to all those measures of reform, which, without
touching the question of a supreme head, only aimed at the cure of the
old evils of the state. In the question of emigration and colonization,
it is true, they could not go so far as the democracy, since the power
of the oligarchy mainly rested on their free control over the provinces
and was endangered by any permanent military command; the ideas of
equalizing Italy and the provinces and of making conquests beyond the
Alps were not compatible with conservative principles. But the senate
might very well sacrifice the Latin and even the Campanian domains
as well as Sicily in order to raise the Italian farmer class, and
yet retain the government as before; to which fell to be added the
consideration, that they could not more effectually obviate future
agitations than by providing that all the land at all disposable should
be brought to distribution by the aristocracy itself, and that according
to Drusus' own expression, nothing should be left for future demagogues
to distribute but "the street-dirt and the daylight." In like manner it
was for the government--whether that might be a monarch, or a close
number of ruling families--very much a matter of indifference whether
the half or the whole of Italy possessed the Roman franchise; and hence
the reforming men on both sides probably could not but coincide in the
idea of averting the danger of a recurrence of the insurrection of
Fregellae on a larger scale by a judicious and reasonable extension of
the franchise, and of seeking allies, moreover, for their plans in the
numerous and influential Italians. Sharply as in the question of the
headship of the state the views and designs of the two great political
parties differed, the best men of both camps had many points of contact
in their means of operation and in their reforming tendencies; and, as
Scipio Aemilianus may be named alike among the adversaries of Tiberius
Gracchus and among the promoters of his reforming efforts, so Drusus
was the successor and disciple no less than the antagonist of Gaius.
The two high-born and high-minded youthful reformers had a greater
resemblance than was apparent at the first glance; and, personally also,
the two were not unworthy to meet, as respects the substance of their
patriotic endeavours, in purer and higher views above the obscuring
mists of prejudiced partisanship.

Discussions on the Livian Laws

The question at stake was the pass