Page:Great Men and Famous Women Volume 5.djvu/53

THE GRACCHI 26 in the city, maintained and filled at the cost of the state, and that corn should be sold at a rate artificially cheap to the poor free citizens. Such a law was purely socialistic. The privilege was confined to Rome, because in Rome the elections were held, and the Roman constituency was the one depositary of power. The effect was to gather into the city a mob of needy unemployed voters, living on the charity of the state, to crowd the circus and to clamor at the elections, available no doubt immediately to strengthen the Hands of the popular tribwne, but certain in the long run to sell themselves to those who could bid highest for their voices. Excuses could be found, no doubt, for this miser- able expedient, in the state of parties, in the unscrupulous violence of the aristocracy, in the general impoverishment of the peasantry through the land monopoly, and in the intrusion upon Italy of a gigantic system of slave labor. But none the less it was the deadliest blow which had yet been dealt to the con- stitution. Party government turns on the majorities at the polling places, and it was difficult afterward to recall a privilege which, once conceded, appeared to be a right The utmost that could be ventured in later times, with any prospect of success, was to limit an intolerable evil, and if one side was ever strong enough to make the attempt, their rivals had a bribe ready in their hands to buy back the popular support. Caius Gracchus, however, had his way, and carried all before him. He escaped the rock on which his brother had been wrecked. He was elected tribune a second time. He might have had a third term if he had been contented to be a mere demagogue. But he, too, like Tiberius, had honor- able aims. The powers which he had played into the hands of the rnob to obtain, he desired to use for high purposes of statesmanship, and his instrument broke in his hands. He was too wise to suppose that a Roman mob, fed by bounties from the treasury, could permanently govern the world. He had schemes for scattering Roman colonies, with the Roman franchise, at various points of the empire. Carthage was to be one of them. He thought of abolishing the distinction between Romans and Italians, and enfranchising the entire peninsula. These measures were good in themselves essential, indeed, if the Roman conquests were to form a compact and permanent dominion. But the object was not attainable on the road on which Gracchus had entered. The vagabond part of the constituency was well contented with what it had obtained, a life in the city, supported at the public expense, with politics and games for its amusements It had not the least inclination to be drafted off into settlements in Spain or Africa, where there would be work instead of pleasant idleness. Carthage was still a name of terror. To restore Carthage was no better than treason. Still less had the Roman citizens an inclination to share their privileges with Sam- nites and Etruscans, and see the value of their votes watered down. Political storms are always cyclones. The gale from the east to-day is a gale from the west to-morrow. Who and what were the Gracchi, then ? the sweet voices began to ask ambitious intriguers, aiming at dictatorship, or perhaps the crown. The aristocracy were right, after all ; a few things had gone wrong, but these had