Other extraordinary magistrates

The decemvirs {decemviri legibus scribundis)

One of the most important events of the early republican period was the codification of the until then unwritten customary law by the Law of the Twelve Tables.

The military tribunes with consular power (tribum militum consulari potestate)

Magistrates bearing the title of military tribune with consular power were for the first time appointed in 444 BC, five years after the end of the decemvirate, in the place of the consuls. At first three consular tribunes were appointed but their number was subsequently increased to six. The introduction of these magistrates is associated with two measures proposed in 445 BC by C. Canuleius, a tribune of the plebs, one permitting intermarriage (connubium) between patricians and plebeians (contrary to an earlier rule included in the Law of the Twelve Tables), and the other opening up the consulship to the plebeians. Although the first of these measures was successfully carried in the same year (lex Canuleia), the implementation of the second was blocked by the patricians. Faced with the discontent of the plebeian population the patricians devised a compromise in terms of which the two consuls were to be replaced by three (later six) magistrates invested with consular power, chosen from both orders.

It was probably up to the senate to determine annually, by decree, whether the magistrates for the following year should be ordinary consuls or consular tribunes. The preservation of internal order and the defence of the state against external enemies must have been the main considerations upon which the senate's decision was based. The consular tribunes were elected by the assembly of the centuries (comitia centuriata) according to the procedure followed in the election of ordinary magistrates. Their functions and powers were not different from those of the consuls.^[316] Thus one of them remained in the city to carry out the everyday business of the state (he supervised the administration of justice, summoned and presided over meetings of the senate and the assemblies, introduced laws and supervised the procedures relating to the election of magistrates etc.) while the others were entrusted with the conduct of military operations, each acting as supreme commander of the army on alternate days.^[317] As the administration of justice was traditionally regarded as a patrician prerogative, the consular tribune who remained in the city was probably always a member of the patrician class.^[318] The practice of electing military tribunes with consular power was abandoned in 366 BC, after the passing of the leges Liciniae Sextiae, and the dual consulship was restored.^[319]