families of wealth and consideration had long ago separated from the
plebs, and leagued themselves with the patriciate in the participation
of senatorial rights and in the prosecution of a policy distinct from
that of the plebs and very often counteracting it. The Licinian laws
abrogated the legal distinctions within the ranks of the aristocracy,
and changed the character of the barrier which excluded the plebeian
from the government, so that it was no longer a hindrance unalterable
in law, but one, not indeed insurmountable, but yet difficult to be
surmounted in practice. In both ways fresh blood was mingled with
the ruling order in Rome; but in itself the government still remained,
as before, aristocratic. In this respect the Roman community was a
genuine farmer-commonwealth, in which the rich holder of a whole hide
was little distinguished externally from the poor cottager and held
intercourse with him on equal terms, but aristocracy nevertheless
exercised so all-powerful a sway that a man without means far sooner
rose to be master of the burgesses in the city than mayor in his own
village. It was a very great and valuable gain, that under the new
legislation even the poorest burgess might fill the highest office
of the state; nevertheless it was a rare exception when a man from
the lower ranks of the population reached such a position,(11) and
not only so, but probably it was, at least towards the close of
this period, possible only by means of an election carried by
the opposition.

New Opposition

Every aristocratic government of itself calls forth a corresponding
opposition party; and as the formal equalization of the orders only
modified the aristocracy, and the new ruling order not only succeeded
the old patriciate but engrafted itself on it and intimately coalesced
with it, the opposition also continued to exist and in all respects
pursued a similar course. As it was now no longer the plebeian
burgesses as such, but the common people, that were treated as
inferior, the new opposition professed from the first to be the
representative of the lower classes and particularly of the small
farmers; and as the new aristocracy attached itself to the patriciate,
so the first movements of this new opposition were interwoven with the
final struggles against the privileges of the patricians. The first
names in the series of these new Roman popular leaders were Manius
Curius (consul 464, 479, 480; censor 481) and G