Recurring for a moment to the basileus, the office tended to make the man more conspicuous than any other in their affairs. He was the first person to catch the mental eye of the historian by whom he has been metamorphosed into a king, notwithstanding he was made to reign, and by divine right, over a rude democracy. As a general in a military democracy, the basileus becomes intelligible, and without violating the institutions that actually existed. The introduction of this office did not change the principles of the gentes, phratries and tribes, which in their organization were essentially democratical, and which of necessity impressed that character on their gentile system. Evidence is not wanting that the popular element was constantly active to resist encroachments on personal rights. The basileus belongs to the traditionary period, when the powers of government were more or less undefined; but the council of chiefs existed in the centre of the system, and also the gentes, phratries and tribes in full vitality. These are sufficient to determine the character of the government.[281]
The government as reconstituted by Cleisthenes contrasted strongly with that previous to the time of Solon. But the transition was not only natural but inevitable if the people followed their ideas to their logical results. It was a change of plan, but not of principles nor even of instrumentalities. The council of chiefs remained in the senate, the agora in the ecclesia; the three highest archons were respectively ministers of state, of religion, and of justice as before, while the six inferior archons exercised judicial functions in connection with the courts, and the large body of dicasts now elected annually for judicial service. No executive officer existed under the system, which is one of its striking peculiarities. The nearest approach to it was the president of the senate, who was elected by lot for a single day, without the possibility of a re-election during the year. For a single day he presided over the popular assembly, and held the keys of the citadel and of the treasury. Under the new government the popular assembly held the substance of power, and guided the destiny of Athens. The new element which gave stability and order to the state was the deme or township, with its complete autonomy, and local self-government. A hundred demes similarly organized would determine the general movement of the commonwealth. As the unit, so the compound. It is here that the people, as before remarked, must begin if they would learn the art of self-government, and maintain equal laws, and equal rights and privileges. They must retain in their hands all the powers of society not necessary to the state to insure an efficient general administration, as well as the control of the administration itself.