cursus honorum

• Censors

  • 2 of them
  • In charge of public morals and investment in property
  • In 28 BC, Augustus and Agrippa used this power to carry out the census of the Senate and purge it of their opponents
• Order - all one year terms except

  • Senate advisors and heads of clans
  • 2 consuls (18 months) / 1 dictator (6 months)
  • 6 praetors - legal cases
  • 2 censors - public morals, investment in property
  • 4 cerulean aediles - markets, festivals, temples
  • 8 quaestor
• Four public assemblies

  • Comitia curiata - original assembly of decreasing importance
  • Comitia tributa - plebeian assembly + patricians that had the ability to pass laws and had the power of veto
  • Comitia centuriata - army units
  • Concilium plebis - plebeians who elected tribunes (patricians could not be elected)
  • Helped the everyday Roman be involved in politics
• Imperium was held and could be extended into a promagistrate position. 
• Age restrictions - 42 for consul
• 159/200 men elected in a century came from 26 families. 
• Novus homo - someone new to politics without a good family name
• Patronage - the practice of giving a person or group a position of power or influence in return for their support