Publicy Vindicated

Publicly Vindicated
Acts 16.35-40

One of the most famous cases in ancient Roman law was the one brought by the young upstart barrister Cicero against the rich, aristocratic proconsul Gaius Verres.

Verres, like many Roman aristocrats of his generation, had discovered how to play the famous Roman system of democracy to his own advantage. Of course one had to go through the official motions of being elected to various offices of state – quaestor, praetor and so on. No problem: there were friends who could fix all that, who could buy or manipulate enough votes to get a candidate safely installed. Even the consulship itself, the senior position in Roman society, held for one year, wouldn’t present too much of a problem. Likely candidates had things worked out months, sometimes years, in advance, and pressure would be brought to bear on people who threatened to upset this careful planning with silly ideas that they might like to put themselves forward to stand against the candidates who ‘everybody knew’ were going to get elected anyway...

Taken from Acts for Everyone Part 2 by Tom Wright