Page:Roman Constitutional History, 753-44 B.C..djvu/69

Rh As there were no tribunes, the chief pontiff (pontifex maximus) presided at the election of the new tribunes, who entered on their office on December 10, 449. Consuls were next elected, Lucius Valerius and Marcus Horatius, whose duty it was legally to carry through the concessions made to the plebeians.

III. The Valerio-Horatian Laws and the New Popular Assembly.

The Patrician Policy. — The new consuls continued the conservative policy of their party. They recognized the validity of the laws of the Twelve Tables and made them the basis of the administration of justice. In a series of laws relating to the right of appeal and the plebeian magistrates and assembly, they made important concessions to the plebeians, but they maintained the patrician character of the consulship and quaestorship and the authority of the Senate.

Right of Appeal. — Although the right of appeal had been guaranteed by law long before, nevertheless the decemvirs had been vested with a supreme authority not subject to appeal. The provisions in the Twelve Tables respecting appeal would not prevent the election of other magistrates with similar unlimited powers. A Valerio-Horatian law accordingly enacted that no one should preside at an election of a magistrate who was not bound to allow appeals; and, if any one did so preside, he might be killed by anybody with impunity. The dictator, who, properly speaking, was appointed (dictus), not elected (creatus), was probably not affected by this provision and retained his old powers.

The Plebeian Tribunes. — Far from being destroyed by the attack of Appius and his party, the tribunate was reëstablished and sanctioned so firmly by the new laws that its