One of the tasks performed by consuls during their term in office was to preside over the annual elections. This was not a function exclusive to consuls, as it could also be carried out by a dictator or an interrex. In fact, in the fourth century, the sources do not explicitly allude to any consul ever acting as president over electoral comitia – which obviously does not mean that they did not perform such a task – yet we know of the intervention of interreges, as well as of the appointment of dictators, solely to conduct the election process in various years throughout that century. Between 367 and 298, the presidency over elections belonged to a dictator or an interrex on sixteen occasions, or at least this was the intention, since at times the appointment of a dictator was challenged for a variety of reasons. For the remaining years one of the consuls must have presided over the elections.

In the consular year 297/6 Q. Fabius Maximus Rullianus was the first attested consul to act as president over elections. From then on, the presidency of dictators and interreges became exceptional, and it was more commonly the consuls who were in charge. We know the name of the presiding consul for some of the years at the beginning of the third century and for almost every year between the beginning of the Second Punic War – during which, due to the military situation, dictators were mainly in charge of the electoral process – and 167.