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The bill met with bitter opposition from the
rich landholders, but was eventually passed, and Gracchus rose to the
summit of popular power. He also brought forward a measure limiting the
necessary period of military service; a second bill was drawn up by him
for the reformation of the law courts, and a third established a right
of appeal from the law courts to the popular assembly. These measures
were afterward carried by his brother Caius. Tiberius Gracchus was
killed in a tumult which was raised in the Forum by the nobles and their
partisans, and three hundred of his followers lost their lives in the
fray.
Caius Gracchus, his brother, returned to Rome B.C. 124 from Sardinia,
where he had been engaged in subduing the mountaineers. For ten years he
had kept aloof from public life, but was at once elected tribune, in the
discharge of which office he showed distinguished powers as an orator.
He brought forth the important measures known as the Sempronian Laws,
the provisions of which were quite revolutionary in character.


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