Against The Corn-Dealers

Many people have come to me, gentlemen of the jury, in surprise at my accusing the corn-dealers in the Council, and telling me that you, however sure you are of their guilt, none the less regard those who deliver speeches about them as slander-mongers.[*](i.e., men who, knowing the dealers were unpopular, brought charges against them hoping to be bought off. Cf. Lys. 24.2, note.) I therefore propose to speak first of the grounds on which I have found it necessary to accuse them.

When the Committee[*](Fifty of the five hundred members of the Council appointed for the management of the Assembly during a tenth part of the year.) of the time brought up their case before the Council, the anger felt against them was such that some of the orators said that they ought to be handed over without trial to the Eleven, for the penalty of death. But I, thinking it monstrous that the Council should get into the way of such practice, rose and said that in my opinion we ought to try the corn-dealers in accordance with the law; for I thought that if they had committed acts deserving of death you would be no less able than we[*](i.e., the Council.) to come to a just decision, while, if they were not guilty, they ought not to perish without trial.