Jonathan Miller makes an excellent point in his guest column (“An Iraqi Republic,” May 5) that the type of democracy practiced by the Bush administration here at home isn’t equivalent to the brand we are attempting to export by force to the rest of the world. This raises an important question: Which (if either) of these “democracies” should we as a society aspire to? Miller is clearly against the idea of republicanism and mentions the John Birch Society (three times) as his main case against the system, as if to say, “If those right-wing loonies like it, it must be wrong.”
While it is true the virtues of a republic over a democracy have been extolled by right-wing authoritarians, what Miller ignores is that the Founding Fathers of this country also took that view, and for reasons that are still valid. Miller laments that the United States is not a “pure” democracy, in the sense that our presidential elections are not decided by a popular vote.
Why is this “pure”? To me, a “pure” democracy would be one in which every issue is decided by popular vote. This is clearly not desirable at all, being akin to the idea of three wolves and a sheep voting to decide what to have for dinner. The framers of the Constitution were wary not just of absolute rulers, but of the dangers of mob rule. Consequently, they took great pains to guard the new country against both. We are all familiar with the checks and balances that limit the government (or used to, at least); however, we seem to have forgotten how and why our democracy limits the powers of the people.
Initially, the president was to be chosen by the electoral college every four years, the representatives elected by the people every two years and the senators chosen by state legislatures for terms of six years (this last part has since been repealed). This may seem like an awful lot of bureaucracy to come between the will of the people and their leaders.
Exactly! It was chosen so in no single year could one party, by appealing to populist passions, gain control over the entire government. The process of political change was intended to be slow, not subject to the daily whims, moods and fears of the general population.
Miller and other professed opponents of Bush should be grateful such safeguards are in place. Had there been a general popular election of the president and all members of Congress in November of 2001, we would have seen the installation of a belligerent government that would make Bush’s neocons look like the Brady Bunch in comparison. History is full of examples of nasty tyrants selected by the people in times of temporary mass stupidity (one had a funny mustache).
These days we’re all suspicious of leaders. It pays to remember why we need to be suspicious of the masses as well. The idea of a constitutional republic is to protect the minority from the majority. People ought to be allowed to determine their government, but the power they wield should be limited. Majority does not make right. Otherwise, what’s to stop 75 percent of the population from killing off the other 25 percent? This is why we have a constitution and limits to democracy.
Right now, like it or not, conservatives make up arguably a majority of this country. It’s a good time for liberals to recognize republicanism as a defense against the potential tyranny of democracy.
Paul Gresser is a graduate student in physics. He can be reached at gresser@glue.umd.edu.
