Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1904-07-08
A MUNICIPAL ELECTION, AID. 70
The Last Election in Pompeii Before
It's Destruction.

From the London Spectator.
The graffti on the walls of the eXcavated
streets in Pompeii formed the subject of a
paper read by Mr.. Joseph Oxford before the
Royal Society of Literature on THE Last
Municipal Election at Pompeii."
The Pompeiians had, of course no red
and white and blue bills to paste about over
likely spaces, but instead they wrote up on
prominent walls their requests, or advice,
or comments in regard to this or that can
didate for municipal honors. The Pom
peiian municipal honors for which candi-
dates were standing In A. D. 20, the year in
which the lava of Vesuvius preserved for
ever a picture of the customs and manners
of that curious Graeco-Oscan city. were
those of the edileship and the duumvirate.
All burgesses had a vote in electing these
four magistrates-the duumviri and the two
ediles-and the interest which was taken in
the election Is shown by the fact that per-
hapS one in three or four of the electors
there were possibly 10000 Inhabitants, and
there probably 1,500 graffiti referring to
the election) thought it worth while to write
up on his house wall in some public
place, his views as to the merits of the can
didate
At Pompeii a man seeking municipal
honors had to be at least twenty-five years
old and had to prove that he possessed a
fortune of at least $500. In consequence
"
men competed for municipal honors; in
deed, 1t would have been useless for men
only just possessing the requisite qualifica-
lions to come out as candidates, since 1t
was necessary before asking to be elected
to promise a considerable sum to be ex-
pended on public games. or on works likely
to be of permanent benefit to the city. At
Pompeii, however. which was rich city,
there seems to have been actually a pleth-
ora Of candidates for municipal honors,
since a law was made forbidding any in
tending candidate to spend a penny, for
two years before coming up for election, on
any public festival or in donations to the
people; the intending candidate might not
even ask more than nine persons to a pri-
vate dinner! If the candidate or one of his
"clients"-the clients were in a sense the
election agents-broke these rather strin-
gent rules he was fined 5000 sesterces
(about f40} Competition for Offices which
carried no pay with them must have been
pretty severe when man could be prose-
cuted for bribery and corruption even be-
fore actually seeking votes at the poll.
Just as today too. the candidate had to
take into account the probable attitude of
various societies, clubs, guilds and unions,
The objects of these clubs and unions,
however were not always quite SO respect
able as those of the temperance brother
hoods free trade leagues and empire
leagues of our modern English times. They
seem, indeed, to have resembled in their
methods Tammany rather than West Ham
or Chertsey. There were Collegia and He
tairf-the more luxurious creek OUTLOOK on
life fourished in Pompeii-with which the
prospective candidate had to deal There
were the pilicrepi the clubs of ball players
who probably wanted first and foremost ex-
citing public games; there were the late
drinkers and the long seepers' universi
dormientes). who clearly were not In favor
of early closing; and there were the little
thieves (furunculD, who were perhaps
kind of ''hooligans." AS for the voters VINO
favored free drinking and free sleeping you
can still see over Pompeiian tavern door
the inscription: Here you can Nave drink
for one as (about three farthings); any
body who likes to pay more can nave
better draught What will you pay Tor a
glass of Falernian?" But besides the guilds
and the clubs. there was another valuable
electoral interest in the religious sets, or
yotaries of the various deities
Coca sionally peculiar reasons are given in
the graffiti for voting for particular candi-
dates. One reads, for instance: "Proculus,
vote for Sabinus. and he will vote for you,