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Quod privatus a populo petit, aut populus a privato, senatus ex aliqua civitate, qui judicet, datur, cui alternoe civitates rejectoe sunt. Quod vivis Romanus a siculo petit, siculus judex datur quod siculus a cive Romano, civis Romanus datur. Coeterarum rerum selecti judices ex civium Romanorum conventu proponi solent.
Plancus challenged Cato as one of the judices after the speeches, but nevertheless he was convicted. And altogether Cato was a kind of thing difficult and unmanageable for persons accused, as they were neither willing to have him to be a judex, nor could they venture to challenge him.
In consequence of this there was a high opinion of him, so that an orator said to the judices on a certain trial when the evidence of a single person was produced, that it was not right to believe a single witness even if he was Cato; and many persons now were used to say when speaking of things incredible and contrary to all probability, as by way of proverb, that this could not be believed even if Cato said it.
When at last Antistius declared the votes of the judices to be for his acquittal, the people, as if a signal had been concerted, called out the name Talasius, which, pursuant to an old custom, they are used to utter on the occasion of a marriage.
Recent regulations, by the large decrease which they made in the property qualifications required for service, had increased the liability to the conscription of the manufacturing and trading classes of Rome. Two other proposals dealt with the question of criminal jurisdiction. The first allowed an appeal to the people from the decision of judices.
The praetor, or judex quaestionis, presided over the judices in each court, and the judices returned a verdict by a majority of votes, sometimes given by ballot, sometimes openly. In choosing these judices this was the process. The whole number available was, it is said, 300, divided into three decuriae.
"Meministis tum, judices, corporibus civium Tiberim compleri, cloacas referciri, e foro spongiis effingi sanguinem.... Caedem tantam, tantos acervos corporum extruetos, nisi forte illo Cinnano atque Octaviano die, quis unquam in foro vidit?" Oratio prov P. Sextio, xxxv. 36. Ad Quirites post Reditum. "Ejus vir Catilina."
This brought Pompeius again into bad report, which was still further increased when he came forward to speak in praise of Plancus, though he had by special law put an end to encomiums on persons under trial. Cato, who happened to be one of the judices, stopped his ears with his hands, saying it was not right in him to listen to the encomiums which were contrary to law.
Each party had a right to challenge a certain number, and the verdict was decided by a majority of votes. At first the judices were chosen from the Senate, and afterwards from the Equestrians, and then again from both orders. But in process of time the quaestiones perpetuae gave place to imperial magistrates. The accused defended himself in person or by counsel.
As censor, instead of beseeching the gods to increase the glory of the State, he begged them to preserve it. And no doubt he would have greatly preferred that the gods should act without his intervention. He had just impeached Aurelius Cotta, a senator, and the judices, from spite against him, had refused to convict.
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