Julius Caesar's war against the Roman Republic, and his dictatorship, didn't go the way he planned. Cato the Younger's suicide made him a hero during the short years of Caesar's rule. The men who conspired to kill the tyrant held Cato up as their inspiration.

So did the Founding Fathers of the American Republic nearly two centuries later. Joseph Addison's play Cato was a huge hit in the colonies, inspiring, among others, George Washington.

Cato's inflexible commitment to freedom from tyranny and democratic principles became the template for America's leaders. The Founding Fathers, and their descendants, believed they were Catos. It was his example they aspired to, and the best of them fulfilled it. 

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