Could someone with a high position, like a praetor or legatus slaughter a common person, a roman citizen of the lower class, on a busy street (plenty of witnesses) for offending him and get away with it?
Were the courts even accessible to the lower class? Could they go to a government official, tell them what happened and have said person arrested if the evidence is good enough, like today?
Having read several series of books about the classic Roman period, I’d say it had little to do with what ‘the law’ was. At least in the case of poeple of high position, enforcement of laws had more to do with political power than anything else. Powerful people could get out of almost anything one way or another, unless they were opposed by someone even more well-connected. Less powerful people could be convicted of things they didn’t do. In rougher times things didn’t even make it to court - people just got executed.
My impression is just the opposite. Although there was much political corruption, and although Rome was a violent society by today’s standards, in general the rule of law prevailed. Indeed, much of Rome’s power depended on that. That was why subject peoples mostly acquiesced willingly to being part of the Empire, and to sending their young men to fight in the legions. Even the wealthy and powerful would not be able to get away with openly murdering an innocent person in cold blood. Even an emperor wold probably want to find some legalistic excuse for putting someone to death, if he expected to stay Emperor for long.
Which era? The Kingdom? The various periods of the Republic? The Early, mid and late Empire? The Byzantine period?
Depends. During the Republic, and the early Empire, the common man was fairly protected. Mind you, there were some lawless periods, and gangs ruled some areas.
Was there even such a thing as “a Roman citizen of the lower class”? You could be a Roman citizen whose wallet was empty, but being a Roman citizen made you, by definition, a class above anybody who was not one. One of the differences between citizens and not was which laws applied: to citizens and (in case of suits) to anybody who’d done business with a citizen it was Roman law; to people who were not citizens and who were of the same “group”, the laws of that group; when two people of different subject groups did business, they were supposed to agree, among other things, on which laws and tribunals would apply (something that’s still indicated in many contracts).
Indeed, there were many classes of Roman Citizens, but yes, even being the lowest level were above a non-citizen:
As I understand it, women and children had little to no legal protection from the male head of the family. The paterfamilias could subject his wife or kids to any privation, sell them into slavery, or even kill them, with no serious legal consequences.
True during the republic, not sure about the empire. And, I am fairly certain that this was not true in Christian times.
Yes and no - this can, and often is, overstated. While the paterfamilias technically had such power, you should remember that Romans were also a surprisingly close-knit society with extensive social linkages within family, social class, and classes abiove and below. Excercising this kind of authority capriciously wasn’t something people could usually get away with, because it would and could destroy your social position. So even if you were a selfish, hateful monster, it didn’t normally happen. And upper-class Romans were shockingly tolerant of their kids in the late Republican & early Imperial eras.
You would probably find it used most in the early Republic period, which had something of a reputation for extreme discipline. They’ve also been called conservative, but that’s not true, given the immense social and technological changes they embraced. Disciplined though - yeah, and incredibly brutal. Violence was a common, everyday fact and so it wasn’t considered that unsual. There’s some thought that gladiatorial games even developed from a ritual combat blood sacrifice to the honored dead.
I understand, but I guess I was focusing literally on the OP’s question of protection “under the law.”
Understandable, and your response was accurate as far as it went. The complicating factor is that Roman society was not legalistic in the same way ours was. It was mostly driven by laws and even a Constitution, but all of that was extremely flexible based on who you were. It wasn’t money so much as connections which determined your place in society and so forth, and those connections could bend any rule - or if brought against you, you turn a relatively small legal hurdle into an invincible stone wall.
It’s really hard to understand anything before the late Republican Roman society - I do NOT claim to get everything by a long shot - because it’s both dimly recorded and because it was so personality and social-network driven.
Something I’ve always wondered and since the OP made a thread dedicated to the topic, I’ll indulge my curiosity, if the OP can forgive me for slightly derailing the thread. I’ve read all the major books (as far as I know) about the Roman Republic and early Roman Empire; Polybius, Plutarch, Tacitus. But they mainly deal with the political intrigue of the Senate and military campaigns of various consuls. I’ve always wondered about the Roman court system. How exactly did the Roman court system even work? Were there lawyers? Who appointed/elected the judges? Were there distinctions between criminal and civil cases? Did they have juries? Any other info on top of those questions I’d be happy to read as well.
The works of Cicero, specifically the books he wrote about the many court cases he prosecuted or defended, might be of use to you.