Upholding the Republic: A Primer on Democracy and Our Republic
Ronald P. Bouchard Jr.
“The republican is the only form of government which is not eternally at open or secret war with the rights of mankind.” -Thomas Jefferson, in a letter to William Hunter in 1790.
Everywhere you turn, you will hear people in the media and in government refer to our nation as a democracy. While those of ill intent and who have disdain for our nation would love that to be true, our founding fathers were very clear in articulating the kind of government they were establishing. They were not establishing a democracy but a republic. That distinction was and is of the highest importance, and failure to understand and make that distinction has resulted and continues to result in many misconceptions about the nature of American government.
While many people today equate the term “democracy” with freedom and collective decision-making, the American founders viewed it quite differently. They were well-versed in the history of governments around the world, including the failures of various democracies. Prior to the Constitutional Convention, Thomas Jefferson provided James Madison, the principal author of the Constitution, with two trunks full of books on the history of failed republics. The founders understood that, historically, democracy often led to majority tyranny and instability. James Madison knew that in a pure democracy, there was no way to cure the violence and mischiefs of factions. “He warned that factions could unite against the rights of other citizens and the long-standing, cumulative interests of the community.” In Federalist No. 10, he noted that “Democracies have ever been spectacles of turbulence and contention; have ever been found incompatible with personal security, or the rights of property; and have, in general, been as short in their lives as they have been violent in their deaths.”
Thomas Jefferson also displayed similar wariness, stating: “A democracy is nothing more than mob rule, where 51 percent of the people may take away the rights of the other 49.” Benjamin Franklin, in his turn, expressed his thought, “Democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch.” These analogies underline the reason for founders’ fear of majoritarian rule that would disregard minority rights.
To this, John Adams added a grim warning: “Remember, democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts, and murders itself. There never was a democracy yet that did not commit suicide.” His words introduced a cautionary element into the debate, underlining that democracies are inherently unstable and harbor a tendency to commit suicide.
Another chief architect of the American republic, Alexander Hamilton, writing in Federalist No. 9, hailed, “It has been observed that a pure democracy if it were practicable would be the most perfect government. Experience has proved that no position is more false than this. The ancient democracies in which the people themselves deliberated never possessed one good feature of government. Their very character was tyranny; their figure deformity.” Hamilton viewed historical democracies as destabilized and ending up in despotism.
The founders’ concerns were not theoretical but based on historical observations and the philosophical Discourse of their time. They wanted to set up a government that would provide security to individual liberty, provide for orderly processes, and prevent the concentration of power that might result in tyranny. That vision found realization in the shape of a republic which they defined “as a form of government in which all power resides with the people” James Madison, in Federalist No. 10, highlighted the key feature of a republic: “the delegation of government to a small number of elected representatives. He believed that this structure would mitigate the risks of factionalism and protect against the tyranny of the majority.”
Article IV, Section 4 of the Constitution clearly states, “The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government.” James Madison believed that other than a government republican in character, “no other form would be reconcileable with the genius of the people of America; with the fundamental principles of the revolution; or with that honorable determination, which animates every votary of freedom, to rest all our political experiments on the capacity of mankind for self-government.” This provision reflects the founders’ commitment to a system where the rule of law prevails, and elected representatives govern on behalf of the people. It stands as a safeguard against the pitfalls they associated with pure democracies.
One of the grievances listed in the Declaration of Independence against King George III was his attempt to “alter fundamentally our form of government.” This grievance, which they declared as an act of tyranny, underscores the importance the founders placed on maintaining a republican structure. They understood that altering this foundational principle could lead to the erosion of rights, liberties, and properties.
Careless use of the word “democracy” today threatens to obscure distinctions of vital importance. The label of democracy applied to the United States implies that its form of government is subject to change, and that change may be in the direction of the very instability and tyranny which the founders feared. It is language that can mislead citizens as to the nature of their government and the protections it provides. John Adams once said, “There is danger from all men. The only maxim of a free government ought to be to trust no man living with power to endanger the public liberty.” Notes for an Oration at Braintree, Massachusetts, 1772
If the pristine nature of the founders’ vision is to be preserved, it is necessary to retain language that accurately reflects the form and function of American government. But the people haven’t paid enough attention to their government for generations because they trusted it too much and checked it out too little, abdicating their responsibility either out of ignorance of our republican form of government and their duties therein, willful indifference, or because they bought into the lies that those in positions of authority told them to make us believe our country was a democracy, so they could seize total control of it.
In conclusion, let’s ensure that the structure of governance that the founders designed remains intact, in safeguarding the rights and liberties of the people. By avoiding the mischaracterization of the United States as a democracy, we honor the legacy of the founders and preserve the principles upon which the nation was built, ensuring that the next generation will be free.