Obama: A Modern Day Roman Plebeian Tyrant

American Thinker ^ | August 05, 2009 | Frank S. Rosenbloom, M.D.

[neverdem]

Many comparisons have been made between the Roman Empire and the United States.  The Roman Empire was the most powerful civilization on Earth.  Similarly, the United States, for now, is the sole remaining superpower.  However, with the good comes the bad and the decline and fall of the Roman Empire has been compared to the decline and pending fall of the United States. We often forget the fact that the Roman Empire was preceded for 450 years by the Roman Republic, which arose in 509 B.C. with the overthrow of the Roman monarchy. 

Of course, there's an interesting correlation with the American Revolution, which also overthrew government by monarchy.  Rome was structured around a strong constitution, though little of it was written down.  The early years of the Republic were marked by political power held by a strong aristocracy descended from earlier royalty. In a series of events very similar to developments in our own country, the republic devolved into rule by a series of popularly elected political elites who circumvented the constitution for political purposes.

The Roman constitution was a powerful code designed with a complex system of checks and balances and served as a model for our own Constitution.  The purpose was not to establish a simple democracy, but a representative form of government, which was, by the rule of law, resistant to the whims of the majority. But, as the society "advanced," professional politicians began promising rewards in exchange for votes.

Initially, two consuls, or highest magistrates, were elected for one year terms. The main legislative body, the Senate, (the model for our own Senate), was comprised of Patricians, members of society with ancestry derived from royalty. The Plebeian Council was composed of elected officials (tribunes) of lower societal rank who met in tribal councils.  Over time, through a series of popular reforms, decisions made by the Plebeian Council would have the full force of law.  Plebeians soon began occupying the Senate in a movement to bring "change" to the system of government. 

Around 200 B.C. there was an economic crisis, similar to the one we are experiencing today.  The plebeians, especially farmers, found themselves unable to afford their homes and they demanded a bailout from the government. When the Senate refused, an uprising occurred, resulting in increased power for the popularly elected Plebeian Council.  The country was then essentially controlled by new Plebeian political elites who were, however, mostly concerned with their own power and not about the problems of the people who elected them.

As common Plebeians fell further into debt, unemployment rose and farmers could no longer sell their produce, resulting in widespread bankruptcy. People began voting for politicians who promised bailouts. Populist leaders emerged who promised "change." The final decades of the Roman Republic saw an eerily familiar increase in the dependence of the average Roman citizen on their government, along with tax increases to pay for government programs. The Republic had slowly devolved into a democracy wherein people voted themselves benefits they had not earned. Sound familiar?

In 133 B.C., Tiberius Gracchus was elected as a Tribune.  In a move that would be considered "Obamanesqe," he attempted to "spread the wealth" by proposing a law that would have limited the amount of land any particular individual could own and redistributing land to the poor. He was later murdered but his brother was elected and continued to support populist policies that circumvented the constitution.  A new political party, the democratic "Populare" party, gained power.  They regularly broke the law in the name of democracy. In a final attempt to reestablish constitutional rule and strengthen the Senate, Lucius Sulla, a member of the conservative "Optimate" party, took control as dictator, passed laws to strengthen the constitution and the Senate and then resigned.

Another populist movement (like Acorn) arose in about 65 B.C. to address the problems of the poor.  When they were unable to pass all of their reforms legally they began using illegal methods. Eventually, Julius Caesar, a "Populare" politician, was installed as perpetual dictator in 44 B.C., influenced by his greatness as a general and his distribution of benefits, like food subsidies to the population and free land to his former soldiers.  He began appointing officials some today would call "czars" (named today after Russian Czars, a word derived originally from the word Caesar) that would not have to be approved by the legislature, but his tenure was cut short by assassination.  After Mark Antony was defeated by Octavian at the Battle of Actium in 31 B.C., the Senate gave Octavian extra-constitutional powers in 27 B.C., effectively terminating the Roman Republic forever.

The summary above is a short synopsis, not a complete history.  However, the parallels are unnerving and we can easily see the chilling similarities.

Aristotle warned:  "Republics decline into democracies and democracies degenerate into despotisms."  The Federalist papers show us that the founding fathers understood this all too well.  Just as the Roman Senate became more "democratic", so to our own Senate changed from being indirectly elected to direct popular election in 1913.  We were founded as a republic partly because democracies become weaker as they grow whereas republics can become stronger.

Yet we elect populists, like Chairman Obama, whose unaffordable promises and unconstitutional actions, after the manner of Tiberius Gracchus, Caesar, and Octavian, will be recorded in history as the beginning of the end of our republic. We slip further into a "democracy" of dependence on government and control by it. Inevitably, we too will degenerate into despotism and tyranny. This has already begun. From antiquity through the present, great thinkers like Aristotle and our founding fathers have warned us of the dangers of repeating the mistakes of prior civilizations. Those who survive us will learn how the selfish majority, at the behest of power hungry political elitists, accepted subjugation in exchange for benefits and thereby sowed the seeds (or acorns) of our destruction.

Barack Obama: Plebeian politician to Senator to Dictator wannabe. The USA: republic, to democratic dictatorship and then despotism. It not only can happen, but it will, unless we learn from history and prevent its repetition.

[vbmoneyspender]

The author is a bit unclear on what led to the rise of the Gracchi. The problem wasn't that farmers were having a hard time operating as farmers - the problem was that Roman citizens were having to serve in the Roman army for 20 years at a time. As a result, their wives and children had to run their farms while they were away. The ones who weren't able to do this would sell their farms to well-funded patricians who gradually cobbled together huge estates. This led to plebians migrating to Rome where they coalesced into the plebian mob that the Gracchi and others used to go after patricians they disliked.

The principal reform the Gracchi sought was land reform so that soldiers who had come back from the various wars Rome had been fighting since the days of Hannibal would have a livelihood they could rely on.

[Brugmansian]

Good anaylsis but Obama isn’t a populist. A least not in the tradition of Democratic Party populism. The “Great Commoner” William Jennings Bryan campaigned against the financial interests who back Obama. As classical liberalism morphed into its opposite—socialism—so has populism morphed into its opposite—fascism.

[DISCO]

Did the Romans take to the streets and demand the Republic be reinstated? Were the citizens armed? Our constitution allows the people to throw these corrupt politicians out of office. It’s time for the nuclear option. Lets hope that the colb becomes the ones archilles heal.

[Aria]

Interesting comment.

[Aria]

The problem is they’ve imported and dumbed down enough of the population so that those who rely on the government plus those who have the do-gooder complex now outnumber those who see the error in this.

I just think it’s going to be really hard to get back to self-responsibility. See my tag line.

[givemELL]

Thanks for posting this one. Reading Livy’s The War with Hannibal now, and, will look for parallels, although this piece is quite good and has had 5 good additive comments already...I imagine POTUS is short on Roman or Greek history.

[bushfamfan]

There was warning enough when he had the Roman columns for his DNC convention speech. The Demonrats are instruments of evil.

[John Locke]

The era of individualism, liberalism and democracy, of humanitarianism and freedom, is nearing its end. The masses will accept with resignation the victory of the Caesars, the strong men, and will obey them...

Oswald Spengler: The Decline of the West.

[lentulusgracchus]

There are many parallels between the career of the Roman Republic and our own.

Sir Ronald Syme wrote the manual history of the end of the Republic some 50 years ago, The Roman Revolution. Syme took a prosopographical approach: that is, he tracked down as many of the actors in that revolution as he could, consulted their biographies, studied all the leading personalities closely, and only then, very gradually, began to tease out what he saw as "reasons" and "causes" of the Roman Revolution.

Which, by the way, when the House of Julius Caesar had arrived at supreme power over the State .... simply stopped. Octavian turned on his own constituency, did his deal (concordia ordinum was the term of art used) with the moneylenders, bankers, and big property-owners, and sold everybody in the Caesarian Party out. In the end, the Caesarian Party, in its triumph, was revealed to be a Party of One.

Fancy that.

[lentulusgracchus]

Livy is unreliable. Moderns suspect him of doing "class propaganda" that does not reflect the reality of Roman society, but instead paints this fairy-story picture of "the little town that could", full of virtuous praetors and aediles.

Rome, by inspection of the size of its circuit-wall, the Wall of Servius Tullius, appears to have held something over 100,000 people even in the Early Republican period -- several times the next biggest town in central Italy. It was always a bruiser, a heavyweight among Italian cities, and Rome threw her weight around for over 240 years until Italy was united under her leadership on the eve of her death-match against Carthage.

[lentulusgracchus]

Good anaylsis but Obama isn’t a populist.

You're right -- he's a vanguardist, a vanguard Communist, old-school Bolshevik with a Blackberry in his pocket.

[vanilla swirl]

“Did the Romans take to the streets and demand the Republic be reinstated? Were the citizens armed? Our constitution allows the people to throw these corrupt politicians out of office. It’s time for the nuclear option. Lets hope that the colb becomes the ones archilles heal.”

Maybe that’s the one thing we are waiting for. If O is found irrefutably to not being a constitutionally valid President and the dems who hold all branches of government ignore this fact then..........it’s time to lock and load!

[broken_arrow1]

ping

[GiovannaNicoletta]

bookmark

[givemELL]

Thanks for the comment. My version of the last war with Carthage is prefaced with a detailed discussion of the faults of Livys’ history as you have described, and, many of the inaccuracies are footnoted in the book as the pages leaf over and onward as the war slogs along distracted by augury, superstitions, unnatural events of unknown and feared import. Nevertheless, it is a worthwhile read for someone such as myself, with a limited Classical history background.