We have already spoken of the institution of the censorship (in 443 B.C.9 as an incident in the struggle between the orders, which constituted a patrician victory in so far as the new office was confined originally to patricians. When the office became open to plebeians is uncertain, but we hear of a plebeian censor for the first time in 351 B.C. and soon afterwards, the same rule applied as to the consulship, that one of the two colleagues must be a plebeian.
The original purpose of the new magistracy was clearly to relieve the supreme magistrates of one of the duties that they had previously performed, that of taking the census, and at first the censorship appears to have been comparatively unimportant. But the control which it gave over the whole moral life of the people, and especially the power of appointing senators, made it, in the end, an office of even greater dignity than the consulship itself, and it was, with hardly an exception, held only by men of consular rank. The election was held in the comitia centuriata under the presidency of a consul, but the censor had no imperium, and, though he sat on the curule chair, he did not have the fasces borne before him. On the other hand the eminence of his office became apparent when he died, for he alone of all magistrates was buried in the full purple toga which had been the emblem of royalty. The censors also differed from other magistrates in that they were not elected annually; they were only elected for the purpose of taking the census, a duty which ended with the lustrum, or ceremonial purification of the people, and they had to lay down their office when this was completed, or at the latest eighteen months after their election. Then no others were appointed until a new census was to be taken, the usual interval being four or, later, five years. Re-election was forbidden.
