This morning I read that the trial has begun in Rome, where more than forty politicians and businessmen have been accused of corruption that includes taking bribes.
Corruption and bribery are nothing new in Italy. In fact,
the Romans began passing laws against them in 432 BC! It was customary at a
time where there were no political parties in the modern sense for candidates
to court as many voters as possible. One way to do so was to give money or
gifts not only to the public at large, but also to one’s clients. When some
aristocrats began to spend very large sums in their quest for votes,
magistrates decided that the time had come to pass ambitus (bribery) laws to keep them under control.
A 358 BC law called the Lex Poetelia may have imposed the
death penalty on those who resorted to bribery. (Early Roman laws were
notorious for their severity.) As was customary in ancient Rome, the law was
ignored, and in 181 BC a new law, the Cornelia Baebia, was passed, although the
penalty incurred by those who violated it is unknown.
We know more about Sulla’s Lex Cornelia de Ambitu (81 BC). If
convicted, the guilty candidates could not stand for office for a period of ten
years. The 67 BC Lex Acilia Calpurnia permanently disqualified the candidate
from holding office and expelled him from the Senate. The following year there
was actually a trial and the two elected consuls were convicted of bribery,
forced to resign, and new elections were held.
The Lex Tullia of 63 BC established ten-year exile. But all we
know about the Lex Licinia of 55 BC is that it established harsh penalties to
punish those who offered bribes, but we do not know what those penalties were. The
Lex Pompeia of 52 BC penalized the defendant with indefinite exile, as well as
confiscation of all his property. This is the last republican law we know
about.
The most famous trial of all involving bribery (as well as
extortion and other crimes) took place in 70 BC. Gaius Verres did what other
elite Romans did, that is, use bribery and, once he got the desired magistracy,
extortion. But Verres did that on an unprecedented scale, and he was also “unfortunate”
enough that the soon-to-be best lawyer of Rome decided to prosecute him.
Here is a partial list of Verres’ crimes:
Bribery.
1. He received bribe money from at least 600 Roman citizens
and many Sicilians in order to decide their cases in their favor. Sometimes he
even took bribes from both the prosecutor and the defense in the same case.
2. Every senator of
Sicilian cities, as well as other officials, paid Verres a bribe to obtain his
title. That included many who didn’t meet the requirements for office.
3. Some cities, like
Messana, bribed Verres in order to be excused from providing the Romans with
ships for maritime protection.
4. Through bribery,
Verres tampered with way priests were elected at Syracuse.
5. Verres took
bribes from wealthy slave-owners after accusing the slaves of being involved
with Spartacus’ rebels. He condemned them to die by crucifixion, but the owners
were able to pay large amount of money in order to save them.
Extortion.
Verres spent all three years of his stay in
Sicily extorting money from the Sicilians. Most of it had to do with the tithe,
that is, the tenth of the produce of the soil. Although the place and time for
payment of grain, wine, oil, and other products was determined by an old
Sicilian law, passed by king Hiero, the collection was in the hands of wealthy
Roman equestrians (publicans). Once they got their contracts, they usually
formed companies, and it was not unusual for slaves to do the dirty work of
actually collecting the tithes.
Governors were not allowed to hold shares in the collection
companies, but Verres broke the law and did so anyway. He therefore had a
personal interest in increasing the amount to be collected. It appears that the
tenth was never a tenth but two or three times more than that, and often a
“gift” was expected on the side. Some men committed suicide when they couldn’t pay: Diocles of Centuripa,
Dyrrachinus of Elorum, and others. In addition, several hundred farmers who had
lost everything simply left their lands.
Some of the cities and towns that suffered were Aetna, Agrigentum,
Agyria, Centuripa, Enna, Halicya, Herbita,
Hybla, Imachara, and Leontini.
He also
plundered temples and private homes, committed murder, rape, and testamentary
crimes. In my book The Verrines, or Super
Cicero Defeats the Boar (Annotated) you can read the entire speech put
together by Cicero.
