The absurdly powerful student council is a common trope in anime. Wielding power far and beyond what any typical student organization could muster, they sometimes have the power to make and break the rules, hurt others, or generally run the whole school with impunity. Each member often treated with some degree of respect, fear, or both to get away with holding so much power.
Still, no matter how common, it is still ridiculous to see exactly how far a student council's power can reach in an anime. So here are 10 anime with impossibly powerful Student Councils to sink your teeth into.
10 Tenjho Tenge
The Executive Council in Tenjou Tenge can literally get away with murder, rape, or several other nasty things. Though that to be expected since the only way to make it into the council in their school is by winning a school-wide tournament. Where the rules are thin and lethal tactics like using weapons are par for the course.
Once they win, they are then tasked with upholding their rules and punishing any students for breaking them, as well as, putting any excessively violent students in their place. Though, a few take things quite too far and abusing their power to send a few students to the hospital or much worse.
9 Best Student Council
It is basically the premise of the show. When Rino Rando and her puppet, Pucchan, find their apartment burned down by a rampant arsonist (the show hardly takes itself seriously except for a few moments), she is forced to try and gain a position in the student government. The Best Student Council is able to provide its members with free room and board.
Beyond the power to grant its members a place to stay, the Student Council also has several divisions under them. Though unlike a typical council, their divisions consist of vehicles, covert, and assault divisions that they use throughout the series.
8 Kakegurui
The curriculum in Kakegurui isn't anything like a typical high school, completely based around gambling, the students from rich families who attend are able to gain power and money to move up the social ladder of the school through high stakes games. Though, for those that fail, they can rack up enough debt to become the property of the Student Council.
Essentially treating them like slaves, they are then given a "life schedule" they must follow deep into adulthood. Which in turn gives the Student Council access to money and political power in Japan by using those students from prestigious families.
7 Armed Girls Machiavellism
Originally an all-girls school, once the student body of Private Aichi Symbiosis Academy becomes coed, the female students decide to make the lives of the new male students a living hell. Treated as second class students, they are all regarded as perverts and forced to crossdress and act like women despite their protest.
Furthermore, the entire female student body is allowed to carry weapons to "defend" themselves against the boys. The "Five Swords," the group of students that essentially act as a student disciplinary committee, are allowed to bring real swords to school to correct any boy that stands out of line.
6 Love, Election & Chocolate
Getting elected to the Student Council is serious business in Love, Election & Chocolate. It is treated like a miniature version of an actual election, along with all of the just and unjust political maneuvering that comes with it. Though it is easy to see why they take it so seriously when you consider the power they gain from being elected.
The gain control of millions of yen which they can then choose to separate (unfairly) among the many clubs of the school among other things. Furthermore, they gain the power to make political war with each other and can employ the use of spies to help them in their endeavors. Some even accumulating enough power to get away with violence.
5 Code Geass
It is not so much the student council that has the power, it's more the fact that the Student Council President, Milly Ashford, is the granddaughter of the person who runs Ashford Academy. Giving her the ability to run the school wherever her whims take her.
Thankfully, she uses her power to mostly do silly things like run a crossdressing festival, a game where if you take a person's (dumb-looking) hat you become a couple and using a mech to try and cook the world's biggest pizza. Milly able to mobilize the entire student body with nothing more than an announcement over the PA system.
4 Prison School
Even if the school has an actual Student Council, the true queens of the school at the beginning of Prison School are the Underground Student Council. Composed of three girls that are tasked with enforcing the school rules on campus, which includes policing the five boys that were allowed to join their school as part of their new coed program.
They literally have the power to throw students in jail. A fact that becomes no joke (okay, actually the show is a laugh riot but you get what I mean) when the five young men get caught spying on the girl's bath. Soon sentenced to time in jail, the Underground Student Council then puts them through a "rehabilitation" program that is tantamount to torture, which they can get away with because the school has very little oversight on them.
3 Horizon In The Middle Of Nowhere
This is a bit beyond all the other series on the list. While some of the other entries may have had complete control over the school the Student Councils of Horizon in the Middle of Nowhere each have complete control over a nation.
Because of the specific circumstances of the setting (it is a long, long story involving parallel dimensions, fantasy races, re-enacting history, the Japanese Emperor, and destroying the concept of fate), each Student Council essentially acts as the government and the military force for the nations they live in.
2 Angel Beats
The other Student Councils on this list had some type of authority over their school. This one, in particular, has pure physical power that translates into superhuman abilities for the Student Council President that no other member of the school can stand a chance again. Then again, it is fitting because she is basically the Student Council President of Purgatory.
Armed with a litany of power that includes forming blades on each hand, deflecting bullets, cloning herself, and superhuman strength, Kanade Tachibana seems to give the members of the SSS (translated to Afterlife Battlefront in English) no end of trouble in their mission to summon God and enact revenge on him. Most of the members of the SSS mistaking her for an angel and earning her that nickname because of it.
1 Kill La Kill
The power of Satsuki Kiryuuin and her Student Council Members are absolute in Honnouji Academy. Ruling the entire student body with an iron fist, they go far and beyond what is typically possible for a Student Council. Freely giving and taking power to any member of their student body through the use of superpowered uniforms. The uniforms a symbol of where everyone ranks in the school's social hierarchy.
Asking for complete obedience and executing anyone who doesn't follow their despotic rule, they also have complete control of the city surrounding the school. Able to grant better housing to those that fare well in school while forcing the underachieving students to live poorly with their families. Their power is so great, they can invade other schools to add them to their own.