Quintus Roscius
Roman comic actor, 1st century C.E.

Poppaea Sabina
mistress and later second wife of the Roman emperor Nero (d. 65 C.E.)

Petronius Arbiter
Roman author of the Satyricon (d. 66 C.E.)

Marcus Tullius Cicero
Roman philosopher and Senator (d. 43 B.C.E.)

Germania Servius
Roman slave from the northern borders of the empire, 1st century C.E.

SCENE 1.0 FROM BONDAGE TO BONDAGE

--Lord Alexander Tytler

Stage dark; dressing area illuminated as needed. Romans begin in the dressing area as they finish their prep and walk onstage during this scene, except Quintus and Petronius who remain at their dressing tables.

QUINTUS: Maybe they'd find out that Americans actually do vote in high numbers if they didn't throw them all out.

POPPAEA: Ye gods, they might all have voted for me!

QUINTUS: You can't be elected Empress of Rome by renters!

POPPAEA: This is America, babes! Anyone can vote. Blind, illiterate. They are equal opportunity imbeciles here. Got a pencil? As good as a toga.

PETRONIUS: Who do you think won?

CICERO: I suppose Gore lost the election, and Bush stole it.

POPPAEA: Oh, Gore would have stolen it if he could.

CICERO: Certainly.

GERMANIA: Even Nader beat Gore. Nader made Gore lose to Bush.

CICERO: Bush didn't win, he was appointed by the Supreme Court.

PETRONIUS: They both lost, and the presidency was given away as a bad-conduct prize.

GERMANIA: America loves an underdog but hates a loser.

POPPAEA: There will be a feast where everyone eats and no one is satisfied. There will be a struggle between two who are as one in which both will lose and one will gain. Those who count will be counted in, and those who recount will count for nothing. Those whose role it is to judge will not judge but will be themselves judged. One will speak for fifty, and nine will speak for a multitude, but in the end only five will be heard. For it is written that in the end the swift will stall and the strong will fall and the dust flow over all.

CICERO:(normal) This last election saw yet another dead candidate elected. People didn't bat an eyelash. They walked into the polls in an orderly fashion and voted for a dead man.

POPPAEA:(normal) Puppet, dead man, what's the difference? (Irish)> My dear departed grandfather, C. Poppaeus Sabinus, from the day he was made a citizen of this august Republic‹every presidential election, he walked religiously to the polls and wrote in the name of Norman Thomas.

CICERO:(normal) Who?

POPPAEA:(southern/Scarlett) Norman Thomas, the Communist Party candidate for President of the United States. My grandfather did this till the day he died. Norman Thomas predeceased Gramps by about 35 years. Does that make him a man of principle or a fool? Or a principled fool? He knew Norman Thomas was dead. It was a matter of principle. And what did it get him?

CICERO:(Colonel Flagg) Vermont, now; Vermont is about as far from Rome as you can get‹like Moesia, where your grandfather was governor but in the other direction. The margin of this civilization. Maybe the closest thing we have to a glimpse of how the Republic used to be.

POPPAEA:(Yiddish-German) What exactly is the principle embodied by voting for a dead man? For a dead man who stood for undoing the republic and replacing it with another system of government? Emigrate to America and turn it into communist Russia! Just don't make me eat pickled herring!

CICERO: (yankee-Maine) I actually registered to vote in Vermont. You know why? I thought I would see what it might be like. They have town meeting days still, and they have a very small population, divided up in such a way that they practice democracy as it used to be.

POPPAEA:(Brooklyn-Bronx-Russian) He was born in Danzig. Citizens of the margins of civilization are big on lost causeways. Perpetual margin machines. You must let them know up there in the Capital‹what you think! Seems too late now. Perhaps he would have voted for Nader this time around. But voting for a dead man‹ now there's a fashion statement.

CICERO:(Puerto Rican) And I had to go to city hall in Burlington, where I lived at the time, and they made me raise my hand and promise to vote my conscience and not be persuaded by anything else. It was worded so simply and beautifully... sincerely. I wept.
(normal)
It was the essence of the idea, to see what the common people thought, the ones who wanted to vote and took the time to think about things.

POPPAEA:(normal) And did you ever actually vote?

CICERO:(John Wayne-cowboy) You see a really functional voting is not about how many bodies you can get to punch card. It is about how many people care to study the problems of this country and make an informed choice.

POPPAEA:(Miss Kitty) So, what... we should break the Empire into warring states all the size of Vermont? Balkanize it?

CICERO:(Tonto) We could do worse. Maybe we're too big to function as a whole.

SCENE 1.4 THE BIG SLEEP
QUINTUS and PETRONIUS are still at the dressing tables.

QUINTUS: We choose to be in a big sleep, and we pick leaders who won't wake us up.

PETRONIUS: Somebody usually gets killed for doing that.

QUINTUS: Gore for instance. Gore had to die.

PETRONIUS: What?

QUINTUS: People kept saying Gore had to concede so Americans could have "closure". So we could "move on". They even said, "concede with dignity." This is how you talk about death.

PETRONIUS: Not just death, suicide. It was an assisted suicide.

QUINTUS: Yes, and not just the Bush side, Gore's own supporters. They all told him to concede. Die graciously, die with courage, but die already.

PETRONIUS: Keep to what wakes you, boy.

QUINTUS: I'm an actor, Petro. A divided being.

CICERO: Where are we then? Isn't Nero a republican?

I'm sorry, I'm a solitary man, living alone, reading my books‹and I don't watch the news.

What happened to the Republic?

I'm confused--Roman republicans, American Republicans. I was a moralist and humanist; I pointed the finger at Republic and democracy alike.

What I denounced was the lie of pretended leadership, pretended virtue, the faking of representative government through puppet senates, bribery, et cetera.

I stood for the rule of law with the senate really functioning and against absolute power as vested in kings and empresses.

But democracy can't even get you good leadership‹how could it get you good laws?

The idea of the Roman Republic is that the privileged consider the whole and the needs of the many. Which is why I made such a fuss.

Here is what I believe: that those with money and power should work for those without--

that's the Republic.

I want both--an election process by the people and the powerful showing their right to rule by high moral standards.

I refuse to be cynical. There is such a thing as good leadership, and I refuse to pretend I see it in any form of government.

Good people trying to do good things for the whole is the goal. I am an idealist.

And I am stubborn.

Two clowns, one of whom is trying to teach the other how to count ballots properly. Projections on various screens: ballots, images from the Florida recount, etc.

QUINTUS: What's that?

PETRONIUS: It's a Florida ballot.

QUINTUS: It looks an awful lot like a thousand dollar bill with holes.

PETRONIUS: Oh, wait, wrong ballot, that's the one they sent to, ah, never mind that; here's the one I mean. Now, they call this a butterfly ballot because it looks like a book.

QUINTUS: Not like a butterfly?

PETRONIUS: (waves it in his face)

QUINTUS: Not like a butterfly.

PETRONIUS: It was specially designed to help older voters in Palm Beach. You see, this larger type they used, that made the presidential candidates spread over two pages. Bookwise.

QUINTUS: I heard it helped a bunch of voters mark Buchanan instead of Gore.

PETRONIUS: Yes, yes, very effective. Now hold it up to the light... No, that's the wrong way around... No, back to front. Now, a hole equals a vote.

QUINTUS: A hole equals a vote. (nods)

PETRONIUS: So what's this? (holding up a chad)

QUINTUS: A dead vote?

PETRONIUS: A chad! Definition of a chad: the portion of a paper ballot that voters punch out to indicate their candidate of choice.

QUINTUS: But it's not punched out.

PETRONIUS: Not all the way.

QUINTUS: It's still a vote?

PETRONIUS: Depends. There are different types of chads. Plain chad, clean hole, counts as a vote. Hanging chad, one corner still attached to the ballot, counts as a vote?

QUINTUS: Yes?

PETRONIUS: Yes. Swinging chad, two corners still attached to the ballot, counts as a vote?

QUINTUS: Yes?

PETRONIUS: Yes. Tri chad, three corners still attached to the ballot, counts...?

QUINTUS: Yes!

PETRONIUS: No. Dimpled chad, indented but still attached to the ballot all the way around, counts as a vote?

QUINTUS: Yes!

PETRONIUS: No! Well, sometimes, but mainly no. Pregnant chad, pierced but still fully attached to the ballot ?

QUINTUS: Yes!... No!.. Yes!

PETRONIUS: No! Not!

QUINTUS: But pregnant means giving birth, a baby, a little vote.

PETRONIUS: Idiot. (clouts him) Now, how do we count the votes on the ballot?

QUINTUS: Count the holes! (notices PETRONIUS's glare) ...and chads.

PETRONIUS: How?

QUINTUS: Hold them up to the light?

PETRONIUS: No! First we run them through a machine. The machine counts the votes.

QUINTUS: But wouldn't the machine make some of those one-corner thingies fall off?

PETRONIUS: So what? Anyway, the point is the machines reject a lot of votes, and if they reject too many votes, there can be a hand recount. Now, show me how you'd do a hand recount.

QUINTUS: one, two, three (mimes counting money and dealing into a single pile)

PETRONIUS: Hold it up to the light! Look for the holes, look for the chads. Bush vote? Put it in this pile. Gore vote? Put it over here. Voila.

QUINTUS: What if I can't tell?

PETRONIUS: What did I just tell you? Hole, vote, hanging chad, vote, swinging chad, vote, dimpled chad, no, pregnant chad, no. (counting on QUINTUS's fingers)

QUINTUS: Right. Got it.

PETRONIUS: No! Dimpled and pregnant chads should count as votes! (lifts two of QUINTUS's fingers)

QUINTUS: But you said...

PETRONIUS: Listen up. I'm 82 years old, I retired to Florida to tan my liver spots, statistically I've been dead for four years, I go in to vote, I punch that Gore hole but I'm not so strong anymore, face it, I'm as weak as a lame-duck president, I'm even weaker than this paper ballot, I strain myself pushing and all I make is this weensy stretch mark.

QUINTUS: revelation dawns Dimple!

PETRONIUS: Dimple. But you agree I obviously meant to vote for Gore?

QUINTUS: Sure. So I do count these other kinds of chads.

PETRONIUS: Not officially.

QUINTUS: (gets a flash of insight) Maybe? Is there a maybe pile?

PETRONIUS: What good would a maybe pile be?

QUINTUS: Well, when we're done we could count them up and divide by 2 and give half to Bush and half to Gore!

PETRONIUS: Listen, I'll let you in on a little secret. There's the official Palm Beach rules for recounting, I told you those already.
QUINTUS:

Right, vote, vote, vote, no, no. (counting on fingers)

PETRONIUS: Forget that, the only rule you need to know is this: Every... vote... counts. Every vote is a Gore vote. Pregnant or dimples, it's a Gore vote. In fact, you see any marks anywhere on the ballot, even on the back, it's a Gore vote... Only if the ballot is completely blank is it a Bush vote.

QUINTUS: So, so, how did Bush win if he didn't get any of these votes?

PETRONIUS: Ah, you're forgetting the overseas ballots! Military votes count for Bush.

QUINTUS: Automatically?

PETRONIUS: Of course. In fact, some of them count double.

QUINTUS: Double?

PETRONIUS: Yes, because servicemen are voters and patriots, they get to vote once for their candidate of choice and once for their country.

QUINTUS: How do I... what do I... I write a giant 2 on the ballot then?

PETRONIUS: No, rip it in half, both halves in the Bush pile.

QUINTUS: There's no postmark on this one.

PETRONIUS: Doesn't matter.

QUINTUS: And it's not signed

PETRONIUS: Doesn't matter.

QUINTUS: And, look, it's not even dated. How do we know it wasn't cast after the election was over?

PETRONIUS: I'm telling you, it doesn't matter! Military votes, special rules.

QUINTUS: Says who?

PETRONIUS: Bush's lawyers.

QUINTUS: But how can I even tell it's a military vote?

PETRONIUS: Look, a guy in a uniform shows up with an attaché case full of votes, they're military votes, they all go in the Bush pile. Got that?

QUINTUS: Look, here's one from someone who's not even registered to vote.

PETRONIUS: Military?

QUINTUS: Yeah... All right, all right, Bush pile.

PETRONIUS: Look, if you mess up and reject one of these military ballots? Just cross out the "rejected as illegal" stamp and slip it in the Bush pile. Easy as stuffing a turkey.

QUINTUS: How come none of these ballots we have to recount are Nader ballots? Only Bush, Gore, Buchanan?

PETRONIUS: (condescendingly) No one actually voted for Nader. They just added his 3 percent to the totals at the end so it wouldn't look suspicious.

QUINTUS: But this is ridiculous. They should reform it!

PETRONIUS: Why? This way, every vote counts. Democracy in action.

QUINTUS: Only some votes should count.

PETRONIUS: Like whose?

QUINTUS: Maybe only people below the poverty line should be allowed to vote. They have the most to gain from a change and the most to lose from a mistake.

PETRONIUS: Ain't gonna happen. Who's gonna pay? These punch cards are cheap and fast. You think anyone's gonna spend 500 million to gain a few more votes when the same dough will buy a whole lot more votes on tv?

QUINTUS: A vote is a very, very small thing.

PETRONIUS: Especially when hidden under a pile of money.

GERMANIA: We have a shadow president now. Every move Bush makes, people wonder what Gore would have done. Gore is always there beside him, his invisible twin. Re-elect Gore in oh-four. Remember, remember, remember. In classical tragedy, it was the role of the Furies to pursue wrongdoers without rest, wherever they went, and punish them for their crimes. Children who spurned their parents, hosts who harmed their guests, leaders who wronged their people, the Furies would scourge them all with brass-studded whips. Break their hearts and lay waste their lives. You think the Furies are after Bush? Bush is the fool whose luck will one day run out. Remember Oedipus, King of Thebes? His land was laid waste because he gained the throne by violating universal law. Thebes suffered all kinds of horrors from having an illegitimate ruler. Remember the night of the Supreme Court decision? Those few seconds when only about two dozen people in the entire country knew who was going to be president? And everyone else, knowing that they didn't know. Liking that they didn't know. It was actually a relief to have no one be president for awhile. As good as no one. It wasn't that we couldn't decide between them--we just didn't want either one. In our hearts we voted for no president at all. Like looking at Paradise in the rear-view mirror.

The stage Romans speak their lines more or less simultaneously, with much overlapping, as shown here.   Projected on the various screens is live text input from the online Romans, improvising on different themes each day. The stage Romans pace themselves according to the improvisational energy of the Viewpoints'   "kinesthetic response" in response to each other, the projected text, and the sound environment. Each performer's text is shown in a vertical column below.

GERMANIA, POPPAEA, QUINTUS, and PETRONIUS represent the 9 members of the Supreme Court. GERMANIA stands for the liberal minority on the court, POPPAEA for the straight conservative axis. PETRONIUS represents the more cynical conservatives who recognize that there was no solid intellectual basis for the decision that was made. QUINTUS stands for the court's swing vote(s).They share a single large costume, like a many-headed beast intent on savaging itself. Scene takes place in a kind of elevated boxing ring. Multiple names indicate when 2 or 3 members of the court answer more or less simultaneously.

GERMANIA: State our name, please.

POPPAEA: The Supreme Court of the United States of America.

GERMANIA: Are we also known as Justices Breyer, Ginsburg, Kennedy, O'Connor, Scalia, Souter, Stevens, Thomas, and Chief Justice Rehnquist?

POPPAEA, QUINTUS, PETRONIUS: Yes. Yes. Yes.

GERMANIA: We are appearing today, your Honors, in response to a subpoena that was served upon us by the Roman Republic?

PETRONIUS: We do not acknowledge the authority of that body.

GERMANIA: Let it be stated for the record that we have been delegated this authority pro tem by the people of the United States of America. Please raise your right hands. Do we solemnly swear that the testimony...

QUINTUS: Excuse me, we wish to affirm instead.

PETRONIUS: Swearing implies that we sometimes don't tell the truth.

GERMANIA: Do we solemnly affirm that the testimony we are about to give before this committee will be the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth?

POPPAEA, QUINTUS, PETRONIUS: Yes. Yes. Yes.

GERMANIA: Are we represented by counsel?

PETRONIUS: We are counsel.

GERMANIA: We are representing ourselves?

QUINTUS, POPPAEA: Yes. That's right.

GERMANIA: Fine. Now, were we also the Supreme Court in the year 2000?

POPPAEA, QUINTUS, PETRONIUS: (Grimacing or snarling silently at each other) Yes. Yes. Yes.

GERMANIA: And did we, on December 12, 2000, hand down a decision in the case of George W. Bush, et al., petitioners, v. Albert Gore, Jr., et al.?

POPPAEA: Actually, we handed down several decisions that day. There was a per curiam and five others. Six altogether.

GERMANIA: And did this decision, or did these decisions, determine who would be the next president of the United States?

QUINTUS: In effect, they did.

GERMANIA: And were these decisions unanimous?

POPPAEA: No, we split 5-4.

GERMANIA: Have we ever before taken up a case that could decide the presidency?

POPPAEA: No, we have not.

GERMANIA: What was the gist of these opinions of December 12th, if we had to boil it down to one sentence?

POPPAEA: Well, in short, we held that the manual recounts in Florida were unconstitutional because Florida's judges did not set clear and uniform standards for deciding what constitutes a legal ballot, and that in turn violated voters' 14th Amendment rights to equal protection under the law.

QUINTUS: Wait, we weren't saying that the manual recounts were illegal?

POPPAEA: Oh no. Most of us believed the manual recounts were legal. The problem was with the standards being applied to the counting.

GERMANIA: Wouldn't you say we were overstepping our bounds to take this case at all? I would remind your Honors that the 12th Amendment to the Constitution gives Congress the responsibility to decide any fights over the election. Not the courts.

PETRONIUS: Bush and Gore brought their problem to us. Not to Congress.

GERMANIA: You don't have to take any case you don't want to. You don't even have to give a reason. You turn down 99 out of a hundred as it is.

PETRONIUS: (bored) Issue of national importance.

POPPAEA: Congress wouldn't have dealt with the constitutional issue--the equal protection issue.

GERMANIA: And what did equal protection have to do with anything?

POPPAEA: Some counties counted votes differently from others. That's simply not fair.

QUINTUS: Wait, are you talking about the unfairness of the butterfly ballot, you know, the one that caused some voters to accidentally vote for Buchanan?

POPPAEA: No, no, no, we're not talking about mechanical breakdowns, we're talking about the postelection recounts. Manual recounts. Only.

GERMANIA: What about the fact that many Democratic voters in poorer counties were disenfranchised because the punch-card systems used there result in more disqualified votes than the optical scanners used in richer and largely Republican counties? Isn't that an equal-protection issue?

POPPAEA: Maybe, maybe not.

PETRONIUS: (almost simultaneously) Not the issue in this case.

GERMANIA: Even though the several percentage points of difference in Democratic vs. Republican disqualifications may have swung the election to Bush?

POPPAEA, PETRONIUS: Right. Yes yes yes.

GERMANIA: Let's look for a moment at our normal practices as a court. Is it not true that normally we, as a generally conservative body, do not try to extend the coverage offered by the equal protection clause? That, in fact, we despise the equal protection clause.

POPPAEA: (almost simultaneously) Oh yes.

QUINTUS: (almost simultaneously) That would be an overstatement.

PETRONIUS: (almost simultaneously) Mischaracterization.

(PETRONIUS savages POPPAEA.)

GERMANIA: (to POPPAEA Yes? Yes, you despise the equal protection clause?

POPPAEA: Well. It was, there was a, an issue...

(QUINTUS and PETRONIUS both savage POPPAEA.)

GERMANIA: And didn't we say that our decision in Bush vs. Gore, with respect to the equal-protection clause, was limited to only this one situation?

PETRONIUS:  I don't recall that.

GERMANIA: Let me refresh your memory of our written decision, and I quote "Our consideration is limited to the present circumstances."

QUINTUS: Did we write that?

(POPPAEA and PETRONIUS both savage QUINTUS.)

PETRONIUS: What's the question?

GERMANIA: Isn't this a big departure from our normal practice of not using equal protection as a reason for anything?

POPPAEA: Yes.

PETRONIUS: No.

(POPPAEA and PETRONIUS savage each other.)

QUINTUS: Wait...

POPPAEA, PETRONIUS: (to QUINTUS) Flipper!

(POPPAEA and PETRONIUS savage QUINTUS.)

GERMANIA: Was this not actually a political question such as we have refused to take up in other cases? Didn't we decide what constituted a legal ballot in Florida? And didn't we declare December 12th the deadline for counting the votes?

POPPAEA: Hold on, you've got that wrong. December 12th isn't the counting deadline, that's January 6th.

GERMANIA: It is?

POPPAEA: Oh yes. It's perfectly legal to keep counting votes up to January 6th. December 12th is just the deadline after which Congress can't challenge the results.

GERMANIA: So all the votes counted between December 12th and January 6th might just as well go in the wastebasket?

PETRONIUS: Yup.

QUINTUS: It all goes back to the Tilden-Hayes fight in 1876.

GERMANIA: You're saying the electors have to be picked in December even if the vote count isn't complete until January? But wouldn't that mean that the wrong man could be elected president?

PETRONIUS: (smugly) Yup.

GERMANIA: So did we decide that the Florida Supreme Court acted illegally by extending the recount deadline past December 12th?

PETRONIUS: No, what we found was that the Florida Supreme Court was wrong not to have adopted clearer standards. More uniform standards.

GERMANIA: Clearer standards for what, exactly?

PETRONIUS: For counting votes. The Florida Legislature says that the only legal standard for counting a vote is the quote clear intent of the voter unquote. So what the Florida Supreme Court should have done was to set uniform, statewide standards for determining that.

GERMANIA: But do we not agree that only the Florida Legislature has the right to set new standards with respect to its own elections?

PETRONIUS: Of course.

GERMANIA: So if the Florida Court had adopted new standards, that is, done some ad-hoc rewriting of the law, wouldn't we have had to overturn that decision?

POPPAEA: Probably.

QUINTUS: (almost simultaneously) Possibly.

PETRONIUS: (almost simultaneously) No.

(Free-for-all among POPPAEA, QUINTUS, and PETRONIUS.)

GERMANIA: (trying to separate them; they turn on her too) Yes?

PETRONIUS: No.

POPPAEA: Yes.

QUINTUS: I don't know.

GERMANIA: Let me get this clear. If the Florida Court had set clearer standards, we would have overturned their decision because it changed rules that only the Legislature is allowed to change. And since it did not, in fact, set clearer standards, we overturned it for not changing the rules?

QUINTUS: Yes?

POPPAEA: No?

PETRONIUS: (going after QUINTUS and POPPAEA) Yes.

POPPAEA: Yes.

QUINTUS: No.

PETRONIUS: Yes.

GERMANIA: No matter what the Florida Supreme Court did, some legal votes could never, ever have been counted?

PETRONIUS: (turning on GERMANIA) Well, what constitutes a legal vote?

GERMANIA: (snarling back) I'm asking the questions here.

POPPAEA: The vice-president asked for a machine recount, and he got it. And that should have been it. The minute you go to hand recounts, you create a new system because you are looking at votes that would not normally be counted, that would normally be disqualified.

GERMANIA: But hand recounts are perfectly legal in Florida. And the law holds that no vote shall be disregarded if it clearly reflects the intent of the voter.

POPPAEA: Well we decided that Florida law couldn't reasonably be thought to require the counting of improperly marked ballots.

GERMANIA: Even where they clearly reflected the intent of the voter?

POPPAEA: Even then.

GERMANIA: I want to read something into the record here. "Having once granted the right to vote on equal terms, the State may not, by later arbitrary and disparate treatment, value one person's vote over that of another." Anyone recognize this passage from our majority decision?

POPPAEA: We'd like to request a recess.

QUINTUS: Wait...

PETRONIUS: (attempting to leave; POPPAEA also tries to leave; both fail.) We're in recess!

GERMANIA: (shoving POPPAEA and PETRONIUS back in place) We're not. Now. What do we say to the charge that we, that is, the majority of us, five of us, decided what result we wanted to reach and then manipulated our reasoning to get that result?

POPPAEA: We refuse to answer such an insulting question.

GERMANIA: I direct us to answer the question.

QUINTUS: Are you questioning our integrity?

GERMANIA: You refuse to answer the question?

PETRONIUS: Would you care to step outside?

 POPPAEA: We did this country a great service, we saved it from constitutional chaos.

QUINTUS: (following up eagerly) That's right. Sometimes you just have to take responsibility. You have to step up to the plate.

PETRONIUS: (bored again) Violence in the streets...

QUINTUS: Revolution, even. That 1876 election, Tilden versus Hayes? The federal government had to use troops to keep the peace, that's the kind of thing we're talking about.

GERMANIA: Let's stick to this century, shall we? Isn't it true that what really happened in 2000 is that the liberal minority among us were trying to find some way to allow the manual recounts to continue? While at the same time the conservative majority were trying to find a legal basis to stop them?

POPPAEA: Absurd.

PETRONIUS: You can't prove it you know. That's the beauty of secret deliberations.

GERMANIA: Isn't it true that our vote split along political lines? That the conservative majority all voted for Bush and against Gore?

POPPAEA: Coincidence.

PETRONIUS: (to GERMANIA) And don't forget, you're one of us.

GERMANIA: Isn't it true, Mr. Justice, that at the time of the decision you had two sons working as lawyers for Bush?

PETRONIUS: I don't recall that.

GERMANIA: And you, Mr. Justice, isn't it true that your wife was working at the Heritage Foundation, reviewing resumes for potential Bush staffers?

QUINTUS: Irrelevant.

GERMANIA: Why didn't you recuse yourselves on grounds of conflict of interest?

QUINTUS: Our decision was not affected by those peripheral matters.

PETRONIUS: What he said.

GERMANIA: Isn't it true that if either of you had recused yourselves, the Florida Supreme Court decision allowing recounts would have been affirmed and the recounts would have continued?

POPPAEA: That is so.

GERMANIA: And Gore might have been elected?

QUINTUS: We don't know that.

GERMANIA: I have no further questions.

In the first part of this scene, CICERO plays a Roman lawyer and GERMANIA a Christian slave. In the second part, they are a Roman military officer and a Jewish rebel. In the third part, they are a U.S. military officer and a U.S./Roman soldier. PETRONIUS plays a guard throughout. The three are distributed in different areas of the space.

See Sources for the fragment of Gnostic poetry quoted in this scene.

CICERO: Where's that CO? Bring him in.

PETRONIUS: He's not a CO, she is a Jew.

CICERO: A Jew?

PETRONIUS: One of those Christian Jew slaves. You know, " I am the first and the last, I am the honored and the scorned, I am the whore and..."

CICERO: Oh. (with distaste) A Gnostic.

PETRONIUS: Yeah, one of them.

CICERO: She's the one who passed the plate?

PETRONIUS: One of them.

CICERO: Bring her in then. (PETRONIUS escorts GERMANIA into the room.) You, what's your name?

GERMANIA: Germania Servius.

CICERO: You are charged with insurrection.

GERMANIA: I didn't do anything, I was just walking down the street.

CICERO: (ignoring her) Specifically, you're one of those jokers who passed a collection plate so "poor Florus" would have money to send back to Nero.

GERMANIA: Nero was going to confiscate the Temple's treasure!

CICERO: What do you care? You're a Christian. Of a sort.

GERMANIA: It's still wrong. And I didn't have anything to do with it anyway.

CICERO: You've been arrested for it.

GERMANIA: Your men just grabbed anyone they saw off the street. I was going to market. (sarcastically) To buy food?

CICERO: (to PETRONIUS) Is that true?

PETRONIUS: (woodenly) No sir.

CICERO: (CICERO looks consideringly at PETRONIUS; pauses.) Well. You might have done it. You might do it another time. You can't expect us to just wait until someone attacks us?

GERMANIA: I didn't do anything.

CICERO: "It is the right of every sovereign state to protect itself by preventing a condition of affairs in which it will be too late to protect itself." Elihu Root said that. 1914 I think it was.

GERMANIA: Who?

PETRONIUS: (alarmed, warningly) Sir!

(All three freeze momentarily; GERMANIA gets up and goes out; CICERO and PETRONIUS resume positions from beginning of the scene.)

CICERO: (shaking his head to clear it) My memory's not what it used to be. Where's that Christian? Bring her in.

PETRONIUS: She's not a Christian she's a Jew. One of those Sicarii. Found her at the bottom of a well with some kids.

CICERO: Bring her in then. (PETRONIUS escorts GERMANIA into the room.) You, what's your name?

GERMANIA: Germania Servius.

CICERO: You are charged with insurrection. Specifically, with leading armed forays from Masada to attack   the Roman state. Not that I care, but I could also charge you for the attacks against your fellow Jews in En Geddi.

GERMANIA: It wasn't insurrection, it was anticipatory self-defense.

CICERO: What?!

GERMANIA: We knew you Romans were going to attack us, so why should we sit there and take the first blow? Force can't be our last resort. Not when there are so few of us.

CICERO: Exactly. So few of you. How good an idea was it to start something you couldn't finish? If it hadn't been for you Jews we wouldn't have had to level Jerusalem. Masada too--your fault.

GERMANIA: You had the weapons of mass destruction, you used them.

CICERO: We--the what?

GERMANIA: (sarcastically) Rams? Siege towers?

CICERO: You call those weapons of--what about fire? You're the ones who burned all the storehouses. What about most of your fellow rebels committing suicide? You wouldn't call suicide a weapon of mass destruction would you? (sarcastically) Or is suicide "anticipatory self-defense"?

GERMANIA: It was certainly a form of pre-emption. Suicide instead of crucifixion, who wouldn't?

CICERO: What, you think we should have taken prisoners? Who would buy a slave you couldn't turn your back on?

GERMANIA: Can I ask you something? Just how big a threat did you think 900 Sicarii were to the world's only   superpower?

CICERO: Let me put it to you this way. If you had been us, wouldn't you have attacked Iraq on Sept. 10th 2001?

GERMANIA: Who?

PETRONIUS: (quietly, warningly) Sir!

CICERO: Osama Bin Laden, I mean. Not Iraq, Osama bin Laden.

GERMANIA: Who?!

PETRONIUS: (loudly, warningly) Sir!!

(All three freeze momentarily; GERMANIA gets up and goes out; CICERO and PETRONIUS resume positions from beginning of the scene.)

CICERO: (shaking his head to clear it) My memory's not what it used to be. Where's that Jew? Bring her in.

PETRONIUS: She's not a Jew, she's a CO.

CICERO: Bring her in then. (PETRONIUS escorts GERMANIA into the room.) You, what's your name?

GERMANIA: Germania Servius.

CICERO: You are charged with... Oh. You want a discharge?

GERMANIA: Yes, sir.

CICERO: You're a, you've become a conscientious objector?

GERMANIA: No, sir.

CICERO: You're not a CO?

GERMANIA: No, sir.

CICERO: (to PETRONIUS: ) You said she was.

PETRONIUS: (woodenly) I misunderstood.

GERMANIA: I'm a Catholic, sir.

CICERO: What does that have to do with anything? (sarcastically) Have you been wondering "what would Jesus do"?

GERMANIA: No sir. Permission to speak freely?

CICERO: Granted.

GERMANIA: We Christians have mostly decided we can't live by what Jesus said. Or we couldn't go to war at all, ever. (shrugs)

CICERO: As you say. Thank god for the just war doctrine. So what is your trouble?

GERMANIA: It's just that, the just war--the catechism, sir.

CICERO: Compassionate war.

GERMANIA: There are three conditions... what war?

CICERO: No such thing as a just war. Compassionate war, that's the ticket.

GERMANIA: Anyway. There are three conditions under which I as a Catholic can take part in a war of national defense, sir. And by the way that's another thing. It has to be a war of national defense. I'm not clear...

CICERO: (interrupting) Soldier, we both know that the best defense is an offense.

GERMANIA: That's certainly the argument Hitler used to take the Sudetenland. Sir.

CICERO: We're not talking about Hitler, we're talking about the coming war with the Jews.

GERMANIA: The...?

PETRONIUS: (warningly) Sir!

CICERO: I mean, the Arabs, I mean, Iraq. (impatiently) Go on.

GERMANIA: Sir, according to what I understand, the damage we have suffered or will suffer must be quote lasting, grave, and certain unquote. Certainly the Towers fall under that--but it wasn't Iraq who did that.

CICERO: (shrugs) It's easier to go after states than nonstates. And--there's more isn't there? Let's hear it all.

GERMANIA: All other means of putting an end to the problem must have been shown to be impractical or ineffective--that would be the UN inspections, sir, I don't have quarrel...

The military can get you in but it can't get you out?

CICERO: (impatiently) Never mind all that. I'm all for thinking, but we can't delay action just to think about things forever. The time to go after Viet Nam was about nine months ago.

PETRONIUS: (warningly) Sir!

GERMANIA: Bin Laden?

CICERO: I mean Iraq, Iraq.

GERMANIA: Sir, plain speaking, there's about a billion people out there who feel humiliated by the Roman empire. (PETRONIUS glances at her as if to speak.) Who hate the unfair taxes, the corruption, the unemployment--we could just make things worse by acting like this. The military can get you in but it can't get you out?

CICERO: The United States.

GERMANIA: (puzzled) The United States, what, sir?

CICERO: We have a responsibility to act unilaterally. We are the world's policeman.

GERMANIA: If we can act unilaterally so can everyone else. The Parthians, the Persians, the Vandals, the Franks, the Goths (PETRONIUS glances at her and then at CICERO, who gestures him back.) Everyone's going to have weapons of mass destruction.

(As she speaks POPPAEA and QUINTUS appear like a Greek chorus and begin to speak in unison. The others continue through them, but distractedly, as though disturbed by a noise they can't locate.)

POPPAEA: , QUINTUS:

I am the knowledge of my inquiry,

and the finding of those who seek after me,

and the command of those who ask of me,

and the power of the powers in my knowledge

of the angels, who have been sent at my word,

and of gods in their seasons by my counsel,

and of spirits of every man who exists with me,

and of women who dwell within me.

I am the one who is honored, and who is praised,

and who is despised scornfully.

I am peace,

and war has come because of me.

And I am an alien and a citizen.

CICERO: You think we're setting a bad example?

GERMANIA: Yes, sir. Unilateralism is just a new form of isolationism.

CICERO: Now you listen to me. We are going to put down the rebellion that that ass Gessius Florus has provoked in Judah. 

PETRONIUS: (warningly) Sir!

CICERO: Pharisees, Sadducees, Essenes, Persians, Cubans, they all have to learn to fear Rome and love her.

PETRONIUS: (louder) Sir!

GERMANIA: (lost) Cubans?

CICERO: But I don't want any half-assed Christians in my front lines. You'll be spending a nice warm winter guarding Herod's Palace.

PETRONIUS: (exasperated) Sir!

GERMANIA: Sir?

CICERO: And while you're walking guard duty in Jerusalem--and don't forget to keep an eye peeled for Zealots--I'm sure it will cheer you up to remember that your commander-in-chief is a Christian too. In fact, I once heard the emperor say that Jesus is his favorite political philosopher.

GERMANIA: What?!

PETRONIUS: (frantically) Sir!

CICERO: What did I say? (All three freeze; lights out.) My memory's not what it used to be.

(QUINTUS as Bush makes one of those video wills. To be delivered in the most absolutely sincerely abjectly sorrowfully apologetic manner possible. Live video of QUINTUS, partly dissolved, is mixed with slowed-down, partly transparent video footage of Bush from the 2003 State of the Union address.)

QUINTUS: (Turning camera on from in front and then backing up about 6 feet.) Ok, is this on? Testing, one to three, testing, testing. Ok. (Goes back to camera, rewinds, replays the foregoing segment, and then rewinds again and sets it to record.) Hello everyone. I mean, goodbye. This is, this is my last will and testament. I leave everything to you. Everything. (Takes a deep breath.) Wow, I'm more nervous than I was for my State of the--my State of the Union--or state--my speech to the nation, whatever you want to call it, speech to the nation. Ok. This is a bit difficult to complain--explain. It's like this. When I was coming up, it was a dangerous world, it was us versus them, and it was clear who them was. Today we are not so sure who the they are, but we know they're there. And I want to say, I'm sorry I don't have more to leave you. I'm sorry they misunderestimated me, they miscalculated me as a leader. I think we agree, the past is over. I'm sorry about it. The last chapter of the 20th--20th--the 21st century, most of us would rather forget. Sorry. I tried to have a foreign-handed--a foreign policy. I told them, you disarm, or we will. I'm sorry I let terrorists and rogue nations hold us hostile. I'm sorry there's no cave deep enough for America or dark enough to hide. I wanted to get the framework--the groundwork --not framework, the groundwork to discuss a framework for peace, to lay the--never mind that. It all has to do with the fact that more and more of our imports come from overseas, and I apologize for that. See, with the trade deficit I got kind of behind... sorry. I accepted some lousy bills out of the United Nations Senate, I tried to get an energy bill that encourages consumption. I'm--and about Enron and WorldCom and all those others, I'm sorry, I know you can't have it both ways. You can't take the high horse and then claim the low road. If you say you're going to do something and don't do it, that's trustworthiness. And I'm sorry about the life of children living in, you know, the dark dungeons of the Internet. About racial profiling, which is illiterate children, sorry. And I'm sorry to say this but some people want the federal government controlling Social Security like it's some kind of federal program. I'm sorry. I know how hard it is for you to put food on your family. We ought to make the pie higher. Did I say I'm sorry about that? I'm sorry that expectations rise above that which is expected. I want anybody who can find work to be able to find work. Before finality has finally happened. Sorry. Sorry. I spent the tax refund, you know. See, I am a person who recognizes the fallacy of humans. Maybe you thought, maybe you hoped I'd have more to leave you. It was just inebriating what being president was all about then, I'm sorry, but there's not enough people in the system to take advantage of people like me. Sorry. Please listen to what has been said here, even though I wasn't here. I suspect hope is in the far distant future, if at all. And I'm sorry. (pause) You're on your own now. You gotta preserve. (long pause) Can someone please turn this thing off!? (He stands absolutely still as if waiting for someone to turn the camera off.)

Darkness, except for a greenish-lit rear-projection screen. Behind the screen we see two shadow figures in profile, facing away from each other (PETRONIUS and POPPAEA). They move back and forth erratically.They are both dead, though they don't know it yet; PETRONIUS perhaps suspects it. They are waiting because they know that the unstoppable Empire is on its way to rescue them, willy-nilly. From the Empire's perspective, they might as well be dead. The Empire is not brutal; it does not wish them either dead or alive; it is something worse, it is absolutely indifferent.

SHADOW PETRONIUS: Have they come yet?

SHADOW POPPAEA: No.

SHADOW PETRONIUS: Are you sure?

SHADOW POPPAEA: Yes.

SHADOW PETRONIUS: We might have missed them?

SHADOW POPPAEA: No.

Pause.

SHADOW PETRONIUS: It's called a surgical strike.

SHADOW POPPAEA: They haven't come yet.

SHADOW PETRONIUS: What if they went by so fast we didn't notice them?

SHADOW POPPAEA: Wait. Just wait. They'll get here.

SHADOW PETRONIUS: They always come.

SHADOW POPPAEA: Count on it.

Pause.

SHADOW POPPAEA: (calling) Slave! (Pause) Slave! (Pause) Where is that slave? I need some wine.

SHADOW PETRONIUS: You're the slave.

SHADOW POPPAEA: (sarcastically) Ha, ha.

Pause.

SHADOW PETRONIUS: I'd like to be the emperor.

SHADOW POPPAEA: I'd be in Capri by now.

Pause.

SHADOW PETRONIUS: What if they don't come?

SHADOW POPPAEA: Bored?

SHADOW PETRONIUS: Cold.

Pause.

SHADOW PETRONIUS: (pulling at his clothing) I wish my wife would fix this damn hole.

SHADOW POPPAEA: Get a new toga.

SHADOW PETRONIUS: With what?

SHADOW POPPAEA: (leaning down and peering at SHADOW PETRONIUS's torso about chest level) It is pretty big.

SHADOW PETRONIUS: I told you.

SHADOW POPPAEA: I can see the aqueduct. (reaching out) Hey, I can put my hand right through.

SHADOW PETRONIUS: (sharply, moving away) Cut it out. (Pause) Are they coming yet?

SHADOW POPPAEA: (leaning down as if using SHADOW PETRONIUS: as a telescope) I spy... I spy with my little eye... turn a little to the left... uh uh.

Pause.

SHADOW PETRONIUS: Is there blood? I'm afraid of blood.

SHADOW POPPAEA: Not any more.

SHADOW PETRONIUS: I guess we can wait a little longer.

END

Repubocracy

• "a society consisting of a small number of citizens who assemble and administer the government in person": James Madison, "The Union as a Safeguard Against Domestic Faction and Insurrection." Federalist Papers No. 10 (cont'd from No. 9). The New York Packet, Nov. 23, 1787.
• "a very extensive country cannot be governed on democratical principles on any other plan than a confederation of a number of small republics": "Centinel" No. 1. Oct. 5, 1787.
• "the administrators of every government ever are actuated by private interest and ambition to the prejudice of the public good the only effectual method to secure the rights of the people and promote their welfare is to create a mixed government an opposition of interests between the members of two distinct bodies in the exercise of the powers of government and balanced by those of a third": "Centinel" No. 1. Oct. 5, 1787.
• "a Republican or free government can only exist where property is pretty equally divided in such a government the people are the sovereign when this ceases to be the case the nature of the government is changed an aristocracy monarchy or despotism will rise on its ruin":"Centinel" No. 1. Oct. 5, 1787.
• "the highest responsibility is to be attained in a simple structure of government for the great body of the people never steadily attend to the operations of government and for want of due information are liable to be imposed on": "Centinel" No. 1. Oct. 5, 1787.
• "by which I mean a government in which the scheme of representation": James Madison, " The Union as a Safeguard Against Domestic Faction and Insurrection." Federalist Papers No. 10 (cont'd from No. 9). The New York Packet, Nov. 23, 1787.
• "which derives all its powers directly or indirectly from the people and is administered by persons holding their offices during pleasure for a limited period": James Madison, "The Conformity of the Plan to Republican Principles." Federalist Papers No. 39. Jan. 16, 1788.
• "essential to such a government that it be derived from the great body of the society not from an inconsiderable proportion or favored class": James Madison, "The Conformity of the Plan to Republican Principles." Federalist Papers No. 39. Jan. 16, 1788.
• "two great points of difference between a democracy and a republic are first the delegation of government in the latter to a small number of citizens elected by the rest secondly the greater number of citizens and greater sphere of the country over which a republic may be extended": "The Union as a Safeguard Against Domestic Faction and Insurrection." Federalist Papers No. 10 (cont'd from No. 9). The New York Packet, Nov. 23, 1787
• "as society is produced by our wants so is government by our wickedness": Thomas Paine, Common Sense. 1776.
• "the proper function of government is to do for the people those things that have to be done but cannot be done or cannot be done as well by individuals the most effective government is government closest to the people": U.S. Republican Party Oath (2003).
• "equal rights equal justice and equal opportunity for all regardless of race creed age sex or national origin we believe in fiscal discipline tax cuts retirement security democratic capitalism college education victims' rights strong laws mental health civil rights opening markets building government republican capitalism valuing work ending violence supporting families fighting crime protecting citizens supporting innovation battling terrorism investing in America": Elements from the platforms of the U.S. Republican and Democratic Parties, 2003 (mixed together).