The Roman Republic Fails - Ancient Rome for Kids

Some of the problems facing the Roman Republic

1. Rome needed tax money to run the Republic.

2. Elected officials were using their positions to get rich.

3. Rome did not have a police force.

1. Rome needed tax money. The government needed to pay the legions, and build roads, sewers, aqueducts, and arenas. They needed to pay for the welfare program put in place to help feed the growing number of poor in Rome. They needed a lot of money, and they needed more and more as Rome grew.

To get this money, Rome used tax farmers. To become a tax farmer, all you had to do was pay a flat fee to the Senate of the Roman Republic. That put you, the tax farmer, into business. Your business was the job of collecting taxes. This all sounds very nice, but there weren't any rules. Rome wanted as much money as possible. So they didn't set limits on what a tax farmer could collect. That was up to the individual tax farmer.

Everyone understood that tax farmers expected to make a profit. It cost a lot of money to become a tax farmer. The fee was high. It was also understood that all citizens had to pay taxes. But, since there were no rules on how much a tax farmer could charge, or even that the charges had to be fair, or based on income or earnings - there were no rules - you can imagine, under this system, how many abuses there were. It was horrible.

A tax collector had the legal right to charge one person almost nothing, and charge another person a great deal of tax, knowing that person could not pay. If you did not pay the taxes you owed, according to the amount set by the tax collector in your region, you could be sold into slavery.

2. Under the Republic, elected officials used their positions to get rich. Under the Republic, there was no law against buying votes. The poor were quite happy to sell their votes to the highest bidder. So, if you had enough money, you could get elected to government.

A great many people bought their way into office. Once there, the laws they created were not always very good laws. But, many were not there to create good government. They were there to get rich. People paid a lot of money to change the laws or to add new ones. Plus, elected officials whose fees to accept for various positions.

For example, elected officials decided whose fee would be accepted to become a tax farmer in a certain region. An elected official in a region might decide that the best person to get the job was a family member. They had the power to do this.

Under this system, it did not take long before Rome had very bad government.

3. Under the Republic, Rome did not have a police force. Rome's streets were not safe during the day. They were deadly after dark. Wealthy Romans hired guards to protect themselves and their families. Very wealthy Romans built private armies. These guards and armies often fought in the streets, sometimes over nothing. Added to this was crime committed by the desperate poor, trying to feed their families. The government recognized this problem, but they could not put a police force in place because they did not have enough money to pay them.

Between violence in the streets, unreasonable taxes, and a government unable or unwilling to do anything about Rome's problems, Rome was a mess.

What happened? Julius Caesar, a highly respected and famous general, told the people, "I can solve Rome's problems." Click here to see what happened next.