Page:History of Greece Vol V.djvu/399

 CHANGES AT ATHENS UNDER PERIKLES. 375 tioned, — a provision probably introduced by Perikles at the same time as the formalities of law-making by means of specially delegated nomothette. This was the Graphe Paranomon, — indictment for informality or illegality, — which might be brought on certain grounds against the proposer of any law or any pseph- ism, and rendered him liable to punishment by the dikastery. He was required, in bringing forward his new measure, to take care that it should not be in contradiction with any preexisting law, — or if there were any such contradiction, to give formal notice of it, to propose the repeal of that which existed, and to write up publicly beforehand what his proposition was, — in order that there might never be two contradictory laws at the same time in operation, nor any illegal decree passed eitker by the senate or by the public assembly. If he neglected this pre- caution, he was liable to prosecution under the graphe parano- mon, which any Athenian citizen might bring against him before the dikastery, through the intervention and under the presidency of the thesmothetae. Judging from the title of this indictment, it was originally confined to the special ground of formal contradiction between the new and the old. But it had a natural tendency to extend itself: the citizen accusing would strengthen his case by showing that the measure which he attacked contradicted not merely the letter, but the spirit and purpose of existing laws, — and he would pro- ceed from hence to denounce it as generally mischievous and disgraceful to the state. In this unmeasured latitude, we find the graphe paranomon at the time of Demosthenes : the mover of a new law or psephism, even after it had been regularly dis- cussed and passed, was liable to be indicted, and had to defend himself not only against alleged informalities in his procedure, but also against alleged mischiefs in the substance of his measure. If found guilty by the dikastery, the punishment inflicted upon him by them was not fixed, but variable according to" circum- stances ; for the indictment belonged to that class wherein, after the verdict of guilty, first a given amount of punishment was proposed by the accuser, next, another and lighter amount was named by the accused party against himself, — the dikastery being bound to make their option between one and the other, Avithout admitting any third modification, — so that it was the