Encroachments On That Equality Of Rights -- As To Wars And Treaties -- As To The Officering Of The Army -- As To Acquisitions In War
These stipulations must probably even in the regal period, certainly in the republican epoch, have undergone alteration more and more to the disadvantage of the confederacy and to the further development of the hegemony of Rome. The earliest that fell into abeyance was beyond doubt the right of the confederacy to make wars and treaties with foreigners;(3) the decision of war and treaty passed once for all to Rome. The staff officers for the Latin troops must doubtless in earlier times have been likewise Latins; afterwards for that purpose Roman citizens were taken, if not exclusively, at any rate predominantly.(4) On the other hand, afterwards as formerly, no stronger contingent could be demanded from the Latin confederacy as a whole than was furnished by the Roman community; and the Roman commander-in-chief was likewise bound not to break up the Latin contingents, but to keep the contingent sent by each community as a separate division of the army under the leader whom that community had appointed.(5) The right of the Latin confederacy to an equal share in the moveable spoil and in the conquered land continued to subsist in form; in reality, however, the substantial fruits of war beyond doubt went, even at an early period, to the leading state. Even in the founding of the federal fortresses or the so-called Latin colonies as a rule presumably most, and not unfrequently all, of the colonists were Romans; and although by the transference they were converted from Roman burgesses into members of an allied community, the newly planted township in all probability frequently retained a preponderant -- and for the confederacy dangerous -- attachment to the real mother-city.
Next section