The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1884-12-20
A ROMAN ELECTION.
How the Ancients in the First Republic
Worked the Wires.


Worked the Wires.
Eugene Lawrence, in Brooklyn Eagle.
From republican Rome-our early teacher
we borrow mOst-of our political ideas, and even
language. Our elections vary little from those
of the Roman forum. To the Latins we owe
our candidates and our orators, our tribunitian
arts and tribuntian veto, the ballot and the bal
loJ-boX, the register and the polling, the concep-
tion of personal independence, the sovereignty
of the people The free Roman would bow to no
man, and Cicero and Caesar were forced to solicit
the votes of their fellow citizens with humili-
ty that was never feigned.
To obtain an Office at Rome the candidates
toiled for months and even years. Clad in his
white robe he walked the forum or the busy
streets of the city, salunting every one asking
votes and seeking what We now call popularity.
He spoke to every citizen he met Familiarity he
grasped his hand, he begged his support; he
spoke of his own merits, de cried his opponent
promised to advocate some liberal measures and
sometimes bride. Cicero, who was above
bribery, has left us in his letters curious pic
ture of the tolls, anxietes and the interior life
of the Roman candidate.
An election day at Rome was a scene of singu-
trates of Italy were renewed, and every year the
voters crowded the capital. The city was agi-
tated by intense party feeling. The rural popu-
lation from Latium and the distant colonies
over the Tiber FASTENED to exercise the priced
right of suffrage Chariots filled with citizens
came from the Sabine villages, footmen crossed
the Sublielan bridge, a great multitude wan
dered through the streets of Rome, astonished
at the Inagnifcence of the city.
If it was a consular election, the people gath
cred at sunrise at the Campus Martius, where
the voting was TO take place The candidates,
IN their white robes, before daybreak were seen
mingling with the voters, followed by their par
tisans and proclaiming their political principles.
Sometimes they stood on high position where
they could be seen by all. Sometimes the great
multitude covered the tops of the houses, and
filed all the extensive plain from the Capitol to
the river.
At length, at the sound of horn, the voters
assembled in the Campus Martius. If the aus
pices were favorable and no peal of thunder
heard, a standard was raised on the Janiculum,
and the consul began the ceremonies with pray
ers and sacrifices; the people, deeply supersti-
tious, awaited awe-stricken until he closed. The
spectacle was one of rare interest; it was as
semblage of Roman freemen. In the late conf
tia at least all were equal, The rich noble, ac-
customed to luxury and power; the equities who
had sprung from poverty to wealth; The prosper
Gus traders of the forum and suburbs; the farm
ers, even sometimes the freedmen, the manu-
mtted slaves, were blended by the Roman law
into harmonious and momentary equality. Each
was gifted with vote.
The voting next began. The excitement rose
The people, arranged in centuries or hundreds
passed over a bridge of wood into the polling
place. Here, IN the earlier age, they voted
orally, and later with wooden tablets. Each
vote was recorded and counted at once, and the
result announced. The ballot-box and the regis
ter we're watched over by citizens of undoubted
honor, and fraud was scarcely possible. AS one
by the centuries gaye in their ballots the ex-
element was redoubed. The candidates and
the people hung GREATNESS upon the cries of the
heralds rs they proclaimed the progress of the
election.
Livy has left many picture of these fierce
political struggles. Now on one side, now on
another, the balance hung A Seipio Cato,
a Gracious, Caesar had triumphed and the
victor shouted in a wild strain of southern en-
thusiasm that echoed far away over the Capitol
and the crowded hills. The beaten party turned
silently homeward The excitement was over,
and the Roman voters went quietly again to
their usual pursuits.
For 400 wears, at least every year the Romans
gave IN their votes the field of Mars. At length
the Emperor tyrant-swept away the polls
and the polling places Despotism reigned over
for ten centuries the very conception of
a popular election and popular rule had per-
ished; tho right of suffrage-the pledge OF indie
pendence-died 1t was revived in the republics
of the middle ages; it lived in the homes of the
workingmen; it passed to Holland and to Eng
land; it crossed the seas to New England and
sprang up in rare strength. 1t has spread once
more to Italy, to Germany, to every European
state, never again to sink before the rage of a
despot or perish in the poisonous embraces of
slavery