty.[b]