lex Julia de repetundis

{{further|Julius Caesar|First Triumvirate}}

The Roman Republic had, since it acquired an empire, struggled with the problem of provincial governors extorting their provincial subjects. By 171 BC provincials could bring complaints against governors to Rome. The first permanent court ({{langx|la|quaestio perpetua}}) in Rome was established by the lex Calpurnia in 149 specifically to try extortion cases. Available remedies were expanded by Gaius Gracchus' {{lang|la|lex Sempronia}} in 123 BC and later during Sulla's rule.{{sfn|Richardson|1994|p=578}}

Gaius Julius Caesar was consul in 59 BC. During that year he had, with the support of his allies in what is misleadingly termed in modern times the First Triumvirate,{{sfn|Morstein-Marx|2021|p=119}} pursued an aggressive and controversial reform programme. Brought late in his consular year, the {{lang|la|lex Julia}} was one of his least controversial bills. It is sometimes suggested that Caesar, whose reputation for avarice is well known from his pillaging of Spain during his post-praetorian governorship there, brought the bill in Pompey's name. It contained some 200 clauses covering all manner of hitherto semi-illegal practices that republican governors had used to line their own pockets.{{sfn|Morstein-Marx|2021|pp=166–67, rejecting attribution to Pompey}}

Caesar, who had come to political blows repeatedly with Marcus Porcius Cato and allies thereof during his consular year, found their support for the anti-extortion bill. Cato likely saw the bill as a positive for the state and, importantly, legislation brought in good faith for the state rather than for Caesar's own political advancement. Modern scholars have suggested that some of the provisions in the {{lang|la|lex Julia}} were in fact added on Cato's initiative: the clauses protecting the rights of free communities had been an objective of Cato's the previous year.{{harnvb|Drogula|2019|p=139}}, favourable citing {{Cite book |last=Morrell |first=Kit |title=Pompey, Cato, and the governance of the Roman empire |date=2017 |publisher=Oxford University press |isbn=978-0-19-875514-2 |pages=148–51 }}

File:Tribonian bas-relief in the U.S. House of Representatives chamber.jpg was a Byzantine jurist, depicted here in a modern bas relief located in the United States Capitol. He supervised the collation and editing of the Justinianic Corpus Juris Civilis which saw the preservation of fragments of the {{lang|la|lex Julia}}.{{Cite web |title=Tribonian |year=2001 |url=https://www.britannica.com/biography/Tribonian |website=Encyclopaedia Britannica |access-date=2023-10-05 }}]]

Most of the evidence of the {{lang|la|lex Julia}} is preserved by commentaries of Roman jurists; its provisions were still in force as late as the Justinianic Digest.{{sfn|Plescia|2001|p=60}} The third century AD jurist Aemilius Macer held that the {{lang|la|lex Julia}} created a general prohibition against taking any object of value to make or not make any official act. Such acts included civil judgements, imprisonments, criminal judgements, sentencing decisions, and decisions on status.{{sfn|Plescia|2001|pp=62–63}}

During the republican period, claims {{lang|la|repetundae}} (extortion) were brought before a quaestio perpetua, one of the permanent jury courts in Rome, by private prosecution.{{sfnm|Morstein-Marx|2021|1p=167|Richardson|1994|2p=595}} One notable and "awkward" exception from the ostensibly comprehensive anti-bribery law were penalties for equestrian jurors taking bribes in Rome: such jurors were legally immune and regularly bribed with enormous sums by defendants.{{sfn|Morstein-Marx|2021|p=167 n. 205}} By the imperial period, process under the {{lang|la|lex Julia}} was largely by {{lang|la|cognitio extra ordinem}} with sentences imposed starting at exile. Sentencing enhancements were applied if the illegal action caused someone to die or otherwise be punished.{{sfn|Plescia|2001|p=63, citing Macer, Dig., 48.11.7.3}}

It applied to all magistrates, persons with official power or administrative duties, legates, and employees thereof. Family members of covered persons also were covered if they engaged in corrupt activities to influence that covered person. People who took a share in bribe proceeds were also liable.{{sfn|Plescia|2001|p=63, citing Marcianus, Dig., 48.11.1}} Money damages were set for bribery cases in the {{lang|la|lex Acilia}} (123 BC) at double of the bribes paid.{{sfn|Plescia|2001|p=63}}

Governors were also prohibited from forcing provincial communities to defer the cost of maintaining Roman troops within their communities. Senators also were prohibited from voting themselves onto putative embassies to the provinces for the actual purpose of conducting private business. The law also prohibited governors from demanding supposedly voluntary gifts from their provincial subjects.{{sfn|Richardson|1994|p=588}} The ability for governors to misappropriate plunder won in battle and force repayment of debts by force from "free cities" also was curtailed.{{sfn|Morstein-Marx|2021|p=166}} The account books of provincial governors also had to be deposited on the close of a governor's term both at Rome and at two cities within the province.{{sfnm|Morstein-Marx|2021|1p=166|Richardson|1994|2p=580}}{{sfn|Drogula|2019|p=165, noting that Cato's account books disappeared at the close of his propraetorian administration of Cyprus}}

• List of Roman laws

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• {{cite book |last=Drogula |first=Fred K |title=Cato the Younger: life and death at the end of the Roman republic |date=2019 |isbn=978-0-19-086902-1 |publisher=Oxford University Press |location=New York |oclc=1090168108}}
• {{cite book |last=Morstein-Marx |first=Robert |title=Julius Caesar and the Roman People |year=2021 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |doi=10.1017/9781108943260 |isbn=978-1-108-83784-2 |s2cid=242729962 |lccn=2021024626}}
• {{Cite journal |last=Plescia |first=Joseph |date=2001 |title=Judicial accountability and immunity in Roman law |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/3185349 |journal=The American Journal of Legal History |volume=45 |issue=1 |pages=51–70 |doi=10.2307/3185349 |jstor=3185349 |issn=0002-9319}}
• {{Cite book |last=Richardson |first=John |chapter=Administration of the empire |title=The last age of the Roman Republic, 146–43 BC |series=Cambridge Ancient History |volume=9 |edition=2nd |date=1994 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=3yUkzNLiY4oC |editor-last1=Crook |editor-first1=John |display-editors=etal |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=0-521-85073-8 |oclc=121060 |pages=564–98 }}

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{{Julius Caesar}}

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Category:Roman law

Category:1st century BC in the Roman Republic

Category:Julius Caesar