A More Stable Roman Republic

(To help out with the Historia Mundi TL)

The Challenge is to make the Roman Republic more stable. Don't worry
about how to change it, just what changes there should be, but try to
keep it somewhat plausible and recognizable to the Republic of OTL.

Now, if we were to try to fit the Roman Republic into a 3 branch
government mold like the US government, I think we'd come up with the
Senate as the Judicial Branch, the various Assemblies as the
Legislative branch, and the consuls as the Executives (but I'm not as
happy with that last one).

Some ideas:

1) take away the judicial powers of the assemblies, and give them to
the senate, while taking away some of the senate's power
2) allow the assemblies to propose and deliberate legislation, rather
than just vote on it.
3) seperate the civil and military governments more. don't give a
provincial governor a legion, but station a legion there, not under the
authority of the governor.
4) (this is the doozy) Areas of heavy Roman settlement (or just
heavily Romanized) should be organized into Agri Coloniae (Colonial
Territories), which send representatives to a new assembly, the Comitia
Coloniata (Colonial Assembly).

Hello

Some moderate reforms:
-make an expansion progressive but effective of the citizenship to the middle and high classes of the provinces, it can be based in services to the Republic, level of romanization (but making this conditions so easy that you have not problems to assuring that this expansion is effective).
-Coordinated with this make an effective expansion of the members of Senate to assure that in a short term there wil be a considerable amount of senators from Spain, Galia, Greece,..

With middle and high classes of the provinces well represented in the Senate, they have sufficients motives to help to stabilize the Republic against any danger or problem.

Another idea to throw out there:

Consulships last longer than a year. Some even number. The consulship is then staggered, with a senior and junior consul. Lets just use a hypothetical example here, with 2 year terms:

50bc Pompey (sn) Caesar (jr)
49bc Caesar (sn) Crassus (jr)
48bc Crassus (sn) Cicero (jr)

It's a good TL idea, making the Republic more stable, and I'm glad you came up with it. Here's just some ideas:

-As long as the Senate has any power, the factional conflict beween the Optimates and the Populares is going to keep flaring up. So I'd seriously consider either abolition of or a serious downgrading of the Senate, because as long as it exists the conflict between the factions is going to cause trouble for the effective governance of the Empire.
-Definitely give the assemblies the power to deliberate legislation; this is a major part in taking away the Senate's power. As long as the Senate can decide legislation, there's going to be conflict between the progressives and the reactionaries, and the Romans never quite got the notion that 'you can't send in the troops if you lose a debate'
-Maybe downgrade the Consul's power, so that there's not so much competition between factions for the election of their favoured candidates? I'm very much in favour of making Rome more democratic, so more power to the other elected officials would be a good thing.
-Reform the assembly system, so that the aristocracy aren't so favoured. As long as they have more votes, you're going to have the same aristocracy in power all the time, and that's just going to devolve into the Optimate/Populare conflict, which I think NEEDS to be addressed.

Just some ideas.

BlackMage said:

-As long as the Senate has any power, the factional conflict beween the Optimates and the Populares is going to keep flaring up. So I'd seriously consider either abolition of or a serious downgrading of the Senate, because as long as it exists the conflict between the factions is going to cause trouble for the effective governance of the Empire.
-Definitely give the assemblies the power to deliberate legislation; this is a major part in taking away the Senate's power. As long as the Senate can decide legislation, there's going to be conflict between the progressives and the reactionaries, and the Romans never quite got the notion that 'you can't send in the troops if you lose a debate'
-Maybe downgrade the Consul's power, so that there's not so much competition between factions for the election of their favoured candidates? I'm very much in favour of making Rome more democratic, so more power to the other elected officials would be a good thing.

Just some ideas.

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I agree that this is a fine concept of an ATL.

* if the power of the Consuls is lessened, why would anybody want to be one?

* was it the Assemblies or the Senate that was composed of the heads of the clans\families of Rome?

just wondering...don't let them dissuade you from continuing this fine ATL.

Keenir said:

I agree that this is a fine concept of an ATL.

* if the power of the Consuls is lessened, why would anybody want to be one?

* was it the Assemblies or the Senate that was composed of the heads of the clans\families of Rome?

just wondering...don't let them dissuade you from continuing this fine ATL.

Click to expand...

The Senate was composed of the leading families (and ex magistrates). The assemblies were bodies representing the whole of the republic, usually arranged in such a way that the upper classes had more sway.

Don't have Caesar ascend to power. With out him and the succession of emperors after, you don't have centuries of borderline psychotics doing their best to run the Empire in to the ground, along with the violent uphevals and coups that resulted.

The problem with stripping structural power in the Republic from those with significant other forms of power and giving it to the assemblies, is that it makes the Republic much less stable, as these other power groupings will just overthrow it as it is no longer in their interests.

Keenir said:

I agree that this is a fine concept of an ATL.

* if the power of the Consuls is lessened, why would anybody want to be one?

* was it the Assemblies or the Senate that was composed of the heads of the clans\families of Rome?

just wondering...don't let them dissuade you from continuing this fine ATL.

Click to expand...

Well, the Romans could fight over ANYTHING. But seriously though, I think that even if the consul was given less power the authoritas (I think that's the word) that went with it would make it worth it. They wouldn't be totally stripped of power, but the constant factional rivalries over power that pretty much wrecked the Republic would be lessened if power was spread around more.

david3565 said:

Don't have Caesar ascend to power. With out him and the succession of emperors after, you don't have centuries of borderline psychotics doing their best to run the Empire in to the ground, along with the violent uphevals and coups that resulted.

Click to expand...

Again, don't worry about how to get there, just the restructuring of the Republic.

Another idea to stabilize the Roman Republic is creating in each province (but only in the romanized provinces) an assembly (like a mini senate) these assemblies would be formed by the native but romanized high classes and would have some limited power in for example: coordination with Rome of public works and roads, religious celebrations in the province... and the capacity of advise the provincial governor in determined areas (as problems with rebels natives, economic finances..) -but the provincial governor remain the principal authority, I am not thinking to convert the Roman Republic in a federal republic-.

This can be sufficient to maintain the loyalty of the provincials to Rome and to make them allies against the possibility of ussurpation by a provincial governor.

But it is very possible that to implement any kind of reforms and convince to the roman senate and other groups of power to make it effective we need a man with the oratoria skill of Ciceron and the military skill and depth sense of loyalty to the republic of Cincinnatus.

Isn't the best bet to go back a bit and have the reforms of the Gracchi be more successful? Agrarian reform would check the power of the upper classes, and retain a broader-based system.

-- Rick

Well, as far as giving the provinces more power, I'd like to mention Sertorius and spain. Sertorius was a supporter of Marius who fled to spain when Sulla took power, and maintain a base of operations there. He ingratiated himself with the locals and formed a Senate composed of both Roman and Hispanic elites.

In my Historia Mundi timeline, I have a similar phenomenon going on in Dacia, with the Populare rebels gaining the support of the locals. I imagine that when they restore and reform the republic, that the provinces will be given more rights. At the very least, those that supported them will.

Oh, what if we reformed the Centuriate Assembly to actually be a military assembly? So that the active soldiers actually get a vote? Of course, there were alot of centuries, so maybe it would be best to have the representation based on a legionwide basis; each century has one vote, they elect a representative for the entire legion, which goes back to Rome to be in the Centuriate Assembly.

A good idea. This would be a way to neutralize the military rebellions, with the knowledge that their rights are defended in the Centuriate Assembly the legions are not too receptive to follow an usurper that in OTL could promise to the soldiers that if they follow him he will give them gifts and privileges.

With this new Centuriate Assembly the soldiers know that they don´t need to follow an usurper or rebels against the Republic to obtain better conditions, they can use the Centuriate to show to the Republic the reality of the problems of the soldier life and show that they are truly loyal to the republic and he principal defenders of the stability of the Republic against external enemies (barbarians, parths...)

Apart of the administrative measures, I was thinking about the vassal states of Rome, one of the reasons that some historians points about the fall of Rome is the absence of the vassal states as buffer states (the most part annexed by different emperors) .

It could be possible that if the Republic truly treats them as more equals that vassals and if Republic have the idea to extend less conquering but instead foment the creation of this kind of states allied with it, it is possible that we have a Republic more stabilized against external enemies altough less extended in territory.

Rick Robinson said:

Isn't the best bet to go back a bit and have the reforms of the Gracchi be more successful? Agrarian reform would check the power of the upper classes, and retain a broader-based system.

-- Rick

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Bingo! When I was reviewing how to make the Roman Republic survive, this one stood out as the best POD.

It would definitely control the consolidation of power, as well as keeping more people as farmers rather than eternally debt ridden legions.

Start with this, then gradually see how a more stable system could grow out of it. Steal liberally from the Byzantine model as well. Say what you will, but they did last a long time.

More representative democracy is no guarantee of a more stable Roman Republic, as much as it pains me to say it. It is just one way to go....

Glen said:

Start with this, then gradually see how a more stable system could grow out of it. Steal liberally from the Byzantine model as well. Say what you will, but they did last a long time.

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yep, all however-many-dozen dynasties therein.



kidding, kidding. the Byzantines were good at surviving tough times, I admit.
(lots of practice)