From the end of Sulla's dictatorship in 80 BC to the assassination of Julius Caesar in 44 BC, Rome saw the end of the Republic in the actions of a few of its most powerful. A strengthened Senate and the competition for high offices created by Sulla would not have saved the Republic, but rather would have condemned it to the struggles of Pompey, Crassus and Caesar. These men, seeking power for themselves, tore the Italian peninsula apart with an alliance and then a civil war among themselves, thanks in part to the failed reforms of a dictator who had sought to ensure that no other man took power as him. he had done. At the end of the Social War, Sulla had become the dictator of Rome. Despite having almost unlimited power, Sulla quickly began attempting to reform Rome. He nearly doubled the size of the Senate, increased the number of quaestors, restored restrictions, abolished the grain distribution system, an offer of governorships to consuls and praetors at the end of their terms, and other reforms of the courts and citizenship. Sulla resigned from the dictatorship in 80 BC, but his reforms failed soon after. His reforms ultimately failed because they alienated too many people and gave the Senate such increased power that it was doubtful whether “its members were capable of maintaining sufficient unity and sense of responsibility” (Boatwright 193). Senators had to be “consistently more moderate,” especially with “greater competition for high magistracies,” otherwise another man might march on Rome as Sulla had done. The formation of the first triumvirate of Pompey, Crassus and Caesar was one of the beneficial political necessity for every man, especially for Pompey and Caesar. When Pompey returned to Rome after a... means of paper ......defective in describing his actions” (Suetonius 27). We see that through the actions of the triumvirate, and then later the civil The war between Pompey and Caesar was the result of Sulla's failed reforms, as well as their own vainglory and thirst for power over Rome which would consequently lead to the end of the Republic Roman. Their early struggles against a senate that held power over their future and goals certainly helped push them into revolutionary actions that would see Caesar achieve power over Rome unmatched since the days of Rome's first kings, despite never reaching the point of calling himself rex. Works Cited Boatwright, Mary T., Daniel J. Gargola, Noel Lenski, and Richard Talbert. The Romans: from village to empire. 2nd ed. New York: Oxford UP, 2012. Print.Suetonius. The Twelve Caesars. Trans. Roberto Graves. London: Penguin, 2007. Print.