BY DR. JOSE PALU-AY DACUDAO
Now back to Rome
82 BC – Rome had control over most areas around the Mediterranean Sea, from Europe to North Africa.
After 25 years of service in the Roman military and many successful campaigns, the Roman General and politician Lucius Cornelius Sulla (138-78 BC, dictator of Rome 82 to 79 BC) assembled 50,000 soldiers outside Rome and demanded that the Roman Senate give his soldiers land.
Sulla had already been a quaestor, praetor, and consul in the past, all through legal civil means. Now he was going to take power by extra-legal means. Civilian authority was directly threatened by the military.
The senators refused Sulla’s demands. The Republican nature of Roman society was at stake.
Sulla responded by posting a list of his political enemies (mostly from the party of his former commanding officer turned politician Gaius Marius) with cash rewards for their elimination.
In the ensuing massacre, thousands died or were exiled. Sulla then appointed himself as dictator.
The future of Roman democracy was now in Sulla’s hands. If one of our own politicians or generals were in Sulla’s position, how would he behave?
First, try to answer this question in all honesty before you continue reading.
Remember that this was a first in Roman history. Sulla as a typical Roman would have been raised up imbued in the ideals of the Roman Republic. He would have grown up sincerely believing Rome’s motto, SPQR – Senatus Populusque Romanus – the Senate and People of Rome. He would have looked up to Lucius Quinctius Cincinnatus as a role model, as did most Romans at that time.
Instead of abusing his powers Sulla reformed the Roman constitution, aiming to restore the power of the Senate. He improved the system of criminal procedure by increasing the number of quaestiones perpetuae, the first permanent criminal courts established in Rome. In 79 BC, he voluntarily retired to his home in Campania, where he died the following year.
Rome remained a Republic.
Unfortunately, a precedent had been set. For the first time in Roman history, a General had convinced his troops to support his political ambitions. The Roman military got politicized. From then on, the Roman army would have a strong influence on the civilian government.
In less than 50 years, Julius Caesar (100-44 BC, dictator of Rome 45 to 44 BC), who was Gaius Marius’ nephew and another ambitious general, would purposely take power through extra-legal means, supported by the Roman military, and this man had no intention of retiring back to a farm.
Caesar managed, with the support of the Roman army, what was in effect a coup d’etat against the Senate appointed leader Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus (shortened to Pompey in English, 106-48 bc) in 49 BC. He formally assumed the office of dictator for life of Rome in 45 BC. (To be continued)/PN
