Over the course of the Roman Civil War, Julius Caesar spent about 4 years on campaign.
In his absence, for a variety of reasons, the city of Rome descended into a prolonged
political crisis.
In order to fully understand the mess that Caesar left behind, we have to rewind a couple
of years.
After Caesar's victory over Pompey at the battle of Pharsalus in 48, he sent one of
his deputies, Marc Antony, back to Italy to oversee the political situation while he was
gone.
Antony immediately ran into serious problems.
A Tribune of the Plebs exploited Caesar's absence by attempting to push a bill through
the Senate would abolish all private debt.
Debt abolition was a thing in the ancient world.
It's complicated, but sometimes ancient societies would fall into a death financial spiral where
an ever-growing number poor people would find themselves saddled with multi-generational
debts.
This was a growing problem in Rome at the time, and debt abolition was a crude but effective
method of freeing these people so that they could be productive citizens again.
The aristocracy, as the holders of the debts, came out against the bill and blocked it in
the Senate.
That should have been the end of the whole thing, but instead, the Tribune started going
around and making impassioned speeches in front of growing crowds.
Before too long, he was able to lead an angry mob into downtown Rome and occupy the Forum.
This tactic of taking to the streets wasn't totally unprecedented, but the speed at which
Rome's political class lost control of their city was alarming to say the least.
This was a problem, but it was a problem with an clear solution, right?
Antony was in charge and had an army sitting just outside the pomerium, so obviously he
crossed the pomerium and lead the army away from the city.
Hold on, he what?
Yeah, he turned the city over to the angry mob.
Do you think this is what Caesar had in mind when he left the city in Antony's hands?
I imagine not.
The likeliest explanation for this is that he wanted to send a message.
I didn't mention this before, but the Senate got really bent out of shape when Caesar left
Antony in charge.
So much so that they actually tried to get him removed.
Antony was, uh, petty?
Now that the city was in trouble, he wanted the Senate to beg him to intervene.
But things didn't quite go as he expected.
The situation deteriorated quickly.
The mob began to openly bring weapons across the pomerium, which was illegal, but who was
going to stop them?
They eventually started launching deadly attacks against their perceived enemies.
Rome's political class became afraid to be seen in public.
The city was basically ungovernable.
Under armed guard, the Senate met at an undisclosed location and passed the Senatus Consultum
Ultimum, or the Final Act.
This legislation empowered the consuls to do "whatever necessary" to defend the Republic.
It's important to note although the Senate clearly had a plan, there were currently no
consuls in office, and so it's hard to see how any of this would stand up in court.
But before any plan could materialize, Antony returned in force and marched right across
pomerium with several armed cohorts.
The soldiers descended on the mob with swords drawn, and hundreds of Roman citizens were
killed.
This was the apex of pettiness.
Antony deliberately allowed the situation get out of control and then needlessly butchered
a bunch of Roman citizens.
If Antony was disliked before, he was despised now.
When the Senator Cicero arrived back in Italy after the Pompeian defeat at the Battle of
Pharsalus, a letter arrived from Antony telling him that he could not guarantee Cicero's safety,
and that it would be best if he stayed away from Rome for a while.
This was highly irregular.
Cicero was one of Rome's most influential politicians, and in case you missed it, this
was a threat.
Why?
Because Antony didn't like Cicero, that's why.
This blatant and unnecessary abuse of power hardly improved the Senate's opinion of Antony.
But hang on, because it was about to get a lot worse.
For starters, Antony just straight up stole Pompey's giant mansion in the centre of Rome.
One day it was empty, and the next day Antony had moved in.
This was a giant red flag because a generation earlier, the last Civil War had ended with
the winning side murdering a bunch of Senators and stealing their property.
Caesar had promised that this Civil War would be different, but with Antony doing stuff
like this people weren't so sure anymore.
Antony's behaviour quickly got out of hand.
He would show up to Senate meetings blind drunk, or would disappear for days at a time
on wild benders.
I don't know if we should believe this or not, but there's one account that says that
after butchering hundreds of Roman citizens, Antony thought that it would be a good idea
to be carted around the city like a triumphal general in a chariot pulled by lions.
This whole thing was made 10 times worse with the fact that nobody had heard from Caesar
in like 6 months.
People began to fear the worst.
Some whispered that with Caesar out of the picture, they may have to take this Antony
problem into their own hands.
But Cicero was hopeful.
He reassured his allies, writing: "it seems to me that though Caesar is holding Alexandria,
he is ashamed to send a dispatch on the operations there."
Cicero was exactly right.
A couple of months later Caesar defeated the Egyptian army at the Battle of the Nile, bringing
the Siege of Alexandria to an end.
After a brief detour to Asia Minor, the Senate received word that Caesar would be returning
to Italy.
The political class in Rome breathed a collective sigh of relief.
When Caesar landed in Italy, Cicero was there to meet him.
When they saw each other, Caesar ran up and gave Cicero a big ol' hug.
As the retinue traveled inland, the two men hung back from the group and spent several
hours lost in private conversation.
I imagine Antony's name came up once or twice.
Caesar made a point of avoiding Rome for the time being.
He wouldn't be staying for very long anyways.
The Civil War was still ongoing.
This was just a quick pit stop to raise new armies and then he was off again to North
Africa.
But he was still politically engaged, and when he received a full report from his allies
back in Rome, he as not pleased.
Antony was unceremoniously fired.
Caesar had his allies in Rome call for elections for the coming year.
Caesar was unsurprisingly elected consul en absentia.
This was against the rules, but rules were mattering less and less as time went on.
His consular colleague for that year would be a politician named Marcus Lepidus.
We know less about Lepidus than I would like, but from what we do know he was a good administrator
and a skilled politician.
When Caesar went off to Spain at the beginning of the Civil War, Lepidus had overseen Italy
without incident.
After Caesar's victory in Spain, he picked Lepidus serve as one of Spain's new governors.
As governor, Lepidus surpassed all expectations.
While Caesar was away, a medium sized rebellion flared up.
Lepidus moved quickly and was able to defuse the whole situation without losing a single
man.
This was exactly the kind of gumption that Caesar was looking for.
Unlike Antony, Lepidus didn't need any adult supervision.
When Caesar tapped Lepidus to be his co-consul for the year 46, he unmistakably became Caesar's
new #2.
It's worth noting that Antony, who a second ago had been the most powerful man in Italy,
would hold no elected office.
The Senate then turned to Caesar and named him Dictator for a year.
The Dictatorship was an emergency measure that temporarily gave a person absolute control
over the Roman military as well as the ability to override political vetos.
This would give Caesar plenty of leeway to wrap up the Civil War.
The office of Dictator came with a deputy, who was called the the Master of the Horse.
Caesar nominated his co-consul Lepidus as his Master of the Horse, and empowered him
to act on his behalf while he was on campaign in North Africa.
For Lepidus, this was a massive vote of confidence.
Consider for a moment the pickle that Caesar was in as he prepared to leave for North Africa.
The regime had never been more unpopular.
On one hand he couldn't really afford to spend any extra time or money in Italy, but on the
other hand any further political deterioration might be catastrophic.
The plan that Caesar came up with here is just so next level, you just have to step
back and marvel at it.
The big hot button political issue of the day was the movement for the abolition of
debts.
We've talked about this.
It was the justification for the recent street violence, and it was quickly becoming the
rallying cry for anybody opposed the status quo.
Caesar injected himself into this debate by sending his agents to all over Italy to the
small and medium sized cities that dotted the Italian countryside.
These agents asked for meetings with the local aristocracy and then, on Caesar's behalf,
asked to borrow mind boggling sums of money.
War was bad for business, they said, and this loan would help Caesar bring an end to hostilities.
When that was done, Caesar turned around and published a bunch of pamphlets in Rome that
said something like: "Debt abolition would be awesome, but as Rome's richest AND most
indebted citizen, it would benefit me most of all!
It wouldn't be fair!"
This was one hell of a switcharoo.
Not only did public enthusiasm for debt abolition instantly dry up, but it no longer made sense
for Caesar's political rivals to rally behind a policy to which Caesar would be the chief
beneficiary.
But here's the really genius bit.
It's a bit of a long walk, so pay attention.
Every year, 20 new politicians gained lifetime membership to the Roman Senate.
These politicians were the people who had just been elected Quaestor.
Quaestors were elected through a body called the Tribal Assembly.
Now the Tribal Assembly was sharply skewed - in today's terms you might say gerrymandered
- in favour of rich people from the Italian countryside at the expense of poor people
from the city of Rome.
And what do we know about rich people from the Italian countryside?
They had all loaned Caesar all of their money.
What did this mean?
It meant that every candidate for Quaestor had to answer a very simple question from
the most powerful part of their electorate: "are you going to help Caesar end the Civil
War?
Yes or no?"
With this one move, not only did Caesar defang the movement for debt abolition, but he established
a new set of political incentives that churned out an annual crop of young senators that
basically shared his policy goals.
Or at least pretended to.
It really was an inspired bit of business.
When Caesar departed for North Africa, he left behind a Rome that was under new management.
Unlike Antony, Lepidus took his job seriously, and was careful not to alienate the Senate
any more than absolutely necessary.
After some pretty lengthy delays due to weather, he was able to send four additional legions
to North Africa, which played a pretty big role in Caesar's eventual victory over the
Pompeians at the Battle of Thapsus.
But Lepidus's competence couldn't fix Rome's underlying problems.
For years, whenever Caesar had been faced with a difficult political problem, his response
had been the same.
"After the Civil War."
Well, the Civil War was now over.
When Caesar returned to Rome in the summer of 46, he faced an angry populous; an embittered
political class; a disgruntled military; and oh yeah, a truly ludicrous amount of personal
debt.
To make matters worse, the Civil War had proven that Rome's political system was thoroughly
broken.
This was now Caesar's problem, and it would prove to be intractable.