[577] Libertinus describes the freedman’s political position, libertus his relation to his master.
[578] Ulp. in Dig. 1, 16, 9, 3.
[579] Macer in Dig. 48. 2, 8; Paul. Sent. v. 15, 3.
[580] Ulp. in Dig. 2, 4, 4, 1 “Praetor ait ‘parentem, patronum, patronam, liberos parentes patroni patronae in jus sine permissu meo ne quis vocet.’”
[581] Gaius iii. 40-44.
[582] Ulp. in Dig. 38, 2, 1, 1. Mommsen (Staatsr. iii. p. 433) thinks that the author of the change was the famous P. Rutilius Rufus, consul 105 B.C.
[583] Suet. Caes. 48; Val. Max. 6, 1, 4. Willems (Droit Public i. p. 125 n. 8) remarks that there is nothing to show that this power was exercised over justi liberti. The freedmen so punished may have been informally manumitted. For the relegation of a freedman by his patronus see Tac. Ann. xiii 26.
[584] Cf. Plut. Poplic. 7. Plutarch, in this story of the imaginary freedman Vindicius, represents his class as having no voting rights at the beginning of the Republic. Appius Claudius (312 B.C.), he says, first gave them ἐξουσίαν ψήφου: but he does not state the assemblies in which this right was exercised.
[585] See the section on the censor (p. 223).
[586] Liv. ix. 46.