Political Parties In Ancient Rome

Due to the expanding Roman Empire, politics there were not the same as they had been in the Roman Republic. The Roman Republic had a system of checks and balances. This system was in place to keep any person or group of people from being too powerful. In the Roman Empire, there was no such system. The emperor held all the power. He controlled the entire government. The Senate could no longer make laws without the emperor’s approval. The emperor only appointed senators who supported him politically. In the Empire, the emperor could declare war or agree upon treaties with other nations. Only the Senate had the right to do this in the Republic.

Briefly, at the beginning, Rome had a monarchy, until being overthrown by wealthy, powerful citizens who declared Rome a republic and established the Senate. Ultimately, the Republic and Senate became corrupted, and Rome was controlled by an emperor. Imitating the Greek democracy, the Roman Republic and Senate was designed to balance out power, preventing any one person from having too much control over Roman politics. However, the spread of power was very limited. Only free male citizens could participate in government.

The Roman government was democratic when it came to the citizens. The citizens could elect their own officials, and the officials were supposed to represent every level of Roman society. There were many types of officials. The two consuls were the chief officials of Rome. Once elected, they served for two years (Trueman, Chris). One of their most important powers was controlling the army (Government under Roman Republic). When they were unsure of a course of action, they were advised by the Senate, a council of around six hundred male citizens (Trueman, Chris). Those six hundred men were usually from wealthy patrician families and were the ones in charge of making the laws and controlling the spending. Contrary to the election of the other officials, the Senate was appointed by the current Consuls. Once they were appointed, they served for life. When one member died, another was chosen in their place (Government).

At the beginning Rome wasn´t a Republic, they were ruled by a king before. That fact helped The Senate to listen to the people, listen to their thoughts and feelings, and that thing made them overthrew their king and start making a Republic. As you read, people elected their own governors and also, they elected two top Senators, called consuls. The consuls had to do what the members of the Senate suggested and always look for the benefit of the citizens. However, they were just elected for a year and then they had to be elected again. This method worked very

The great Abe Lincoln once said, “A house divided against itself cannot stand.” This describes the dangers and adversities America faced in the early stages of its development with the fighting going on between the two major political parties that were forming in the newborn government. The beginning of our country is an exciting tale, that tells many people coming together and fighting off the all-powerful England, a classic “David and Goliath” story. However, after the stunning victory for America, our Founding Fathers struggled to agree on what the future America should look like. The two main parties were the Federalists and the Republicans. Alexander Hamilton was the main founder of the Federalist party

Political parties as we know them did not begin to develop until the late 1600s. The ancient Greeks, who were pioneers in developing democracy, had no organized political parties in the modern sense. The senate of the ancient Romans had two groups that represented people with different interests — the Patricians and the Plebeians. The Patricians represented noble families. The Plebeians represented the wealthy merchants and the middle class. Although these two groups often mingled, at times they voted as factions, or parties, on particular issues that were important to the groups they represented.

The Roman people, a whole, were able to create a system of government that would last for five hundred years. The Roman Republican government was strong but was not strong enough and would eventually crumble like the empire itself and be replaced with the “Imperial Government”. However there were many things that made the Roman Republican government great, so great that the future would model their governments of Rome’s. The United States would model their government off of the Roman Republic, to form the democracy that we know today.

The final evolution of the Roman government was that of the Roman Empire, which reverted back to having one person holding a majority of the power, named emperor. This evolution was a step backward compared to the Republic, as the people no longer had a say in anything happening and simply had to put their trust in the Emperor doing what was best for the empire and its citizens. This was often not the case, as there were quite a few cases of bad leadership throughout the existence of the Roman Empire. Overall, Rome went through three vastly different governments that, rather than building upon the past governments, built a new one from scratch that did everything in their power to separate themselves from the previous eras of Rome and Roman government. Despite the fact that the timelines of Greek and Roman civilizations thoroughly overlapped, the governments had very little in common.

Most Romans had trouble with the idea of power to only a few people. The concept of power to the people settled well with many of the Romans. There were three main separate parts of the Roman Republic. These parts were the Consuls, the Senate, and the Assembly. A direct statement of their powers is given in document A by Polybius: “ The consuls (magistrates) lead the military and are the supreme masters of the government. They bring matters requiring debate before the Senate. They also call together the people’s Assemblies, and carry out whatever the majority of the Assemblies decide.” This similar to the style of the U.S democracy. Both have mass majority votes on various issues. For U.S democracy it is always for the election of someone to represent for the people. But in the Roman republic it was for people to vote directly on some issues among each other then elect someone to handle the issue in office for a

Introduction: The Roman Republic, emerging from the ashes of monarchical rule, sought to establish a system of governance that balanced power among its citizens while preventing the tyranny of a single ruler. Rooted in the ideals of democracy, the Republic introduced innovative mechanisms such as elected magistracies, popular assemblies, and tribunes of the plebs to enable citizen participation in decision-making. However, beneath the veneer of democratic principles lay a political landscape rife with complexities and contradictions.

The political parties started when two of Washington’s advisors had different opinions on what was best for the country. This division was fueled by different newspapers, each taking one side or the other and publishing articles supporting their side.

The major positions and bodies of the Roman include republican era, and imperial era. Republican era consist of executive power such as consul and dictator; legislative power such as senate and tribal assembly; veto power such as tribunes which voted and chosen by Roman citizens. Albeit there was Emperor who is the ruler of Rome during the imperial era, it is never a hereditary position. Those people who were Emperors, they were the war hero and military genius which mean knowing how to obtain the support from the army and Roman citizens. All these helped to set up the foundation of the Roman democracy. As the information provided, it reflects that ancient Roman already had a concept of voting the ideal people to represent them. If the government is not responding citizens’ appeal, they would refuse to participate in national military service and labor as to require the government to agree or response. This is very similar to strike nowadays. Workers united together as a way to negotiate with the boss. It can be considered as a phenomenon which often happens in a democratic

The Roman Republic was a “democratic” republic, which allowed first citizens to vote, and to choose their governors in the senate (Hence, their consuls). However, it was a nation ruled by its aristocracy, and, consequently, the entire Republic`s power was concentrated in a few individuals. Furthermore, the Senate was controlled by Patricians, which directed the government by using wealth to buy control and power over the decisions of the senate and the consuls. This situation aroused the inconformity of the people; as result, a civil war took place in the Republic (destroying it), and then the Roman Empire was born.

     Because Rome tried to maintain a republic it had different needs compared to the Greeks. "The Romans, unlike the Greeks, were distinguished by practicality and common sense, not by a love of abstract thought. In their pragmatic and empirical fashion, they gradually developed the procedures of public politics and the legal state." (Perry 88)

In ancient Rome there were Tribal or Century assemblies, residual roles, elections and the most fundamental part was that they had the right to legislate but only all adult males, and free slaves had the right to vote for this reason they were kind of democratic. For instance the three branches that the Roman constitution had all the same power shared equally. They are the Consuls (magistrates), the Senate and for the people would be the assemblies. For proposing laws it only had to be a limited group of elected annual magistrates. This made the Romans democratic.