Tribune

“ The tribune is restored to you, the tribune which so many orators, whose names history has preserved, has made illustrious. A parliament which discusses is a parliament that works. And, to tell you the real truth, I am glad to see here a group of opposition deputies. There will always be amongst us opponents who will try to find us at fault, and who, by doing so, will make our good faith show conspicuously. We solicit the most generous treatment for them. We fear neither passion nor scandal, nor abuse of the freedom of speech, dangerous though these things be. ”

“ For as he stood in the tribune, the picture of the field of daisies and poppies suggested the picture of Spring. A speaker is not always responsible for the frolics of his fancy. Indeed, an audience of some five thousand souls, all intent upon this opaque, mysterious Entity in the tribune, is bound to reach the very heart of it ”

“ What—shall the traitor rear
His head amid our tribune—and blaspheme
Each patriot? shall the hireling slave of faction—
St. Just.
I am of no one faction. I contend
Against all factions.
Tallien.
I espouse the cause
Of truth. ”

“ The weakest, from a Roman standpoint or indeed from that of any stable political society, was the identification of the permanent and temporary character of an institution, the assumption that a meeting of the people was the people, that a tribune was the tribune. ”

“ It was the duty of the Government, remarked the young tribune, to calm, not to augment, the fever of popular excitement by acts of an arbitrary and autocratic character,—such as instigating ridiculous prosecutions, and casting doubt on the loyalty of men who had long and faithfully served the Crown, and whose only fault was to set their country above their party. ”

“ A pale, thin-faced gentleman next ascended the platform (or tribune, as it was called) amid shouts of applause from the English, and began his speech in rather a low tone, when compared with the sharp voice of Vincent, or the thunder of the Abbe Duguerry. An audience is not apt to be pleased or even contented with an inferior speaker, when surrounded by eloquent men, and I looked every moment for manifestations of disapprobation, as I felt certain that the English delegation had made a mistake in applauding this gentleman who seemed to make such an unpromising beginning. ”

“ He also, as he passed, turned his deep grey eye toward the little group on the green, and his face lightened up, as he surveyed the athletic form and vigorous proportions of the young patrician, and he leaned toward the officer, who rode beside him, a high crested tribune of the tenth legion, and enquired his name audibly. ”

“ A slight shade darkened the Tribune’s brow at these words: but moving on, a long line of nobles and princes on either side, he regained his self-possession, and the dignity he had dropped with his former equals. Thus he passed through the crowd, and gradually disappeared.
“He bears him bravely,” said one, as the revellers reseated themselves. “Noticed you the ‘we’—the style royal?”
“But it must be owned that he lords it well,” said the ambassador of the Visconti: “less pride would be cringing to his haughty court.”
“Why,” said a professor of Bologna, “why is the Tribune called proud? ”

“ Let him become, let him become a tribune by all means, if for no other reason, yet that you may be brought back from Epirus! For I don't see how you can possibly afford to miss him, especially if he shall elect to have a wrangle with me! ”

“ I come not to ask a favor, I demand liberty of speech The soldier, hindered in doing his duty, breaks his sword, if the liberty of the tribune is dead, tell me so, that I may destroy my commission On the day the tribune shall be no longer free, I shall descend, never to mount it again (From the right,—A dreadful calamity, truly!) The tribune without liberty is acceptable only to the orator without self-respect (Profound sensation)
Well, I shall see if the tribune is respected I continue No! After Napoleon the Great, I would not have Napoleon the Little! ”

“ The tribunes belong to the people, and the people know it. Place a tribune in the centre of the world, and in a few days, in the four corners of the earth, the Republic will arise. The tribune shines for the people, and they are not unaware of it. Sometimes the tribune irritates the people, and makes them foam with rage; sometimes they beat it with their waves, they overflow it even, as on the 15th of May, but then they retire majestically like the ocean, and leave it standing upright like a beacon. To overthrow the tribune is, on the part of the people, rank folly ”

“ It is a people conscious of their political power and dignity, an organised people; it is a people with a constituted head, capable of instructing them in the doctrine of political duties and rights. It is the tribune now who conducts this review of the Military Hero's civil claims. It is the careful, learned Tribune who initiates, from the heights of his civil wisdom, this great, popular veto, this deliberate 'rejection' of the popular affirmation. ”

“ Some of the concessions made at this time related to temporary provisions for relief of debtors; but the great innovation was that which established the office of tribune. The character of the office of tribune is absolutely unique in the political history of the world. The tribunes, elected by the people in the comitia tributa, were plebeian officers who were at first without any constructive part in the carrying on of the Roman government and whose sole duty at the outset [52] was to protect the members of the plebeian order from the oppression of the patrician officials. ”

“ I wish it were possible to give the entire extract, but I must content myself with a few quotations from it. "'A tribune,' he said, 'of the people, is sacred indeed, and ought to be inviolable, because in a manner consecrated to be the guardian and protector of them; but if he degenerates so far as to oppress the people, abridge their powers, and take away their liberty of voting, he stands deprived by his own act of honors and immunities, by the neglect of the duty for which the honor was bestowed upon him..... ”

“ Those great and excellent truths can never cease to exist, so completely are they blended with our fame, our monuments, and our prodigies. We have washed away their first stains in the flood of glory, and they will henceforth be immortal. 62Created in the French tribune, cemented with the blood of battles, adorned with the laurels of victory, saluted with the acclamations of the people, sanctioned by the treaties and alliances of Sovereigns, and having become familiar to the ears as well as in the mouths of Kings, these principles can never again retrograde! ”

“ His veiled threats, uttered during his rare appearances at the speaker's tribune, embraced even the most popular, the most prominent, amongst the representatives of the people. Every one, in fact, who was likely to stand in his way when he was ready to snatch the supreme power. ”

“ If I shall propose ten tribunes of the commons, if you elect this day less than ten tribunes of the people, then that those whom they may have chosen as colleagues for themselves be legitimate tribunes of the people, by the same law as those whom you have this day elected tribunes of the people. ”

“ The tribune shuddered and blushed, and commanded that they should be kept with more humanity, so that permission was given to their brethren and others to go in and be refreshed with them; even the keeper of the prison trusting them now himself. ”

“ Judging men and women by his own evil nature, and knowing well the favour with which their female admirers regarded these votaries of the sword, the tribune did not hesitate to put its true construction on such kindly feelings, and their probable result. ”

“ The crowding of the lawless throng against the front of the tribune, on which the chief characters of the scene are portrayed, though not in a material sense wrong, must be open to much æsthetic dispute; must mar the success and the action of reflex thought, the spiritual contest waging and recoiling between the Divine, meek victim and the surging rabble. ”

“ Every seat is distinguished by a number, so that a deputy can never be at a loss to find his place. In the centre, is an elevated rostrum, with a seat for the President, directly under which is the tribune, also elevated, for the orator addressing the assembly. The tribune is decorated by a bas-relief, in white marble, representing France writing her constitution, and Fame proclaiming it. ”

“ In a word, you must secure friends of every class: for show—men conspicuous for their office or name, who, even if they do not give any actual assistance in canvassing, yet add some dignity to the candidate; to maintain your just rights—magistrates, consuls first and then tribunes to secure the votes of the centuries—men of eminent popularity. Those who either have gained or hope to gain the vote of a tribe or century, or any other advantage, through your influence, take all pains to collect and secure. ”

“ The quaestors and lower officials had neither of these rights; and the theory of the tribune’s being an exceptional magistrate who should render assistance in person [728] was so far preserved that he had only the right of arrest. [729] We sometimes meet with tribunes who carried out their mandates with their own hands, but their presence alone was sufficient for the prensio to be effective; in early times they used their aediles for the act of violence, in later times their viatores. ”

“ But, as the army increased, the popular assembly insisted on having a voice in the appointments, and from 362 B.C. six tribunes were annually nominated by popular vote, while in 311 the number was raised to sixteen, and in 207 to twenty-four, at which figure it remained. The tribunes thus elected ranked as magistrates of the Roman people, and were designated tribuni militum a populo, while those who owed their office to the consuls bore the curious title of tribuni rufuli. ”

“ I 314 suspect, however, that the sublimity of the spectacle would be considerably lessened by a too great familiarity with it; and that if, instead of being occasionally hoisted outside a lantern to catch an uncertain sight and a broken sound of what was passing within the temple, we were in the constant habit of being ushered into so commodious a tribune as we occupied yesterday at the Chamber of Deputies, we might soon cease to experience the sort of reverence with which we looked down from thence upon the collected wisdom of France. ”

“ The experience of thirteen years convinced him that an honest and energetic ministry, which had nothing to fear from the revelations of the tribune, and which was not of a humour to be intimidated by extreme parties, gained far more than it lost by parliamentary struggles. ”

“ The tribunes were thus in their origin only a protecting magistracy of the plebs, but in the course of time their power increased to such a degree that it surpassed that of all other magistrates, and the tribunes then became a magistracy for the whole Roman people, in opposition to the senate and the oligarchical party in general, although they had nothing to do with the administration or the government. During the latter period of the republic they became true tyrants, and may be compared to the national convention of France during the first revolution. ”

“ A military man, by habit as by nature, who had served for more than thirty years as tribune, præfect of allies, commander of a legion, and lastly prætor, all with exceeding great distinction, he knew nearly all the men in his ranks by sight, was acquainted with their services and honors, had led them oftentimes to glory, and was their especial favorite. ”

“ The men, if in uniform or full court dresses, are admitted to a tribune within the choir; while the inferior crowd, left to shift for themselves, rush in with an impetuosity none can resist; for though none are admitted at all to the chapel without tickets, yet the number of applicants (almost exclusively foreign) is much too great for the limited capacity of the place. A scene of indescribable confusion ensues. The guards get mingled with the multitude. English peers are overturned by Roman canons. ”

“ The tribunes had been instituted as the champions of the oppressed, when the plebs feared oppression. It was resolved that they should not interfere on the weaker side when the democracy were the strongest. They were chosen by the people as their defence against the aristocracy. It was not to be borne that they should become the agents of the aristocracy to make them once more supreme. Against a popular tribune, whom no colleague was suffered to oppose, the wealthy classes were defenceless. ”

“ As it was in the Campus Martius that the people were to vote in their centuries, and the defendant, stretching forth his hands towards the Capitol, had turned from men to the gods in his prayers, it became evident to the tribunes that unless they could release men's spell-bound eyes from the visible reminder of his glorious deed, their minds, wholly possessed with the sense of the service he had done them, would find no place for charges against him, however true. ”

“ In the Tribune, is a Holy Family, into which he has introduced a variety of naked figures in different attitudes, that have not the smallest connection with the subject of the picture, but intrude impertinently to mar its effect. ”

“ That the tribunes might be always easily found, they were not allowed to go more than one mile beyond the city walls. Their houses were to be open night as well as day, that any plebeian unjustly dealt with might flee thither for protection and refuge. ”

“ When a great part of the commonalty was grown cool, and it appeared from their orderly and peaceful behavior that they had been very much appeased by what they had heard, the tribunes, standing up, declared, in the name of the people, that since the senate was pleased to act soberly and do them reason, they, likewise, should be ready to yield in all that was fair and equitable on their side ”