The lands held by the patricians, being divided into extensive tracts, were principally used for pasturage; the small lots assigned to the plebeians were, of necessity, devoted to agriculture.

Hence arose the first great cause of hostility between the two orders; the patricians were naturally eager to extend their possessions in the public domains, which enabled them to provide for their numerous clients, and in remote districts they frequently wrested the estates from the free proprietors in their neighbourhood; the plebeians, on the other hand, deemed that they had the best right to the land purchased by their blood, and saw with just indignation, the fruits of victory monopolized by a single order in the state.

The tribute paid by the plebeians increased this hardship, for it was a land-tax levied on estates, and consequently fell most heavily on the smaller proprietors; indeed, in many cases, the possessors of the national domains paid nothing.
From all this it is evident that an agrarian law only removed tenants who held from the state at will, and did not in any case interfere with the sacred right of property; but it is also plain that such a change must have been frequently inconvenient to the individual in possession.

It also appears, that had not agrarian laws been introduced, the great body of the plebeians would have become the clients of the patricians, and the form of government would have been a complete oligarchy.
The chief means to which the Romans, even from the earliest ages, had recourse for securing their conquests, and at the same time relieving the poorer classes of citizens, was the establishment of colonies in the conquered states.

The new citizens formed a kind of garrison, and were held together by a constitution formed on the model of the parent state.