Page:Roman Constitutional History, 753-44 B.C..djvu/218

204 Provincial Government. — In the course of about one hundred and sixty years the number of provinces had increased to nine, and by the time of Gaius Gracchus the judicial business of the capital was assigned to three jurisdictions, or departments (provinciae), but there were only six praetors to fill these twelve positions. The senate, it would seem, omitted to remedy this condition of affairs, partly in order to prevent outsiders from entering the nobility through the praetorship, but chiefly in order that it might have greater scope and liberty in deciding what departments or provinces the praetors should have, and in rewarding ex-consuls and ex-praetors by extending their authority and granting them lucrative provincial governorships.

Sulla, on the other hand, decided that on leaving office all the consuls and praetors were, as proconsuls and propraetors respectively, to become provincial governors, the senate determining only what provinces were to be consular and what praetorian. He organized cisalpine Gaul as a tenth province, increased the number of praetors to eight, and thus made the number of consuls and praetors leaving office every year correspond to the number of provinces. In this way he removed an eminent cause of disorder and an excellent opportunity for intrigue and favoritism. Moreover, every governor was to leave his province within thirty days after the arrival of his successor.

Practical Abolition of the Censorship. — The censorship had been one of the buttresses of the nobility in its earlier days, but had to a great extent lost its political, and especially its moral, importance. Sulla set it aside. The senate was in practice recruited by ex-quaestors. The enrollment of citizens was incomplete and the assessment of their property was antiquated; but this was of little consequence when the army was raised in a large measure by enlistment and the temporary tax was not levied. If the register of voters was