As the king had originally been judge in criminal and civil causes, without being legally bound in the former to respect an appeal to the prerogative of mercy in the people, or in the latter to commit the decision of the question in dispute to jurymen; so Caesar claimed the right of bringing capital causes as well as private processes for sole and final decision to his own bar, and disposing of them in the event of his presence personally, in the event of his absence by the city-lieutenant.

In fact, we find him, quite after the manner of the ancient kings, now sitting in judgment publicly in the Forum of the capital on Roman burgesses accused of high treason, now holding a judicial inquiry, in his house regarding the client princes accused of the like crime; so that the only privilege, which the Roman burgesses had as compared with the other subjects of the king, seems to have consisted in the publicity of the judicial procedure.

But this resuscitated supreme jurisdiction of the kings, although Caesar discharged its duties with impartiality and care, could only from the nature of the case find practical application in exceptional cases.
Retention of the Previous Administration of Justice For the usual procedure in criminal and civil causes the former republican mode of administering justice was substantially retained.
Criminal causes were still disposed of as formerly before the different jury-commissions competent to deal with the several crimes, civil causes partly before the court of inheritance or, as it was commonly called, of the -centumviri-, partly before the single -iudices-; the superintendence of judicial proceedings was as formerly conducted in the capital chiefly by the praetors, in the provinces by the governors.

Political crimes too continued even under the monarchy to be referred to a jury-commission; the new ordinance, which Caesar issued respecting them, specified the acts legally punishable with precision and in a liberal spirit which excluded all prosecution of opinions, and it fixed as the penalty not death, but banishment.

As respects the selection of the jurymen, whom the senatorial party desired to see chosen exclusively from the senate and the strict Gracchans exclusively from the equestrian order, Caesar, faithful to the principle of reconciling the parties, left the matter on the footing of the compromise-law of Cotta,( 29) but with the modification-- for which the way was probably prepared by the law of Pompeius of 699( 30)-that the -tribuni aerarii- who came from the lower ranks of the people were set aside; so that there was established a rating for jurymen of at least 400,000 sesterces (4000 pounds), and senators and equites now divided the functions of jurymen which had so long been an apple of discord between them.
Appeal to the Monarch The relations of the regal and the republican jurisdiction were on the whole co-ordinate, so that any cause might be initiated as well before the king's bar as before the competent republican tribunal, the latter of course in the event of collision giving way; if on the other hand the one or the other tribunal had pronounced sentence, the cause was thereby finally disposed of.