Thursday in History: Ides

Beware the Ides of March.

From 509 BC to 27 BC, Rome was a Republic. They had a senate, which was elected by prominent citizens. They had checks and balances, one of the most interesting of which was their having not one, but two executive officers, called consuls. These men were elected to serve for only one year, to prevent anyone from becoming too powerful, and could not serve two consecutive terms, but could get elected again after a term off (which quite a few of them did). Each consul had a responsibility to raise an army if necessary, and neither could get ideas about a military takeover, because the other was there to check them.

Lots of our political heritage comes from Rome. One thing they had that was interesting and unique was the idea of naming a dictator, but only during times of crisis. The idea was that one man (not two) could make more decisive choices, and by not being mired in bureaucracy, the city and its people might be saved. Dictatorships were only meant to last for six months, and then the government as it was would be restored. In order for this kind of thing to work, they had to choose a man who put the good of the country before his own need for power, a man who would take the the compliment of having the safety of his nation placed in his hands for a time and would willingly surrender his title and power once he had righted that which was wrong.

Having two consuls was a good idea; anybody can see that. The things that could go awry when a dictator was needed are also very obvious: the man appointed could become a tyrranical king who held the fate of the country in his oppressive fist.

Surprisingly, this office did actually work. But that was in the days before the civil wars, before senators would come armed to an assembly meeting, and consul-generals would march their armies into the city to put down their political opponents. In the days of Roman revolution, being a dictator was a good way to get things to go your way. Sulla, the first man to hold the dictatorship for a hundred years, emulated the dictators of old by resolving the problems at hand and resigning the position in 81 BC, after which he retired from public life.

On this day in history in 44 BC, a collection of prominent senators plotted to murder a man who wasn’t likely to give up the dictatorship and retire from public life. They met and reaffirmed their resolution to save the Republic by ridding it of a man who was steering it once again toward a monarchy.

Julius Caesar was a pretty cool guy. He was a brilliant general. He conquered Gaul (modern day France and bits of Spain), and invaded Britain. His biggest problem was that he knew he was awesome, and everyone else knew that he knew. He took power in Rome after defeating his political enemies in a civil war, and had himself made dictator for life.

Karl von Piloty's The Murder of Caesar, 1865

A group of sixty men plotted to kill him, some even his close friends, one of whom was named in Caesar’s will as his second heir if the first died before Caesar did. Shakespeare’s famous line, “Et tu, Brute?” relates the anguish that Caesar probably felt when he saw who was among the betrayers.

On March 15th, they cornered him in the senate on some pretense, and surrounded him to carry out their plan. The first man to attempt to stab him was rebuffed by the military genius, and he shouted out, “You villain, what are you doing?” But the men were united, and determined.

Julius Caesar was stabbed twenty three times and left to bleed to death.

His assassins, who only wanted to preserve the Republic and probably grab some power for themselves along the way, then had to endure (or die in) yet another civil war. In the end, they didn’t save the Republic. The victor of this civil war was none other than Gaius Octavius, the heir of Julius Caesar himself. When things calmed down after the fighting was over, he named himself Princeps Civitatus, or “First Citizen,” and in 27 BC took the title “Augustus.” The Roman Republic was no more.

Beware the Ides of March.