41.8
Then
came the elections. The new consuls were C. Claudius Pulcher and Ti.
Sempronius Gracchus, and the new praetors, P. Aelius Tubero (for the
second time), C. Quinctius Flamininus, C. Numisius, L. Mummius, Cnaeus
Cornelius Scipio and C. Valerius Laevinus. Tubero received the civic
jurisdiction, Quinctius the alien. Sicily fell to Numisius, and Sardinia to
Mummius; the latter, however, owing to the magnitude of the war, was
made a consular province. Gaul was divided into two provinces and allotted
to Scipio and Laevinus. On the Ides of March, when Sempronius and
Claudius entered upon office, the provinces of Sardinia and Histria and the
instigators of war in those provinces were only informally discussed. On the
following day, the Sardinian deputation, who had been referred to the new
consuls, and L. Minucius Thermus, who had been second in command with
the consul Manlius in Histria, appeared before the senate, and after the
information they gave, the senate realised what a state of war existed in
those provinces. Delegates from the Latin allies, after numberless appeals to
the censors and the late consuls, were at length admitted to an audience of
the senate, and their statement made a great impression. The gist of their
complaint was that their citizens who were on the Roman register had
migrated in great numbers to the City, and if this were allowed it would
come to pass in a very few lustra that the towns and fields would be deserted
and incapable of furnishing any men for the army. The Samnites and Paeligni
stated that 4000 families had gone from them to Fregellae, but they were not
diminishing their contingents, nor were the Fregellans increasing theirs. The
practice of individuals changing their citizenship led to two kinds of fraud.
The law allowed those amongst the Latin allies who chose, to become
Roman citizens if they left male progeny behind in the old home. This law
was abused to the injury of the allies and of the Roman people. For in order
to avoid any male descendants being left at home, they gave their children as
slaves to some Roman or other, on condition that they should be
manumitted, and as freedmen become citizens, whilst on the other hand
those who had no male descendants became Roman citizens. Subsequently,
even this legal presence was brushed aside. In defiance of law and without
any male descendants they migrated to Rome and were placed on the City
register. The delegates asked that this might be stopped for the future, and
that those who had migrated should be ordered to return to their homes.
They asked further that a law might be passed making it illegal for any
person to adopt or manumit any one with the view of changing his
citizenship, and also require those who had become Roman citizens by this
means to renounce their citizenship. The senate granted these requests.
