Page:Roman Constitutional History, 753-44 B.C..djvu/140

126 were appointed. Of these, naturally a larger number than usual were persons outside the nobility, belonging for the most part to the equestrian order. This circumstance tended for the time being to confirm the harmony and the friendly relations existing between the nobility and the rest of the people.

Disappearance of the Constitutional Dictatorship. — In order to avoid responsibility, or to conciliate and humor the people, the senate in the course of the war left various matters to the popular assemblies. Besides the election of a dictator and a master of horse in 217, the people in 210 by a plebiscite nominated a dictator and master of horse, who were then in due course appointed. Although sanctioned, or rather proposed, by the senate, this popular interference was doubtless the immediate cause of the disappearance of the constitutional dictatorship; but the fundamental cause was the political danger which this office involved, and the desire of the senate to be supreme. A dictator with the old military authority (dictator rei gerundae causa) was appointed for the last time in 216, and after 202 no constitutional dictator was chosen for any purpose whatever.

As a substitute for the dictatorship, the senate thenceforward claimed that in great emergencies it had the power by its final and supreme decree (senatus consultum ultimum) to confer quasi-dictatorial authority on the consuls — a proceeding somewhat similar to the declaration of martial law in modern times.

Enlarged Powers of the Assemblies. — In addition to the choice of a dictator and a master of horse, the friendly senate readily allowed the people to enlarge their formal powers in other directions. For a number of years, the plebeian assembly decided who were to be proconsuls in Spain. Of these, Publius Cornelius Scipio, son of the