Roman Leadership
Roman power grew through four main periods of expansion. In the end, Rome ruled over an empire that lasted 500 years. The costs of expansion were great. The Gracchi brothers, Gaius Marius and Lucius Cornelius Sulla were men who lived during the beginning stages of Rome's expansion. They both served in the Roman military, aiding Rome in its conquests. They also served in politics, witnessing firsthand the effects of those conquests on Rome's people.
Tiberius Gracchus enjoyed a traditional Greek education-which included the study of philosophy, mathematics, and the Greek language. This gave him an open-minded view of the world. During his service in the army, Tiberius traveled throughout the Italian peninsula. He noted that many of the people who worked the land were foreign slaves, because small property owners had to serve in the army. When he returned to Rome, he discovered many people in the city living in poverty. Tiberius felt that these two situations could lead to the end of the Republic. To find solutions to these problems, he decided to enter politics.
In 133 BC, he was elected tribune. He immediately began to campaign for land reform. He wanted to pass a law thatwould divide huge estates belonging to the rich into smaller farms and distribute them among the poor. Many small farm owners had been drafted to fight in the Roman army. Some never returned to their farms. Those who did discovered that the constant warfare had severely damaged the Italian farmland. These small farmers lacked the money to repair the damage. So, they were forced to sell their land to rich landlords. These new larger farms owned by the rich were called latifundias. The latifundias used slave labor, and the few remaining small farmers found they could not produce crops as cheaply as the larger farms. Eventually these small farmers also sold their property to the rich and moved to the cities in search of work.
Tiberius's idea proved quite popular with the common people but was strongly opposed by large landowners. Members of the Senate organized a plot against him. His enemies stirred up a mob of rioters who seized Tiberius and many of his followers and killed them.
Tiberius's dreams of reform were left to his younger brother, Gaius. Gaius was a flamboyant person, and a passionate and skilled speaker. After his brother was murdered in 133 BC, he took up his brother's cause of helping the poor. He proved to be an even stronger opponent to the wealthy than his brother had been.As tribune, he passed programs that benefited many groups in Roman society. For example, he supported a measure that divided state lands from conquests into smaller holdings and redistributed them to the lower classes. Another law he passed created corn allowances, or subsidies, for the poor living in the city. Under the law, the government provided produce and money for food to guarantee that these people would not starve. This reform was important to many people in Rome. After the years of conquest, very few people could afford to continue operating farms. Farmers who lost or sold their property left the land and drifted toward the cities, particularly Rome. Unemployment was high. Rome did not have many factories, and slaves held most of the few available jobs.
Gaius developed programs that built better roads and harbors, thus helping the business community. He also reformed the system for taxing the provinces and administering the law. All of Gaius' reforms weakened the power of the Senate. Although Gaius became popular with many citizens, most senators hated and feared him. A mob of soldiers and citizens attacked Gaius and his supporters, claiming they threatened the stability of the Republic. Recognizing that resistance was hopeless, Gaius ordered his personal slave to kill him.Though both met tragic ends, Tiberius and Gaius Gracchus introduced a number of reforms that made a dramatic impact on the quality of life for many people in Rome.
The Roman army was traditionally manned by citizen soldiers. Because Rome was constantly at war during the expansion period, it required a constant flow of soldiers. Small land holdings fell into disuse because there was no one to tend to them. As Roman conquests spread through the Mediterranean lands, even more men were required, and wealth and cheap corn poured back into Rome, much of it into the hands of the wealthy, who carved out vast areas for vegetables, vines, olives and sheep farming, all managed by slave labor. The dispossessed rural poor became the urban poor. They were ineligible for military service since they no longer were property holders.
Not only was there therefore a shortage of recruits, but the soldiers had nothing to return to between campaigns or at the end of their service. A working solution to this problem was finally devised by Gaius Marius, once. He introduced the Roman army as it came to be known and feared all across the Europe and the Mediterranean. Rather than accepting hires from Roman landowners, he recruited volunteers from the urban poor. Once the idea of a professional army was introduced, it remained until the very end of the Roman Empire. The benefits to the army were numerous, with the unemployed enlisting for military service alongside the more fortunate citizens. Poorer citizens were drawn to life-long service, as they were rewarded with the prospect of settlement in conquered land. This also 'Romanized' the population in newly conquered provinces reducing unrest and lowering the chance of revolt against Rome. The new Roman army was always able to provide reserves in times of disaster. In addition, the growth of the army ensured continued military success due to the high number of fresh soldiers available for each campaign.
Lucius Cornelius Sulla came from a good family of moderate means. When he returned in 83 BC from a successful eastern campaign, he had no political power beyond that which a man at the head of a trained army of veterans could command. He used his army to capture Rome. This accomplished, Sulla had himself appointed not consul, but dictator. In this capacity his first act was to rid himself of all political and personal opposition, using the novel method of proscription - the posting up of lists of undesirable characters whom anyone was now at liberty to assassinate, and for a reward. For a start, he pronounced sentence of death on forty senators. Other deaths, expulsions, and confiscations of property followed.
Sulla then reorganized the constitution to put power effectively back into the hands of the upper classes. He virtually nullified the traditional influence of the tribunes of the people. The power held by the Tribunes of the People was virtually abolished, as they now no longer possessed the power to challenge the senate. He doubled the membership of the senate. The power of the Senate was increased by turning over to it the control of the law courts. He established new courts to deal with specific offenses, and sorted out the distinctions between civil and criminal law, To prevent the too rapid rise of popular young men, Sulla rigidly established the age and order at which positions could be held.
/ The Story of Tiberius Gracchus