The plan from the very first, was to appoint a mixed commission for making laws. In Livy it looks as if the plebeians had entertained the preposterous idea of appointing the lawgivers exclusively from their own order, five in number; but Dionysius has the number ten, evidently therefore there were to be five patricians, and five plebeians. Very strange again is the statement of Livy that the plebeians had earnestly requested, that, if it was once intended to have a revision of the laws, and the patricians did not wish the plebeians to have a share in it, these would begin alone, and come to an agreement with them with regard to the fundamental principles only. People were therefore sensible enough to see, that a mixed commission would only breed the most bitter quarrels among its members; and that on that account all had better be chosen from one order, when the main points were once settled. Nevertheless it is remarkable that all the writers agree in asserting that the obnoxious laws, the ones which were hostile to the liberty of the plebeians, were on the two last tables, which derived their origin from the second set of decemvirs. The ten first are not attacked; they merely granted isonomy, which had already been agreed upon, as Appius in Livy says, _se omnia jura summis infimisque æquasse_. The quite different rights of patricians and plebeians were made equals; so that with regard to the patricians also, personal arrest, and personal bail could take place. Undoubtedly, the ten first decemvirs were all patricians from old families; _decemviri consulari potestate legibus scribundis_, was their name according to the consular Fasti which have been recently discovered. They were appointed in the place of the consuls, the city præfect, and the quæstors. But, are Livy and Dionysius correct in stating that the tribunate also was abolished? It is not to be believed. It would have been madness, if the plebeians had thus given themselves up with their hands fettered. At the second decemvirate only, we find them _appellationi invicem cedentes_: we then meet with C. Julius, who brings a criminal cause before the people. The tribunes must have said, we are willing that there shall be ten patrician lawgivers, but the continuance of the _leges sacratæ_ is to us the guarantee of our rights; for the _leges sacratæ_ referred to the tribunate. The mistake may easily be accounted for; it arose, because such was the case under the second tribunate. On this supposition, that the tribunate was not abolished during the first decemvirate, and that a general law of the land was the object aimed at, every thing is clear. All the points about which there might be dispute, were reserved.