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Valerio-Horatian Laws The Valerio-Horatian Laws (leges Valeriae Horatiae) the plebeians, were sent to Mons Sacer negotiate. The were three laws which were passed by the consuls of negotiations were successful, the decemviri resigned and Rome for 449 BC, Lucius Valerius Potitus and Marcus the secession was called off. Lucius Valerius and Marcus Horatius Barbatus. They restored the right of ap- Horatius were elected as the consuls for the year. They peal to the people and introduced measures which were restored the right to appeal to the people and passed mea- favourable to the plebeians. The consuls’ actions came sures which were favourable to the plebeians to address after a plebeian rebellion, the second plebeian seces- their grievances which had emerged during the rebellion. sion, which overthrew the second decemvirate, which had ruled tyrannically. The two consuls had shown sympathy towards the plebeians and, as a result, had been chosen to negotiate the resolution of the rebellion. Their new laws 2 The laws quelled the plebeian unrest. Lex Valeria Horatia de plebiscitis. This established that the resolutions passed by the Plebeian Council were binding on all. The plebeians had created this body as 1 Background their own assembly where they could debate their own issues during their first rebellion, the first plebeian se- In 454 BC, during what was to be the 200-year Conflict cession (494 BC). The patricians were excluded from of the Orders between the patricians and the plebeians, the Plebeian Council. The Council could also vote on the patricians gave “consent to the appointment of a body laws which concerned the plebeians. It was convened of legislators, chosen in equal numbers from plebeians and presided over by the plebeian tribunes, positions and patricians to enact what would be useful to both or- which had been created during the first plebeian rebel- ders and secure equal liberty for each.” [1] The plebeians lion. These tribunes proposed resolutions to the vote of wanted a published set of laws so that there were clear the Council. These plebeian institutions were created for and known rules and protections as well as punishments. the self-defence of the plebeians against abuse by the con- Up until that time, the laws were unwritten and open to suls and the Roman aristocracy and were separate from arbitrary use and, at times, abuse. A ten-man commis- the institutions of the patrician-controlled Roman senate. sion was appointed to develop the laws, the Decemviri The patricians refused to recognise the Council’s resolu- Legibus Scribundis Consulari Imperio (decemviri means tions as laws binding on the whole people and therefore on ten men). The consulship (the office of the two annually the patricians as well. Livy wrote that as “it was as it were elected heads of the republic) and the plebeian tribunes a point in controversy, whether patricians were bound by (the representatives of the plebeians) were suspended. regulations enacted in an assembly of the commons, they The decemviri were also to act as a government exempt [the consuls] proposed a law in the assembly of the cen- from the right to appeal to the people against arbitrary ac- turies [the Assembly of the Soldiers, which voted on laws tions on their part. The conduct of the first decemvirate proposed by the consuls], that whatever the commons or- was exemplary and it drew up ten bronze tablets of laws. dered collectively, should bind the entire people; by which law a most keen-edged weapon was given to motions in- It was felt that two more laws were needed to complete the [2] legislation. A new decemvirate was elected. According troduced by tribunes.” to Livy, the second decemvirate was despotic and abused Lex Valeria Horatia de provocatione. This was restora- the people, taking advantage of their exemption from the tion of the right of appeal to the people (provocatio ad right to appeal. This eventually led to the plebeian rebel- populum), which means calling out to the people. A citi- lion known as the second plebeian secession. The ple- zen could call out to the people against the summary use beians seceded to Mons Sacer (Sacred Mount) outside of power against him by the consuls or officials. With this the city and pledged to remain there until their demands type of appeal the summary action undertaken would be were met. Their demands were the resignation of the de- stopped. This law also forbade the creation of any of- cemviri, the restoration of the right to appeal to the peo- ficial positions that were exempt from the people’s right ple and the restoration of the plebeian tribunes and their of appeal. Livy stated that through this law the right of powers. Lucius Valerius and Marcus Horatius, two patri- appeal to the people “was not only restored but strength- cians who had stood up to one instance of abuse of a ple- ened for the future by a fresh enactment. This forbade beian by the decemviri and had shown sympathy towards the appointment of any magistrate from whom there was 1 2 4 REFERENCES no right of appeal, and provided that anyone who did so Publilius Philo in 339 BC and one by Quintus Hortensius appoint might be rightly and lawfully put to death, nor in 287 BC. This has led some historians to argue that in should the man who put him to death be held guilty of both cases the first and second laws are unhistorical and murder.” [3] that only the third one is historical.[7][8][9][10][11][12][13] Lex Valeria Horatia de tribunicia potestate. This Cornell disputes the above view. He points out that Ro- law restored the potestas tribunicia, the powers of the man legislators repeatedly dealt with the same subject and plebeian tribunes (often referred to as tribunician pow- incorporated the provisions of the existing law into the ers). It also put in place the principle of the inviolabil- amendments or the new provisions of a new law. He ar- ity (sacrosanctitas) of the plebeian tribunes, the aediles gues that it cannot be proved that the three laws on appeal (the assistants of the tribunes) and the decemviri into law. were identical, that the purpose of the Valerio-Horatian This principle was based on the lex sacrata (sacred law), Law was “not to grant the right of appeal per se [in fact, which was a religious sanction according to which a tem- it was a restoration], but to prohibit the creation of mag- ple, sacred object or person could be declared physically istracies not subject to appeal,” and that we do not know inviolable (sacrosanct). According to Festus “Sacred laws anything about the content of the law of 300 BC. He notes are laws which have the sanction that anyone who broke that Livy said that Marcus Valerius Corvus’ law of ap- them becomes accursed to one of the gods, together with peal had was ‘more carefully set down’ and that this must his family and property”.[4] The violator became sacer be in comparison with previous laws on appeal.[14] Livy (accursed), was considered as having harmed a god or also wrote “this was the third time since the expulsion the gods in addition to the sacrosanct object or person, of the kings that such a law had been introduced, by the became forfeit to the god(s), anyone who killed him/her same family in every instance” He specified that the sec- was performing sacred duty and would not be punished ond and third laws were renewals and said that he thought and the dead violator was surrendered to the god(s) in that the reason for this was that the wealth of a few car- question. ried more power than the liberty of the plebs. He added The principle of the inviolability of the plebeian tribunes that the law forbade the scourging or execution of those had been established following the first plebeian rebellion. who appealed, but merely provided that if anyone should disregard [its] injunctions it should be deemed a wicked Besides being the leaders of the plebeians, the plebeian [15] tribunes were the protectors of the plebeians. They had act. the power to stop actions by the consuls or officials which Regarding the law on plebiscites constituting laws binding they deemed as summary and harmful to individual ple- the whole people, Cornell, again, thinks that the record of beians. This power rested on the principle that the person three subsequent laws on the same subject need not im- of the plebeian tribune was sacrosanct. Anyone who hurt ply that the first two were unhistorical. He notes that be- him would be declared sacer. In effect this meant that the tween 449 BC (the year of the Lex Valeria-Horatia) and plebeians swore to kill whoever hurt their tribunes and 287 BC (the year of the Lex Hortensia) there were thirty- this was given a religious basis.[5] The plebeians under- five plebiscites which had the force of law. He argues took to protect their protectors. that the law of 449 BC probably established the general Livy said that the consuls renewed the potestas tribuni- principle, “but in some way restricted its freedom to do cia “with certain sacred rites revived from a distant past, so, for instance, by making the plebiscites subject to the and in addition to securing their inviolability by the sanc- auctoritas partum or to the subsequent vote of the comitia tions of religion, they enacted a law that whoever of- populi, or indeed both.” Auctoritas patrum meant author- ity of the fathers (the patricians) through the patrician- fered violence to the magistrates of the plebs, whether [16] tribunes, aediles [the assistants of the tribunes], or de- controlled senate.
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