Literature and history

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Episode 48 The Right and The Expedient.

This is the third of three episodes on Marcus Tullius Cicero, the Roman orator, statesman, and lawyer who lived from 106 to 43 bc.

Thus far, we have learned about the bumpy period of history into which Cicero was born, the

Marion reforms to the military, the social war in which Cicero briefly fought, and the dictatorship of Sola.

We talked about some of Cicero's most famous cases, the trial of the accused parasite Sextus Roskius,

the corrupt Sicilian governor Gaius Verus and several others.

And we discussed Cicero's journey up the Curses Honorum as he went through the rungs of

Cuester, Edile, Pritter, and Consul, all at the earliest date legally possible.

When we last left him in the opening months of 62 B.C.

Cicerow had just finished his consulship.

He had been central to averting the wave of arson

and political assassinations that historians call the Catalan conspiracy. But in averting this conspiracy, Cicero had joined

with other senators to sanction summary executions of Roman citizens without trials, though

these citizens may indeed have been guilty of sedition

and terrorist plots.

In the heat of the moment, in December of 63, the executions that capped off Cicero's consulship were measures of expediency, performed

by a state that had no prison system.

Cicero himself had survived an attempt on his life, and he was leery that the next year's magistrates

would free the conspirators thus endangering the Senate and the stability of Rome.

Nonetheless, the executions in the coming decade, would come back to haunt him.

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