AMONG the confederacies of antiquity, the most considerable was that
of the Grecian republics, associated under the Amphictyonic council.
From the best accounts transmitted of this celebrated institution,
it bore a very instructive analogy to the present Confederation of
the American States.
The members retained the character of independent and sovereign
states, and had equal votes in the federal council. This council had
a general authority to propose and resolve whatever it judged
necessary for the common welfare of Greece; to declare and carry on
war; to decide, in the last resort, all controversies between the
members; to fine the aggressing party; to employ the whole force of
the confederacy against the disobedient; to admit new members. The
Amphictyons were the guardians of religion, and of the immense
riches belonging to the temple of Delphos, where they had the right
of jurisdiction in controversies between the inhabitants and those
who came to consult the oracle. As a further provision for the
efficacy of the federal powers, they took an oath mutually to defend
and protect the united cities, to punish the violators of this oath,
and to inflict vengeance on sacrilegious despoilers of the temple.
In theory, and upon paper, this apparatus of powers seems amply
sufficient for all general purposes. In several material instances,
they exceed the powers enumerated in the articles of confederation.
The Amphictyons had in their hands the superstition of the times,
one of the principal engines by which government was then
maintained; they had a declared authority to use coercion against
refractory cities, and were bound by oath to exert this authority on
the necessary occasions.
Very different, nevertheless, was the experiment from the theory.
The powers, like those of the present Congress, were administered by
deputies appointed wholly by the cities in their political
capacities; and exercised over them in the same capacities. Hence
the weakness, the disorders, and finally the destruction of the
confederacy. The more powerful members, instead of being kept in awe
and subordination, tyrannized successively over all the rest.
Athens, as we learn from Demosthenes, was the arbiter of Greece
seventy-three years. The Lacedaemonians next governed it twenty-nine
years; at a subsequent period, after the battle Leuctra, the Thebans
had their turn of domination.
It happened but too often, according to Plutarch, that the deputies
of the strongest cities awed and corrupted those of the weaker; and
that judgment went in favor of the most powerful party.
Even in the midst of defensive and dangerous wars with Persia and
Macedon, the members never acted in concert, and were, more or fewer
of them, eternally the dupes or the hirelings of the common enemy.
The intervals of foreign war were filled up by domestic
vicissitudes, convulsions, and carnage.
After the conclusion of the war with Xerxes, it appears that the
Lacedaemonians required that a number of the cities should be turned
out of the confederacy for the unfaithful part they had acted. The
Athenians, finding that the Lacedaemonians would lose fewer
partisans by such a measure than themselves, and would become
masters of the public deliberations, vigorously opposed and defeated
the attempt. This piece of history proves at once the inefficiency
of the union, the ambition and jealousy of its most powerful
members, and the dependent and degraded condition of the rest. The
smaller members, though entitled by the theory of their system to
revolve in equal pride and majesty around the common center, had
become, in fact, satellites of the orbs of primary magnitude.
Had the Greeks, says the Abbe Milot, been as wise as they were
courageous, they would have been admonished by experience of the
necessity of a closer union, and would have availed themselves of
the peace which followed their success against the Persian arms, to
establish such a reformation. Instead of this obvious policy, Athens
and Sparta, inflated with the victories and the glory they had
acquired, became first rivals and then enemies; and did each other
infinitely more mischief than they had suffered from Xerxes. Their
mutual jealousies, fears, hatreds, and injuries ended in the
celebrated Peloponnesian war; which itself ended in the ruin and
slavery of the Athenians who had begun it.
As a weak government, when not at war, is ever agitated by internal
dissensions, so these never fail to bring on fresh calamities from
abroad.
The Phocians having ploughed up some consecrated ground belonging to
the temple of Apollo, the Amphictyonic council, according to the
superstition of the age, imposed a fine on the sacrilegious
offenders. The Phocians, being abetted by Athens and Sparta, refused
to submit to the decree. The Thebans, with others of the cities,
undertook to maintain the authority of the Amphictyons, and to
avenge the violated god. The latter, being the weaker party, invited
the assistance of Philip of Macedon, who had secretly fostered the
contest. Philip gladly seized the opportunity of executing the
designs he had long planned against the liberties of Greece. By his
intrigues and bribes he won over to his interests the popular
leaders of several cities; by their influence and votes, gained
admission into the Amphictyonic council; and by his arts and his
arms, made himself master of the confederacy.
Such were the consequences of the fallacious principle on which this
interesting establishment was founded. Had Greece, says a judicious
observer on her fate, been united by a stricter confederation, and
persevered in her union, she would never have worn the chains of
Macedon; and might have proved a barrier to the vast projects of
Rome.
The Achaean league, as it is called, was another society of Grecian
republics, which supplies us with valuable instruction.
The Union here was far more intimate, and its organization much
wiser, than in the preceding instance. It will accordingly appear,
that though not exempt from a similar catastrophe, it by no means
equally deserved it.
The cities composing this league retained their municipal
jurisdiction, appointed their own officers, and enjoyed a perfect
equality. The senate, in which they were represented, had the sole
and exclusive right of peace and war; of sending and receiving
ambassadors; of entering into treaties and alliances; of appointing
a chief magistrate or praetor, as he was called, who commanded their
armies, and who, with the advice and consent of ten of the senators,
not only administered the government in the recess of the senate,
but had a great share in its deliberations, when assembled.
According to the primitive constitution, there were two praetors
associated in the administration; but on trial a single one was
preferred.
It appears that the cities had all the same laws and customs, the
same weights and measures, and the same money. But how far this
effect proceeded from the authority of the federal council is left
in uncertainty. It is said only that the cities were in a manner
compelled to receive the same laws and usages. When Lacedaemon was
brought into the league by Philopoemen, it was attended with an
abolition of the institutions and laws of Lycurgus, and an adoption
of those of the Achaeans. The Amphictyonic confederacy, of which she
had been a member, left her in the full exercise of her government
and her legislation. This circumstance alone proves a very material
difference in the genius of the two systems.
It is much to be regretted that such imperfect monuments remain of
this curious political fabric . Could its interior structure and
regular operation be ascertained, it is probable that more light
would be thrown by it on the science of federal government, than by
any of the like experiments with which we are acquainted.
One important fact seems to be witnessed by all the historians who
take notice of Achaean affairs. It is, that as well after the
renovation of the league by Aratus, as before its dissolution by the
arts of Macedon, there was infinitely more of moderation and justice
in the administration of its government, and less of violence and
sedition in the people, than were to be found in any of the cities
exercising singly all the prerogatives of sovereignty. The Abbe
Mably, in his observations on Greece, says that the popular
government, which was so tempestuous elsewhere, caused no disorders
in the members of the Achaean republic, because it was there
tempered by the general authority and laws of the confederacy.
We are not to conclude too hastily, however, that faction did not,
in a certain degree, agitate the particular cities; much less that a
due subordination and harmony reigned in the general system. The
contrary is sufficiently displayed in the vicissitudes and fate of
the republic.
Whilst the Amphictyonic confederacy remained, that of the Achaeans,
which comprehended the less important cities only, made little
figure on the theatre of Greece. When the former became a victim to
Macedon, the latter was spared by the policy of Philip and
Alexander. Under the successors of these princes, however, a
different policy prevailed. The arts of division were practiced
among the Achaeans. Each city was seduced into a separate interest;
the union was dissolved. Some of the cities fell under the tyranny
of Macedonian garrisons; others under that of usurpers springing out
of their own confusions.
Shame and oppression erelong awakened their love of liberty. A few
cities reunited. Their example was followed by others, as
opportunities were found of cutting off their tyrants. The league
soon embraced almost the whole Peloponnesus. Macedon saw its
progress; but was hindered by internal dissensions from stopping it.
All Greece caught the enthusiasm and seemed ready to unite in one
confederacy, when the jealousy and envy in Sparta and Athens, of the
rising glory of the Achaeans, threw a fatal damp on the enterprise.
The dread of the Macedonian power induced the league to court the
alliance of the kings of Egypt and Syria, who, as successors of
Alexander, were rivals of the king of Macedon. This policy was
defeated by Cleomenes, king of Sparta, who was led by his ambition
to make an unprovoked attack on his neighbors, the Achaeans, and
who, as an enemy to Macedon, had interest enough with the Egyptian
and Syrian princes to effect a breach of their engagements with the
league.
The Achaeans were now reduced to the dilemma of submitting to
Cleomenes, or of supplicating the aid of Macedon, its former
oppressor. The latter expedient was adopted. The contests of the
Greeks always afforded a pleasing opportunity to that powerful
neighbor of intermeddling in their affairs. A Macedonian army
quickly appeared. Cleomenes was vanquished.
The Achaeans soon experienced, as often happens, that a victorious
and powerful ally is but another name for a master. All that their
most abject compliances could obtain from him was a toleration of
the exercise of their laws.
Philip, who was now on the throne of Macedon, soon provoked by his
tyrannies, fresh combinations among the Greeks. The Achaeans, though
weakened by internal dissensions and by the revolt of Messene, one
of its members, being joined by the AEtolians and Athenians, erected
the standard of opposition. Finding themselves, though thus
supported, unequal to the undertaking, they once more had recourse
to the dangerous expedient of introducing the succor of foreign
arms.
The Romans, to whom the invitation was made, eagerly embraced it.
Philip was conquered; Macedon subdued. A new crisis ensued to the
league. Dissensions broke out among its members. These the Romans
fostered. Callicrates and other popular leaders became mercenary
instruments for inveigling their countrymen. The more effectually to
nourish discord and disorder the Romans had, to the astonishment of
those who confided in their sincerity, already proclaimed universal
liberty (note-Fed18-1) throughout Greece. With the same insidious
views, they now seduced the members from the league, by representing
to their pride the violation it committed on their sovereignty.
By these arts this union, the last hope of Greece, the last hope of
ancient liberty, was torn into pieces; and such imbecility and
distraction introduced, that the arms of Rome found little
difficulty in completing the ruin which their arts had commenced.
The Achaeans were cut to pieces, and Achaia loaded with chains,
under which it is groaning at this hour.
I have thought it not superfluous to give the outlines of this
important portion of history; both because it teaches more than one
lesson, and because, as a supplement to the outlines of the Achaean
constitution, it emphatically illustrates the tendency of federal
bodies rather to anarchy among the members, than to tyranny in the
head.
Signed "PUBLIUS"
Footnotes Explained:
Footnote Number 1. This was but another name more specious for the
independence of the members on the federal head.
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