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by Anthony Molho
Chapter 4
GOVERNMENT
AND POLITICS
The government of Florence
was controlled by the aristocrats.
Those same men who owned the businesses and set the pattern for the social
life of the city were also the political leaders.
To
understand why this was so, we must remember that Florentine ideals of
government were different from ours.
The vast majority of Americans accept the ideal of democracy. We believe that everyone should have the
right to seek election to any public office.
We accept the words of the Founding Fathers that "all men are
created equal."
This
ideal is a relatively new one in the history of humanity. In Florence no one would have considered
such a proposition. The Florentines
believed that only the rich were capable of governing. The rich had the education, the skills, the
leisure to run the government. The poor
and the semiskilled were not permitted to take any part at all mi political
life. They were' thought to be too
ignorant and too likely to want policies dangerous to business. The term "the people" (populus in
Latin), so often used in Florentine political debates, did not refer to all the
people. In addition to the poor, slaves
and servants were excluded. Women did
not hold public office. Priests, nuns,
and monks were considered to belong not to an earthly government but to the
Church. Only those successful in
business or in a craft made up "the people" in Florence. In these attitudes the Florentines were like
other Europeans of their day.
In
Florence there was little doubt that merchants and bankers and skilled
guildsmen with money were capable of taking part in government. But a puzzling issue was how far down the
social and economic ladder one could move before drawing the line. Should the government be in the hands only
of the rich? That is, should Florence be governed by an aristocracy of money?
Or should some others be included, and, if so, who? Those who owned their homes
and shops? They could be counted on to agree with the policies desired by their
social superiors. Or perhaps there was
a third alternative. Perhaps Florence
should be governed by one man, a prince, whom today we would call a
dictator. To understand why Florentines
debated and fought over these issues we must look back over medieval Italian
history.
FORMS OF GOVERNMENT IN
ITALY
After the collapse of the
Roman Empire in the 5th century A.D., no political power was able to unify
Italy. It remained a land of small
states, each dominated by a city. Gradually
some of these states became strong enough to conquer their neighbors. In the 12th and 13th centuries there were
some 300 small states in central and northern Italy alone. By the middle of the 14th century many had
been taken over by their neighbors. In
that way Florence had become the largest and most powerful state in the region
known as Tuscany. But still at least a
dozen independent city-states flourished in central and northern Italy. Each ruled its surrounding area and sought
for more.
Italy
was thus a changing land. Cities fought
cities. Big cities gobbled up little
ones. Warfare was constant. In such a situation a number of forms of
government were sure to be tried. Some
cities fell into the hands of prominent, local families. The head of the family became the city's master. By the mid-14th century most Italian states
had adopted this kind of government. A
state governed in this way was known as a signory (from signore, the
Italian word for lord). But in other
states political power was in the hands of the richest social classes. In Venice, for example, the government was
controlled by 1,000 or so individuals, all members of the great merchant
families. The Italians called these
governments republics. They were
not, like the signories, controlled by one man. A relatively large number of individuals played a part in them.
THE FLORENTINE REPUBLIC
The Florentine republic was
founded in the 1280's and 1290's. It
was during these two decades that the merchants formally gained control of the
government. At that time, as we already
know, the highest class was made up of two groups. The first was the landowning nobility. The second was the rich business class originally descended from
ambitious peasants. But before the
1280's only the old landowning families had taken part in the government. As we have seen, however, many of them had
joined in the business activities of the merchants. There were marriages between the two groups. Only a few nobles held out for the old way
of life. In their castles in the Tuscan
countryside they had enjoyed great power and prestige and were accountable to
no one but themselves. They felt
contempt for the merchants and artisans whom they considered to be their social
inferiors. Moving into the city, these
nobles expected to take the law into their own hands as they had in their
country estates. They assumed that they
could attack their enemies and create turmoil and unrest if it suited their
needs.
Such
a state of affairs could not last: During the 1280's reforms were passed,
leading up to the Ordinances of justice of 1293 and 1295. The Ordinances put the government of
Florence firmly under the control of the guildsmen. After 1295 only members of the 21 guilds were able to take any
part in government. All others were
excluded. Some of those excluded were
descendants of the old landowning families who had refused to conform to urban
customs. Certain families were
specifically mentioned by name and forbidden to hold office. If caught violating the laws, they were to
be punished twice as severely as ordinary citizens.
Guild Leadership
Thus in Florence after the
1290's citizenship meant guild membership.
Only guild members were considered to be the Florentine populus. They were a minority of the population, but
how small the minority was it is hard to say.
Perhaps as many as a third of all adult males were guild members. Minor guild members, however, were not the
political equals of major guildsmen.
Because major guild members were richer, they had more political
power. They held the major
offices. They were appointed
ambassadors to foreign courts. They had
lighter taxes to pay, for they or their friends controlled the tax commission. Even so, minor guildsmen were relatively
pleased with their status. They had at
least some voice in the government. So
long as conditions in the city were good they were satisfied. Only the more unruly nobles were displeased.
The
men in actual power numbered between 1,500 and 1,800. Of course not all of them were active in politics. Nor were all of them equally distinguished
or skilled. Perhaps 100 to 200 were
actively involved in the practical operations of government.
A
diagram of the way power was distributed in Florence might be visualized as
follows. Imagine a band of concentric
circles. The outermost perimeter would
represent those without power: workers not enrolled in guilds, members of the
old nobility excluded after the 1290's, members of religious groups, the poor. Moving toward the center, the next circle
would represent the minor guildsmen.
The third circle would be that of the major guildsmen in whose hands
rested the actual administration of politics.
The center of the circle, therefore, would represent not one man but a
number. And these men were governing on
behalf of a substantial portion of the population: all the members of the
guilds, though more specifically, the major guildsmen. While this system is hardly a democracy in
modern terms, it was the best justification Florence had for thinking of itself
as a republic. An Italian political
commentator, Bartolus of Sassoferato, stated his opinion an the question as
follows:
For although they [the Florentines] are said to be
ruled by the few, I say that they are few compared to the whole population of
the city, but they are many to those ruling in other cities, and because they
are many, the people are not resentful of being governed by them.... Moreover, many of their men are of moderate
wealth.
Florentines
were aware that their government was unlike those set up elsewhere in
Italy. Most other cities were governed
by signories. The Florentines were
proud of their form of government. They
cherished their liberty. Not until 1434
did they let their republic be undermined by the rise of one family-the
Medici. Why did the republic last so
long, some 150 years during a period of great political turmoil in Italy and in
the city?
Republican Strengths
Perhaps the first answer
that comes to mind is the city's great wealth.
Few cities in Europe were so rich.
And in comparison with other cities, Florence had a high percentage of
people who in that day rated as wealthy-from extremely rich merchants to highly
skilled artisans who made a comfortable living. The existence of a relatively large number of wealthy individuals
made it difficult for any one person or family to impose its rule on the
city. At all times too many individuals
were interested in the affairs of the city to permit any one individual to take
away their liberties.
Another
reason for the long life of the Florentine republic was that the Florentines
prided themselves on their equality.
Since the members of the ruling class were all in business, they enjoyed
basic equality before law. They felt
communality of interest, and they supported a form of government which
supported them. Then there was
patriotism. In the early years of the
15th century, Florence was attacked by the Milanese. Since Milan was a signory, the fight, in Florentine opinion, was
between republicanism and signorialism.
In a letter to the Milanese lord they exclaimed:
We, a community of common people, dedicated to our
commercial and industrial activities, are free, and therefore we are the most
hated; we are devoted to our own liberty....
It is we who want peace that will guarantee our sweet liberty.
The Florentines saw
themselves as struggling, in this fight, to preserve their republican
government.
Finally,
the way in which the government chose officials won the loyalty of the
guildsmen to it. Rotation in office, as
we shall see, gave a chance to a number of them to participate in politics at
any one time. By the' very nature of
government structure, a high percentage of citizens were able to share in
making policy.
Selection of Officials
The principal aim of the
Florentine constitution was to prevent any one man from obtaining too much
power. To this end, power was
distributed among various agencies by an elaborate system of checks and
balances. Officials were allowed to
keep their positions for a brief time (two to six months was normal). They were neither appointed nor elected;
they were drawn by lot. It was the
desire to safeguard the republican traditions that suggested this way of
choosing officials.
The
most powerful and important body was the priorate. It was composed of nine men who held office
for two months. The priors could not be
reelected for the next three years. Two
of them came from each of the city's four quarters. The office of chief prior, the ninth man, rotated among the four
quarters. Fifty-four men thus held the
prior's office each year. During their
term of office the priors lived in grandeur together in the Palazzo dei
Signori. Their official duties were
also attended with great ceremony.
This
system may strike us as inefficient. An
official no sooner learned his duties than he was out of office. But the arrangement had a great
advantage. It ensured that during their
lifetimes many members of the ruling class would hold office, many of them more
than once and some often.
An elaborate system was worked
out to select the priors.
Representatives of the guilds met with representatives of the city's
four quarters. Together they listed all
men who were eligible to hold the office.
About 5,000 to 6,000 names were thus listed in alphabetical order. A committee of 151 men selected about 10 per
cent of the names by casting a secret ballot on each name in the general
list. Any name receiving 100 or more
votes was written on a slip of paper, which was then placed in a carefully
guarded pouch. When there was a
vacancy, a paper was drawn out of the pouch and the man who was named became
the new prior.
In
addition to the priorate there were tax commissions and Commissions in charge
of the territories Florence had acquired.
Officials were also assigned to supervise the police, the fire
department, and the prisons. Each of
these offices required the services of four to six men holding office for four
to six months.
THE GOVERNMENT IN ACTION
In brief outline this was
the government of Florence as it was worked out in 1290's. But the next 150 years were often too
chaotic for the constitution to be used precisely as planned. To be sure, the written provisions were
carefully followed. They did prevent
any one man from keeping an office long enough to use it as a stepping-stone to
supreme power. But ambitious factions
of the great merchants were constantly struggling with each other behind the
scenes for control of the city. At the
other end of the social scale, the poor and unemployed made known their
miseries more than once by uprisings.
Even more important, Florence was almost constantly at war, seeking more
territory or fending off enemies. The
history of the city government was record of endless struggles for power both
at home and abroad. But an amazing fact
of these 150 years is that business and art and writing flourished brilliantly
in this time of unrest.
We
can only hint at the nature of these disturbances that troubled Florence during
the early Renaissance. In Italy as a
whole each of the strongest states was still attempting to extend its control
over smaller, neighboring states. The
Florentines for their part were eager to bring all of Tuscany under their
power. They attacked the city of Lucca
more than once without success. Only
toward the end of the 14th century did they manage to subdue the rest of
Tuscany, except for Lucca and Siena.
But by this advance Florence became roughly the equal of the greatest
Italian states: Milan, Venice, Naples, and the papacy.
These
struggles had their influence on the Florentine government and its
policies. Florence had to fight its
wars with the use of mercenaries -hired soldiers who were recruited and paid by
their own captains. These troops were
thought to be more efficient than citizen armies, but also they were far less
reliable. They fought for the state
that offered the most pay, and were willing to quit or even to change sides
when their captain thought it advantageous.
Since its enemies used mercenaries, Florence could not hope for victory
without doing likewise. Only
mercenaries were well enough trained to stand up against the hired soldiers of
other states. Since they were very
expensive, taxes rose sharply as a result.
Twice early in the 14th century Florence was at the edge of destruction. Then the government had to suspend the
constitution and give the state over to a dictator, a foreigner from
Naples. In each case, however, the
republican government was restored within a few years.
The
troubled times offered an opportunity to the lesser guildsmen and the miserable
woolworkers, who were not guildsmen at all.
Using every violent and nonviolent means at hand, the woolworkers put
forward demands for the right to form guilds.
Only if they became guildsmen could they hope for a slight share in the
government. We remember the most famous
of their uprisings, which took place in 1378.
The workers succeeded in getting two guilds of their own. But in 1382 the merchant group hired
soldiers and attacked the woolworkers in their slums. The workers were forced to yield, giving up the two new
guilds. The rich merchants and
bankers. retained all their former
power.
THE LAST YEARS OF THE
REPUBLIC
The Florentine constitution
lasted from the 1280's for almost 150 years in spite of its weaknesses and the
severe problems it faced. Then in the
early 1420's wars loomed again. The
dangers seemed greater than ever. At
the same time a most dangerous conflict developed at home between the two
families of the Albizzi and the Medici.
After continuous crisis from 1423 to 1434, Cosimo de' Medici succeeded
in taking over the political leadership of Florence. Thereafter the city was a republic only in name.
The
crisis began in 1423 when Milan set out to unite northern and central
Italy-including Tuscany and Florence-under its domination. The war lasted until 1428 and was a near
defeat for Florence. Final Florentine
victory came only after tremendous expenditures of money. Taxes mounted, business suffered, and
citizens grew more and more disgruntled.
The city and the people were exhausted.
A long period of peace would be required to restore business life and
repay the government's debt.
But
peace was not to be. In that very year,
1428, Florence attacked the city of Lucca again, hoping at last to subdue
it. Before the meteoric rise of
Florence, Lucca had itself been a leading city. Its silk merchants and bankers were men of great wealth. By the 15th century, however, Lucca was a
second-rate power in comparison with Florence.
It was easy for Florentine leaders- to believe that Lucca would be
defeated quickly and its wealth seized.
Nearly every prominent Florentine enthusiastically welcomed a war.
Almost
at once the war turned into the greatest disaster ever to result from
Florentine policy. Lucca was I never in danger of defeat, and
it was more than likely that Milan would join its side. Before long it was the Florentine leaders
who tried to withdraw from the fighting.
Meantime the government's debts rose sharply while taxes were ever more
frequent and always higher. There was
the usual danger of riots within the city itself.
At this point it became clear that a major struggle for
power was developing within the city between two factions of guildsmen. The rival groups were, led by the Albizzi
and Medici families. This rivalry was a
more intense version of the power struggles between groups that had gone on in
Florence since the beginning of the republic.
Led
by Maso degli Albizzi, the Albizzi family had enjoyed great prestige in the
government since 1382. Respected and a
moderate in his policies, Maso believed in giving concessions to rival guildsmen
instead of trying to beat them down.
For example, he made no attempt to keep the leading member of the Medici
family from holding office many times.
But
in 1417 Albizzi policy changed. Maso
died and was succeeded by his more impulsive and arrogant son Rinaldo. The son had great ambitions. He urged the war against Lucca, and in this
matter he was supported by almost all prominent Florentines. But when the war went badly and the citizens
grew restive, Rinaldo had reason to fear that he would be blamed. He sought to shift the blame to the
Medici. His fear of them was in no way
lessened when Florence finally sued for peace in the spring of 1433.
Aretino on a mercenary
leader
He valued brave men more than he did riches and
indeed only desired the latter to keep the valiant, who served him, from going
hungry. There was nothing about his
men's lodgings or their conduct in action that he did not know about, for in
battle he fought side by side with privates in the ranks and in peacetime he
made no distinction between himself and others. Indeed, the very clothes he wore proved he was himself a fighting
man. They were worn and shabby and they
had armor stains upon the legs, and arms, and chest. . . .
But what more than anything else won the hearts of his followers was
that he said, "Follow me!" instead of "Go ahead of me)" in
time of peril.... He sought only honor
and not his own interest, and ... sold
all his possessions. . . to
pay the army's overdue salaries, He was the first to bestride his stud and
always the last one to dismount.
Machiavelli on mercenary
troop
Mercenary and auxiliary troops are useless and
dangerous.... He who bases his
government on hireling soldiers will never be solid or secure, because they are
disunited, ambitious, without discipline, unfaithful, vigorous among friends,
vile among enemies; they have no fear of God or faith with men.
The
Medici, for their part, were, as we have already seen, a fairly new
family. Only during the second half of
the, 14th century had a few of them taken part in political life. Not until Giovanni de' Medici set up his
great bank in 1197 did the family join the ranks of the most powerful people in
the city.
With
the largest and richest bank in Europe under their control, the Medici could
supply desperately needed funds to the Florentine government during the war
with Lucca. By that time Cosimo de'
Medici had become head of the family.
The state borrowed vast sums from him, gradually repaying him as it
collected its taxes.
The
end of the war found Florence in a state of weakness and disarray. The whole previous decade had impoverished
the government and taken a fearful toll of business. Even more alarming, the city's leadership was now sharply
divided. One group led by Rinaldo degli
Albizzi faced another formed around Cosimo, de' Medici.
At
first, events favored Rinaldo. He
rallied around him the older families, who saw with alarm the Medici rise to
power. Members of this faction wanted
to cut down or kill Cosimo's political influence. In a series of meetings held right after the peace with Lucca,
the Albizzi worked out their plans.
Cosimo for his part kept his plans to himself. His position was very strong.
He does not seem to have wanted any greater power or influence. Then in September a new priorate was drawn
for office with a number of Rinaldo's friends in it. The Albizzi saw their chance.
They accused Cosimo of a number of trumped-up crimes and had him
exiled. With members of his family, he
fled to Venice.
No
sooner was Cosimo gone than public opinion, began slowly to swing to his
support. He gradually removed large
sums of his money to Venice, thus aggravating economic conditions in
Florence. The government was in serious
trouble without the support of its richest citizen. Soon Cosmo’s friends could claim that he had been exiled unjustly
and only because of Rinaldo's vengeful schemes. Finally, in the autumn of 1434, the priorate then in office
pardoned him and recalled him to Florence.
Ten months after his banishment he returned to Florence in triumph. The same priorate that welcomed Cosimo back
also banished Rinaldo and his friends.
THE MEDICI GOVERNMENT
Cosimo found an
enthusiastic people and an organized band of followers waiting for him in
Florence. He was able, then, to keep
most of the old forms of republican government and yet in reality to act as
head of state. He played his role in
masterly fashion. He made only one open
change in the republican organization of the state. He arranged that when names for new officials were' drawn from
the pouch, the drawing would be done by a new group of officeholders loyal to
him. Seldom holding office himself, he
refused to assume the outward show of being a signore. Instead of moving to a government palace, he
remained in his own home. In all ways
he tried to appear as no more than a, private citizen. By his careful conduct he managed to hold
the real reins of power without arousing the opposition of the public.
Part
of Cosimo's strength was his popularity with the mass of the people. He promoted a huge building program, ranging
from a Medici family palace to great churches.
These projects made thousands of jobs for men who might otherwise have
been out of work. Cosimo also staged
festivals, processions, and ceremonies which the people loved. Diversions of that sort helped keep peoples'
minds off discussions of the destruction of the republican government.
It
is fair to say that the Florentine republic came to an end when Cosimo came to
power. This change was brought about by
the policies of the men who led the state in the 1420's and 1430's. Cosimo and his successors offered the city
peace, jobs for many, and an endless stream of colorful spectacles. But the price for these things was loss of
freedom and the dynamic quality that Florentine public life had had before
1434. People could speak out against
government policies only at the risk of punishment or exile. Only those who supported the Medici
political line could hope for important places in government. Thus peace and order in the Medici regime
were achieved and paid for at the great cost of weakening some of the very
qualities that had made republican Florence great.