16 THE GREEN RISING 



of private property rights and created injustices that 

 were clearly felt by the less fortunate classes. 1 



Plato in his Laws referred to the tenure of land 

 and prescribed very specifically the method of land 

 distribution as a means of maintaining equality of 

 the rights of ownership. Plato was so impressed 

 with the danger of inequalities growing out of land 

 tenure that he was constrained to advocate main- 

 taining continuously a definite number of families 

 to whom the total land area should be distributed. 



Class conflicts arose very early in Rome over land 

 policies and inequalities resulting from them. As 

 Rome extended her power over surrounding tribes 

 and nations, large land areas were appropriated by 

 the state. In time these public lands became the 

 private property of the patrician families. The vast 

 estates tnus acquired were cultivated by slave labor. 

 The demands of the plebeians to share in the dis- 

 tribution of the agri publicii brought on the first 

 agrarian conflict. In the year 486 B.C. the consul, 

 Spurius Cassius, proposed the first agrarian measure 

 for the redistribution of public lands. His proposal 

 was vigorously opposed and he fell a victim to the 

 vengeance of the patrician landowners. In 367 B.C. 

 the plebeian tribunes proposed a law limiting the 

 size of private estates acquired from the public agri- 

 cultural lands. For a time this law had a beneficial 

 effect, but in later years its provisions were disre- 

 garded. 



* See the writer's Social Teachings of the Jewish Prophets. 



