The Cautionary Tale of Julius Caesar

Hi-ho, Barflies, LL here.

Before we begin Andres' excellent post on the perils of strongmen, I wish to point you to a book I read a long time ago which did, in fact, laud Caesar. It's The Assassination of Julius Caesar: A People's History of Ancient Rome, by radical left historian Michael Parenti. Needless to say, he holds Caesar up as an exemplar because he used his dictatorship to give the Roman mob bread and circuses, and to redistribute wealth, as opposed to those awful Optimates who were nothing but reactionaries. 

Now, Rome needed reform root and branch. But Caesar did Rome no favors. He set in motion the end of the Republic and the birth of the Empire, which was completed by his adopted son Octavian, known to history as Augustus. (The irony being that Augustus established an oligarchical empire, which I'm sure those who bray about the one percent would loathe.) As Benjamin Franklin said, those who would give up liberty for a little security deserve neither. But it's illustrative that the likes of Dr. Parenti see Caesar not as a cautionary tale for a free republic, but as a needed "reformer", no matter his methods. That is the cautionary tale, not Dr. Parenti's exaltation of a putschist. 

Also, one final point: Caesar's assassin, Brutus, inhabits the lowest circle of Hell in Dante's Inferno, ground for eternity in Satan's ceaselessly grinding jaws. The admiration of strongmen has a long history.

Anyway, on with the show!

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Before I begin, I would like to thank Dr. Bret C. Devereaux from the blog A Collection of Unmitigated Pedantry. Dr. Devereaux is a professor of ancient Roman history who I think of as the Orc logistics guy and a chief prosecutor against Sparta. His work largely inspired me to make the case that Julius Caesar is, first and foremost, a cautionary tale.

I am but a history buff; he is a professional. Keep that in mind.

One thing I have learned as a history buff is that primary sources have huge biases that need to be accounted for. Much of the written record was made to support a political or an ideological agenda, not just to record facts.

Herodotus, considered to be the father of history as a subject in the Western tradition, often exaggerated key details and lied to promote an ideological agenda—mainly, to promote the idea that a bunch of city-states who were almost always at war were in reality one people and that being Greek mattered more than being Athenian or Spartan.

The historical traditions in other parts of the world are often no better when it comes to bias and making up facts to suit an agenda. For example, Chinese historians writing in either the Confucian or communist tradition will ignore key details if they get in the way of the agenda they are looking to promote.

Also, every historical tradition I can think of will whitewash the uglier aspects (which include crimes against humanity) of their own history. In fact, it’s the norm.

So in writing about what Julius Caesar represents today, I confess to shaping the facts to support a political agenda.

Mainly, the story of Julius Caesar is a cautionary tale about the dangers of political polarization, systemic breakdown of government, and the normalization of violence and rule breaking in a republican/democratic form of government (though the Roman Republic was anything but democratic).

Moral of this story: elites who behave lawlessly (even if at the expense of other elites) are very destructive to self-governance; demagogues and tyrants are symptoms of a republican/democratic system in serious trouble that at the same time can make existing troubles worse; and just getting rid of the person does not eliminate of the problem—in fact, as Caesar’s assassins found out, it can make things worse if done carelessly.

Background

After defeating and destroying Carthage in the Punic Wars, Rome was unquestionably the most powerful state in the ancient Mediterranean world. Unprecedented wealth flowed into Rome, principally to Rome’s elites. Tribute and especially defeated peoples in the form of slaves flowed like a raging river into Rome’s top 1 percent after fighting wars in what is today Spain, Syria, Turkey, Tunisia, and Greece.

Chattel slavery is when another human being is someone’s literal property, kind of like a piece of farming or mining equipment.

Keep in mind that although the ancient Mediterranean version of chattel slavery was not quite as brutal and dehumanizing as New World chattel slavery practiced in the Caribbean, the American South, and Brazil, it was still a crime against humanity in the horrors it entailed, not to mention that in the ancient world, there was no concept of laws of war regarding civilians and prisoners of war. So it meant that when Rome went to war, it did so with extreme brutality as a part of its doctrine (as did everyone else).

While the majority of the spoils of war went to enrich Rome’s top 1 percent, the Roman soldiers who fought and died to make these conquests happen—many of them who were only small farmers themselves—were often left impoverished, outcompeted by large landowners fueled by slave labor.

In addition, the systems that worked well for Rome while it was just a city-state on the Italian Peninsula or even the dominant power in Italy started to come under intense strain when Rome built its empire outside of Italy.

With so much at stake, political polarization began to paralyze the Roman state. Instead of focusing on policy, the governing elite began to use the systems of checks and balances inside the republic to punish political opponents and settle grudges. In turn, this led to animosity so intense between different political factions inside Rome that governing nearly ground to a halt.

Forget loose sexual morals and other vices—what caused the Roman Republic to weaken to the point where Julius Caesar could kill it was political polarization and the normalization of violence to solve political disagreements.

By the time Julius Caesar showed up on the scene, the Roman Republic as a system of government was gravely ill with factionalism and government paralysis. It was ripe to be destroyed in a civil war or coup.

The Cautionary Tale of Julius Caesar

Julius Caesar was born on July 12, 100 BC, into a high-class family that had fallen on hard times. Like most elite Romans, Caesar started his career in politics and the law by serving in the Roman army. He was recognized for his ability and courage in the army.

Keep in mind that before Caesar joined the military, he had experience being on the wrong side of a civil war, where he was lucky not to be executed by Sulla, the victor of said civil war, and only lost his wealth and land via confiscation. Many others were not so lucky and were executed.

Caesar served as a practitioner of the law as well.

Caesar started at the bottom of the political ladder and worked his way up. He served as a governor of Spain, head priest, and in logistics operations in Rome.

Just a few small problems.

Violence had become a normal part of Roman political life at this point, and political polarization was worse than ever before. In addition, when Caesar got to the top and became a consul of Rome, he did so by allying with Crassus, the richest man in Rome, and Pompey, its most successful general up to that point.

At all stages of his climb to be consul, basically cohead of the Roman state for one year, he was consistently accused of bribery and using violence to get his political agenda accomplished.

In fact, his actions in what is now modern-day France, the Netherlands, Belgium, and Northern Italy were motivated by the fact that his (very illegal even at the time) tactics put him deep in debt and earned him enough ire that many powerful Romans wanted to prosecute him for his actions as consul.

It is important to keep in mind that during his conquest of Gaul, Caesar, by his own admission, committed what we would today call war crimes and crimes against humanity on a scale that may have been too much even for the already brutal standards of Roman warfare. For example, he starved noncombatants (mainly women and children looking to leave) in a siege of Alesia in order to crush a revolt by revolting Gauls.

To avoid the consequences of his actions, he started a civil war to seize power by crossing the Rubicon, the river that divided Roman Gaul and Roman territory proper. This civil war killed thousands of Romans and led to the death of his old partner Pompey in Egypt.

As for Crassus, in an attempt to bolster his popularity and political fortunes, he got himself and thousands of Roman soldiers killed in a botched invasion of Parthia (modern-day Iraq and Iran) beforehand.

Julius Ceaser was a highly skilled military commander, politician, and overall strategist, but he used his talents to commit genocide and start a civil war.

His enemies made a stupid move by assuming his assassination would cause things to go back to normal, but I don’t think he deserves any tears for his death.

The Point

The political philosophy that Caesar inspired has been a reliable guidebook for aspiring dictators all over the world.

I would argue that Donald Trump followed Caesar’s footsteps (however incompetently compared to the original himself or other operators, like Vladimir Putin).

Trump relied on legally questionable if not outright illegal methods to get elected president that got him deep in debt, abused the office of president for personal gain (not to mention being wildly incompetent at the job), and broke countless norms and quite likely laws that had kept the American political system operational. Don’t forget that in response to losing the 2020 election, Trump also attempted a coup, albeit a badly planned one that failed.

Benito Mussolini and Francisco Franco seized power in a similar fashion to Caesar, via coup and civil war, respectively.

Even Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party were elected into power, broke countless laws and norms that had kept the Weimar Republic operational, and relied heavily on violence to suppress political opponents before they got into power.

Caesar would approve such a move.

When people at any point of the political spectrum glorify Julius Caesar, they are celebrating a figure who used violence to settle political disagreements, committed crimes against humanity to pay off debts he foolishly incurred, and started a civil war to avoid legal consequences for his lawlessness.

Julius Caesar is not someone to be celebrated; he is a cautionary tale, one we would do well to heed at the present time.