History of Julius Caesar Vol. 2 of 2

In our opinion, Professor A.W. Zumpt (Studia Romana, Berlin, 1859) is the only one who has cleared up this question; and we shall borrow of him the greatest part of his arguments. As to M. Th. Mommsen, in a special dissertation, entitled The Question of Right between Cæsar and the Senate, he proves that we must distinguish in the proconsulship between the provincia and the imperium. According to him, the provincia being given at the same time with the consulship, it could be taken possession of, according to the law Sempronia, only on the Calends of the month of January of the following year; the imperium, or military command, was added to it two months later, on the Calends of March. The provincia was given by a senatus-consultus, and counted from January to January; the imperium was given by a curiate law, and went from March to March: the imperium followed the rules of the military service; a year commenced was reputed finished, as for the campaigns of the soldiers, and thus the two first months of 705 might count for a complete year. The learned professor concludes that, if the Senate had the right to deprive Cæsar of his imperium, it could not take from him the command of the province before the end of the year 705, and that then Cæsar would find himself in the same position as all the proconsuls who, during the interval between the 1st of January, the commencement of their proconsulship, and the 1st of March, the time when they received the imperium, had the potestas, and not the military command. This system, we see, rests upon hypotheses which it is difficult to admit.

805

“Erat autem obscuritas quædam.” (Cicero, Pro Marcello, 10.)

806

The question became complicated through the difference of origin of the powers given for each of the two Gauls. The Senate had the power of taking away from Cæsar’s command Ulterior Gaul, which was given to him by a senatus-consultus, but it could not deprive him of Citerior Gaul, given by a plebiscitum, and yet it was the contrary opinion that Cicero sustained in 698. In fact, he exclaimed then, in his Oration on the Consular Provinces: “He separates the part of the province on which there can be no opposition (because it has been given by a senatus-consultus), and does not touch that which can be easily attacked; and, at the same time that he dares not take away that which has been given by the people, he is in haste to take away all, senator as he is, that which has been given by the Senate.” (Cicero, Orat. de Provinc. Consular., 15. – Velleius Paterculus, II. 44. – Suetonius, Cæsar, 20. – Appian, Civil Wars, II. 13. – Dio Cassius, XXXVIII. 8.)

807

The 1st of March was the commencement of the ancient Roman year, the period at which the generals entered into campaign.

808

P. Servilius, who was consul in 675, took possession of his province a short time after he entered upon his duties as consul; he returned in 679. Cicero (Orat. III. in Verrem, 90) says that he held the command during five years. This number can only be explained by admitting that the years 675 and 679 were reckoned as complete. L. Piso, who was consul in 696, quitted Rome at the end of his consulship, and returned thither in the summer of 699. Now, he was considered as having exercised the command during three years. (Cicero, In Pisonem, 35, 40.) They must, therefore, have counted as one year of the proconsulship the few months of 695. (See Mommsen, The Question of Right between Cæsar and the Senate, p. 28.)

809

At all times the assemblies have been seen striving to shorten the duration of the powers given by the people to a man whose sympathies were not with them. Here is an example. The Constitution of 1848 decided that the President of the French Republic should be named for four years. The Prince Louis Napoleon was elected on the 10th of December, 1848, and proclaimed on the 20th of the same month. His powers ought to have ended on the 20th of December, 1852. Now, the Constituent Assembly, which foresaw the election of Prince Louis Napoleon, fixed the termination of the presidency to the second Sunday of the Month of May, 1852, thus robbing him of seven months.

810

De Bello Gallico, VIII. 39.

811

Dio Cassius, XL. 59.

812

Appian, Civil Wars, II. 4.

813

“Quid ergo? exercitum retinentis, quum legis dies transierit, rationem haberi placet? Mihi vero ne absentis quidem.” (Epist. ad Atticum, VII. 7.)

814

Cicero, Epist. ad Atticum, VII. 9.

815

“Absenti sibi, quandocumque imperii tempus expleri cœpisset.” (Suetonius, Cæsar, 26. – Cicero, Epist. Famil., XIII. 11.)

816

Cæsar, De Bello Civili, I. 5.

817

“I have contended that regard should be had to Cæsar for his absence. It was not to favour him; it is for the honour of a decision of the people, promoted by the consul himself.” (Cicero, Epist. Familiar., VI. 6.)

818

Titus Livius, Epitome, CVIII.

819

“Sed quum id datum est, illud una datum est.” (Epist. ad Atticum, VII. 7.)

820

“Doluisse se, quod populi Romani beneficium sibi per contumeliam ab inimicus extorqueretur, erepto semestri imperio in urbem retraheretur.” (Cæsar, De Bello Civili, I. 9.)

821

See, on the period of the comitia, Cicero, Epist. ad Atticum, III. 13; Epist. Familiar., VIII. 4.

822

Although all the facts prove that the term of the power was to cease in 707, Plutarch (Pompey, 55) reckons four years of prolongation, and Dio Cassius (XL. 44, 46) five, which shows the difference in the estimation of dates. (Zumpt, Studia Romana, 85.)

823

“I believe certainly in Pompey’s intention of starting for Spain, and it is what I by no means approve. I have easily demonstrated to Theophanes that the best policy was not to go away. I am more uneasy for the Republic since I see by your letters that our friend Pompey is going to Spain.” (Cicero, Epist. ad Atticum, V. 11.)

824

Cicero, Epist. Familiar., VIII. 4.

825

“But at last, after several successive adjournments, and the certainty well acquired that Pompey consented to consider the recall of Cæsar on the Calends of March, the senatus-consultus was passed, which I send you.” (Cœlius to Cicero, Epist. Familiar., VIII. 8.)

826

Cœlius to Cicero, Epist. Familiar., VIII. 8.

827

Cœlius to Cicero, Epist. Familiar., VIII. 8.

828

Cœlius to Cicero, Epist. Familiar., VIII. 8, §§ 3, 4.

829