

ON DEMOCRACY

The following excerpts are intended to make you consider some
important questions about things you may have always taken for
granted.  The primary one being the perception that Democracy is
synonymous with freedom.  IT IS NOT!  And although many of our
institutions include some form of democratic-like participation, 
WE DO NOT LIVE IN A DEMOCRACY for some very good reasons, some of
which are stated below.

Our Republic was founded upon the principles of Liberty (the right to
do whatever one wishes so long as those actions do not infringe upon
the equal rights of others) and limited government, not democracy.
In fact, seldom if ever will one see reference to democracy in the
founding documents of our nation, at least in a positive context.
Peculiar, don't you think if we are suppose to live in a democracy as
our politicians tell us?

Consider that in the past, we had Liberty coins, not democracy coins.
We have the Statue of Liberty, not the Statue of Democracy.  We pledge
allegiance to the flag, and to the Republic for which it stands, not
the democracy for which it stands.  Patrick Henry said: "Give me
Liberty or give me death!", not "Give me democracy or give me death".

So you may ask, if we live in a Republic founded upon the principles
of Liberty and limited government, why do many of our politicians keep
trying to shove this concept of democracy down our throats, as if
freedom naturally followed?  That is a very good question!  

Perhaps they don't like the limits on the powers that have been
granted them by our state and federal constitutions.  Maybe because
majority rule sounds legitimate and moral on its face, they wish to
use our own ignorance to enslave us with the consent of the masses;
and to extract from us every last penny that we have.  Or maybe they
have other self serving motivations.  Whatever the case may be, only
knowledge of our heritage will enable us to anticipate such schemes
and act accordingly to right the direction of our Republic.

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Please take the time and consider the following selected excerpts
copied without permission from Chapter 3 of THE UNSEEN HAND by 
A. Ralph Epperson.
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     ... It is generally conceded that even a monarchy or a
dictatorship is an oligarchy, or a government run by a small, ruling
minority......
     Such is also the case with a democracy, for this form of
government is traditionally controlled at the top by a small ruling
oligarchy.  The people in a democracy are conditioned to believe that
they are indeed the decision-making power of government, but in truth
there is almost always a small circle at the top making the decisions
for the entirety...

     As proof of these contentions, one has only to read the 1928
United States Army Training Manual, which defined democracy as:

     A government of the masses.  Authority is derived through mass
meeting or any other form of direct expression.  Results in mobocracy,
attitude toward property is communistic - negating property rights.
     Attitude toward law is that the will of the majority shall
regulate, whether it be based on deliberation or governed by passion,
prejudice, and impulse, without restraint or regard to consequence.
     Result in demagogism, license, agitation, discontent, anarchy.(1)

     A democracy, according to this definition, is actually controlled
by a demagogue, defined as: "A speaker who seeks to make capital of
social discontent and gain political influence." ...


     The 1928 definition of a democracy was later changed by those who
write Army manuals, however.
     In 1952, this became the definition of a democracy in the
Soldier's Guide:

     Because the United States is a democracy, the majority of the
people decide how the government will be organized and run - and that
includes the Army, Navy and Air Force.  These people do this by
electing representatives, and these men and women then carry out the
wishes of the people(2)


     So if democracies are in truth oligarchies, where the minority
rules, is there a form of government that protects both minority and
majority rights?
     There is, and it is called a republic, which is defined as:

     Rule by law: a republic

     In the republican form of government, the power rests in a
written constitution. wherein the powers of the government are limited
so that the people retain the maximum amount of power themselves.  In
addition to limiting the power of government, care is also taken to
limit the power of the people to restrict the rights of both the
majority and the minority.
     Perhaps the simplest method of illustrating the difference
between an oligarchy, a democracy and a republic would be to discuss
the basic plot of the classic grade B western movie.
     In this plot, one that the moviegoer has probably seen a hundred
times, the brutal villain rides into town and guns down the
unobtrusive town merchant by provoking him into a gunfight.  The
sheriff hears the gunshot and enters the scene.  He asks the assembled
crowd what happened, and they relate the story.  The sheriff then
takes the villain into custody and removes him to the city jail.
     Back at the scene of the shooting, usually in a tavern, an
individual stands up on a table (this individual by definition is a
Demagogue) and exhorts the crowd to take the law into its own hands
and lynch the villain.  The group decides that this is the course of
action that they should take (notice that the group now becomes a
democracy where the majority rules) and down the street they (now
called a mob) go.  They reach the jail and demand that the villain be
released to their custody.  The mob has spoken by majority vote: the
villain must hang.
     The sheriff appears before the democracy and explains that the
villain has the right to a trial by jury.  The demagogue counters by
explaining that the majority has spoken: the villain must hang.  The
sheriff explains that his function is to protect the rights of the
individual, be he innocent or guilty, until that individual has the
opportunity to defend himself in a court of law.  The sheriff
continues by explaining that the will of the majority cannot deny the
individual that right.  The demagogue continues to exhort the
democracy to lynch the villain, but if the sheriff is persuasive and
convinces the democracy that he exists to protect their rights as
well, the scent should end as the people leave, convinced of the
merits of the arguments of the sheriff.
     The republican form of government has triumphed over the
democratic form of mob action.
     In summary, the sheriff represents the republic, the demagogue
the control of the democracy, and the mob the democracy.  The republic
recognizes that man has certain inalienable rights and that government
is created to protect those rights, even from acts of the majority.
Notice that the republic must be persuasive in front of democracy and
that the republic will only continue to exist as long as the people
recognize the importance and validity of the concept.  Should the
people wish to overthrow the republic and the sheriff, they certainly
have the power (but not the right) to do so.
     But the persuasive nature of the republic's arguments should
convince the mob that it is the preferable form of government.

     It is easy to see how a democracy can turn into anarchy when
unscrupulous individuals wish to manipulate it.  The popular beliefs
of the majority can be turned into a position of committing some
injustice against an individual or group of individuals.  This then
becomes the excuse for the unscrupulous to grab total power, all in an
effort to "remedy the situation."
     Alexander Hamilton was aware of this tendency of a democratic
form of government to be torn apart by itself, and he has been quoted
as writing:  "We are now forming a republican form of government.
Real liberty is not found in the extremes of democracy, but in
moderate governments.  If we incline too much to democracy, we shall
soon shoot into a monarchy (or some other form of dictatorship.)"
     Others were led to comment on the perils of democratic forms of
government.  One was James Madison who wrote: "In all cases where a
majority are united by a common interest or passion, the rights of the
minority are in danger!"(5)  Another was John Adams who wrote:
"Unbridled passions produce the same effects, whether in a king,
nobility, or a mob.  The experience of all mankind has proved the
prevalence of a disposition to use power wantonly.  It is therefore as
necessary to defend an individual against the majority (in a
democracy) as against the king in a monarchy."(4)

     George Washington, in his farewell address to the American people
as he was leaving the presidency, spoke about the amending of the
Constitution:

     If in the opinion of the people, the distribution or modification
of the Constitutional power be in any particular wrong, let it be
corrected by an amendment in the way in which the Constitutional
designates.  But let there by no change by usurpation, for though
this, in one instance, may be the instrument of good, it is the
customary weapon by which free governments are destroyed.

     It was about the same time that a British professor named
Alexander Fraser Tyler wrote: "A democracy cannot exist as a permanent
form of government.  It can exist only until the voters discover they
can vote themselves largess (defined as a liberal gift) out of the
public treasury.  From that moment on, the majority always votes for
the candidate promising the most benefits from the public treasury,
with the result that democracy always collapses over a loose fiscal
policy, always to be followed by a dictatorship."

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(This file was found elsewhere on the Internet and uploaded to the
Patriot FTP site by S.P.I.R.A.L., the Society for the Protection of
Individual Rights and Liberties. E-mail alex@spiral.org)

