07-22-2008, 09:14 AM
Quote:Was he not governor out in Spain before that...He was quaestor, and later propraetor of Hispania Ulterior = Andalusia, and invaded Lusitania.
He committed several war crimes (sacking a city that had already surrendered, even sacking a friendly city), which forced him to remain in office and keep his immunity. On his return from Spain, he managed to seize the consulship, but many senators considered it outrageous that a war criminal could be elected consul. They tried to make sure that Caesar, after his consulship, would obtain a "short" province (where he would be in charge for only one year), so that Caesar's immunity ran out swiftly and he could be brought to court. Caesar countered this by concluding the triumvirate, "a conspiracy to overthrow the state by its three leading citizens" (Livy).
Caesar now became governor of Cisalpine Gaul, and his immunity was renewed at the Lucca conference. In c.50, however, renewal of his governor's immunity had become impossible, as Gaul had been pacified. So, Caesar tried to obtain the consulship again. When his opponents decreed that one could not run for consul as long as one commanded an army, Marc Antony (tribune) vetoed, but was overruled and maltreated. This gave Caesar the excuse he needed: he could move to Italy under the pretense that he was fighting for the constitutional rights of the tribune. In reality, he was trying to keep his immunity intact.
Had he laid down his governor's powers, he would have been accused of war crimes in Lusitiana, and in Gaul, where his treatment of the Tencteri and Usipetes was below the level that was expected of a Roman general.
I know there was no "Human Rights Charter" back then, but there were certain things a Roman commander was supposed not to do - attacking the elderly of the Usipetes and Tencteri during an armistice, for example. Cato had proposed to surrender Caesar to the Germans - a very practical suggestion of course, given that Caesar commanded eight legions.
Summa summarum: it was Caesar's governorship in Spain that led to the end of the Roman Republic.
