While Canadians were celebrating the nation’s 157th birthday on Monday, the United States Supreme Court turned in a landmark decision on presidential immunity, ruling 6-3 that Donald Trump and other former presidents could not be criminally prosecuted for “official acts” taken while in office.

Critics — including President Joe Biden — are already warning that Monday’s decision could pave the way for a presidential dictatorship, but this sort of knee-jerk alarmism is unfounded. If anything, the ruling will help insulate the United States from one of the fatal flaws plaguing many presidential democracies: the near inevitability that the judicial system will be weaponized against the political opponents of the government of the day, including ex-presidents.