Official Discrimination. The central political principle behind most modern legal systems is equality before the law. Neither individual cases nor legal rights in general are supposed to depend on the identity of the persons involved. While there are exceptions in practice (e.g., for minors, aliens, and the mentally ill), the ideal is well established. For the Romans, legal equality was more suspect in theory and the practical exceptions were more numerous and more serious. There was inequality both in substantive rights and in procedural access to the justice system. It may be useful, then, to consider in turn the various categories of people who did not have the full rights of the adult male Roman citizen.

Women. Women not under paternal control were subject to a limited form of guardianship (called tutela). The guardian (tutor) only had authority...