Popular sovereignty has never been as completely in practice as in ancient Athens. The people didn't merely exercise their power at intervals, they wielded it at all times. The Assembly, which was composed of all citizens, decided and debated all questions of public policy. The legislation, executive, and judicial functions of government were exercised by commissions drawn from the citizen body by lot. This made it so the people actually administrated justice, interpreting and applying the law as they saw fit. A jurist on the bench would never balk the popular will by giving inconvenient precedents. Theoretically, a judicial decision rendered today could be reversed in a similar case tomorrow.

Being jealous of the expert as democrats tend to be, the Athenians even tried to prevent the rise and development of legal professions. The law required all men to plead his own case and permitted any man to prosecute a public offender. The law also allowed one citizen to aid another but forbade the acceptance of fees for service. No attempts were made to prevent litigants from using a speech written by another for him as his own, because such a prohibition would have been quite futile. The attempts to prevent professionalism in the administration of justice were not very successful.

On these web pages you can learn about the judicial system of ancient Athens and perjury in ancient Greece. There is a link to Book 1 of Plato's The Republic and another to some speeches from Athenian trials.

Chronological Table.

Judicial system of ancient Athens.

Perjury in Ancient Greece.

Book 1 of The Republic And Other Stuff.

For The Teacher.

Bibliography.

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