Comitia

“ Comitia curiata consisted of the members of the thirty curiae, that is, the patricians, who formed exclusively the populus in the early times. They were convened, in the kingly period, by the king himself, or by his tribunus celerum, and in the king’s absence by the praefectus urbi. After the death of a king the comitia were held by the interrex. In the republican period, the president was always one of the high patrician magistrates, viz. a consul, praetor, or dictator. They were called together by lictors or heralds. The votes were given by curiae, each curia having one collective vote ”

“ The Comitia of the Centuries still retained the election of the higher magistrates, the power of enacting laws, of declaring war [Pg 121] and making peace, and also the highest judicial functions. Accusations for treason were brought before the Centuries, and in all criminal matters every Roman citizen could appeal to them. [46] But, notwithstanding these extensive powers, their influence in the state was gradually superseded by the Assembly of the Tribes.
3. The Comitia Tributa obtained its superior influence and power mainly through its Tribunes. ”

“ The plebeian assembly, which had perhaps originally met by curiae, was organized on the basis of the territorial tribes in 471 B.C. This change suggested a renewed organization of the whole people for comitial purposes. The comitia tributa populi was the result. ”

“ But popular phraseology did not conform to this canon, and comitia, which gained in current Latin the sense of “elections” was sometimes used of the assemblies of the plebs (see the instances in Botsford, distinction between Comitia and Concilium, p. 23) . The distinction between comitia and contio was more clearly marked. Both were formal assemblies convened by a magistrate ”

“ During the republic the Campus Martius was employed specially for two purposes. (1.) As a place for holding the constitutional assemblies (comitia) especially the Comitia Centuriata, and also for ordinary public meetings (conciones) . (2.) For gymnastic and warlike sports. For seven centuries it remained almost entirely open. ... In the Comitia, the citizens, when their votes were taken, passed into enclosures termed septa, or ovilia, which were, for a long period, temporary wooden erections."
W. Ramsay, Manual of Roman Antiquity, chapter 1. ”

“ Hence, although all Roman citizens appeared in these comitia on a footing of equality, yet by far the greater power was thrown into the hands of the wealthy.—As regards the functions of the comitia centuriata, they were— (a.) The election of magistrates. The magistrates that were elected by the centuries are the consuls (whence the assembly is called comitia consularia) , the praetors (hence comitia praetoria) , the military tribunes with consular power, the censors, and the decemvirs. (b.) Legislation. ”

“ CONCĬLĬUM generally has the same meaning as conventus or conventio, but the technical import of concilium in the Roman constitution was an assembly of a portion of the people as distinct from the general assemblies or comitia. Accordingly, as the comitia tributa embraced only a portion of the Roman people, viz. the plebeians, these comitia are often designated by the term concilia plebis. ”

“ Had all the patricians attended the comitia by virtue of the right they had as citizens, they would not, as mere private individuals, have had any considerable influence on a vote reckoned by counting heads, where the meanest proletarian was as good as the princeps senatus. ”

“ This law gave to the decrees passed by the tribes the power of a real lex, binding upon the whole people, provided they obtained the sanction of the senate and the populus, that is, the people assembled in the comitia curiata or in the comitia centuriata. ”

“ Plebs, distinguished from populus, 1, n. 3; origin of, 16, 21; relation to clients, 22; belong to populus, 23 ff.; to tribes and curiae, 24; to gentes, 28-31; vote in comitia curiata, 25, 32; Mommsen on, 34-6; not the conquered, 43; in army, 75, n. 1; right to auspices, 101-3; assembly of termed comitia, 120; first secession of, 262; in contio, 263; community of, 264 f.; misunderstanding with government, 268; meaning of word in Valerian-Horatian law, 275-7; Publilian law on, 301 f.; condition of in third Samnite war, 311; leaders of ally with patricians, 330 ”

“ Briefly, then, believing as I do, that the comitiary, as distinguished from a representative, constitution is essential to the vitality of Church Congresses, I further believe that restrictions in the nature of, and as stringent as, those which exist, are indispensable to guard the order, and in guarding the order to maintain the liberty, of rational debate. ”

“ Jurors, see Iudices. Juventus Thalna, M., tribal lex de bello indicendo of, 231. Kalumniator, 400. Kaput legis, 463, n. 6. Κήρυκες, 153, n. 3. King, auspices of, 103; presidency of contio, 140; of comitia calata, 154; curiata, 173 ff.; right to address people, 145, 173; as legislator, 177 f.; irresponsible, 180; powers of, 181; jurisdiction, 182; election, 182-4, 189 f.; declares war, 175 f., 181, 230. Klebs, on reformed comitia centuriata, 223, 225. Knights, see Equites. Kornemann, on lex Scantinia, 357, n. 13. Laelius Felix, defines comitia and concilium, 119; not in accord with Livy, 119-25 ”

“ And in each country we have only to reckon with a sovereign a few bishops and nobles, and a large uneducated mass of people, not as to-day, with the most far-reaching representation—with an emperor and a diet, a king or queen and a parliament, a president and a senate. And all this simplicity of the times is admirably reflected in the documents that have come down to us. ”

“ Faction within the country was the inevitable consequence, and the arrangements of the constitution made faction permanent. There was no middle class. The nation had not gone through the same processes as other Western people. Nobility was easily obtained, and Its peculiar institutions. each member of the nobility ranked as the peer of all the rest. Below the ranks of the nobility came the serfs. Political power, and also most of the executive, was vested in this wide aristocratical democracy. Usually delegates of the nobles constituted a governing house. ”

“ The new nobility were the creatures of the Crown, hence bound to support it; the clergy were timid, the Commons anything but bold, so that Parliament gradually became the servile echo and ready instrument of the throne. ”

“ An organic senatus-consultum, proposed to the Senate by the titular high dignitaries of the Empire and submitted for the acceptance of the people, appoints the emperor and controls in his family the order of inheritance, from male to male, to the perpetual exclusion of women and their descendants. Until the moment in which the election of the new emperor is completed, the affairs of the state are directed by the ministers, who form themselves into a council of government and who make their decisions by a majority of votes. The secretary of state keeps the register of the deliberations. ”

“ This second form began to manifest itself in the Lower Status of barbarism, after confederacies were formed, and it became definite in the Middle Status. The office of general, or principal military commander, was the germ of that of a chief executive magistrate, the king, the emperor, and the president. It may be called a government of two powers, namely, the council of chiefs, and the general. ”

“ The States General shall henceforth meet whenever they may think fit and without requiring the consent of the King, to deliberate upon the government of the kingdom, and the vote of the nobility and clergy shall have no binding power over the deputies of the communes. ”

“ This standing Council of the Empire was to be formed of a President, one Elector, one Bishop, one Prince, one Count, and sixteen representatives of the States. It was to summon the Diet, of which it served as a standing committee, to nominate the members of the Imperial Chamber, to collect taxes, to maintain order at home, and decide on questions of peace and war. Although under the presidency of the Emperor or his Stadtholder, nothing of importance could be done without its leave, and thus it shared the executive power with him. ”

“ Great are the Advantages which both the King and People may receive by a well-ordered Parliament; there is nothing more expresseth the Majesty and Supream Power of a King, than such an Assembly, wherein all his People acknowledg him for Soveraign Lord, and make all their Addresses to him by humble Petition and Supplication; and by their Consent and Approbation do strengthen all the Laws, which the King, at their Request and by their Advice and Ministry, shall ordain. ”

“ An elective monarchy is one in which the succession is by election; the term for life; example, the old German empire, in which the emperor was chosen by certain princes called "electors." [Footnote: Our mode of electing a president may have been suggested in part by this old practice.]
An absolute monarchy is one in which the three functions of government as related to law—the legislative, executive and judicial—are all vested in one person ”

“ THE STATES OF FRANCE were general assemblies of the three states or orders of the kingdom; the Clergy, the Nobility, and the ‘Tiers Etat’, that is, the people. They used to be called together by the King, upon the most important affairs of state, like our Lords and Commons in parliament, and our Clergy in convocation. Our parliament is our states, and the French parliaments are only their courts of justice. ”

“ We can imagine when the council rose, that the angel who watched over the youth of our republic, and who had trembled for the result, clapped his hands for joy, and that the exultant sound, taken up by messenger after messenger, passed from hierarch to hierarch, until all heaven rang with the acclaim. ”

“ Upon ascending the throne, the King shall take an oath in the presence of the two Chambers to observe faithfully the present constitution. Article 23. The regent, before entering on the duties of that office, shall swear fidelity to the King and faithful observance of this constitution and of the laws of the State. Article 24. All the inhabitants of the Kingdom, whatever their rank or title, shall enjoy equality before the law. All shall equally enjoy civil and political rights and be eligible to civil and military office, except as otherwise provided by law. ”

“ In the new kingdoms, settled on foreign soil, we find an essentially military kingship, an imperium vested in a particular family. These kings either established themselves in Roman cities, such as Ravenna, Langres or York, or moved about from one royal estate to another. Of national assemblies we have frequently no trace at all, while the council is identical with the comitatus and consists of relatives and nominees of the king. ”

“ The Chief Departments of the State; the Dual Control of Senate and Princeps
We have already seen that, in the most essential fact of sovereignty—the creation of the Principate—the Senate and people, or rather the Senate as representing the people, was theoretically supreme. [1802] The attribute of sovereignty that comes nearest to this is the power of legislation, for it is one that the “determinate human superior” generally retains in his own hands. ”

“ Let who is to be our first chief be at the election of us all. For who shall follow, be it he or she whom it shall please the governor of the day to appoint, whenas the hour of vespers draweth near, and let each in turn, at his or her discretion, order and dispose of the place and manner wherein we are to live, for such time as his or her seignory shall endure. ”

“ We absolve, at the same time, the electors, princes, and states, and all that belong to the empire, particularly the members of the supreme tribunal, and other magistrates of the empire, from those duties by which they were united to us as the legal chief of the empire, according to the constitution. ”

“ The forty-first congress assembles at an auspicious period in the history of our government. The splendid and impressive ceremonial which we have just witnessed in another part of the capitol [Grant’s inauguration] , appropriately symbolizes the triumphs of the past, and the hopes of the future, a great chieftain, whose sword at the head of gallant and victorious armies, saved the Republic from dismemberment and ruin, has been fitly called to the highest civic honor which a grateful people can bestow. ”

“ And I say to you, Charles, and to you, Frederick, Kings, and to you, ye other Princes and Tyrants, see who sits by the side of you in council, and count how many times a day this aim of human life is indicated to you by your councillors. ”

“ A third Congress met at Asuncion, October 3, 1814, to nomi- nate new magistrates, and these legislative bodies began to assume the type which they have ever since borne. The chief authority. Consul, Dictator, or President, chooses the members by his right to appoint the President of Congress, the latter chooses the commandants of dis- tricts, and these again choose their delegates for each
' partido '^ or arrondissement : thus all the citizens vote, and Congress chooses the Consul, Dictator, or President, who virtually chooses himself. ”

“ This was a great gain for the plebeians. Yet the patricians were strong enough in this assembly to control its action. On occasions of extraordinary peril, a Dictator might be selected by one of the consuls, who was to have absolute authority for the time. The Senate commonly had an important part, however, in the selection of this officer. There was a Master of Horse to command the knights under him. He was appointed by the dictator.
RELIGION.—Worship in families was conducted by the head of the household, the paterfamilias, who offered the regular sacrifices. ”