Democracy is inherently flawed for other reasons, the wolves and the lamb voting on who is for dinner being an excellent illustration. As for people screaming about disenfranchisement and going berserk, so what? Let them scream.
The USA was, as Ben Franklin said, "a Republic, if you can keep it." Every time I hear a lefty talking about '…
Democracy is inherently flawed for other reasons, the wolves and the lamb voting on who is for dinner being an excellent illustration. As for people screaming about disenfranchisement and going berserk, so what? Let them scream.
The USA was, as Ben Franklin said, "a Republic, if you can keep it." Every time I hear a lefty talking about 'our democracy,' I shudder. As to the inevitability, the Founders generally thought that the government would last only 40 years or so, at which time a new constitutional convention would form another, likely quite different, government. So the fact that the Constitution has survived for 235 years in more-or-less its original form is a testament to its durability.
If the Fedgov 'stuck to its knitting' as in 'strictly followed the Enumerated Powers,' few people would care who was in charge. Overreach in the interpretation of the Interstate Commerce and General Welfare clauses, along with liberal interpretations by the courts, has given the government far too much power. (It started with Marbury v. Madison, merely 16 years after the Constitution was written.) That is the true problem here, but fixing it will take more than a discussion on this esteemed forum.
n.b.: Jefferson said the following in a letter to Chief Justice Marshall regarding Marbury:
“You seem to consider the judges as the ultimate arbiters of all constitutional questions; a very dangerous doctrine indeed, and one which would place us under the despotism of an oligarchy. Our judges are as honest as other men, and not more so. They have, with others, the same passions for party, for power, and the privilege of their corps. … Their power [is] the more dangerous as they are in office for life, and not responsible, as the other functionaries are, to the elective control. The Constitution has erected no such single tribunal, knowing that to whatever hands confided, with the corruptions of time and party, its members would become despots. It has more wisely made all the departments co-equal and co-sovereign within themselves.”
Democracy is inherently flawed for other reasons, the wolves and the lamb voting on who is for dinner being an excellent illustration. As for people screaming about disenfranchisement and going berserk, so what? Let them scream.
The USA was, as Ben Franklin said, "a Republic, if you can keep it." Every time I hear a lefty talking about 'our democracy,' I shudder. As to the inevitability, the Founders generally thought that the government would last only 40 years or so, at which time a new constitutional convention would form another, likely quite different, government. So the fact that the Constitution has survived for 235 years in more-or-less its original form is a testament to its durability.
If the Fedgov 'stuck to its knitting' as in 'strictly followed the Enumerated Powers,' few people would care who was in charge. Overreach in the interpretation of the Interstate Commerce and General Welfare clauses, along with liberal interpretations by the courts, has given the government far too much power. (It started with Marbury v. Madison, merely 16 years after the Constitution was written.) That is the true problem here, but fixing it will take more than a discussion on this esteemed forum.
n.b.: Jefferson said the following in a letter to Chief Justice Marshall regarding Marbury:
“You seem to consider the judges as the ultimate arbiters of all constitutional questions; a very dangerous doctrine indeed, and one which would place us under the despotism of an oligarchy. Our judges are as honest as other men, and not more so. They have, with others, the same passions for party, for power, and the privilege of their corps. … Their power [is] the more dangerous as they are in office for life, and not responsible, as the other functionaries are, to the elective control. The Constitution has erected no such single tribunal, knowing that to whatever hands confided, with the corruptions of time and party, its members would become despots. It has more wisely made all the departments co-equal and co-sovereign within themselves.”