*The land law.* His proposed land law took the form of a re-enactment of a previous agrarian measure dating, probably, from the end of the third century B. C. This law had restricted the amount of public land which any person might occupy to five hundred iugera (about three hundred and ten acres), an amount which Gracchus augmented by two hundred and fifty iugera for each of two grown sons. All land held in excess of this limit was to be surrendered to the state, further occupation of public land was forbidden, and what was within the legal limit was to be declared private property. Compensation for improvements on surrendered lands was offered to the late occupants, and a commission of three men was to be annually elected with judicial powers to decide upon the rights of possessors (_III vir agris iudicandis assignandis_). The land thus resumed by the state was to be assigned by the commissioners to landless Roman citizens in small allotments, incapable of alienation, and subject to a nominal rental to the state. *Deposition of the tribune Octavius.* This proposal aroused widespread consternation among the Senators, who saw their holdings threatened. In many cases it had doubtless become impossible for them to distinguish between their private properties and the public lands occupied by their families for several generations. The Senate resorted to its customary procedure in protecting its prerogatives and induced a tribune named Octavius to veto the measure. But Gracchus was terribly in earnest with his project of reform and took the unprecedented step of appealing to the Assembly of the Tribes to depose Octavius, on the ground that he was thwarting the will of the people. The Assembly voiced their approval of Tiberius by depriving his opponent of his office. The land bill was thereupon presented to the Assembly and passed. The first commissioners elected to carry it into effect were Tiberius himself, his younger brother Caius, and his father-in-law, Appius Claudius.