sitting on juries of any kind from that day forward, and
transferring the judicial functions to the Equites. How bitterly must
such a measure have been resented by the Senate, which at once robbed
them of their protective and profitable privileges, handed them over to
be tried by their rivals for their pleasant irregularities, and stamped
them at the same time with the brand of dishonesty! How certainly must
such a measure have been deserved when neither consul nor tribune could
be found to interpose his vote! Supported by the grateful knights, Caius
Gracchus was for the moment all-powerful. It was not enough to restore
the Agrarian law. He passed another aimed at his brother's murderers,
which was to bear fruit in later years, that no Roman citizen might be
put to death by any person, however high in authority, without legal
trial, and without appeal, if he chose to make it, to the sovereign
people. A blow was thus struck against another right claimed by the
Senate, of declaring the Republic in danger, and the temporary
suspension of the constitution. These measures might be excused, and
perhaps commended; but the younger Gracchus connected his name with
another change less commendable, which was destined also to survive and
bear fruit. He brought forward and carried through, with enthusiastic
clapping of every pair of hands in Rome that were hardened with labor, a
proposal that there should be public granaries in the city, maintained
and filled at the cost of the state, and that corn should be sold at a
rate artificially cheap to the poor free citizens. Such a law was purely
socialistic. The privilege was confined to Rome, because in Rome the
elections were held, and the Roman constituency was the one depositary
of power. The effect was to gather into the city a mob of needy
unemployed voters, living on the charity of the state, to crowd the
circus and to clamor at the elections, available no doubt immediately to
strengthen the hands of the popular tribune, but certain in the long run
to sell themselves to those who could bid highest for their voices.
Excuses could be found, no doubt, for this miserable expedient, in the
state of parties, in the unscrupulous violence of the aristocracy, in
the general impoverishment of the peasantry through the land monopoly,
and in the intrusion upon Italy of a gigantic system of slave labor. But
none the less it was the deadliest blow which had yet been dealt to the
constitution. Part