One of the most important functions of the senate under the Emperors was that it served as an organ of publication, and kept the public in communication with the government. The Emperor could communicate to the senate important events at home or abroad, and though these communications were not formally public, they reached the public ear. It was usual for a new Princeps on his accession to lay before the senate a programme of his intended policy, and this was of course designed for the benefit of a much larger audience than that assembled in the Curia.
SECT. III. — THE PRINCEPS AND THE MAGISTRATES
We have seen that the republican magistrates continued to be elected under the Empire, and they were still supposed to exercise their functions independently. Under the dictatorship of Julius Caesar, they had been subject to the mains Imperium of the dictator; but it was not so under the Principate. The Princeps has no maius imperium over them, as he has over the proconsul abroad. His power is only co-ordinate, but on the other hand it is quite independent.
The dignity of the consulate was maintained, and it was still a coveted post. Indeed new, though reflected, lustre seemed to be shed on the supreme magistracy by the fact that it was the only magistracy which the Princeps deigned occasionally to hold himself. To be the Emperor's colleague was a great distinction indeed. The consuls still gave their name to the year of their office, and they retained the right of conducting and controlling the elections in the popular assemblies. It has already been mentioned that a new senatorial court was instituted, in which they were the presiding judges. Augustus also assigned the consuls some new duties in civil jurisdiction. But he introduced the fashion of replacing the consuls who entered upon office in January by a new pair ofconsules suffecti at the end of six months. This custom, however, was not definitely legalized, and was sometimes not observed. In later times four-monthly consulates were introduced, and later still two-monthly.
The number of praetors had been increased to sixteen by Julius Caesar. Augustus at first reduced the number to eight; he then added two praetores aerarii; afterwards he increased them again to sixteen, but finally fixed the number at twelve. The chief duties of the praetors were, as before, judicial. But Augustus assigned to them the obligation of celebrating public games, which formerly had devolved upon the consuls and the aediles.
A college of ten tribunes was still elected every year, but the office became unimportant, and the chief duties of a tribune were municipal. The aediles also lost many of their functions.
Augustus divided the city of Rome into fourteen regions, over each of which an overseer or prefect presided; these overseers were chosen from the praetors,aediles, and tribunes.
The quaestorship was a more serious and laborious office. Sulla had fixed the number of quarters at twenty; Julius Caesar raised it to forty; Augustus reduced it again to twenty. Quaestors were assigned to the governors of senatorial provinces; the proconsul of Sicily had two. Two quaestors were at the disposal of the Emperor, to bear communications between him and the senate. The consuls had four quaestors, and these were two quaestores urbani.
This magistracy had an importance over and above its proper functions, in that it qualified for admission into the senate. Thus as long as the quaestors were elected by the comitia, the people had a direct voice in the formation of the senate; and thus, too, the Emperor, by his right of commendation already mentioned, exercised a great though indirect influence on the constitution of that body.
The vigintivirate was held before the quaestorship. It comprised four distinct boards: the tresviri capitales, on whom it devolved to execute capital sentences; the tresviri monetales, who presided at the mint; the quatuorviri viis in urbe purgandis, officers who looked after the streets of Rome; and thedecemviri iudicandis, who were now appointed to preside in the centumviral courts.
The Republican magistrates formed a civil service and executive for the senate. The Princeps had no such assistance at his disposal. As a magistrate, he was supposed, like a consul or a praetor, to do everything himself. The personal activity, which is presupposed on the part of the Princeps, is one of the features which distinguish the Principate from monarchy. It followed, as a consequence of this theory, that all the officials, who carried out the details of administration for which the Emperor was responsible, were not public officers, but the private servants of the Emperor. A freedman fulfilled duties which in a monarchy would devolve upon a secretary of state. The Emperor had theoretically a perfect rightto have appointed, if he chose, freedmen, or citizens of any rank, as governors in the provinces which he was supposed to govern himself. It was due to the sound policy of Augustus and his self-control that he made it a strict rule, which his successors maintained, only to appoint senators, and in certain cases knights, to those posts. He also voluntarily defined the qualification of equestrian rank for the financial officers, procuratores Augusti, who represented him in the provinces. But the position of the knights must be more fully explained.
SECT. IV — THE EQUITES.
The equestrian order was reorganized by Augustus, and altered both in its constitution and in its political position.
(1) Constitution. In the early Republic the equites were the citizen cavalry, who were provided with horses for their military service at public cost. But in the later Republic there had come to be three classes of equites; those who were provided with public horses (eques Romanus equo publico), those who provided their own horses, and those who by estate or otherwise were qualified for cavalry service but did not serve. The two last classes were not in the strictest speech Roman knights, and they were abolished altogether by Augustus, who thus returned to the system of the early Republic. Henceforward every knight is aneques Romanus equo publico, and the whole ordo equester consists of such.
(2) Admission. The Emperor himself assumed the right of granting the public horse which secured entry into the equestrial order. The chief qualifications were the equestrian census, free birth, soundness of body, good character, but the qualification of free birth was not strictly insisted on under the Empire, and freedmen were often raised to be knights. A senator's son necessarilybecame a knight by virtue of his birth, and thus for men born in senatorial rank, knighthood was a regular stage before entry into the senate. There was a special official department (A.D. census equitum Romanorum) for investigating the qualifications of those who were admitted into either of “the two orders”, (ordo uterque) as the senate and the knights were called.
(3) Life-tenure. Another innovation of Augustus consisted in making the rank of knight tenable for life. Apart from degradation, as a punishment or as a consequence of the reduction of his income below the equestrian rating (400,000 sesterces), a knight does not cease to be a knight, unless he becomes a senator or enters legionary service. Legionary service was so attractive under the Empire that cases often occurred of knights surrendering their rank in order to become centurions.
(4) Equitum probatio. It was an old custom that the equites Romani equo publico should ride annually, on the Ides of July, in full military caparison from the Temple of Mars at the Porta Capena, first to the Forum to offer sacrifice there to their patron gods, Castor and Pollux, and then on to the Capitol. This procession, called the transvectio equitum had fallen into disuse, and Augustus revived it and combined with it an equitum probatio, or “review of the knights”. Sitting on horseback and ordered according to their turmae, the knights passed before the Emperor, and the name of each was called aloud. The names of any whose behavior had given cause for censure were passed over, and they were thus expelled from the order. Here the Emperor discharged duties which before the time of Sulla had been discharged by the censors. He was assisted by three