In my opinion, Cato was never going to be the top man. He was somebody that opposition to the top man would rally around. Which limited him because if he had somehow cleared the field of every other possible contender to lead Rome, he wouldn’t have known what to do. His drive was based on reacting to others.
Well, I don’t think it was ever Cato’s ambition to lead Rome. Cato’s ambition was to stamp out corruption and restore senatorial rule. As a sidenote, my favorite description of him comes from Cullen Murphy, who described him as “a senator known for eccentric habits, grim austerity, and humorless rectitude-combine Mahatma Gandhi, John the Baptist, and Ralph Nader.”
I wouldn’t want Ralph Nader for president. But I would want him for U.S. Attorney General.
Didn’t read it, but Amen, and not in the religious sense. 
By the 50BCs Rome had overextended the communication systems available. Strains on the Empire tore bits from the system, and a cult of personality was in only nominal control. Yeah, later emperors might patch it, and even extend it, but the damage, caused by the Romans and their roads, had been done.
This is comment I had to argue with, though I just realized what was bothering me now.
Cicero was never really a power figure in Rome. That is, unlike so many other great Romans, he had no intrinisic power base. He was wealthy, but nothing like those who could build their wealth into political muscle. He also wasn’t a populist demamgogue. He was the arch-Roman, the guy who tried ot defend the Republic from all those tearing her apart. He failed, largely because everybody wanted to take power rather than share it. He didn’t pull Pompey’s strings, though he was friendlier to Pompey than, say, Ceasar.
In the end, he was murdered not for having the power to stop Ceasar, but for having the moral power to cast doubt on Caesar’s legitimacy.
And yet, precisely because of that, he was perhaps the single greatest Roman to ever live (with the exception of Claudius, IMHO). He was not the great conquerer or ruler, just a man who came up from relatively little to inspire the Republic and nearly save her.
If you like Cicero, read Imperium, by Robert Harris, a historical novel of the period (first of a projected trilogy), from the POV of Cicero and especially of Cicero’s secretary Tiro (inventor of Tironian notes, which I think may have been the world’s first known system of shorthand; it was in continual use, mainly by monks, into the 17th Century).
He was murdered because he and Antony hated each other, and because Antony wanted his revenge for Cicero naming him an enemy of the state.
Well, yeah, that was essentially my point. Cicero couldn’t really do anything about Caesar, but he had the public image to condemn them.
A key point I think many have missed here is that Pompey was a dictator of sorts when the Senate named him sole consul in 52 BC (in the aftermath of the riots over the death of Clodius and the prosecution of his killer Milo). He had the chance to seize control of the city but didn’t; many ancient historians saw this as a sign of nobility, while others saw it as yet another example of his poor political judgement.
If Pompey had defeated Caesar, it seems unlikely he would have done anything about the growing political discontentment in Rome. He’d let the Senate continue with business as usual, exercising military power when another Saturninus, Cinna, Catiline, or Clodius appeared on the scene. IMO it’s unlikely he would have proposed or supported anything to strengthen the position of the Senate–remember in his first (underage) consulship he overturned many of the Senate-stregthening reforms of Sulla’s (which, IMO, artifically preserved the Republic for another 30 years).
He might possibly have recognized–like almost everyone in power–that the system was severely broken, but I doubt he would have had the political will/skills to promote genuine reform; nearly every political act of his career had been about getting what he felt was his due. I therefore wouldn’t be surprised if, upon his death, the Roman world fell back into chaos as yet another general got the idea that he could run things much better (and he’d probably be right; Caesar did more for the common Roman in his eighteen months as dictator than the nobiles had done for the last century).
You know what, you are exactly right. Pompey was an inspiring leader, though not a mighty general. He was only bad at being a statesman, and unfortunately that is what Rome needed. He had power, but wasn’t ruthless or cunning or perhaps even interested in using it.
Pompey was not a puppet but was not a man of great political skills. His interest in retaining his primacy as First Man and theirs in preserving the hollow shell of the Republic as the arena for the Good Men to compete for Dignitas coincided. His conduct of the civil war shows he was not a puppet.
“Pompey had a simple view of natural law: All the glory in the world belonged to Pompey, and anyone else who got any was guilty of thieving.”
– John Maddox Roberts, in one of his SPQR novels, I forget which one.
Because the whole Caesar/Civil War thing was the culminating symptom not a cause. The Roman political system was designed so that it was very difficult to change anything. The rich old elite were unwilling to give up one gram of privilege to address the huge social and political pressures it was being subject to while the Republican system was guaranteed to keep throwing up rich. powerful and successful war leaders who could.
The Marian reforms which opened the ranks to the plebs without a stake in the system (rather than land owners) made it inevitable that successful Legions would owe primary loyalty to their general.
With the rich elite continuing to steal public land and incorporating small land-holdings into their slave estates (thus swelling the ranks of the mob in Rome with landless peasants) it was inevitable that the Republic would be replaced with a form of government able to run an empire and make the necessary changes at home.
The Good Men, with their violent opposition to any hint of land reform (as evidenced with the fate of the Grachii), had closed off the possibility of real reform.
So - Cometh the Hour cometh the Man. If not Caesar, someone else within a couple of decades.
What if Pompey had won and Cleopatra had herself delivered to him in a carpet? As partners, would she have had the political acumen to help him consolidate power?
Caesar was only in Egypt because of the civil war and murder of Pompey, so without those events, who knows whether Pompey would have sided with Cleopatra or Ptolmey.
To be honest, Cleopatra had nothing. Yes, she had a power base in Egypt, but it was dubious and was not a significant threat without Roman troops backing her. Her political acumen was uncertain, too - she hardly affected Roman society. She was a skilled society dame, apparently quite capable of wooing important figures.
This is about right; Cleopatra’s actions are best explained in terms of defending her and Egypt’s extremely weak position before Caesar and the armies of Rome.
Egypt’s one strategic advantage was its export of enormous amounts of grain to Rome. Cleopatra’s wiles may have played some part in Caesar’s decision to avoid a military conquest of the Nile, but certainly a desire not to upset current trade was another factor–simpler just to keep the folks who’d been organizing the country rather than risk a drop in exports as Roman bureaucrats transitioned in. Octavian, of course, had no choice but to remove Cleopatra, but note that he remained personally involved in the organization of Egypt as a province, and it was the only province where he divided the proconsulship (to avoid anyone getting funny ideas).
It’s doubtful Egypt could have helped a victorious Pompey in any meaningful way, and in fact it could have worked against him if–unlike Caesar–he decided to more forcefully “Romanize” the country.
The Roman Republican government was based on traditions. It worked when everyone did what they were supposed to. Its vulnerability was that people could advance themselves by defying tradition and simply doing what was advantageous to them. This started long before Caesar or Pompey came along - it went as least as far back as Tiberius Gracchus.
You had a system in which people were supposed to be limited by a self-imposed sense of restraint and duty with minimal external checks. Such a system will inevitably give way to those indviduals who choose not to restrain themselves. And every time one individual defied a tradition it weakened the strenght of that tradition’s hold over other ambitious individuals.
For those curious, or in case you run into the term in other contexts, the Latin term for the concept was mos maiorum…the custom of the ancestors.
The Republic probably could have ben reformed, however. Cicero was more of a traditionalist but probably would have supported change if it meant the Republic would survive. Cato the Younger, however, was absurdly iron-backed and completly opposed to any change, or even deviation from formality. Given that by the end of the Republic they were almost the only really loyal people left…