Conspiracy Theory in Latin Literature

3. Tacitus and Punishment

67 In 61 c.e. the urban prefect Pedanius Secundus was murdered by one of his own slaves. According to the provisions of the senatus consultum Silanianum, the entire familia would have been executed, but because he had four hundred slaves, the people protested the severity of the punishment.1 The conservative senator and famous jurist Gaius Cassius Longinus spoke in favor of the execution. His speech as recorded by Tacitus (Ann. 14.43–44) skillfully deploys the rhetoric of conspiracy, in which we learn as much about the arguments as we do about the audience receptive to such arguments. Moreover , we learn as much about the historian and his methods as we do about the speaker. The legitimacyof deterrence depends upon persuasion. In Sallust’s account of the debate over the execution of the Catilinarian conspirators in 63 B.c.e. (Cat. 51–52), Cato and Caesar argue for and against deterrent punishment. Sallustian tone, diction, and even content suffuse the Tacitean speech of Cassius ; allusions to the famous debate on the Catilinarian conspirators are manifest .2 Beyond literary indebtedness, however, I am interested in the way these two episodes betray an anxiety over the dilemma of punishing a crime that is epistemically intractable and the way the speakers deploy a rhetoric of conspiracy to bolster their arguments for deterrence. In both cases a senatus consultum addressed the immediate circumstances, but the ethical issues were far from resolved. If conspiracy theory is latent in the sources, discussions of punishment are recurrent. Cicero speaks in practical and theoretical terms. In the Pro Sulla, a speech delivered in 62 in which Cicero defends Publius Sulla Cornelius (nephew of the dictator Lucius Sulla) for complicity in the Catilinarian conspiracy , Cicero justifies the execution of the Catilinarian conspirators.3 In the De Officiis, a philosophical treatise composed at the end of his career, he considers punishment from a more theoretical standpoint.4 Seneca likewise contemplates punishment in twin treatises, De Ira and De Clementia, that situate chapter 3 TaCiTus and punishmenT ConspiraCy Theory in LaTin LiTeraTure 68 punishment in the context of emotions and political theory.5 The De Ira was composed before 52, under Claudius; the De Clementia, between 55 and 56, at the beginning of Nero’s reign.6 The execution of the four hundred slaves of Pedanius Secundus in 61 no doubt challenged Seneca’s view. Tacitus may have in part been motivated to embellish the episode to provide a concrete example of the abstracts Seneca could only theorize. Thus, Sallust’s speech of Cato depicts deterrent punishment in action, while Cicero continues to offer retrospective considerations. Tacitus’ speech of Cassius, which also depicts deterrent punishment in action, on the other hand, challenges Seneca’s notions of punishment in retrospection. Taken together, the two episodes demonstrate the ongoing dialectic between theory and practice and the continual reevaluation of the critical dispute over the punishment of conspirators in concrete and abstract terms. From the highest to the lowest reaches of Roman society, the executions of the senatorial conspirators and the four hundred slaves are discomfiting, but the dialogue between the historians and the philosophers—between Sallust and Cicero,Tacitus and Seneca—elucidates at best a desire for resolution, at least an abiding anxiety over the paradoxes of punishment. Never taken lightly, punishment is especially complicated in the case of conspiracy, a crime difficult if not impossible to prove. Across genres and across time, recourse to prevention supports arguments for punishing conspiracy. Cato and Cassius (as transmitted by Sallust and Tacitus) triumph by persuasion and demonstrate in practice what Cicero and Seneca could only approximate in theory. punishmenT Plato delineates three types of punishment:7 Reform serves primarily the interest of the individual (the wrongdoer). Retribution serves primarily the interest of justice. Deterrence serves primarily the interest of society. Each presents ethical dilemmas. Reform can take the form of condition, therapy, or education and has as its primary aim the improvement of the individual. The assertion that punishment is a benefit depends on the extent to which the wrongdoer can be reformed . If he cannot be reformed, Plato advocates his ultimate removal from society. In the De Ira, Seneca addresses the necessity of punishment with a medical metaphor: A doctor attempts remedies incrementally so that no treatment seems harsh if its result is salutary. Similarly, it befits a guardian of the law; the ruler of the state ought to heal human nature by the use of words, and these of the milder...