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PTXXXX10.1177/0090591714541876Political TheoryFraistat

Article
Political Theory
2015, Vol. 43(5) 657­–677
The Authority of © 2014 SAGE Publications
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DOI: 10.1177/0090591714541876
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Shawn Fraistat1

Abstract
While traditionally Plato has been read as a critic of democracy and an
advocate of philosopher-kingship, a number of more recent interpretations
have argued that Plato’s views about these issues changed over the course of
his life. Several scholars argue that Plato shifts from an authoritarian outlook
in “middle period” dialogues, such as the Republic, to a more democratic
view in “late” dialogues, such as the Laws. In contrast to these scholars,
this article argues that Plato’s attitude towards authority and democracy is
consistent in his “middle” and “late” periods. I show that Plato defines law
as the writing of political experts, and that the Laws turns to written law as a
second-best method for instituting the rule of the wise. This interpretation
enables us to understand the Laws as a dialogue about the political use of
writing, which helps illuminate some of the more peculiar features of the
Laws and account for its place in the Platonic corpus.

Keywords
Plato, authority, writing, law, Laws

The Laws and Plato’s Political Thought


While traditionally Plato has been read as a critic of democracy and an advo-
cate of philosopher-kingship, a number of interpreters have challenged this
view, arguing that Plato’s position on these issues changed over the course of

1Yale University, New Haven, CT, USA

Corresponding Author:
Shawn Fraistat, Department of Political Science, Yale University, P.O. Box 208301, New
Haven, CT 06520-8301, USA.
Email: shawn.fraistat@yale.edu

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658 Political Theory 43(5)

his life. Several scholars maintain that Plato shifts from an authoritarian out-
look in “middle period” dialogues, such as the Republic, to a more demo-
cratic view in “late” dialogues, such as the Laws.1 In contrast to these scholars,
I focus primarily on the Laws to argue that Plato’s attitude toward authority
and democracy remains consistent.2 This article is not the first to claim that
the Republic and the Laws are consonant with one another,3 but it proposes a
novel explanation for the manner in which they fit together. I demonstrate
that Plato defines “law” as the writing of political experts, and that in the
Laws he turns to written law as a second-best method for instituting the rule
of the wise. This interpretation enables us to understand the Laws as a dia-
logue about the political use of writing, which helps illuminate some of the
more peculiar features of the Laws and account for its place in the Platonic
corpus.
On the face of it, the relationship between the Republic and the Laws is
quite puzzling. The Republic’s Greek title is Politeia, a word that can be
translated as “polity,” “constitution,” or “regime.” It refers to the basic struc-
ture of political authority and the arrangement of ruling offices. The Laws’s
Greek title is Nomoi, which means “laws” or “customs.” One might therefore
assume that they are complementary works, with the Republic outlining the
ideal political regime and the Laws describing the appropriate laws or cus-
toms that belong to that regime.4 But this will not do as an explanation; as V.
Bradley Lewis points out, the Laws expressly treats both politeia and nomoi,
and the Republic addresses both as well.5 Furthermore, the regimes and laws
considered in the two dialogues are not compatible with each other. In the
Republic, Plato’s Socrates sketches an ideal city, Kallipolis, in which philos-
opher-kings rule over a communized warrior class and a servile producer
class. In the Laws, by contrast, an anonymous Athenian Stranger proposes
what he explicitly designates a “second-best regime” and a corresponding set
of laws for the city his Cretan interlocutor Kleinias is going to found. The
city’s name is Magnesia, and it differs from the Republic’s Kallipolis in a
number of respects. Importantly, the Athenian does not attempt to abolish the
family or private property. Nor does he advocate philosopher-kingship—the
Magnesian regime features the rule of law and magistrates elected by the
entire citizen-body.
The differences between the Republic and the Laws are striking, and the
interpretive literature tends to account for them in one of two ways. The first
view maintains that Plato intended the Republic to articulate a theoretical
ideal, whereas the Laws contains his practical political program.6 The strong
version of this position, defended by Glenn R. Morrow, denies that the Laws
has any ideal or utopian character at all.7 The weaker version, propounded by
André Laks, Trevor J. Saunders, G. F. Ferrari, Malcolm Schofield, and

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Fraistat 659

Kenneth Royce Moore, characterizes the Laws as a “practical utopia”: in


Moore’s words, “the Kallipolis of the Republic represented the ideal form
that a city-state might take whereas Magnesia signifies a condition that is
more realistic yet somewhat less than the ideal.”8
Scholars who assert that the Laws contains Plato’s practical program are
correct to note that it is in a sense less “ideal” than the Republic. The Athenian
Stranger refers to the Magnesian regime as “second-best,” and to the extent
that he describes the nature of the best regime, it sounds very much like
Kallipolis (e.g., Laws, 739c–e). Nevertheless, it is difficult to maintain that
Plato thinks of the Laws as a readily implementable list of laws and institu-
tions. The Athenian advocates measures that are radically out of step with
existing Greek practices, insofar as they institute the equality of the sexes,
prohibit pederasty, establish a comprehensive public education system, and
create a Nocturnal Council that engages in philosophical (or, on some inter-
pretations, quasi-philosophical) debates. The Athenian recognizes the diffi-
culties his interlocutors will face attempting to put these proposals into
practice. Conceding that he has to some extent been outlining the city as
though he were telling dreams or molding citizens from wax, the Athenian
claims that they will have to adapt them further, creating a regime inferior to
the second-best now under discussion (ibid., 746b–c). He thereby explicitly
acknowledges the elements of idealization and utopianism within the Laws.
The weaker version of this position, which refers to the Laws as a “practi-
cal utopia,” is closer to the mark. But it still suggests a misleading contrast
with the Republic, implying that Plato regarded the city sketched there as
theoretical and impractical. Plato’s works consistently refer to the Republic’s
best regime as improbable, but not impossible (e.g., Republic, 456c–57c,
471e, 473c, 499d; Laws, 710c, 711d).9 And the second-best regime outlined
in the Laws is quite improbable in its own right. Over the course of the dia-
logue, its necessary preconditions prove to be considerable. For example, the
Athenian states that Kleinias’s ability to implement the measures they have
been discussing will be restricted by his own traditions (Laws, 739b), chance
events (e.g., ibid., 709a), the nature of the territory (ibid., 704a–05b, 747d–e),
the willingness of the citizens to accept radical social and economic policies
(ibid., 745e–46d), and the fact that he is not founding the regime alone (ibid.,
752e; cf. the discussion of oligarchy at 710e). The second-best regime does
not seem to be within reach of most cities; the Laws is more “practical” than
the Republic only in the limited sense that its preconditions are slightly less
“demanding” (ibid., 740a). Thus the label “practical utopia” is not a particu-
larly useful way of articulating what is distinctive about the city of the Laws
nor of differentiating it from the city in the Republic.
The second view, championed by Gregory Vlastos and other revisionist
readers of the Laws, holds that Plato changed his mind about key aspects of

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660 Political Theory 43(5)

the Republic and wrote the Laws in part as a repudiation of it. Vlastos, for
example, argues that Plato became more pessimistic about the possibility of
philosopher-kingship as a result of shifts in his epistemological and meta-
physical views and his experiences advising a tyrant in Sicily.10 This view is
implausible for several reasons. As noted above, the Laws describes Magnesia
as a second-best regime, and its references to the best regime point to the one
outlined in the Republic. Christopher Bobonich objects that the Laws’s praise
of communism does not imply that Plato still sanctions the rule of philoso-
pher-kings.11 But philosopher-kings were introduced in the Republic specifi-
cally to explain how communism could be established (Republic, 472eff.). In
fact, the Republic almost passes by the discussion of communism and philos-
opher-kings completely. Socrates makes three radical proposals in the
Republic: the first is that the sexes should be treated as equals; the second is
the communism of women, children, and property; and the third is the rule of
philosopher-kings. Socrates introduces the least controversial of his three
proposals, that the sexes should be equal, on his own, but he mentions com-
munism only briefly and is prepared to omit the discussion of philosopher-
kings entirely. These topics are only treated in any depth because Adeimantus
and Polemarchus interrupt him—without their interruption at the beginning
of Book V, Socrates would have passed directly to the subject matter of Book
VIII. This corresponds exactly to the Athenian Stranger’s procedure in the
Laws: the Athenian proposes the equality of the sexes on his own, mentions
the desirability of communism in passing, and does not explicitly call for the
rule of philosopher-kings. The conversation might have taken a very different
turn if he had been pressed to explain his cryptic remarks about
communism.
Furthermore, although the Laws does not describe the best regime at
length, it does outline how it might come into being. According to the
Athenian Stranger, the best regime would come about through the rule of a
tyrant, who is young, possessed of an able memory, a good learner, coura-
geous, and magnificent by nature (Laws, 709e–10a). These qualities match
the five that Socrates claims a potential philosopher must have in the Republic
(487a). It seems just as unlikely as it did in the Republic that someone with
these qualities will come to possess tyrannical power, but the Athenian does
not foreclose the possibility: “What is difficult is the following, which sel-
dom comes to pass even in a great span of time, but which, when it does hap-
pen in a city, brings to that city myriads of all that is good,” namely, the
“possibility that a divine erotic passion for moderate and just practices should
arise in some of the great and all-powerful rulers” (Laws, 711d; this passage
and the surrounding discussion recall Republic, 499a–d).
Finally, the Athenian seems perfectly willing to grant kingly power to
some individuals, and those individuals appear to be philosophers. Vlastos

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Fraistat 661

argues that the Laws repudiates philosopher-kingship and holds that no


human being can rule responsibly as an autocrat; as evidence, he cites Laws,
691c, 713c, 875b, and 875d. Yet the passages he references do not support
this conclusion. The first only denies that a mortal soul can rule unaccount-
ably “so long as it is still young and irresponsible” (Laws, 691c). The third
does say that “there is no one among human beings whose nature grows so as
to become adequate both to know what is in the interest of human beings as
regards a political regime and, knowing this, to be able and willing always to
do what is best” (ibid., 875b), but this statement is quickly qualified:

Of course, if ever some human being who was born adequate in nature, with a
divine dispensation, were able to attain these things [power, a good character,
and knowledge], he wouldn’t need any laws ruling over him. For no law or
order is stronger than knowledge, nor is it right for intelligence to be subordinate,
or a slave, to anyone, but it should be ruler over everything, if indeed it is true
and really free according to nature. (ibid., 875c)

Vlastos acknowledges this passage, but thinks that the Athenian is mention-
ing this possibility as an exception “too slight to be worth talking about.”12
This is a dubious assertion, given that Plato spends significant portions of
multiple dialogues talking about it (e.g., the Statesman and the Republic), and
the Laws itself discusses the possibility as well as the desirability of wise rul-
ers repeatedly (e.g., 711c–12a, 713c–14a; the Athenian also praises two mon-
archs, Cyrus and Darius, for their excellent rule, and these men ruled as
autocrats—see 694a–96a). Vlastos seems to regard the exception as slight on
the basis of the fourth passage he cites, which immediately follows 875c and
appears to qualify the qualification: “But now, in fact, it is so nowhere or in
any way, except to a small extent [nûn de ou gar estin oudamou oudamôs, all’
ê kata brachu]” (ibid., 875d). As I interpret this sentence, the Athenian asserts
that no human beings with adequate natures are ruling anywhere or in any
way now. One might also construe it to mean that no human beings with
adequate natures exist anywhere or in any way now. Regardless, neither read-
ing denies the possibility of such human beings emerging nor implies that
this is so improbable as to render it unworthy of discussion.
The second passage Vlastos points to, 713c, is the most interesting and
complicated. There the Athenian tells a myth in which the god Kronos saw
that “human nature is not at all capable of regulating the human things, when
it possesses autocratic authority over everything, without becoming swollen
with insolence and injustice” (ibid., 713c). For this reason, Kronos set up
“demons, members of a more divine and better species” to rule us (ibid.,
713d). The Athenian explains that what this myth is saying, “making use of
the truth [alêtheia chrômenos], is that there can be no rest from evils and toils

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662 Political Theory 43(5)

for those cities in which some mortal rules rather than a god” (ibid., 714e).
This last assertion is a striking paraphrase of Socrates’s claim in the Republic
that cities will have no rest from evils until philosophers rule as kings or
kings philosophize (473c–d). Some interpreters have noted this and argued
that the Laws’s substitution of “god” for “philosopher” means that Plato no
longer regards beings of this description as a human possibility.13 But the fact
that the Athenian uses theological or mythical language to describe them does
not have this implication. The myth’s argument is said to be “alêtheia chrô-
menos,” that is, using the truth or consulting it as one would an oracle. This
suggests that the Athenian is expressing a deeper truth in a somewhat dis-
torted way, using mythical language.
Both the procedure (using a myth to illustrate a deeper truth) and the par-
ticular language the Athenian employs here have ample Platonic precedent.
Plato often employs myths as a pedagogical device, and he frequently uses
the language of gods, demons, and divinity when he is referring to excep-
tional human beings and the highest human capacities. In particular, he com-
monly employs it when he is discussing wisdom, philosophy, and philosophers.
To list but a few examples, philosophers are called divine in the Republic
(497b–c, 500c–d, 540b–c); the Athenian Stranger speaks of the types of
knowledge one would need to be a god, demon, or hero for human beings
(Laws, 818b–c; see also 792d, 945c, 966d, and 969b); he claims that “there
are always among the many certain divine human beings—not many—whose
intercourse is altogether worthwhile” (ibid., 951b), referring to individuals of a
philosophic temperament; and he also says that a city that practices commu-
nism “is inhabited, presumably, by gods or children of gods” (ibid., 739d–e).
These considerations strongly suggest that the “divine human beings” of the
Laws are equivalent to the philosopher-kings of the Republic, and that Plato’s
account of them in the former is not intended to contradict what he wrote in
the latter.
Against these two interpretations, I argue that the Laws is neither a practi-
cal program nor a repudiation of the Republic. Rather, it is a “utopian” exer-
cise of a different sort. Whereas the Republic outlines a best regime in which
philosophers rule directly, the Laws describes a second-best regime in which
a philosopher (i.e., the Athenian Stranger) rules indirectly, by means of writ-
ten law. The Laws does not turn to law as a democratic or practical alternative
to the rule of the wise, but rather, as a second-best method for realizing it.
The fact that Plato envisions law as a second-best vehicle for wise or phil-
osophic rule follows from the very manner in which he defines law. He rejects
the common understanding of law as a collection of rules promulgated by the
authoritative part of a community. Instead, he defines law as the writings
(grammata or suggrammata) of political experts. This is particularly explicit

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Fraistat 663

in Minos. In that dialogue, Socrates and a nameless companion debate the


nature of law. When Socrates first asks his companion what law is, the com-
panion responds that laws are the resolutions and decrees of a political com-
munity (Minos, 314c). Socrates objects that law is held to be something noble
and good, and not every measure enacted by a political community is good.
Law, according to Socrates, expresses a judgment; for it to be noble and
good, it must express a true judgment (ibid., 314e–15a). Therefore, we should
not call any political judgment a law, but only those that are propounded by
individuals who know and judge rightly (ibid., 316d–17c). He concludes that
a law is nothing other than the true judgment of an expert on a particular
subject, expressed in writing: just as the treatises of doctors express the “laws
of medicine” and farming treatises the “laws of farming,” so too “the writing
which people call laws are treatises [suggrammata] on politics—treatises
[suggrammata] by kings and good men” (ibid., 316d–17a).14
This definition is echoed in Phaedrus, the Statesman, and the Laws itself.
For example, in Phaedrus, Socrates addresses his discourse on writing in part
“to Solon and anyone else who writes political documents [suggrammata]
that he calls laws” (Phaedrus, 278c). The Statesman similarly treats political
laws as a species of “written rules [suggrammata]” (Statesman, 300c; see
also 300a–b and 300e–301a), and defines them as “things issuing from those
who know which have been written down as far as they can be” (ibid., 300c).
As for the Laws, the Athenian equates law with rules or principles laid down
by reason, asserting that “we should obey whatever within us partakes of
immortality, giving the name ‘law’ to the distribution ordained by intelli-
gence” (Laws, 714a). He also makes it clear that laws are something written:
the Athenian claims that there were no lawgivers prior to the advent of writ-
ing (ibid., 680a), and that lawgivers are writers and poets (ibid., 811c, 817c,
858c–59a).15
Plato’s definition of law as the writings of political experts has a number
of important implications. First, it explains the titles of the Republic and the
Laws. The reason the former’s Greek title is “regime” and the latter’s title is
“laws” is not to delimit their subject matter, but to indicate the vehicle through
which wisdom or philosophy enters the polities they describe. In the Republic,
Socrates informs Glaucon that there will “always have to be present in the
city something possessing the same understanding of the regime as you, the
lawgiver, had when you were setting down the laws” (Republic, 497c–d). In
the Republic’s case, that something is the rulers of the regime. In the Laws’s
case, that something is the laws.
Second, it explains why the regime outlined in the Laws is second-best. In
the Statesman, the Eleatic Stranger argues that the best regime is one ruled by
intelligent kings: the constitution “that is alone a constitution [politeia] is the

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664 Political Theory 43(5)

one in which the rulers would be found truly possessing expert knowledge”
(Statesman, 293c). He admits that “in a certain sense it is clear that the art of
legislator belongs to that of the king; but the best thing is not that the laws
should prevail, but rather the kingly man who possesses wisdom” (ibid.,
294a). He then proceeds to criticize law on four grounds:

1. Law cannot do what is best for everyone, because it is of necessity


general and cannot deal adequately with particulars. (Statesman,
294b; cf. Laws, 875d)
2. Law does not let people ask questions. (Statesman, 294c)
3. Behaving like a “stubborn and ignorant man [anthrôpon authadê kai
amathê],” law constrains people to act in predetermined ways, even
when a better way of doing something becomes apparent. (ibid., 294c,
295c–d)
4. Law acts as though nothing is wiser than it, and at the same time
encourages the belief that “no one is ignorant . . . since it is possible
for anyone who wishes to understand the things that are written down
and things established as ancestral customs.” It would therefore con-
demn a wise man who inquired into the political art as a babbling
sophist; if this man were found guilty of persuading anyone contrary
to the laws and the written rules, he would be subject to the most
extreme penalties. (ibid., 299b–d).

These criticisms of law echo many of the criticisms of writing that Socrates
makes in Phaedrus. Like all writing, law is unable to tailor itself to particular
individuals, but is compelled to speak to many people at once (Phaedrus,
275e). Therefore, its rhetorical character and its prescriptions must address
the general case. This renders it unable to deal adequately with anything idio-
syncratic, exceptional, or unexpected. In addition, law is ineffective as a
vehicle for instruction. Laws and writings cannot answer questions or explain
themselves further (ibid., 275d). What is worse, they leave people with the
impression that they have sufficiently understood the subject matter of which
the laws or writings treat, but in fact they remain ignorant (ibid., 275a–b).
Believing they are wise, people become “difficult to get along with” (loc.
cit.), and extremely hostile toward anyone who calls authoritative writings
into question. (Here and in the Statesman quotation above, Plato seems to
have the fate of Socrates in mind.) Thus, for many of the same reasons that
writing is inferior to speaking, a regime with a legal code written by a phi-
losopher is inferior to a regime in which philosophers rule directly.
Third, Plato’s definition of law explains why the Magnesian regime’s turn
to the rule of law is not a repudiation of philosopher-kingship as an ideal. In

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Fraistat 665

the Statesman, the Eleatic Stranger addresses the question of why it is some-
times necessary to have recourse to law, given that law is “not completely
correct” (Statesman, 300d). While in the best case an intelligent king would
be everywhere in the city, advising everyone on an individual basis, in prac-
tice, this is plainly impossible. Instead, he is forced to issue general rules that
are intended to handle most cases tolerably well. Thus, even the best regime,
in which wise human beings are present, will have laws. But the Eleatic
Stranger also suggests law as a remedy for the absence of wise rulers.
Supposing an intelligent king were to go away for a long time, he would
leave behind written instructions in the form of laws to guide his subjects in
his absence (ibid., 295b–c). The Eleatic Stranger claims that if the intelligent
king were to return or another like him were to arise, he would be perfectly
justified in breaking those laws so long as he did so on the basis of true politi-
cal expertise (ibid., 295c–96a). The same is not true for others, however. No
large collection of people, neither the rich nor all the people together, “could
ever acquire this expert knowledge of statesmanship” (ibid., 300e). Hence in
regimes where political experts are absent, “no one in the city should dare do
anything contrary to the laws, and . . . the person who dares to do so should
be punished by death and all the worst punishments” (ibid., 297d–e; see also
300e–01a).
Plato’s definition of law and his discussion of it in the Statesman lend
strong support to the view that the Magnesian regime is not a constitutional
or representative democracy, but rather, a grammatocracy, in which the laws
of a wise man comprehensively regulate the conduct of each citizen from
cradle to grave. At the same time, Plato is well aware that a polity of this
description has a number of inextricable flaws connected to the very nature
of written law. In what follows, I will show how these dynamics structure the
discussion of political authority in the Laws.

Political Authority in the Second-Best Regime


At first glance, the structure of ruling offices in the Laws seems considerably
more democratic than in the Republic. Whereas Kallipolis’s philosopher-
kings appoint their own successors, most of Magnesia’s rulers are either
appointed by elected officials or elected by the citizens themselves. Against
interpreters such as Bobonich and Vlastos who construe this as evidence that
Plato changed his mind about the political competence of ordinary citizens, I
contend that Plato turns to elections as a second-best method for appointing
officials. In the absence of philosopher-kings, Plato envisions the election of
magistrates as a way of ensuring loyalty to the laws rather than to a particular
faction within the polity, and he tries to mitigate the need for wise or excep-
tional rulers by means of the wisdom embodied in the laws themselves.

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666 Political Theory 43(5)

There is a considerable degree of continuity between the Laws’s attitude


toward the political capacity of ordinary citizens and that of other Platonic
dialogues. In keeping with earlier dialogues, the Laws contains passages that
are critical of democracy (e.g., Laws, 648c, 698b–701c), such as its discus-
sion of the Athenian regime. According to the Athenian Stranger, in ancient
times, Athens had a good and well-measured government. The Athenian peo-
ple were not sovereign over everything; instead, they were voluntarily
enslaved to the rulers and the laws, and were kept within measured bounds by
the awe they felt for them (ibid., 698b–c, 700a). Subsequently, however, they
were corrupted by ignorant poets, who flattered them and made them believe
that “everyone is wise in everything” (ibid., 701a). As a consequence, the
Athenian people lost their respect for their laws and traditions, and this
threatened to overturn authority in every facet of life (ibid., 701a–e). The
Athenian Stranger’s arguments here are similar to those found in Gorgias
(517b–19d), the Republic (557a–63e), and the Statesman (292e, 297b–99a).
Like Socrates and the Eleatic Stranger, the Athenian maintains that the major-
ity of people are not competent to care for and educate others in the deepest
sense, and that, in a democracy, freedom becomes so extensive that it leads to
anarchy and lawlessness.
Of course, it is important to recall that what Plato means by “democracy”
is not what we often mean by the term today. Whereas we tend to associate it
with representative government and elections, Plato and his contemporaries
associate it with direct democracy and the selection of public officials by lot
(e.g., Statesman, 300a, 301a). Elections were an important part of many
ancient Greek non-democracies, including Sparta and various Cretan cities,16
and were conceived of as an aristocratic or oligarchic device. Thus, for Plato,
there is no contradiction between rejecting democracy and embracing elec-
tions. The question therefore remains: even if Plato is still a critic of Athenian
democracy, might the presence of elections in the Laws nevertheless mark a
change in his estimation of the political capacity of ordinary citizens, and
thus imply a “democratic turn” in that sense?
I maintain that it does not, for several reasons. For one, the Laws does not
go as far in granting political power to ordinary citizens as it might initially
appear. Although the Laws extends suffrage to the citizen-body as a whole, a
significant countervailing consideration is that artisans and laborers who
would be considered free citizens in Kallipolis are classed as slaves in
Magnesia (Laws, 806d–e, 846d–47a; cf. Republic, 547c, which identifies this
as a difference between the best regime and the second-best). Suffrage is
thereby restricted to a group of people corresponding roughly to the Republic’s
guardian class or Sparta’s warrior-citizens. What is more, the Athenian fur-
ther subdivides that group into four “unequal classes, so that when it comes

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Fraistat 667

to offices, revenues, and distributions, the honor that is due to each person
will depend not only on the virtue of his ancestors and himself, and the
strength and handsomeness of bodies, but also on the way one uses money or
poverty” (Laws, 744b–c). This bias is explicitly formalized in Magnesia’s
procedure for electing councilmen, which favors the wealthier classes (ibid.,
756c–e).
Second, it is precisely because the judgments of non-philosophers are
taken into account that Magnesia’s system of choosing officials is a second-
best. The Athenian makes it clear that his desire to prevent civil conflict leads
him to structure the regime’s offices in a less-than-ideal manner. As the
Athenian explains, a strictly just arrangement would allot authority to those
who deserve it on the basis of education and virtue (ibid., 757d), with no
regard to “someone’s wealth or any such possession, be it physical strength
or size or descent” (ibid., 715b–c; cf. 744b–c). But because this is an affront
to citizens’ self-love and leads to civil strife, most cities (i.e., all but the best)
are compelled to recognize spurious claims to rule. Thus, to secure the alle-
giance of the wealthy, the Athenian introduces the four unequal property
classes (ibid, 744c); he also makes concessions intended to forestall the “dis-
content of the many,” such as sanctioning the use of the lot despite his injunc-
tion that it ought to be used as little as possible (ibid., 757e–58a, 759b–c).
The necessity of satisfying non-philosophers means that Magnesia’s proce-
dures for filling offices look to criteria other than wisdom and virtue, thereby
falling short of the best regime.
While elections are inferior to the appointment of philosopher-kings by
philosopher-kings, they are still superior to every other alternative. The
Laws’s core criticism of autocracy as it is normally practiced is that even
good non-philosophic rulers will not have adequately educated successors
(ibid., 694c–96a). Plato believes that this problem is surmounted by the best
regime, whose philosophic rulers are capable of identifying and educating
new, perfected philosophers to succeed the old.17 But in all other cases, auto-
cratic succession is dangerous, because it is extremely likely to empower
corrupt and vicious individuals who favor themselves or their faction at the
expense of everyone else in the city. If the presence of elections in the sec-
ond-best regime is supposed to be evidence of a democratic turn, it must be
shown that Plato would have favored a regime without elections as a second-
best option in an earlier period. Yet earlier dialogues suggest that Plato has
remained consistent on this point.18 As was noted above, most officials in the
Spartan and Cretan regimes were elected, and those regimes are held up as
superior models in multiple dialogues (e.g., Crito, 52e; Minos, 318c–d); in
the Republic, Sparta and Crete are identified as examples of the second-best
regime type (544–45a). Hence there is good reason to believe that their pres-
ence in Magnesia does not indicate a change of mind.

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668 Political Theory 43(5)

To the contrary, I maintain that the Athenian endorses elections and the
rule of law not as an alternative to the rule of philosophers, but as a second-
best method for realizing it, by ensuring the competent and perpetual admin-
istration of a philosopher’s writings. That is to say, the purpose of elections is
not to empower ordinary citizens, but to safeguard the Athenian’s grammato-
cracy. Like the Spartan and Cretan regimes, which serve as central inspira-
tions, the Magnesian regime is structured to resist change and maintain
fidelity to the founding lawgiver’s prescriptions. The Athenian Stranger
claims that one of the finest features of the Spartan and Cretan regimes is the
law “that does not allow any of the young to inquire which laws are finely
made and which are not, but that commands all to say in harmony, with one
voice from one mouth, that all the laws are finely made by the gods; if some-
one says otherwise, there is no heed paid to him at all” (Laws, 634d–e). In
keeping with this, he repeatedly appeals to the gods in order to impart a simi-
lar authority to his own legislation (e.g., ibid., 624a, 630d–e, 634d–e, 641d,
762e, 811c, 818b–c, 838b–e, 951b).
The supremacy of the Athenian’s laws relegates Magnesia’s rulers to the
status of administrators with very little legislative power. To the extent they
are permitted to make or alter legislation, it only pertains to relatively minor
matters, and only for a short period of time (ibid., 772b–d). After a ten-year
period of tinkering, all of the laws are to be set in stone, and no one can revise
them without the unanimous consent of everyone in the city (ibid., 772b–d;
see also 799a–b). Even where rulers are not explicitly bound by legal regula-
tions, they are expected to look to the lawgiver for guidance (e.g., ibid., 727c,
728a–b, 770b–71a, 811b–e, 835a–b, 858d, 926b–c, 957d); they are subservi-
ent to the point that the Athenian refers to them as “slaves” (ibid., 762e) and
“servants [hupêretas] of the laws” (ibid., 715d). The Athenian’s characteriza-
tion of Magnesia’s rulers as hupêretai (“under-rowers, servants, helpers,
assistants”) is especially provocative, because it suggests a resemblance to
the Republic’s auxiliaries. In Book III, the Republic introduces a distinction
between true guardians, who are said to have “gold souls,” and their “silver-
souled” helpers or auxiliaries (414b–15a; the auxiliaries are usually referred
to as epikouroi [“auxiliaries, helpers, allies, assisters”], but they are called
hupêretai at 552b). Like the silver souls of the Republic, Magnesia’s rulers
are capable of competently following the instructions of a philosopher with-
out being philosophers themselves.
It is clear, then, that contrary to Bobonich’s claim that the “Athenian’s
confidence in the capacities of Magnesia’s citizens is evident,”19 Plato’s turn
to the rule of law in the Laws is not animated by a newfound appreciation for
the wisdom of the masses. The Athenian proposes that Magnesian citizens
elect their leaders because the best way of choosing rulers—having

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Fraistat 669

philosopher-kings appoint their own successors—is impossible in that


regime. And the central reason he is able to endorse elections as an acceptable
second-best is that his laws have mitigated the need for citizens to choose
exceptionally well. The regime absolves its elected officials of most legisla-
tive responsibilities and therefore does not require a succession of extraordi-
narily outstanding leaders. Sparta and Crete have shown that it is possible to
construct a regime of non-philosophers that maintains fidelity to the writings
of a founding lawgiver; Magnesia’s innovation is to make that lawgiver a
philosopher.

Shortcomings and Self-Critique


The Athenian’s solution as it has been articulated thus far resembles a modi-
fied version of the Spartan or Cretan regime, with the Athenian assuming the
place of Lycurgus or Minos, and “Kronos” standing in for Apollo or Zeus
(Laws, 713a–14a, 897b). The regime is framed by the writings of an absent
but purportedly wise lawgiver whose authority is traced back to god, and
whose laws must administered in perpetuity.20 This solution, however, is a
problematic one, given what Plato takes to be the essential shortcomings of
law. In this section, I will show that some of the most peculiar and interesting
aspects of Magnesia are in fact attempts to answer criticisms of writing and
law discussed above. I will focus in particular on three of the Athenian’s pro-
posals: (1) prefacing the laws with explanatory “preludes”; (2) incorporating
the Laws itself into the regime as an educational text; and (3) introducing a
Nocturnal Council that secretly meets and debates philosophical issues, such
as the unity of virtue. Each of these devices is innovative and cannot be
understood as a modification of prevailing Greek practice. Rather, they are
radical measures intended to address the weaknesses of law as fully as pos-
sible. Importantly, however, they are not wholly successful; the Athenian
manages to mitigate some of the worst features of law but cannot eliminate
them. Thus, the argument and action of the dialogue ultimately vindicate the
claim repeated in Phaedrus, the Republic, the Statesman, and the Laws itself,
to the effect that law is a second-best solution to the political problem.
In Book IV, the Athenian claims that important laws should be introduced
by “preludes” that attempt to explain the law and persuade citizens to follow
it. This claim is prefaced by a discussion of doctoring intended to clarify the
purpose of the preludes. According to the Athenian, cities contain two differ-
ent kinds of doctors: “free doctors,” who care for free citizens, and “slave
doctors,” who act as “servants [hupêretai]” to the free doctors and care for
slaves (ibid., 720a). As the Athenian explains, these two kinds of doctor treat
patients in radically different ways:

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670 Political Theory 43(5)

1. The slave doctor neither gives nor receives any account of the ail-
ments of those he is treating (ibid., 720c), whereas the free doctor
communes “with the patient himself and his friends, . . . learns some-
thing himself from the invalids and, as much as he can, teaches the
one who is sick” (ibid., 720d). Were the slave doctor to witness the
free doctor carrying on a dialogue with a patient, “using arguments
that come close to philosophizing,” he would burst out laughing and
accuse the free doctor of teaching the sick man how to be a doctor
rather than actually doctoring him (ibid., 857d).
2. The slave doctor prescribes what he deems right from experience, not
knowledge (ibid., 720c), whereas the free doctor investigates ail-
ments from their beginning, according to nature (720d).
3. The slave doctor issues his prescriptions as though he has exact
knowledge, like a “headstrong tyrant [turannos authadôs]” (ibid.,
720c), whereas the free doctor “doesn’t give orders until he has in
some sense persuaded” (ibid., 720d).
4. The slave doctor issues his prescriptions and then immediately rushes
off (ibid., 720c), whereas the free doctor remains throughout the
course of the treatment to tame the sick person with persuasion (ibid.,
720d).

In describing and objecting to the methods of the slave doctor, the Athenian
repeats many of the criticisms of law and writing contained in the Statesman
and Phaedrus (cf. the discussion above). He intimates that while all existing
legislation resembles the doctoring of slaves by slaves (ibid., 857c), he
intends to imitate the free doctor to the extent that he is able (ibid., 857e), and
the preludes are a means of accomplishing this.
Although his description of the free doctor would lead one to expect that
the Athenian’s preludes will “teach” Magnesia’s citizens, scholars such as
Karl Popper, R. F. Stalley, and Morrow have argued that they are essentially
pieces of propaganda intended to produce compliance.21 In support of this
claim, the Athenian himself distinguishes the persuasive rhetoric of a prelude
from an argument (logos) (ibid., 723b), and many of his preludes eschew
rational demonstration in favor of emotionally charged exhortations employ-
ing religious and mythical language (e.g., ibid., 854b–c, 870d–e, 872e–73a,
873e–74a, 913c, and 930e–31c). These preludes may imitate the free doctor
in taming “the sick person with persuasion,” but they certainly fall short of
“teaching” (ibid., 720d). Yet, as Bobonich has pointed out, not all of the pre-
ludes are of this character.22 In contrast to the monological and highly rhetori-
cal preludes found elsewhere in the Laws, Book X contains dialogical
preludes that are said to include “arguments” (ibid., 903a). Because the

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Fraistat 671

simple, exhortative preludes are not well suited for presenting demonstrative
arguments or responding to potential objections, the Athenian increasingly
turns to the dialogue form as a way of imitating the free doctor (cf. the dis-
tinction between rhetoric and dialogue/discussion in Gorgias, 448e–d and
passim). This is manifest in the debates he stages between himself and a
hypothetical young atheist in the Book X preludes (Laws, 885b–907b), the
question-and-answer he carries on with himself when his interlocutors are
unable to keep up (Laws, 893b–94a; cf. Gorgias, 451a–c), and his description
of the Laws itself, up through the end of Book IV, as a prelude (Laws, 722d).
Having introduced the notion of a legal prelude and broadened it to include
portions of the very dialogue in which he and his interlocutors are engaging,
the Athenian advances his second radical innovation. He proposes that all of
the speeches that they have been exchanging since dawn (that is to say, the
ones we have been reading—the Laws itself) should be written down and
enshrined as the cornerstone of the new regime (ibid., 811c–e). Judges are to
look to the Laws when judging (ibid., 957d), and citizens will study the dia-
logue in school. This is an astonishing proposal. A Platonic character is sug-
gesting that a Platonic dialogue—and, he adds, writings that are “brothers” to
it (ibid., 811e)—should be made authoritative. What does Plato hope to
achieve by this? As noted above, Platonic characters in multiple dialogues
argue that writing and law are defective insofar as they cannot say different
things to different people, answer questions put to them, or defend them-
selves from criticism. Leo Strauss has argued that it is reasonable to suppose
that Plato intended his own dialogues to avoid some of these difficulties.23
The dialogue format permits him to record philosophic exchanges in which
questions are posed and statements are interrogated in a manner that helps the
reader to philosophize along with the speakers. The fact that Plato never
speaks in his own name means that one can only attempt to understand his
opinions by carefully considering the interplay between his characters, which
serves as a further invitation to think. Plato is also able to say different things
to different people, by writing dialogues in which philosopher-characters say
different things to different people. The perfectly written dialogue would
contain something for everyone, speaking to every reader and providing him
or her with an appropriately tailored education. The Laws, in insisting on
itself as educational material, purports to do this for the citizens of Magnesia.
It will give them deeper access to the Athenian—to his character, to the rea-
sons underlying his legislation, to his doubts and hesitations—than any law
or persuasive prelude possibly could. Perhaps the Laws itself could lead suit-
able readers to a life of philosophy.
This is an improvement, but it still will not do. The Athenian argues that
the Laws should be read by every citizen, but this same fact prevents him

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672 Political Theory 43(5)

from clearly disclosing his full understanding. Like Socrates, the Athenian
believes that philosophy is politically dangerous in the wrong hands: philoso-
phy unsettles established convictions and thereby poses a risk to political
communities (Republic, 537e; cf. the Athenian’s claim that “there is a danger
in imbuing the children with much learning” [Laws, 811b; see also 819a]). He
is therefore forced to speak in elliptical (and at times mythical and theologi-
cal) language about matters that are discussed much more plainly in other
Platonic dialogues. Furthermore, he is not a god, and not everything he has
said is bound to be correct (Laws, 641d). Readers cannot become philoso-
phers simply by repeating the opinions expressed in the Laws. They must go
beyond it and genuinely philosophize for themselves; rendering the Laws
authoritative will actively impede this process.
For this reason, the Athenian turns to a third device: he calls for the estab-
lishment of a Nocturnal Council. The Council is first mentioned in Book X,
where it is created to carry on secret discussions with imprisoned atheists.
These atheists have been jailed because they refuse to accept the public teach-
ings about the gods, and the Council’s job is to reform them through philo-
sophical argument. Evidently even the long, dialogical preludes of Book X
are insufficient to resolve the atheists’ objections; the Council is introduced
because the legislator’s writings are still inferior to face-to-face conversation
with a wise person. This interpretation is confirmed in the twelfth and final
book, where the Athenian greatly expands the Council’s role. Now the
Athenian reveals that although all of his legislation had been for the sake of
virtue, it will amount to nothing unless he and his conversation partners can
define virtue and explain how the various individual virtues fit together to
form a whole. The Athenian implies that it is not within his power to do this.
Instead, he suggests that the problem should be dealt with by the Nocturnal
Council. The Council, composed of the highest magistrates in the city along
with qualified young men of their choosing, must meet for a few hours before
sunrise and discuss the issue (ibid., 951dff., 961aff.). The Council should also
receive foreign guests and hold discussions with the select few Magnesian
citizens who are permitted to go abroad to study other regimes. The Athenian
goes further—the Council should be placed at the head of the entire regime,
and the whole city be turned over to it (ibid., 969b).
The abrupt insertion of the Nocturnal Council into the heart of the
Magnesian regime has occasioned a great deal of interpretive controversy.
Following the suggestion of Aristotle, scholars such as George Klosko, Ernest
Barker, and Peter Brunt have argued that Book XII brings Magnesia much
closer to Kallipolis, and that the Nocturnal Council members are more or less
equivalent to the Republic’s philosopher-kings.24 Others are more cautious
about the philosophical credentials of the Council members,25

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Fraistat 673

and/or maintain that the Council is meant to play an informal, advisory role
analogous to Plato’s Academy.26 While I cannot enter into the debate about
the exact nature of the Council here, I maintain that Plato introduces it in
order to reaffirm his consistent contention that writing is not an adequate
substitute for the presence of living philosophers.
In keeping with this, Book XII reveals the insufficiency of the Magnesian
regime as it has been sketched in the previous books. Because the regime
cannot make do without a “gold-souled” element in its ruling class, the
Athenian now draws the Republic’s distinction between fully educated guard-
ians and those who are merely their assistants or hupêretai (Laws, 968a; see
also 965a). Accordingly, the Athenian begins to refer to the Nocturnal Council
members as “Guardians [phulakes],” recalling the Republic, rather than
“Guardians of the Laws [nomophulakes]” (e.g., ibid., 964c–e, 965b–c,
966a–b, 969c). By permitting each Nocturnal Council member to bring a
young man of his choosing to the meetings, the Athenian also introduces a
wise, partially self-selecting elite into the polity (ibid., 961a–b). He is finally
ready to declare that in the absence of living beings who understand the true
end of the political art and grasp the Ideas of virtue, goodness, and beauty, the
regime cannot succeed (ibid., 962b–c, 964b–d, 965c, 966a).
By the end of the dialogue, the Athenian’s interlocutors have absorbed the
lesson. The Spartan, Megillos, tells Kleinias that “from all that has now been
said by us, either the city’s founding must be abandoned, or this stranger here
must not be allowed to go, and by entreaties and every contrivance he must
be made to share in the founding of the regime” (ibid., 969c). Kleinias agrees.
The written speeches the Athenian has left with them are not sufficient; the
regime requires the Athenian’s active participation.

Conclusion
I have argued that Plato’s Laws ought to be understood as an extension rather
than a repudiation of the political position he articulates in the Republic.
Whereas the Republic sets out to demonstrate that the best regime requires
wise, philosophizing rulers, the Laws argues that the second-best alternative
is a regime in which philosophic writings rule. Thus, Plato retains his earlier
conviction about the incompetence of most people to judge political matters
well, and continues to reject the claims to political power advanced by
wealthy elites and the dêmos.
We might still ask why Plato chose to write a dialogue about a second-best
regime of this nature. I believe he has left us a hint as to the answer. There is
a moment in the Laws where the Athenian suddenly voices a concern about
whether he will be able to finish the account he has begun, and prays that he

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674 Political Theory 43(5)

and his interlocutors will manage to “overcome old age sufficiently” (Laws,
752a). Seth Benardete claims that the Athenian’s fear that he might leave the
laws incomplete makes little sense in terms of the dialogue, given that the
conversation takes place over the course of a single day. He suggests that
perhaps the Athenian is breaking the fourth wall and expressing the worry of
an elderly Plato who is thinking about his own death. As I argue above, the
Statesman suggests law as a remedy to the problem of absence. Written law
is a solution to the problem of succession, because the intelligent king can
leave behind his own laws as his successors. We might imagine that Plato,
nearing the end of his life, began to think about his own future absence, and
to reflect upon the political possibilities as well as the limitations of the writ-
ings he would leave behind. This would explain why the Laws is the only
Platonic composition that advocates the political use of a Platonic dialogue,
calling for itself to be enshrined as the centerpiece of the Magnesian regime:
the Laws is the dialogue in which Plato explores the political uses of his own
written work. For that reason, it is of particular importance to Plato scholars
who want to understand his political project and his attempt to continue shap-
ing a world in which he is no longer present.

Acknowledgments
An earlier version of this article was presented at the 2013 American Political Science
Association Annual Meeting. I would like to thank the participants at that event, as
well as Neil Fraistat, Bryan Garsten, Karuna Mantena, Kimberly O’Neill, Steven B.
Smith, and the editor and three anonymous reviwers of this journal, for their many
helpful comments and suggestions.

Declaration of Conflicting Interests


The author declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research,
authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding
The author received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publica-
tion of this article.

Notes
 1. E.g., Eric R. Dodds, The Greeks and the Irrational (Berkeley: University of
California Press, 1973); Gregory Vlastos, Platonic Studies (Princeton: Princeton
University Press, 1981); Julia Annas and Robin Waterfield, eds., Plato: Statesman
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995), xvii–xx; Christopher Bobonich,
Plato’s Utopia Recast: His Later Ethics and Politics (Oxford: Oxford University
Press, 2002); and Thanassis Samaras, Plato on Democracy (New York: Peter
Lang, 2002).

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Fraistat 675

  2. References to the Laws are to Thomas Pangle, trans., The Laws of Plato (Chicago:
University of Chicago Press, 1980). This article also quotes from Allan Bloom,
trans., The Republic of Plato: Second Edition (Basic Books, 1991). Quotations
from other Platonic dialogues are from John Cooper, ed., Plato: Complete Works
(Indianapolis: Hackett, 1997).
  3. For example, G. C. Field, The Philosophy of Plato, 2nd edition (Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 1969); Kenneth Royce Moore, Sex and the Second-Best City: Sex
and Society in the Laws of Plato (New York: Routledge, 2005); and Christopher
Rowe, “The Relations of the Laws to Other Dialogues: A Proposal,” as well as
Robert Kraut, “Ordinary Virtue from the Phaedo to the Laws,” in Plato’s Laws:
A Critical Guide, ed. Christopher Bobonich (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 2010).
  4. See, e.g., Cicero, De Legibus, 1265a.
  5. V. Bradley Lewis, “Politeia kai Nomoi: On the Coherence of Plato’s Political
Philosophy,” Polity 31, no. 2 (1998): 331–49.
  6. E.g., Glenn R. Morrow, Plato’s Cretan City: A Historical Interpretation of the
Laws (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1960); A. E. Taylor, The Laws
of Plato (J. M. Dent & Sons, 1966), xiii; W. K. C. Guthrie, History of Greek
Philosophy Volume V: The Later Plato and the Academy (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 1978), 335; Trevor J. Saunders, trans., Plato’s Laws (New
York: Penguin Books, 2004), xxxii; and Moore, Plato, Politics and a Practical
Utopia (New York: Continuum, 2012); see also Moore, Second-Best City, 3, 54.
 7. Morrow, Cretan City, 11.
 8. Moore, Practical Utopia, 1. See also André Laks, “Legislation and Demiurgy:
On the Relationship between Plato’s ‘Republic’ and ‘Laws,’” Classical Antiquity
9, no. 2 (1990): 209–29; Trevor J. Saunders, “Plato’s Later Political Thought,” in
The Cambridge Companion to Plato, ed. Richard Kraut (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 1992), 465; Malcolm Schofield, Plato: Political Philosophy
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006), 10; and G. F. Ferrari, “Plato’s Writerly
Utopianism,” in Dialogues on Plato’s Politeia (Republic): Selected Papers from
the Ninth Symposium Platonicum, ed. Noburu Notomi and Luc Brisson (Sankt
Augustin: Academia, 2013).
  9. Several scholars argue that the Republic is nonetheless not a serious political pro-
posal; e.g., Leo Strauss, The City and Man (Chicago: University of Chicago Press,
1964), 64, 124; Bloom, Republic, 410; and Jill Frank in a paper presented at the
American Political Science Association’s 2008 annual meeting. While I cannot
discuss their arguments here, I contend that the passages cited above, as well as
political activities undertaken by Plato and many of his students, suggest otherwise.
10. Vlastos, Platonic Studies, 216.
11. Bobonich, Plato’s Utopia Recast, 11.
12. Vlastos, Platonic Studies, 215fn25.
13. E.g., Taylor, The Laws of Plato, xxxv.
14. Although some scholars allege that Minos is spurious, the definition of law as
the suggrammata of political experts is also clearly present in dialogues whose
authenticity is not in doubt.

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676 Political Theory 43(5)

15. The written character of nomoi in the Laws seems to distinguish it from the
Republic. As Melissa Lane points out, the almost complete absence of verbs
for writing suggests that Kallipolis’s nomoi are not written. “Founding as
Legislating: The Figure of the Lawgiver in Plato’s Republic,” Dialogues on
Plato’s Politeia (Republic), 113.
16. The Spartan assembly was composed of all adult male citizens over thirty, and it
elected the Ephors and the Council of Elders. Cretan arrangements were broadly
similar. See Aristotle, Politics, 1270b–72b and Plutarch, Life of Lycurgus, 5–6,
26.
17. This is true irrespective of whether the regime has one philosophic ruler or a few
(Republic, 445d, 540d, 587d; cf. Statesman, 297c).
18. It might be objected that the Statesman appears to identify law-bound monarchy
as the second-best regime (303b). I would suggest that this ranking is only con-
sidering the short term. The rule of one person is the most efficient for enacting
wise policies (cf. Laws, 694a–95d, 709e–10a), but unless that ruler is a philoso-
pher, he is liable to have wicked successors. The most stable non-philosophic
regime is “mixed,” like Sparta or Crete.
19. Bobonich, Plato’s Utopia Recast, 383.
20. For this reason, some interpreters have considered the Laws to contain Plato’s
reflections about divine revelation. See Strauss, The Argument and Action of
Plato’s Laws (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1975), 1, and Mark J. Lutz,
Divine Law and Political Philosophy in Plato’s Laws (DeKalb, IL: Northern
Illinois University Press, 2012).
21. See Karl Popper, The Open Society and Its Enemies, vol. 1: The Spell of Plato,
5th edition (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1971), 271n. 10; Morrow,
“Plato’s Conception of Persuasion,” Philosophical Review 62 (1953): 234–50;
and R. F. Stalley, An Introduction to Plato’s Laws (Indianapolis: Hackett, 1983),
43.
22. Christopher Bobonich, “Persuasion, Freedom, and Compulsion in Plato’s Laws,”
The Classical Quarterly 41, no. 2 (1991): 370.
23. Strauss, The City and Man, 50–53.
24. See Aristotle, Politics, II.6; George Klosko, “The Nocturnal Council in Plato’s
Laws,” Political Studies 36 (1988): 74–88; Ernest Barker, Greek Political
Theory: Plato and His Predecessors (London: Methuen, 1918), 405; and Peter
Brunt, Studies in Greek History and Thought (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1993),
205–1.
25. E.g., see Strauss, Argument and Action, 180, and Catherine H. Zuckert, “Plato’s
Laws: Postlude or Prelude to Socratic Political Philosophy?” The Journal of
Politics 66, no. 2 (2004): 389.
26. Morrow, Cretan City, 509. Moore agrees that the Academy is an inspiration for
the Nocturnal Council, but he argues that it has some direct powers of gover-
nance. See Second-Best City, 33, 81.
27. On this point, see Pangle, The Laws of Plato, 507.
28. Seth Benardete, Plato’s “Laws”: The Discovery of Being (Chicago: University of
Chicago Press, 2000), 174. According to some ancient sources, Plato did in fact

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Fraistat 677

die before completing the Laws, leaving only a draft (e.g., Diogenes Laertius,
Lives of Eminent Philosophers, III.37).

Author Biography
Shawn Fraistat is a recent graduate of Yale University’s doctoral program in Politcal
Science. A political theorist who studies primarily ancient Greek and eighteenth-cen-
tury liberal thought, his research centers on questions concerning authority and the
social and political foundations of liberal democracy.

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