Juris civilis initia et progressus. Ad leges XII. Tabularum brevis commentatio. Ex Ulpiani Fragmentorum Tituli XXIX. selectis notis illustrati. Gaii ex veteris jurisprudentiae Fragmentis Institutionu

it abolishes: the other forbids that anything be proposed concerning the status original: "capite" of a citizen, unless through the greatest assembly, since the seditious Tribunes of the plebs had not yet been invented. They did not want laws to be passed against private individuals. For that is what a privilege original: "privilegium" is; and what is more unjust than that? Since the force of a law should be a decree and just for all, they did not want laws to be passed concerning individuals unless in the centuries-based assembly original: "centuriatis comitiis". For the people, when described by census, orders, and ages, apply more judgment to their vote than when spread out and summoned into Tribes. Cicero in his oration Pro Domo: The sacred laws forbid, the laws of the XII Tables forbid, that laws be imposed upon private individuals; for that is what a privilege is.

The institution of the Athenians.

That the institution of the Athenians was the same, is clear from the oration of Demosthenes against Timocrates.

The reason for the former chapter is this: for if laws are sanctioned for the sake of enjoying equity—that is, so that the highest may be held to the same law as the lowest—those finally are to be considered laws which always speak with one and the same voice to everyone.

The equity of the latter chapter is this: since it demonstrates that the judgment of the whole people is weightier than that of a part, and that the people, described by census, orders, and ages, apply more judgment to their vote than when gathered indiscriminately into Tribes.

Cicero argues so often in his orations that nothing was done against him by Clodius by law, who, when he was accusing Cicero of a capital crime, had not carried the law in the centuries-based assembly, but in the tribal one.

LET THERE BE THE COMMAND OF THE PEOPLE, AND VOTES. WHATEVER THE PEOPLE HAVE LAST ORDERED, LET THAT BE LAW AND RATIFIED.

From Livy, book 7

The author of Ad Herennium, book 2, seemed to have looked to this law when he contended that a defense was weak if it showed that something was done...