Kevin, what is the nature of that authority?  When Pio IX realised his temporal authority was irrevocably slipping away (the Papal States), he decided to expand his spiritual authority.  The result was the 1st Vatican Council, which purported to be an 'oecumenical council' and which rubber-stamped his declaration of infallibility.  (Only 2 bishops had the nerve to stick around to the end and vote against it.)  V-1 was every bit as stacked as Francis's recent synod.  
This Ultramontane spirit has, alas, been ascendant ever since.  In our own time, we've had a pope who had the gall to presume to change the Mass and impose it on the church, and how many bishops stood up against it?  (Just 2 that I know of.)  It took Benedict XVI to (diplomatically) correct Paul VI's hubris, and to state publicly that the pope can't just do whatever he wants.  He also re-established the precedent of the pope resigning, an example which I hope many more popes will emulate--including the present one.