On the 19th of April 1024, ten days after the death of his brother Benedict VIII, Romanus was elected pope and took the name John XIX. Both both he and his brother were members of the powerful house of Tusculum, and he had been a consul, senator and a civil leader of Rome. His election was part of the broader Tusculan control of the papacy, representing a period where Roman noble families treated the papacy as a hereditary position, and was said to have been the result of bribery. He also retained his secular positions making him both civil and religious leader of Rome.