If the senatorial people that Mark Antony and Octavian were fighting managed to defeat them and restore the republic fully. Perhaps they pass some reforms that strengthen the Republic and make it less susceptible to civil war and dictators?
What if the assassins won the civil war?
- Thread starter JustinianTheGrand
- Start date
What sort of reforms? They can imitate the steps taken by Sulla and tighten the oligarchal structure all they want, but it won't change the underlying social and structural problems the Roman Republic is facing by this time. The military has grown big enough to control the outer provinces but therefore way too big to be controlled, strongmen of both conservative and populist stripes have already arisen (and even succeeded, as this is after Ceasar's unchecked dictatorship), and corruption is already an integral part of the Roman state.
The Liberators winning the war against the Populares would likely just lead to their cause being coopted by Lepidus, who, as a very indecisive figure, would probably just ignore the problems for a while until another Caesar rises and properly adresses them. Barring a sudden territorial collapse in Rome's Mediterranean empire, i don't see the republic surviving in its original constitutional form any longer.
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There's also the problem that the Liberators generally represented the conservative faction that would have opposed any decent, meaningful reforms. They were disliked members of a social elite that had for the last century been engaging with populists in a series of civil wars and strife, their murder of the populists' most beloved and successful politician had forced many of them to flee Rome before waging civil war against the Second Triumvirate, I can't see their victory bringing lasting peace to the Republic as opposed to them acting like more incompetent Sullas before the next stage of the Optimates-Populares struggle begins.