After listening to a history of Rome, here are my heroes of the Republican era

They're gonna put it down said:
yeah and the other funny thing is a lot of media companies will list their own stuff to be pirated, so they can catch 1% of the people that actually download the content they themselves listed.

I think they say after 3 notices they may cut you off. It's mostly scare tactics and to make it look like they are being proactive. Obv they don't really give a shit about copyright infringement, doesn't effect them. But they gotta play their role
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Several countries wanted 3 strikes laws*. However, I don't know if ISP's follow the same rules.

*Which would've prevented you from ever having an internet connection again - can't they just be humane and keep it at a few years in prison?
 
Derp Derp said:
Oh very interesting choices.

I'd say my favorites were Sulla and Marius.

I think it was interesting that Ceasar said that Sulla didn't know his political ABC's because he retired from his Dictatorship at the height of his powers and before he could be assured that his reforms would survive. The reason I find that interesting is because Sulla died a natural death in his own bed while Ceasar was assasinated. Maybe Ceasar didn't give Sulla his due?
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Caesar was assassinated because, unlike Sulla and Augustus, he didn't massacre all of his political opponents.
 
How can you seriously say that Sulla was your favorite? Sulla was a monster. Augustus's reign is only really saved at all because he lived long enough to clean up after himself and tidy up his image - if he had died in, say, 30 BC, one of the worst things you could've said about Caesar was the fact that he gave his inheritance to the bastard.
 
Also, almost all of Sulla's reforms were gone in 10 years. The only lasting legacy of Sulla was setting the precedent that turning your army on Rome is a valid way to get what you want, and that murder of your political opponents was fine as well. Sulla had more to do with the death of the republic than Caesar did.

When reading Augustus's account of his own career, and his claim that he "relinquished power" and gave it back to the senate, I must merely roll my eyes. Caesar may have been a tyrant, but at least he was an honest one. Augustus, I supposed, learned that a spoonful of sugar helps the tyranny go down. People are still eating up his bullshit to this day.

Not that I weep for the death of the republic. The empire was, in pretty much all respects, a huge improvement. The republic was a city-state government trying to govern an empire. For one thing, all power was concentrated in Rome, so it's not like anyone anywhere else in the empire had "liberty". For another, it was really just an ogliarchy. For the people living in the provinces, the switch to empire was had particular importance. The proconsuls appointed to govern the provinces by the republic were typically corrupt Roman autocrats who squeezed the province in order to enrich themselves.

After the empire, when all the proconsuls were suddenly responsible to one man, proconsuls that tried to use their office to bring glory and wealth to themselves tended to not live so long. And it's not like the empire was even the death of republics - the Romans typically kept local republics and democracies in power to govern themselves after conquest. The empire mainly dealt with military matters, infrastructure, and kept the cities, governed internally by their own ancient political system, from fighting amongst each other. And in this area, it was a huge improvement than the previous system, of giving one of these city-state republics total domination over the others. Unfortunately, most of this would come to an end with the coming of the Dominate in the 4th century.

We wouldn't really see another age of republics until the modern era. This time around, though, the presidential and parliamentary systems were a huge improvement over the Roman system with regards to governing large areas of landmasses. It combined the liberty of a republic with what Hamilton would call the ability for "energetic government" that only monarchies and empires had previously possessed. Importantly, all people are participants in modern republics, not just a single large city.

One thing that's often overlooked is the brilliance of the founders putting the president at the top of the military chain of command - huge armies loyal to their general, rather than the state itself, had been a huge problem with the Roman republic. Putting the head of the political system at the top of the chain of command in the military, as things were in the empire, nicely quashes this tendency. I imagine that they had that in mind when they wrote it down, although it's often overlooked by moderns simply because it's done it's job too well, and thusly we've never had to deal with military dictators.
 
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General Sherman said:
Caesar was assassinated because, unlike Sulla and Augustus, he didn't massacre all of his political opponents.
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I agree with you in part. Though there was no wholesale slaughter of the political class under Octavian/Augustus (Octavians proscriptions were aimed largely at the merchant class) as their was under Sulla. In fact I think Ceasars arrogance and inability to compromise with the Roman political class lead directly to his assasination and I think Augustus took serious note of that when he offered the Principate as his compromise to the Roman political class in exchange for autocratic power. In principle you are correct. Had Ceasar anihilated his political opponents he probably would not have been assasinated.
 
General Sherman said:
How can you seriously say that Sulla was your favorite? Sulla was a monster. Augustus's reign is only really saved at all because he lived long enough to clean up after himself and tidy up his image - if he had died in, say, 30 BC, one of the worst things you could've said about Caesar was the fact that he gave his inheritance to the bastard.
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I agree. Sulla was a monster. He was also a remarkable multi-faceted individual. He arose from extreme poverty to enter the Political class. Though he lacked the connections and training early in life to have been a military cadet or a tribune of the soldiers he still managed to rise up the Roman military ranks to become one of the greatest Roman generals ever. Sulla was one of the few Roman generals to win the grass crown. As a General he never lost a battle and he won some of the most lopsided victories in all of military history against overwhelmingly superior forces where he was outnumber 4 or 5 to 1. To add to that Sulla was an extremely subtle politician (which was Marius's downfall) he understood power, how to gain it, how to use it and he was particularly adept at manipulating the mechanics of fear to meet his ends. Then when he had mastery over the entire Roman world and very well could have made himself a King, he simply walked away from it. It is often said that when Machiavelli wrote "The Prince" that the chapter "The Lion and The Fox" that he specifically had in mind the career of Lucious Cornelius Sulla when he wrote that chapter. So yes, Sulla is one of my favortes.

As for Augustus, I think you mischaracterize him. He may not have been the universal genius that Julius Ceasar was nor was he even remotely in Ceasars league as a military commander but as a politician his genius and practicality far exceeded that of Ceasar and his Principate was a monumental human achievement from which many of the germinal beginings of government institions we now take for granted sprang. In this respect Augusts was one, if not the most influential politicians in all of Western history.
 
General Sherman said:
Also, almost all of Sulla's reforms were gone in 10 years. The only lasting legacy of Sulla was setting the precedent that turning your army on Rome is a valid way to get what you want, and that murder of your political opponents was fine as well. Sulla had more to do with the death of the republic than Caesar did.

When reading Augustus's account of his own career, and his claim that he "relinquished power" and gave it back to the senate, I must merely roll my eyes. Caesar may have been a tyrant, but at least he was an honest one. Augustus, I supposed, learned that a spoonful of sugar helps the tyranny go down. People are still eating up his bullshit to this day.

Not that I weep for the death of the republic. The empire was, in pretty much all respects, a huge improvement. The republic was a city-state government trying to govern an empire. For one thing, all power was concentrated in Rome, so it's not like anyone anywhere else in the empire had "liberty". For another, it was really just an ogliarchy. For the people living in the provinces, the switch to empire was had particular importance. The proconsuls appointed to govern the provinces by the republic were typically corrupt Roman autocrats who squeezed the province in order to enrich themselves.

After the empire, when all the proconsuls were suddenly responsible to one man, proconsuls that tried to use their office to bring glory and wealth to themselves tended to not live so long. And it's not like the empire was even the death of republics - the Romans typically kept local republics and democracies in power to govern themselves after conquest. The empire mainly dealt with military matters, infrastructure, and kept the cities, governed internally by their own ancient political system, from fighting amongst each other. And in this area, it was a huge improvement than the previous system, of giving one of these city-state republics total domination over the others. Unfortunately, most of this would come to an end with the coming of the Dominate in the 4th century.

We wouldn't really see another age of republics until the modern era. This time around, though, the presidential and parliamentary systems were a huge improvement over the Roman system with regards to governing large areas of landmasses. It combined the liberty of a republic with what Hamilton would call the ability for "energetic government" that only monarchies and empires had previously possessed. Importantly, all people are participants in modern republics, not just a single large city.

One thing that's often overlooked is the brilliance of the founders putting the president at the top of the military chain of command - huge armies loyal to their general, rather than the state itself, had been a huge problem with the Roman republic. Putting the head of the political system at the top of the chain of command in the military, as things were in the empire, nicely quashes this tendency. I imagine that they had that in mind when they wrote it down, although it's often overlooked by moderns simply because it's done it's job too well, and thusly we've never had to deal with military dictators.
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Hey I didn't say Sulla was a nice fella though I wouldn't place as much blame on Sulla as you do for the collapse of the Republic cause, as you pointed out, the Republic was not suited and was in fact incompetent and corrupt at running a world wide empire. What really lead to the collapse of the Republic, and lets be honest, that was a progression of events from the Gracchi rebellion, to the Marian military reforms, to the Social Wars, to Sulla's constitutional reforms, To the First Triumvirate, To Pompey Consulship with out a colleage to Ceasars Dictatorship to the second Triumvarite to Augustus creation of the Principate the collapse of the Republic was a series of events and steps that occurred over a 100 years period of time of which Sulla did play a significant role.

As for Augustus, well hell yea a little bit of sugar helped the tyranny go down. He'd have been dead had he done otherwise as the political class would have never tolerated him and as you've pointed out the improvements of the Principate in how more efficiently and affectively the Imperium governed the Empire vs the Republic is in large measure to the genius of Augustus Principiate. I think that once Ceasar crossed the Rubicon an autocratic form of government was a fordrawn conclusion as this is what the people wanted. They wanted political stability, an end to civil wars, competent, reliable and predictable governance and Augusts gave that to them with his Principate.
 
Derp Derp said:
I agree. Sulla was a monster. He was also a remarkable multi-faceted individual. He arose from extreme poverty to enter the Political class. Though he lacked the connections and training early in life to have been a military cadet or a tribune of the soldiers he still managed to rise up the Roman military ranks to become one of the greatest Roman generals ever. Sulla was one of the few Roman generals to win the grass crown. As a General he never lost a battle and he won some of the most lopsided victories in all of military history against overwhelmingly superior forces where he was outnumber 4 or 5 to 1. To add to that Sulla was an extremely subtle politician (which was Marius's downfall) he understood power, how to gain it, how to use it and he was particularly adept at manipulating the mechanics of fear to meet his ends. Then when he had mastery over the entire Roman world and very well could have made himself a King, he simply walked away from it. It is often said that when Machiavelli wrote "The Prince" that the chapter "The Lion and The Fox" that he specifically had in mind the career of Lucious Cornelius Sulla when he wrote that chapter. So yes, Sulla is one of my favortes.
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He did set the precedents that lead to the end of the republic. Once something has been done, it cannot be undone. If you use these extreme tactics in order to "preserve the republic", I assure you, people will follow in your footsteps. That is the one thing that those who use "any means necessary" fail to realize - by using dirty means to get a desired ends, you are giving the means legitimacy. He perceived that the republic had some disease, and overreacted. He was the lupus of the republic.

Derp Derp said:
As for Augustus, I think you mischaracterize him. He may not have been the universal genius that Julius Ceasar was nor was he even remotely in Ceasars league as a military commander but as a politician his genius and practicality far exceeded that of Ceasar and his Principate was a monumental human achievement from which many of the germinal beginings of government institions we now take for granted sprang. In this respect Augusts was one, if not the most influential politicians in all of Western history.
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Well, I suppose his reign had a lot of good effects.
 
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General Sherman said:
He did set the precedents that lead to the end of the republic. Once something has been done, it cannot be undone. If you use these extreme tactics in order to "preserve the republic", I assure you, people will follow in your footsteps. That is the one thing that those who use "any means necessary" fail to realize - by using dirty means to get a desired ends, you are giving the means legitimacy. He perceived that the republic had some disease, and overreacted. He was the lupus of the republic.



Well, I suppose his reign had a lot of good effects.
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He wasn't the only one though. With out the Marian reforms which created the capite cense legions nor the short sightedness of the Senate to adequately provide for those soldiers gave the motivation to the legionares to be loyal to their generals and not the Senate of Rome. With out the Marian reforms the conditions for Sulla's march on Rome would not have existed and you can also state that the Senates short sightedness about the capite cense legions played as much of a roll on those legions which marched on Rome as Sullas leadership did. I mean you are correct about the precedent Sulla set but you do see what I mean about the series of events that ended the Republic. There was a lot of blame to go around.
 
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