Lawrence Sammons II

No matter what. There's no appeal. There's nothing you can say. Well, they just don't like me. You know, they have a bias against people from Arkansas like me, you know, and they're throwing me out. There's no appeal to this. You have to go.

No matter what. There's no appeal. There's nothing you can say. Well, they just don't like me. You know, they have a bias against people from Arkansas like me, you know, and they're throwing me out. There's no appeal to this. You have to go.

Right. So this looks pretty clearly to have been something they invented right after the Persian Wars and in the context where Athens had gotten rid of its tyrants, but the Persians had tried to bring a tyrant back and impose a tyrant on Athens, a previous tyrant. And the first people who were ostracized were people who could be associated in some way with the tyrants.

Right. So this looks pretty clearly to have been something they invented right after the Persian Wars and in the context where Athens had gotten rid of its tyrants, but the Persians had tried to bring a tyrant back and impose a tyrant on Athens, a previous tyrant. And the first people who were ostracized were people who could be associated in some way with the tyrants.

So it looks like the Athenians thought to prevent a potential tyrant, we will use this thing, ostracism, right? We can't trust having this guy around even, so we're going to get rid of him. But it turns into something else.

So it looks like the Athenians thought to prevent a potential tyrant, we will use this thing, ostracism, right? We can't trust having this guy around even, so we're going to get rid of him. But it turns into something else.

In Socrates' case, we're told that more people voted that he should be executed than found him guilty. So there were people who voted for Socrates' innocence who still voted that he should be executed. And why? Why, in Socrates' case, he had annoyed a whole lot of people, including some very powerful people.

In Socrates' case, we're told that more people voted that he should be executed than found him guilty. So there were people who voted for Socrates' innocence who still voted that he should be executed. And why? Why, in Socrates' case, he had annoyed a whole lot of people, including some very powerful people.

Oh, they thought about it, but they didn't see it as a positive example. Almost everything they said about it was, we want to avoid that. The founders just didn't want the American system to be that open to the will of the people. The will of the people had to be controlled to some degree. It had to be blunted, you know, the force of the will of the people.

Oh, they thought about it, but they didn't see it as a positive example. Almost everything they said about it was, we want to avoid that. The founders just didn't want the American system to be that open to the will of the people. The will of the people had to be controlled to some degree. It had to be blunted, you know, the force of the will of the people.

One of the things is that the pay for public service in the fifth century became eventually pay for all kinds of things, including in the fourth century, they paid themselves to vote. They're paying themselves to vote? Like a lot? Well, no, not a lot.

One of the things is that the pay for public service in the fifth century became eventually pay for all kinds of things, including in the fourth century, they paid themselves to vote. They're paying themselves to vote? Like a lot? Well, no, not a lot.

Eventually, they got to the point where they paid themselves to go to the theater so that they subvented, they underwrote theater tickets for Athenians. And why were they making, those are terrible decisions. Well, I mean, how do you, if you're in an assembly and a politician gets up and says, I think you guys should be paid to vote, who's going to vote against that? Right.

Eventually, they got to the point where they paid themselves to go to the theater so that they subvented, they underwrote theater tickets for Athenians. And why were they making, those are terrible decisions. Well, I mean, how do you, if you're in an assembly and a politician gets up and says, I think you guys should be paid to vote, who's going to vote against that? Right.

I mean, once that idea is out there. What's the idea of paying people to do X or Y's out there? It's just impossible, it seems to me, in a democratic environment to get people to go, no, no, I'll give up that money. I don't want to be paid. No, I don't want to get that extra benefit.

I mean, once that idea is out there. What's the idea of paying people to do X or Y's out there? It's just impossible, it seems to me, in a democratic environment to get people to go, no, no, I'll give up that money. I don't want to be paid. No, I don't want to get that extra benefit.

How do you borrow money from a goddess? Yeah, it's funny. Athena was very willing to loan. They saw that money in their treasuries and that was owned by their gods as available for human use. It wasn't that the money owned by the gods couldn't be used.

How do you borrow money from a goddess? Yeah, it's funny. Athena was very willing to loan. They saw that money in their treasuries and that was owned by their gods as available for human use. It wasn't that the money owned by the gods couldn't be used.

Right. So the Athenians kept those books separate. The money that was taken out of the mines, that was money that didn't have to be borrowed. But the money that they borrowed from the gods, some of which they had taken from other Greek states, some of that imperial money gets dedicated to the gods.

Right. So the Athenians kept those books separate. The money that was taken out of the mines, that was money that didn't have to be borrowed. But the money that they borrowed from the gods, some of which they had taken from other Greek states, some of that imperial money gets dedicated to the gods.

That money had to be paid back and had to be paid back in interest. And Athena was very generous during the Peloponnesian War. She lowered her interest rate from something like 7% to 1.5%, something like that. It was nice of her. But the Athenians basically spent all the money they had in their... that they'd accumulated through their empire.

That money had to be paid back and had to be paid back in interest. And Athena was very generous during the Peloponnesian War. She lowered her interest rate from something like 7% to 1.5%, something like that. It was nice of her. But the Athenians basically spent all the money they had in their... that they'd accumulated through their empire.

And that debt was a debt to the gods, but they never paid it back. A state, a democratic state can just spend itself into oblivion. And in fact, I would go so far to say it will spend itself into oblivion.

And that debt was a debt to the gods, but they never paid it back. A state, a democratic state can just spend itself into oblivion. And in fact, I would go so far to say it will spend itself into oblivion.

They overspent, and that overspending led to more military action. Because why? The empire is generating some of this money that's being used to pay people, yeah, and to build the buildings and to pay people to serve on juries. The Athenians quite well understood that sailing out and attacking other Greeks and imposing tribute payments on them was paying them, right?

They overspent, and that overspending led to more military action. Because why? The empire is generating some of this money that's being used to pay people, yeah, and to build the buildings and to pay people to serve on juries. The Athenians quite well understood that sailing out and attacking other Greeks and imposing tribute payments on them was paying them, right?

This time, those who think about Rome all the time, and those who do not.

This time, those who think about Rome all the time, and those who do not.

There was a direct relationship between those two things. They understood that. So the democratic system of paying for public service and building these buildings is generating empire. It's not that the Athenians weren't imperial before. Athens was always aggressive. Even before democracy, the Athenians had an unusually aggressive profile. It's part of their national character for some reason.

There was a direct relationship between those two things. They understood that. So the democratic system of paying for public service and building these buildings is generating empire. It's not that the Athenians weren't imperial before. Athens was always aggressive. Even before democracy, the Athenians had an unusually aggressive profile. It's part of their national character for some reason.

But boy, democracy really amped it up.

But boy, democracy really amped it up.

No, there were. By the end of the 5th century, there are Athenians who are saying things like, this imperialism thing is a little out of control. It's a tiny, tiny voice in a chorus of, but more empire is better.

No, there were. By the end of the 5th century, there are Athenians who are saying things like, this imperialism thing is a little out of control. It's a tiny, tiny voice in a chorus of, but more empire is better.

Philip didn't destroy Athens. The Athenian city-state continued and the Athenians actually kept having jury trials and they kept electing officials. They just weren't sovereign anymore. Athens wasn't running its own show, right? They got to worry about the Macedonians. They're not making their own policy anymore. They're not deciding whether they're going to go to war or not.

Philip didn't destroy Athens. The Athenian city-state continued and the Athenians actually kept having jury trials and they kept electing officials. They just weren't sovereign anymore. Athens wasn't running its own show, right? They got to worry about the Macedonians. They're not making their own policy anymore. They're not deciding whether they're going to go to war or not.

Macedon is calling the shots on that, right? Eventually the Romans are going to call the shots on that. So that's what changes. But internally, they still had elections and they still had officers, right? They still played democracy, we could call it. That's probably unfair to call it playing.

Macedon is calling the shots on that, right? Eventually the Romans are going to call the shots on that. So that's what changes. But internally, they still had elections and they still had officers, right? They still played democracy, we could call it. That's probably unfair to call it playing.

But they had lost that thing that had defined the Greek city-state before, which is being the absolute sovereign authority over yourself. You make your own laws. You make your own foreign policy. You decide whether you're going to go to war or not. Nobody else is going to tell you whether you're going to do that.

But they had lost that thing that had defined the Greek city-state before, which is being the absolute sovereign authority over yourself. You make your own laws. You make your own foreign policy. You decide whether you're going to go to war or not. Nobody else is going to tell you whether you're going to do that.

And see, it sounded to me like you were describing the world we live in now. A place where you get to vote on some stuff. Yeah. I mean, I've had this really dark thought over the last few years. Maybe I have too many of them, but

And see, it sounded to me like you were describing the world we live in now. A place where you get to vote on some stuff. Yeah. I mean, I've had this really dark thought over the last few years. Maybe I have too many of them, but

Aristotle says man is suited to live a life in the polis and that the heavy responsibilities of citizenship is the best way for a human being and the ideal way for a human being to spend his public life. Maybe I still believe that that is true. I'm an ideal world, but it just seems to me that human beings in the end find that too burdensome and that they retreat.

Aristotle says man is suited to live a life in the polis and that the heavy responsibilities of citizenship is the best way for a human being and the ideal way for a human being to spend his public life. Maybe I still believe that that is true. I'm an ideal world, but it just seems to me that human beings in the end find that too burdensome and that they retreat.

look in the late 80s and early 90s, I realized that I had to stop basically watching the news.

look in the late 80s and early 90s, I realized that I had to stop basically watching the news.

And I had to, you know, retreat to some degree into Thucydides and these other authors. But the problem is that you keep seeing the same things in those authors that you see around you. So my copy of Thucydides has in the margins, it'll have, you know, November 1992 written in the margins or something, you know, where I go, this reminded me of something.

And I had to, you know, retreat to some degree into Thucydides and these other authors. But the problem is that you keep seeing the same things in those authors that you see around you. So my copy of Thucydides has in the margins, it'll have, you know, November 1992 written in the margins or something, you know, where I go, this reminded me of something.

It's not that I don't follow the news at all anymore, but I realized I just couldn't become someone who was in that game of what's the next winning move in this political sport.

It's not that I don't follow the news at all anymore, but I realized I just couldn't become someone who was in that game of what's the next winning move in this political sport.

Oh, I find... I find this hilarious that people assume that democracy is somehow the ultimate form of government. This has been a running shtick of mine for years, that you go to any political science department in the West and you won't find somebody who goes, no, the next thing is going to be this really better thing. It's not democracy at all, right?

Oh, I find... I find this hilarious that people assume that democracy is somehow the ultimate form of government. This has been a running shtick of mine for years, that you go to any political science department in the West and you won't find somebody who goes, no, the next thing is going to be this really better thing. It's not democracy at all, right?

Somehow they're all studying ways to make democracy better and ways to make democracy more democratic.

Somehow they're all studying ways to make democracy better and ways to make democracy more democratic.

So you're caught in this kind of circle where you evaluate democracy against the principles of democracy. I don't think that works. You got to evaluate it by some external standards. How much justice does it produce? How much goodness does it produce? How much wealth does it produce? You know, how many families does it produce?

So you're caught in this kind of circle where you evaluate democracy against the principles of democracy. I don't think that works. You got to evaluate it by some external standards. How much justice does it produce? How much goodness does it produce? How much wealth does it produce? You know, how many families does it produce?

There's all kinds of ways you could evaluate it that aren't, you know, how democratic is it? That thing just won't work, right, in terms of an evaluation process for me. So I really hope that we're not just going to keep reinventing democracy over and over and that a human history hasn't ended with this thing that we're just going to keep tweaking.

There's all kinds of ways you could evaluate it that aren't, you know, how democratic is it? That thing just won't work, right, in terms of an evaluation process for me. So I really hope that we're not just going to keep reinventing democracy over and over and that a human history hasn't ended with this thing that we're just going to keep tweaking.

Isn't it possible that mankind will actually produce a system of government in the future that's superior to democracy? It's at least possible, I think. And so if it's possible, we should be thinking about it. But I still think if we focus too much on that political thing, we take our eyes off the other things that are actually more important.

Isn't it possible that mankind will actually produce a system of government in the future that's superior to democracy? It's at least possible, I think. And so if it's possible, we should be thinking about it. But I still think if we focus too much on that political thing, we take our eyes off the other things that are actually more important.

Right. That's true. But I'll also just add in Thucydides' defense that he did have a dark view of human nature. So do I. but that no historian believes that mankind is completely irredeemable. Because you would never write about the past if you didn't think a better future was actually possible. Thucydides had to believe a better future is actually possible.

Right. That's true. But I'll also just add in Thucydides' defense that he did have a dark view of human nature. So do I. but that no historian believes that mankind is completely irredeemable. Because you would never write about the past if you didn't think a better future was actually possible. Thucydides had to believe a better future is actually possible.

That's what he says, in fact, early in his history about the future. He doesn't put it quite in that optimistic a way, but it's implied. What does he say? Well, he says that he wants his work to be a possession for all time. He says, for those who want to know about the future, this work will be valuable. Because as long as human nature is what it is, similar things will happen again.

That's what he says, in fact, early in his history about the future. He doesn't put it quite in that optimistic a way, but it's implied. What does he say? Well, he says that he wants his work to be a possession for all time. He says, for those who want to know about the future, this work will be valuable. Because as long as human nature is what it is, similar things will happen again.

And if you know the kinds of things that are likely to happen, you can in fact plan for them. And you can try to avoid them. It's not that you're likely to avoid them, but it's possible you may. And I think, no, I believe this. This is to me the inherent optimism that goes along with history, even if you have a dark view of human nature.

And if you know the kinds of things that are likely to happen, you can in fact plan for them. And you can try to avoid them. It's not that you're likely to avoid them, but it's possible you may. And I think, no, I believe this. This is to me the inherent optimism that goes along with history, even if you have a dark view of human nature.

So I don't believe that it's impossible for better things to happen in the future. And it's one of the reasons I study the past.

So I don't believe that it's impossible for better things to happen in the future. And it's one of the reasons I study the past.

Sure. My name's Lawrence Sammons, but everyone calls me Jay. And I teach Greek history and Greek and Latin at Boston University and have done so for over 30 years. I also work for the American College of Greece in a consulting role in Athens. And my interests have been democracy and imperialism and the historians who write about democracy and imperialism for pretty much my whole career.

Sure. My name's Lawrence Sammons, but everyone calls me Jay. And I teach Greek history and Greek and Latin at Boston University and have done so for over 30 years. I also work for the American College of Greece in a consulting role in Athens. And my interests have been democracy and imperialism and the historians who write about democracy and imperialism for pretty much my whole career.

When I got to graduate school, I still thought I was going to be a Roman historian, but it was really Thucydides that dragged me into Athenian history. I found him so interesting that I abandoned my Roman studies and focused on the Greeks. And what was it about Thucydides? What about the way that he wrote? He was so dark. I mean, Thucydides has an extremely dark view of human nature.

When I got to graduate school, I still thought I was going to be a Roman historian, but it was really Thucydides that dragged me into Athenian history. I found him so interesting that I abandoned my Roman studies and focused on the Greeks. And what was it about Thucydides? What about the way that he wrote? He was so dark. I mean, Thucydides has an extremely dark view of human nature.

He's very much like my father in many ways. If you think things are as bad as they can possibly get, you're definitely wrong. They're going to get worse. But I think sometimes people think Thucydides is sort of taking joy in that, that he's saying what's good, that human beings exercise power in this really sort of awful way. But I think that's wrong.

He's very much like my father in many ways. If you think things are as bad as they can possibly get, you're definitely wrong. They're going to get worse. But I think sometimes people think Thucydides is sort of taking joy in that, that he's saying what's good, that human beings exercise power in this really sort of awful way. But I think that's wrong.

He's someone who recognizes the tragedy of the fact that human beings tend to make similar mistakes over and over again.

He's someone who recognizes the tragedy of the fact that human beings tend to make similar mistakes over and over again.

Of course, one of the most famous things Thucydides said is, as long as human nature remains the same, similar things will happen again. And that's why he believed his work would be useful for those who want to know about the future.

Of course, one of the most famous things Thucydides said is, as long as human nature remains the same, similar things will happen again. And that's why he believed his work would be useful for those who want to know about the future.

Not because history is cyclical, not because history repeats itself, but because human beings repeat themselves and make the same kinds of mistakes generation after generation.

Not because history is cyclical, not because history repeats itself, but because human beings repeat themselves and make the same kinds of mistakes generation after generation.

Athens was a second-tier state, maybe even a third-tier state in the seventh and sixth centuries BC. And what does that mean? Like, what is a third-tier state at that time? Well, I mean that, A, they weren't as powerful as some other states. Their military strength was not up to some other states.

Athens was a second-tier state, maybe even a third-tier state in the seventh and sixth centuries BC. And what does that mean? Like, what is a third-tier state at that time? Well, I mean that, A, they weren't as powerful as some other states. Their military strength was not up to some other states.

But what I really mean is that they didn't have the early history that other states had, like Sparta and Thebes and Argos. Those are names that ring through mythology and what the Greeks thought of their very ancient past. Whereas Athens, for example, if you take Homer, the Iliad, Athens plays almost no role at all in the Iliad.

But what I really mean is that they didn't have the early history that other states had, like Sparta and Thebes and Argos. Those are names that ring through mythology and what the Greeks thought of their very ancient past. Whereas Athens, for example, if you take Homer, the Iliad, Athens plays almost no role at all in the Iliad.

Most classicists can't even name the Athenian hero of the Iliad because he's a nobody in the story. He appears four times and twice he's being called a coward. But they do know that Odysseus comes from Ithaca and Ajax comes from Salamis. So you have all these other heroes that come from other places that seem far less important than Athens.

Most classicists can't even name the Athenian hero of the Iliad because he's a nobody in the story. He appears four times and twice he's being called a coward. But they do know that Odysseus comes from Ithaca and Ajax comes from Salamis. So you have all these other heroes that come from other places that seem far less important than Athens.

But to an Athenian reading Homer, he fails to find himself there. So what does this mean for the Athenian psyche? And I think it's actually a major factor in how the Athenians thought of themselves.

But to an Athenian reading Homer, he fails to find himself there. So what does this mean for the Athenian psyche? And I think it's actually a major factor in how the Athenians thought of themselves.

Yeah. Yeah, I do. I do think that. That's probably making it too strong. I think that this feeling rarely rises to a kind of conscious level, but it's active. It does rise to a conscious level. For example, Pericles, in one of the speeches that Thucydides records, says, we don't need any Homer to sing our praises. That's a really odd thing to say. We don't need any Homer.

Yeah. Yeah, I do. I do think that. That's probably making it too strong. I think that this feeling rarely rises to a kind of conscious level, but it's active. It does rise to a conscious level. For example, Pericles, in one of the speeches that Thucydides records, says, we don't need any Homer to sing our praises. That's a really odd thing to say. We don't need any Homer.

We know we're not there and we don't need him. We're going to write our own epic.

We know we're not there and we don't need him. We're going to write our own epic.

And this is one of the things that makes Athenian democracy different. It starts to look different from other Greek city-states because the Athenians lowered the property qualification to the point eventually you don't have to own property to be a citizen and vote in the assembly.

And this is one of the things that makes Athenian democracy different. It starts to look different from other Greek city-states because the Athenians lowered the property qualification to the point eventually you don't have to own property to be a citizen and vote in the assembly.

Aristotle said you can't define democracy by voting in elections because if you have voting in elections, you're going to have rule of the rich. Aristotle said this necessarily follows from elections that you'll end up with rule of the rich. They saw it that early. Yeah. Isn't that amazing? I mean, that's obviously not true. I mean, Aristotle got it wrong.

Aristotle said you can't define democracy by voting in elections because if you have voting in elections, you're going to have rule of the rich. Aristotle said this necessarily follows from elections that you'll end up with rule of the rich. They saw it that early. Yeah. Isn't that amazing? I mean, that's obviously not true. I mean, Aristotle got it wrong.

Well, it's gonna be heard by a jury, a large jury of Athenians. Okay. You're gonna have to defend yourself. There's no lawyer to defend you. You can hire someone to write a speech for you, but you're still gonna have to deliver that speech yourself.

Well, it's gonna be heard by a jury, a large jury of Athenians. Okay. You're gonna have to defend yourself. There's no lawyer to defend you. You can hire someone to write a speech for you, but you're still gonna have to deliver that speech yourself.

They're outdoors. Athenian courts were typically outdoors. Jurors sitting on benches around you, no microphones, no amplification, no nothing. The whole trial is going to happen in one day. Prosecution will make its case. The prosecutor will also not be a public prosecutor. It'll be an individual Athenian citizen who has the ability to bring this case against you.

They're outdoors. Athenian courts were typically outdoors. Jurors sitting on benches around you, no microphones, no amplification, no nothing. The whole trial is going to happen in one day. Prosecution will make its case. The prosecutor will also not be a public prosecutor. It'll be an individual Athenian citizen who has the ability to bring this case against you.

And you're going to defend yourself. And the whole thing will be over in a day. The jurors will vote whether you're guilty or not. And if they find you guilty, then they're going to vote on what punishment you're going to get.

And you're going to defend yourself. And the whole thing will be over in a day. The jurors will vote whether you're guilty or not. And if they find you guilty, then they're going to vote on what punishment you're going to get.

I hope so, if you want to be heard. If you've got any chance. And you need to think about entertaining the jury, too. Right. You've got to hold people's attention. It's just like public speaking anywhere else. You know, you may have all the evidence in the world, but if you can't hold their attention or if they just don't like you, I mean, let's just say they jurors don't like you.

I hope so, if you want to be heard. If you've got any chance. And you need to think about entertaining the jury, too. Right. You've got to hold people's attention. It's just like public speaking anywhere else. You know, you may have all the evidence in the world, but if you can't hold their attention or if they just don't like you, I mean, let's just say they jurors don't like you.

They've been looking for a chance to get rid of you. Right. And there's no mechanism for making sure that only evidence is used here.

They've been looking for a chance to get rid of you. Right. And there's no mechanism for making sure that only evidence is used here.

Sure. Once a year, the Athenians would get together and vote on the question, are we going to ostracize anybody this year? Ostracism would mean sending somebody away for 10 years. Their property wasn't seized. Nothing was done to them. They were just sent away. So there's no right to property that prevents the Athenian people from doing this. The Athenian people can do what they want.

Sure. Once a year, the Athenians would get together and vote on the question, are we going to ostracize anybody this year? Ostracism would mean sending somebody away for 10 years. Their property wasn't seized. Nothing was done to them. They were just sent away. So there's no right to property that prevents the Athenian people from doing this. The Athenian people can do what they want.

It is, in fact, a direct democracy. Of course, I always tell my students, I'm definitely voting yes. You know, every year, are we going to have an ostracism? Yes, definitely. I don't know who we're going to ostracize, but I don't want to miss the chance of having an ostracism. That's pretty great. So and then a few days later, they would come back and they would have the actual vote.

It is, in fact, a direct democracy. Of course, I always tell my students, I'm definitely voting yes. You know, every year, are we going to have an ostracism? Yes, definitely. I don't know who we're going to ostracize, but I don't want to miss the chance of having an ostracism. That's pretty great. So and then a few days later, they would come back and they would have the actual vote.

And the day of the vote, you would write the name of the person you wanted to ostracize on a broken piece of pottery. That pottery is called an ostracon. So that's what gives ostracism its name. And so you wrote the name of the person you wanted ostracized, you know, Professor Sammons. And then you turn that in. And if 6,000 people voted, then whoever got the most votes had to go. No matter what.

And the day of the vote, you would write the name of the person you wanted to ostracize on a broken piece of pottery. That pottery is called an ostracon. So that's what gives ostracism its name. And so you wrote the name of the person you wanted ostracized, you know, Professor Sammons. And then you turn that in. And if 6,000 people voted, then whoever got the most votes had to go. No matter what.

No matter what. There's no appeal. There's nothing you can say. Well, they just don't like me. You know, they have a bias against people from Arkansas like me, you know, and they're throwing me out. There's no appeal to this. You have to go.

Right. So this looks pretty clearly to have been something they invented right after the Persian Wars and in the context where Athens had gotten rid of its tyrants, but the Persians had tried to bring a tyrant back and impose a tyrant on Athens, a previous tyrant. And the first people who were ostracized were people who could be associated in some way with the tyrants.

So it looks like the Athenians thought to prevent a potential tyrant, we will use this thing, ostracism, right? We can't trust having this guy around even, so we're going to get rid of him. But it turns into something else.

In Socrates' case, we're told that more people voted that he should be executed than found him guilty. So there were people who voted for Socrates' innocence who still voted that he should be executed. And why? Why, in Socrates' case, he had annoyed a whole lot of people, including some very powerful people.

Oh, they thought about it, but they didn't see it as a positive example. Almost everything they said about it was, we want to avoid that. The founders just didn't want the American system to be that open to the will of the people. The will of the people had to be controlled to some degree. It had to be blunted, you know, the force of the will of the people.

One of the things is that the pay for public service in the fifth century became eventually pay for all kinds of things, including in the fourth century, they paid themselves to vote. They're paying themselves to vote? Like a lot? Well, no, not a lot.

Eventually, they got to the point where they paid themselves to go to the theater so that they subvented, they underwrote theater tickets for Athenians. And why were they making, those are terrible decisions. Well, I mean, how do you, if you're in an assembly and a politician gets up and says, I think you guys should be paid to vote, who's going to vote against that? Right.

I mean, once that idea is out there. What's the idea of paying people to do X or Y's out there? It's just impossible, it seems to me, in a democratic environment to get people to go, no, no, I'll give up that money. I don't want to be paid. No, I don't want to get that extra benefit.

How do you borrow money from a goddess? Yeah, it's funny. Athena was very willing to loan. They saw that money in their treasuries and that was owned by their gods as available for human use. It wasn't that the money owned by the gods couldn't be used.

Right. So the Athenians kept those books separate. The money that was taken out of the mines, that was money that didn't have to be borrowed. But the money that they borrowed from the gods, some of which they had taken from other Greek states, some of that imperial money gets dedicated to the gods.

That money had to be paid back and had to be paid back in interest. And Athena was very generous during the Peloponnesian War. She lowered her interest rate from something like 7% to 1.5%, something like that. It was nice of her. But the Athenians basically spent all the money they had in their... that they'd accumulated through their empire.

And that debt was a debt to the gods, but they never paid it back. A state, a democratic state can just spend itself into oblivion. And in fact, I would go so far to say it will spend itself into oblivion.

They overspent, and that overspending led to more military action. Because why? The empire is generating some of this money that's being used to pay people, yeah, and to build the buildings and to pay people to serve on juries. The Athenians quite well understood that sailing out and attacking other Greeks and imposing tribute payments on them was paying them, right?

This time, those who think about Rome all the time, and those who do not.

There was a direct relationship between those two things. They understood that. So the democratic system of paying for public service and building these buildings is generating empire. It's not that the Athenians weren't imperial before. Athens was always aggressive. Even before democracy, the Athenians had an unusually aggressive profile. It's part of their national character for some reason.

But boy, democracy really amped it up.

No, there were. By the end of the 5th century, there are Athenians who are saying things like, this imperialism thing is a little out of control. It's a tiny, tiny voice in a chorus of, but more empire is better.

Philip didn't destroy Athens. The Athenian city-state continued and the Athenians actually kept having jury trials and they kept electing officials. They just weren't sovereign anymore. Athens wasn't running its own show, right? They got to worry about the Macedonians. They're not making their own policy anymore. They're not deciding whether they're going to go to war or not.

Macedon is calling the shots on that, right? Eventually the Romans are going to call the shots on that. So that's what changes. But internally, they still had elections and they still had officers, right? They still played democracy, we could call it. That's probably unfair to call it playing.

But they had lost that thing that had defined the Greek city-state before, which is being the absolute sovereign authority over yourself. You make your own laws. You make your own foreign policy. You decide whether you're going to go to war or not. Nobody else is going to tell you whether you're going to do that.

And see, it sounded to me like you were describing the world we live in now. A place where you get to vote on some stuff. Yeah. I mean, I've had this really dark thought over the last few years. Maybe I have too many of them, but

Aristotle says man is suited to live a life in the polis and that the heavy responsibilities of citizenship is the best way for a human being and the ideal way for a human being to spend his public life. Maybe I still believe that that is true. I'm an ideal world, but it just seems to me that human beings in the end find that too burdensome and that they retreat.

look in the late 80s and early 90s, I realized that I had to stop basically watching the news.

And I had to, you know, retreat to some degree into Thucydides and these other authors. But the problem is that you keep seeing the same things in those authors that you see around you. So my copy of Thucydides has in the margins, it'll have, you know, November 1992 written in the margins or something, you know, where I go, this reminded me of something.

It's not that I don't follow the news at all anymore, but I realized I just couldn't become someone who was in that game of what's the next winning move in this political sport.

Oh, I find... I find this hilarious that people assume that democracy is somehow the ultimate form of government. This has been a running shtick of mine for years, that you go to any political science department in the West and you won't find somebody who goes, no, the next thing is going to be this really better thing. It's not democracy at all, right?

Somehow they're all studying ways to make democracy better and ways to make democracy more democratic.

So you're caught in this kind of circle where you evaluate democracy against the principles of democracy. I don't think that works. You got to evaluate it by some external standards. How much justice does it produce? How much goodness does it produce? How much wealth does it produce? You know, how many families does it produce?

There's all kinds of ways you could evaluate it that aren't, you know, how democratic is it? That thing just won't work, right, in terms of an evaluation process for me. So I really hope that we're not just going to keep reinventing democracy over and over and that a human history hasn't ended with this thing that we're just going to keep tweaking.

Isn't it possible that mankind will actually produce a system of government in the future that's superior to democracy? It's at least possible, I think. And so if it's possible, we should be thinking about it. But I still think if we focus too much on that political thing, we take our eyes off the other things that are actually more important.

Right. That's true. But I'll also just add in Thucydides' defense that he did have a dark view of human nature. So do I. but that no historian believes that mankind is completely irredeemable. Because you would never write about the past if you didn't think a better future was actually possible. Thucydides had to believe a better future is actually possible.

That's what he says, in fact, early in his history about the future. He doesn't put it quite in that optimistic a way, but it's implied. What does he say? Well, he says that he wants his work to be a possession for all time. He says, for those who want to know about the future, this work will be valuable. Because as long as human nature is what it is, similar things will happen again.

And if you know the kinds of things that are likely to happen, you can in fact plan for them. And you can try to avoid them. It's not that you're likely to avoid them, but it's possible you may. And I think, no, I believe this. This is to me the inherent optimism that goes along with history, even if you have a dark view of human nature.

So I don't believe that it's impossible for better things to happen in the future. And it's one of the reasons I study the past.

Sure. My name's Lawrence Sammons, but everyone calls me Jay. And I teach Greek history and Greek and Latin at Boston University and have done so for over 30 years. I also work for the American College of Greece in a consulting role in Athens. And my interests have been democracy and imperialism and the historians who write about democracy and imperialism for pretty much my whole career.

When I got to graduate school, I still thought I was going to be a Roman historian, but it was really Thucydides that dragged me into Athenian history. I found him so interesting that I abandoned my Roman studies and focused on the Greeks. And what was it about Thucydides? What about the way that he wrote? He was so dark. I mean, Thucydides has an extremely dark view of human nature.

He's very much like my father in many ways. If you think things are as bad as they can possibly get, you're definitely wrong. They're going to get worse. But I think sometimes people think Thucydides is sort of taking joy in that, that he's saying what's good, that human beings exercise power in this really sort of awful way. But I think that's wrong.

He's someone who recognizes the tragedy of the fact that human beings tend to make similar mistakes over and over again.

Of course, one of the most famous things Thucydides said is, as long as human nature remains the same, similar things will happen again. And that's why he believed his work would be useful for those who want to know about the future.

Not because history is cyclical, not because history repeats itself, but because human beings repeat themselves and make the same kinds of mistakes generation after generation.

Athens was a second-tier state, maybe even a third-tier state in the seventh and sixth centuries BC. And what does that mean? Like, what is a third-tier state at that time? Well, I mean that, A, they weren't as powerful as some other states. Their military strength was not up to some other states.

But what I really mean is that they didn't have the early history that other states had, like Sparta and Thebes and Argos. Those are names that ring through mythology and what the Greeks thought of their very ancient past. Whereas Athens, for example, if you take Homer, the Iliad, Athens plays almost no role at all in the Iliad.

Most classicists can't even name the Athenian hero of the Iliad because he's a nobody in the story. He appears four times and twice he's being called a coward. But they do know that Odysseus comes from Ithaca and Ajax comes from Salamis. So you have all these other heroes that come from other places that seem far less important than Athens.

But to an Athenian reading Homer, he fails to find himself there. So what does this mean for the Athenian psyche? And I think it's actually a major factor in how the Athenians thought of themselves.

Yeah. Yeah, I do. I do think that. That's probably making it too strong. I think that this feeling rarely rises to a kind of conscious level, but it's active. It does rise to a conscious level. For example, Pericles, in one of the speeches that Thucydides records, says, we don't need any Homer to sing our praises. That's a really odd thing to say. We don't need any Homer.

We know we're not there and we don't need him. We're going to write our own epic.

And this is one of the things that makes Athenian democracy different. It starts to look different from other Greek city-states because the Athenians lowered the property qualification to the point eventually you don't have to own property to be a citizen and vote in the assembly.

Aristotle said you can't define democracy by voting in elections because if you have voting in elections, you're going to have rule of the rich. Aristotle said this necessarily follows from elections that you'll end up with rule of the rich. They saw it that early. Yeah. Isn't that amazing? I mean, that's obviously not true. I mean, Aristotle got it wrong.

Well, it's gonna be heard by a jury, a large jury of Athenians. Okay. You're gonna have to defend yourself. There's no lawyer to defend you. You can hire someone to write a speech for you, but you're still gonna have to deliver that speech yourself.

They're outdoors. Athenian courts were typically outdoors. Jurors sitting on benches around you, no microphones, no amplification, no nothing. The whole trial is going to happen in one day. Prosecution will make its case. The prosecutor will also not be a public prosecutor. It'll be an individual Athenian citizen who has the ability to bring this case against you.

And you're going to defend yourself. And the whole thing will be over in a day. The jurors will vote whether you're guilty or not. And if they find you guilty, then they're going to vote on what punishment you're going to get.

I hope so, if you want to be heard. If you've got any chance. And you need to think about entertaining the jury, too. Right. You've got to hold people's attention. It's just like public speaking anywhere else. You know, you may have all the evidence in the world, but if you can't hold their attention or if they just don't like you, I mean, let's just say they jurors don't like you.

They've been looking for a chance to get rid of you. Right. And there's no mechanism for making sure that only evidence is used here.

Sure. Once a year, the Athenians would get together and vote on the question, are we going to ostracize anybody this year? Ostracism would mean sending somebody away for 10 years. Their property wasn't seized. Nothing was done to them. They were just sent away. So there's no right to property that prevents the Athenian people from doing this. The Athenian people can do what they want.

It is, in fact, a direct democracy. Of course, I always tell my students, I'm definitely voting yes. You know, every year, are we going to have an ostracism? Yes, definitely. I don't know who we're going to ostracize, but I don't want to miss the chance of having an ostracism. That's pretty great. So and then a few days later, they would come back and they would have the actual vote.

And the day of the vote, you would write the name of the person you wanted to ostracize on a broken piece of pottery. That pottery is called an ostracon. So that's what gives ostracism its name. And so you wrote the name of the person you wanted ostracized, you know, Professor Sammons. And then you turn that in. And if 6,000 people voted, then whoever got the most votes had to go. No matter what.