Gridlock and endless investigations destroyed Rome
– Is America Next?
by Dr. James & Natalie Ricks
Political warfare and paralysis undermined the Roman republic. Scholars believe that political stalemate helped destroy the Roman Republic. Rome had grown as a republic to great heights as the world’s only superpower. Then important decisions went undecided. Nothing was done to solve great problems. Why? They were the victims of legislative stalemate and political infighting. The Senate was paralyzed by partisanship. In Rome, each party would rather leave a crisis unsolved than give a victory to the leadership of the other side. We see eerie similarities in today’s Washington.
The second issue that added to the legislative disease of partisanship-over-patriotism was wealth. The empire’s wealth, which corrupted the political system, included vast campaign finance corruption. By 70 BC, the weaknesses in Rome’s government were clear. The empire’s wealth had completely and powerfully corrupted the Senate. In fact, wealth of the Roman Republic as a superpower corroded every aspect of Roman political life. Money eroded the political process.
The only way to get elected in 70 BC was to spend lavishly. To get citizens’ votes, politicians sponsored expensive gladiatorial games. Wealthy businessmen traded campaign contributions for political favors. Both Caesar and Cato commented that the very patriotic and self sacrificing Senators of the past that had guided Rome to superpower status no longer existed in this petty, spoiled generation of legislators.
The Roman Senate was stuck in gridlock and therefore could not solve pressing problems. The two parties hated each other so much that they could not let the other side gain any victories. This even included international issues affecting all of the nation. Ordinary citizens lost faith in the republic and the government because of this political paralysis. The two parties spent endless time on punitive investigations of the other party. Scandals used for political purposes rocked the Senate. Rome had usually resolved its differences peacefully and for the good of the country. During Rome’s rise from a small city to a superpower the people displayed traits of patriotism and piety and honor. They had character and discipline, but years of wealth had led to decadence, not just in society, but also in politics. They entered the politics of winning at all costs; even the personal destruction of rivals.
At that time in Rome there were two major political parties, the Optimates and the Populares. The Optimates stood for old moral values and supported political reforms from within the Senate. The Populares—which literally means “democrats”—believed that Rome needed more democracy, not less. It needed leaders responsive to the popular will.
Rome had a serious problem in 70 BC with pirates who terrorized the Mediterranean and took hostages, including senators’ wives being held for ransom. Yet the Senate was trapped in partisan bickering and could not agree on a solution. Does any of this sound like our border crisis? In America today, one party is currently more interested in blocking the other party, regardless of what is good for our nation. In Rome’s past the Senate and the voters of Rome made momentous decisions which helped the Roman republic become the most powerful nation/empire in world history with possibly the exception of America in the last century or so.
People eventually lost confidence in the governemnt’s ability to solve problems. Citizens lost confidence in the government of Rome and maybe Americans are losing confidence in Congress and our media, the fourth branch of government. In the past, the Roman Senate had provided superb guidance for Rome during the struggle with Hannibal and the rise to superpower status. Polybius said, the Roman people, whose civic virtue and constitution was the key factor in why Rome, in one generation, rose from being a small nation to being master of an empire. The Roman Empire was, in the terms of its day, a global empire, marked by a global economy, a global culture, and a global political world. All this is similar to American domination of the planet.
Rome was, in its own way, as creative as our own age of technology and science. As America today builds upon the intellectual heritage of Europe, so Rome built upon its legacy from Greece. In art, literature, and architecture, the Roman Empire laid the cultural foundations for European history. Roman science and medicine shaped the history of both the medieval Christian and Muslim worlds. The Roman Empire was an age of creativity with few parallels in history. One coinage united worldwide commerce. One law protected all inhabitants. Rome had great senators like Cato and Cicero. In Europe, parts of the Middle East, and northern Africa one language, Latin, was spoken throughout the empire.
Roman citizens eventually felt they could no longer trust their Senate due to endless gridlock and useless investigations. Therefore the Roman republic died. Some now think America also needs a large, all powerful (socialistic), autocratic, central government. Many successful republics ended in this fashion or collapsed when voters discovered they could raid the treasury and spend the government into financial ruin. We could look at the French Revolution, which ended with Napoleon’s military dictatorship.
A republic requires devout, engaged, moral citizenry to maintain itself. Have we started to enter the period of endless investigations and political warfare? It seems our country is facing political paralysis. Will the American republic continue?
