rotest against the four quaestors being elected promiscuously from the
commons and patricians by the free suffrage of the people."

44. The election of tribunes was first held. There were chosen tribunes
with consular power, Lucius Quintius Cincinnatus a third time, Lucius
Furius Medullinus a second time, Marcus Manlius, Aulus Sempronius
Atratinus. On the last-named tribune presiding at the election of
quaestors, and among several other plebeians a son of Antistius, a
plebeian tribune, and a brother of Sextus Pompilius, also a tribune of
the commons, becoming candidates, neither the power nor interest of the
latter at all availed so as to prevent those, whose fathers and
grandfathers they had seen consuls, from being preferred for their high
birth. All the tribunes of the commons became enraged, above all
Pompilius and Antistius were incensed at the rejection of their
relatives. "What could this mean? that neither through their own
kindnesses, nor in consequence of the injurious treatment of the
patricians, nor even through the natural desire of making use of their
new right, as that is now allowed which was not allowed before, was any
individual of the commons elected if not a military tribune, not even a
quaestor. That the prayers of a father in behalf of a son, those of one
brother in behalf of another, had been of no avail, though proceeding
from tribunes of the people, a sacrosanct power created for the support
of liberty. There must have been some fraud in the matter, and Aulus
Sempronius must have used more of artifice at the elections than was
compatible with honour." They complained that by the unfairness of his
conduct their friends had been kept out of office. Accordingly as no
attack could be made on him, secured by his innocence and by the office
he then held, they turned their resentment against Caius Sempronius,
uncle to Atratinus; and, with the aid of their colleague Marcus
Cornelius, they entered a prosecution against him on account of the
disgrace sustained in the Volscian war. By the same tribunes mention was
frequently made in the senate concerning the division of the lands,
(which scheme Caius Sempronius had always most vigorously opposed,) they
supposing, as was really the case, that the accused, should he give up
the question, would become less valued among the patricians, or by
persevering up to the period of trial he would give offence to the
commons. He preferred to expose himself to the torrent