Post on 11-Apr-2017
Are We Rome?Comparing the Roman Empire to Our Nation
Today
Who am i?• Enormous multi-cultural society• Technological advancements• Economically draining and overstretched
armed forces• Sense of itself as unique and endowed with a
global mission• Its concern about foreigners penetrating its
borders• Its apparent determination to maintain
military superiority
Comparing nations• The Roman Empire became overextended
abroad and corrupt and dictatorial at home and then collapsed.
• What can we then infer about America?
Rome: A Republic• Republic: elected officials govern the state• Patricians: heads of a few aristocratic
families• Plebeians: common people• The plebeians refused to fight for Rome until
the patricians granted them more rights.• The plebeians elected tribunes to protect
them against unjust treatment. They could veto harmful laws made by the plebeians.
Republican government• Together the patricians
and plebeians created a practical and flexible unwritten constitution
• Later around 450BC, the Law of the Twelve Tables was compiled and became Rome’s first law code.• This is comparable to our
Bill of Rights.• The plebeians had
insisted that they be written down.