There is an aspect of republican government that makes some people uncomfortable. It’s the idea that ordinary people are not fit to govern. In a republic, the people delegate some of their natural rights to a group of educated representatives who have abilities beyond the common level. The people are not expected to know everything there is to know about managing a country, but they are expected to recognize qualified leaders. Thomas Jefferson describes it thus:
Thomas Jefferson
“We think experience has proved it safer, for the mass of individuals composing the society, to reserve to themselves personally the exercise of all rightful powers to which they are competent, and to delegate those to which they are not competent to deputies named, and removable for unfaithful conduct, by themselves immediately. Hence with us, the people (by which is meant the mass of individuals composing the society) being competent to judge of the facts occurring in ordinary life, they have retained the functions of judges of facts, under the name of jurors; but being unqualified for the management of affairs requiring intelligence above the common level, yet competent judges of human character, they choose for their management, representatives, some by themselves immediately, others by electors chosen by themselves.” (from a letter to Pierre S. du Pont de Nemours, 1816)
A republic is not aristocratic, but it’s not populist either. The idea of some people being more qualified than others doesn’t sit well with those who believe in standing for the common man. This kind of angst is the kindling that fuels the push towards democratic socialism. Today there are people like William P Meyers who openly argue that the Founders were elitists who used the guise of republican government to secure wealth and power for themselves. From Mr. Meyers’ website we read:
William P. Meyers
“…to win the American Revolution this predatory elite [i.e. the Founding Fathers] needed help. Their own rhetoric about freedom and equality led to widespread demands for the right to vote: universal suffrage. In other words, the people began demanding democracy. Even the slaves (white and black alike) demanded to be freed and allowed to vote.
After the British were defeated a centralized, national government was seen by George Washington and company not as a method of extending freedom and the right to vote, but as a way of keeping control in the hands of rich. They wrote several anti-democratic provisions into the U.S. Constitution. Slavery was institutionalized. The Senate was not to be elected directly by the people; rather Senators were to be appointed by state legislatures. The President was not to be directly elected by the voters, but elected through an electoral college. The Supreme Court was to be appointed. Only the House of Representatives was elected directly.
More important to our democracy-versus-republic debate, the U.S. Constitution left the question of who could vote in elections to each individual state. In most states only white men who owned a certain amount of property could vote. So, on the whole, the first federal government that met in 1789 was a republic with only a fig-leaf of democratic representation. This is what today’s commentators mean when they say America is a republic, not a democracy.”
It’s not hard to fall into this trap. After all, our Founders did form the Constitution in secret, and they presented the document to the public only after it was finished. One could argue that this is no different from the elitist attitude we see from our current representatives, who pass bills without giving the public a chance to understand their content. If we believe in representative government, shouldn’t we be okay with this behavior?
It is critical for Americans to understand the difference.
Let’s consider the Founders. Were they predatory elitists? No, in fact they were best qualified to represent the people because they were best able to effectively articulate the will and wishes of the people. The values of liberty, virtue and self-government were already ingrained in the culture. The people valued the leadership of the Founders because they were able to take core American values and implant those ideals into the government. And we must remember that those early leaders recognized and respected natural rights. Their knowledge and abilities, gained through education and experience, did not give them a sense of superiority over the rest of the population.
Contrast that with elitists today. They seek to use their position of power to go against the will of the people. But they even take it a step further. They seek to manipulate the people and shift them away from their core values.
Democracy propaganda usually has a populist slant, appealing to the common man’s desire for power over the elites. Of course the true effect of democracy is the opposite of what the working class desires – it allows elites to concentrate even greater power. The tea party movement has brought increased awareness of how democracy leads to oligarchy. This new right-wing populism has caused the elitists to take a different tack.
For example, David Brooks of the New York Times characterizes tea partiers as ignorant commoners, and he pits these populists against the “educated class”:
David Brooks
“The public is not only shifting from left to right. Every single idea associated with the educated class has grown more unpopular over the past year.
The educated class believes in global warming, so public skepticism about global warming is on the rise. The educated class supports abortion rights, so public opinion is shifting against them. The educated class supports gun control, so opposition to gun control is mounting.
The story is the same in foreign affairs. The educated class is internationalist, so isolationist sentiment is now at an all-time high, according to a Pew Research Center survey. The educated class believes in multilateral action, so the number of Americans who believe we should “go our own way” has risen sharply.
A year ago, the Obama supporters were the passionate ones. Now the tea party brigades have all the intensity.
The tea party movement is a large, fractious confederation of Americans who are defined by what they are against. They are against the concentrated power of the educated class.”
We cannot allow the democratic/oligarchic elitists to characterize themselves as the educated class. The only way to fight against this deceitful propaganda is to help create our own “educated class” – not a caste of superiors, but simply a group of citizens who seek out and uphold true principles. We need to use the principles of republican government to cultivate a new batch of leaders who can match the Founding Fathers in wisdom, vision and virtue.
