An ancient Greek, counting up the value of the gifts that Sir Keir Starmer had received over his spotless political career, might immediately have thought of the three mock goddesses of bribery that the comic poet Cratinus invented: Doro, St Give, Dexo, St Receive and Emblo, St Backhander. But a gift might be a bribe, or a genuine thank-you, or an act of altruism: after all, what are friends for? (Julius Caesar racked up gigantic debts.) Greeks agreed that gifts from rich to poor strengthened communal bonds and thought statesmen could serve their own interests if they were serving the interests of the people at the same time.
As for Romans, ‘No vice is more foul than avarice among leaders of men,’ observed Cicero, for whom greed was the main source of injustice; ‘there is nothing by which those in charge of public affairs can more easily endear themselves to the masses than by incorruptible abstemiousness’. He quoted the Roman general Manius Curius, who was roasting his usual meal of turnips when Samnites tried to bribe him. He said he would rather rule people like that than possess their gold.
Political bribery was common. The Latin was ambitus (cf. our ‘ambitious’), derived from ambio ‘I visit in rotation, canvass’. Politicians regularly offered clients benefits of various sorts, including money; officials invited sweeteners from the public for dealing with red tape (the emperor Caracalla advised them not to take ‘everything, nor every time, nor from everyone’). Wits said that a provincial governor had to make three fortunes: one to recoup election ‘expenses’ from getting to the top in Rome; one to bribe the jury on charges of ripping off provincials; and one to live off thereafter.
Sir Keir, then, acquisitive? The very thought! But he must fear that some of his neophyte MPs might be tempted by handouts. Let him follow the example of the emperor Vespasian. He marked out colleagues known for their greed, encouraged the habit – and then charged them with extortion. He called them his ‘sponges’, since ‘he put them in to soak, then squeezed them dry later’.
Problem solved!
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