[487] Gaius i. 3 “olim patricii dicebant plebi scitis se non teneri, quia sine auctoritate eorum facta essent; sed postea lex Hortensia lata est, qua cautum est, ut plebi scita universum populum tenerent, itaque eo modo legibus exaequata sunt”; Pompon. in Dig. 1, 2, 2, 8 “pro legibus placuit et ea (plebiscita) observari lege Hortensia: et ita factum est, ut inter plebis scita et legem species constituendi interesset, potestas autem eadem esset.”
[488] Pompon. l.c.
[489] The lex Agraria of 111 B.C. (Bruns Fontes) thus refers to a lex Sempronia of 123 B.C., “[ex] lege plebeive scito, quod C. Sempronius Ti. f. tr. pl. rogavit.” Cf. lex Rubria (ib.) “ex lege Rubria seive id pl. sc. est.”
[490] Thus Cicero, exiled by a plebiscitum, was restored by a lex centuriata. See the section on the people.
[491] Of the many instances one of the most remarkable is to be found in Sall. Jug. 84, “Marius ... cupientissima plebe consul factus, postquam ei provinciam Numidiam populus jussit.” Here plebs should be populus and populus, plebs.
[492] “Legislative” is here used in the modern sense. At Rome a judicial and elective act of the people was equally a lex.
[493] At least in 304 B.C. they had no right of relatio with the Senate (Liv. ix. 46).
[494] Gaius iv. 23.
[495] Varro L.L. viii. 105 “Hoc (the condition of nexum) C. Poetilio Libone Visolo dictatore (313 B.C.) sublatum ne fieret; et omnes, qui bonam copiam jurarunt, ne essent nexi dissoluti.” Livy (viii. 28), who attributes the measure to 326 B.C., makes it a universal release of nexi: “jussique consoles ferre ad populum, ne quis, nisi qui noxam meruisset, donec poenam lueret, in compedibus aut in nervo teneretur: pecuniae creditae bona debitoris, non corpus obnoxium esset.”
[496] Liv. ix. 46 “Cn. Flavius ... patre libertino ... civile jus, repositum in penetralibus pontificum, evulgavit, fastosque circa forum in albo proposuit, ut quando lege agi posset, sciretur”; Pompon. in Dig. 1, 2, 2, 7 “postea cum Appius Claudius composuisset (for “proposuisset”) et ad formam redegisset has actiones, Cn. Flavius scriba ejus libertini filius subreptum librum populo tradidit ... hic liber, qui actiones continet, appellator jus civile Flavianum.”