Cicero - Anthony Everitt [107]
Volumes two and three proceed to outline in detail a legal code for an ideal state. Unsurprisingly, it has a close resemblance to the Roman constitution, with its more obvious flaws (as seen by Cicero) ironed out. So, for example, he recommends “two officeholders with royal powers,” very similar to the Consuls, but insists that they should not hold office again except after a ten-year interval, a Roman convention more honored in the breach than in the observance. Elsewhere in his writings, Cicero’s skepticism shows that his cast of mind was rational rather than religious and that he gave little credit to the validity of soothsaying and the like, but here he regards religious observance, ritual, the role of priests as the interpreters and controllers of prodigies and ancestral rites as the foundation of governance.
In closing, Cicero examines the functions and powers of public officials. His object, as ever, is to assert his concept of the mixed constitution with rights for the People but with the Senate predominant. Thus, according to one of his proposed laws concerning suffrage, the ballot should be open to all citizens but the votes cast should be scrutinized by the “traditional leaders of the state.” His line is that senior figures in the state should be able to monitor how citizens vote on the grounds that “everyone knows that laws which provide secret ballots have deprived the aristocracy of all influence.”
Cicero’s constitutional writings reveal a humane conservatism. It says a great deal for his intellectual tenacity that he maintained his beliefs during the years when Caesar’s astonishing career reached its climax and the pillars of the Republic finally came crashing down.
9
THE DRIFT TO CIVIL WAR
52–50 BC
During his sole Consulship in 52, Pompey put through a range of reforms. Some were sensibly designed to correct administrative abuses, but others were purely political and suggested that he was considering whether to align himself with Caesar, now within sight of the end of his labors in Gaul, or with the Senate. On the face of it, he still supported Caesar. Despite the displeasure of the optimates, he had arranged for legislation which gave Caesar permission to stand for a second Consulship in absentia. Caesar intended to hold office in 48—very properly observing the convention that a second Consulship could not take place until ten years had elapsed since the first.
The law that had appointed Caesar as governor of Gaul did not allow the Senate to discuss his successor before March of 50. The allocation of provinces for a given year was decided in advance, before the Consuls and Praetors who would receive them were elected. This meant that Caesar could be replaced only by the senior officeholders of 49. Although it was technically feasible for a Consul to take up a governorship while still in office, it was unusual and so in all probability Caesar could count on remaining in his post until the beginning of 48, by which time he could expect to be Consul.
It was essential that he be able to stay in his province until then. If any interval of time arose between the end of his governorship and the start of his Consular term, and if he were compelled to come to Rome and campaign in person, his legal immunity would lapse and his enemies in the Senate, led by Cato, would undoubtedly bring him to trial for alleged breaches of the law during his first Consulship in 59. If he was found guilty, his career would be brought to a rapid premature conclusion. So Pompey’s new law was vital for his political survival. Yet even