What Does It Mean to Make America “More Democratic”?
Local and state laws and institutions might save us the worst excesses of those attempting a totalizing cultural hegemony.
According to the Washington Post, “democracy dies in darkness.” Despite the Framers of our government explicitly rejecting the designation “democracy,” we hear claims about it every time one party does something the other doesn’t like. It’s a “threat to democracy,” it’s “undemocratic,” it “violates the will of the people.” But more and more, these objections have morphed into a wholesale rejection of American government as currently framed: We need to modify our existing institutions to make them “more democratic.” We need “transformational” change. We need “harmful content” warnings on the founding documents themselves.
But if indeed democracy dies in darkness, certainly it’s due at least in part to the electorate’s lack of knowledge, be it an accidental neglect failing to protect liberty or the intentional obfuscation of our regime’s purpose by an elite that seeks to modify it for their own ends. And given the current war on every cultural issue, tossing aside a historical document producing unprecedented national success could well prove a grave error should it be the only means to mitigate this increasingly turbulent cultural strife.
What does it mean when we hear that America needs to be made “more democratic”? Is more better? More of what, exactly? Representatives? Referendums? Town hall meetings? Bake sales? And what are the implications of a “more democratic” America?
America is a Republic
Presumably we mean more in the sense of more decisions being made by the people. Too many decisions in the hands of the elite is undemocratic. Now surely those making this argument know the Framers explicitly stated that they were not founding a democracy. Of the most famous Federalist Papers, 10 and 51 authored by James Madison (add in 39 too), the argument is for a republic, a federal republic (more on the “federal” below). The problem with democracy is actually that it can violate the rights of minorities. Yes, you read that correctly – Madison and the Framers were attempting to protect minorities against the rule of a numerical majority.
Consensus is so contrary to human nature that it was never expected. But the closer we can approximate a version of it, a consensus of the broadest interests of the country as a whole, the better.
I stress numerical, since the minorities we are referring to could be classified in a number of ways. A simple numerical minority, of course, based merely on political affiliation; but also a religious minority (think Mayflower Compact), a racial minority, even a professional minority (say, the minority of farmers). The Framers feared what Madison called “pure democracy” because pure democracy has a clear outcome: A majority, even if only a bare 51%, may oppress a rather large minority, the other 49%. The rights of any group equaling less than a bare majority required for legislative decisions to be made, however defined, would be threatened. Or worse: mobocracy, as Lincoln described. Mob justice, unevenly and most often violently applied. Hence a republic, as a mixture of institutions that do not rely simply on majority rule, is the means to protect the rights of all.
We are a republic because checks and balances are a channeling of the passions, the all-too-human tendency to harm others, for profit, for reputation and honor, for the still not fully understood evil that lurks in the heart of Cain. For the Framers, and for anyone who views the history of self-government from ancient Rome to Renaissance Venice, it was clear human nature presented obstacles to simple majority rule, rule of the demos, the people. On the other hand, the ambitious few may also or even often tyrannize under the guise of a populist appeal. There are particularly violent passions only politics can bring out.
As Madison describes in Federalist 39, good government therefore needs representatives of the people given the obvious problems of direct democracy and must utilize rotating offices (includes standards of good behavior. Read: impeachment) to keep representatives honest. Or at least allow citizens to exercise damage control. Allow the people to select the best candidates, those who could soberly and prudently guide the political community. If they turned out to be scoundrels, checks from other branches and regular elections would stifle the most destructive outcomes of vice.
The Senate is, by design, a check on the House. Hence 6-year terms and fewer members versus 2-year terms and more numerous members, to say nothing of each chambers’ differing parameters for debate and procedure. Pointing out this simple fact is not meant to condescend, my dear reader! This design is apparently confusing to some members who today belong to these very bodies and seek to erase structural differences.
Taxation implies representation. Cynically allowing lobbying interests to rule the day will only foster more narrowly tailored, and unhelpful, federal legislation and regulation.
Among those who saw matters more clearly, Anti-Federalists such as Brutus called for an even more numerous House of Representatives, to guard against predations of the federal government on the states and to better represent what he and others called the different “orders of society” – America is mercantile and commercial and industrial and agricultural and literary and scientific, to name a few. Consensus is so contrary to human nature that it was never expected. But the closer we can approximate a version of it, a consensus of the broadest interests of the country as a whole, the better. This is what has been traditionally meant by a mandate – voters in relatively large percentages supporting the position of one party (and their candidates) over another. The candidates themselves knowing they need such a consensus to win a national election thus appeal to the broadest issues (hence, “It’s the economy, stupid”).
But where do these large percentages come from? How does one achieve a more or less broad consensus? From the states.
Calls for more democracy ignore precisely this problem of consensus. Or more to their immediate objection: Calls for more democracy are made by those upset that a minority, the losing party in the election, still hold sway over legislation, the judiciary, local and state governments, and the numerous other institutions that are involved in American governance. It’s not a one-pony show.
A Federal Republic of States
Handing the keys to America to a small narrowly-elected elite, however defined, breaches numerous constitutional provisions and the intentions behind them. Attempts to erase institutional differences, restrict state and local control over issues pertinent and better managed by them, and the continued attempts to consolidate all matters in the hands of the federal government ignores the U.S. Constitution and the political culture it has helped to build and support. Neither Republicans, nor especially Democrats, seem to bother justifying broad, sweeping legislation sent from Washington down into small communities thousands of miles away. Nor do we Americans bother asking too many questions, despite manifest distrust of the feds. Taxation implies representation. Cynically allowing lobbying interests to rule the day will only foster more narrowly tailored, and unhelpful, federal legislation and regulation. Paid for by us, for them.
What does this mean for “our democracy,” for the legitimate basis of our government which is the people? Contrary to “voter suppression” rhetoric, more Americans voted last year that ever before, not just in raw numbers but as a proportion of the population. And yes, this includes especially minority voters, who were very active in minority-heavy Southern states such as Georgia. And let’s not even get started on comparing the actual voting laws in the various states. For if we did, it would become readily apparent that states such as Texas and Georgia, those evil bastions of Jim Crow 2.0 racism, in fact have voting laws more permissive and more liberal (in the original sense of securing the people’s liberty) than those of Joe Biden’s Delaware, New York, New Jersey, and many other blue states.
What matters just as much as how many folks vote is when and where they vote. Where do we find “more democracy,” more citizen participation? Or rather, where is participation limited? Where could one consider voter turnout an issue? Not national elections (Presidential are highest, midterms next) but local and state turnout.
A federal republic was the Framers’ rejection of the notion of a majority taking all and then legislating for all, country-wide, from the top down.
America, properly defined, is a small-r republican government. To the extent that we do believe elites have too much control over the processes and procedures of American life, the remedy is more federal republic, i.e. federalism, not a consolidated, general government. A federal republic was part of the Framers’ solution to treat the failure which direct, plebiscitary democracies always historically suffered and died from: protecting the rights of all against simple legislative majorities, majorities that devolve into tyranny. To this end, the Framers looked to the states.
In fact, institutions at the federal level are far less democratic than those among state and local institutions. Attempts for more federal control ignore this. The federal judiciary being a quasi-aristocracy that, as even Hamilton admitted in Federalist 78, relied not on checks and balances but on the character of the judges, on moral and intellectual qualities any good government needs (but which is not provided by our Constitution, as our present cultural decline clearly attests). This is also to say nothing of the vast fourth “branch” of government, the unelected federal bureaucracy, whose rule-making power and regulations are ever-expanding.
Jefferson expressed hope that the people would elect those of good character, those who furnish America with a natural aristocracy, constitutionally limited of course, that was truly “rule of the best” and would replace the pseudo-aristoi (as he called them) ruling Europe at the time. Merit – being good at the job, caring about your fellow citizens, and representing the community’s interests, just to be clear about what political merit actually is – replaces mere birth, mere social class, true inherited privilege.
But Jefferson knew that selecting the best meant the people need to know and trust their representatives. We still hear this sentiment echoed today when people speak of “local communities,” “community involvement,” “grassroots movements,” and so on. A federal republic was the Framers’ rejection of the notion of a majority taking all and then legislating for all, country-wide, from the top down. Hamilton himself, contra Jefferson, wanted more centralized power. But the Anti-Federalists won the day, at least in the original constitutional design being modified based on their objections.
Certain powers are explicitly reserved to the states in the Anti-Federalists’ crown jewel, the Bill of Rights, a clearly articulated and intentional check on the federal government. This should not be underestimated. COVID protocols, immigration, policing, education, taxation, fiscal policy among many others, provide space for states both policy- and culture-wise. While “for the general welfare” and “necessary and proper” hand the federal government expansive powers, without powers reserved to the states in the 10th Amendment, matters would have been much worse.
America’s Strange Selection of its Federal Government
The states even maintained selection of the president via the Electoral College, another federal feature of the republic. This should be obvious. Apparently it is not given the Electoral College is the most attacked feature of the U.S. Constitution. And in a media landscape where our college-educated elite (and their teachers) profess ignorance or openly reject without any discussion of the merits of this process, it’s worth making matters clear.
The president is to be selected by as many of the states as possible. This means as many citizens have their candidate selected as the president, across the geography of the largest representative government the world has known. Arguments for the elimination of the Electoral College make two shocking, not-at-all predictable claims: 1) That it’s racist. 2) That it’s undemocratic. See how tempting these claims are! They fit on a bumper sticker.
First, use of an institutional tool by some one person or group (Madison’s “factions”) does not render the tool inherently evil, or unusable, by those who are trying to combat that group. Both parties have very recently and very liberally helped themselves to the Senate filibuster (including judicial nominations). That’s the minority in action, checking the (often rather slim) majority.
The very notion of checks and balances is that there are a host of such institutional tools available via the inner workings of each of the three branches, along with fifty other governments, the states, to protect against any one of them, or anyone in them, from violating rights. No institution is perfectly immune from abuse. But we don’t get rid of Stop signs because some so-and-so runs one from time to time.
A plebiscite for the U.S. President (the so-called “popular vote” never mentioned in the ol’ Constitution) would render all but a handful of populated states entirely irrelevant.
Second, the selection of the president by the states is intended to have the broadest geographic appeal. Larger numbers all from the same “order” of society is not “more democratic” (all the coders in San Francisco, say). It’s far less so. The geographical facts of the United States have vast implications. From fishing in Maine, ranching in Texas, tech in California, commercial banking on Wall Street, where one lives fosters the Anti-Federalists’ observation that America had (and would continue to have) distinct orders of society. To select the president via Electoral College is for the largest number of distinct orders to “have a voice” in that selection. Rural folks in Texas; urbanities in Manhattan.
Shutting out the entire Midwest or the entire South is to shut out the president’s need to achieve a broad consensus. Or to be specific: Since the Founders knew well that populations tend to congregate into large cities, the Electoral College protects the franchise of rural voters. Despite the always present urban-rural divide, consensus on the direction of the country as a whole would be aimed for.
Perhaps such a consensus sounds naïve; but red states, and conservatives generally, might do well to remind so-called progressives that their moral posturing promises them nothing. Factional differences not only in politics, but rooted in human nature, were the ground upon which the Founders consciously framed our government. Different folks want to live in different ways. Liberty is thus required. It is this the U.S. Constitution aims to protect.
Certainly this has not worked perfectly. Presidents (in both parties) more and more talk moderate on the national stage, but as radicals to their party. Often it’s unclear which policies they will in fact pursue. This is to say nothing of the modern president’s powers, which would be an utter shock to the Anti-Federalists who vehemently hoped to control against precisely our current, ever-expansive national government. But our contemporary government is a far cry from the wholesale neglect of the vast majority of states which would occur should we simply make the selection of the president “more democratic.” A plebiscite for the U.S. President (the so-called “popular vote” never mentioned in the ol’ Constitution) would render all but a handful of populated states entirely irrelevant.
And much of the romanticized praises of voting procedures in countries such as Canada and Israel (where stable government and consensus is even harder to come by and one never knows when an election might be called) in reality introduces some very significant, controversy-fueling problems. Can we imagine if Americans didn’t know when the next presidential election would be? If the president could call an election when he or she wanted to? (Yes, this is Canada.) Political scientists’ obsession with every form of government except our own has not borne the fruit of an improved constitutional design.
Toward A Truly Representative Future
If we granted that “more democratic” is a goal worth pursuing, the means to achieving it, as promoted by its loudest proponents, is nonetheless misguided. Democracy, let’s call it here the direct will of the people, is meant to occur and was part of our constitutional design – at the level of state and local governments. Issues are handled by those that understand them best: local voters and their closer-to-home institutions. Anti-Federalists promoted this idea; Jefferson as well. So while the Biden administration continues its experiments with progressivism, McAllen, Texas (on the newly wide-open southwest border) just elected their first Republican mayor, ever. Southlake, Texas, a wealthy suburb in blue Dallas, just voted out a Critical Race Theory-promoting mayor, two council members, and two school board members by margins all hovering around 70-30. Only about 4500 votes separated the Republican and Democratic candidates in 2020, so while Southlake (located in Texas’ 24th Congressional district) has been Republican since 2005, it’s not 70% Republican. Voters spanning both parties expressed their will through local institutions on two of the most prominent cultural issues today: immigration and education.
In both cases, and clearly we could add others, top-down public policies dictated by current fashion trends did not go over so well with the locals. They failed; they failed because the reality on the ground, not just in one state but in one section of one state, is radically different than the confines of the Beltway.
Solutions, to the degree they exist, are never reducible to a slogan. “More democracy” or “We need to have more voices heard” is an au courant 21st century sentiment. But this language is vague, its intended effect only to elicit our emotional attraction to equality. So often actual policy outcomes are very different, sometimes even diabolically harmful and politically self-serving – policies positively oligarchic in their outcomes.
A truly more representative solution to elite democracy, an oligarchy of the wealthy, unbenevolent few which America has clearly become, would mean a devolution away from the current momentum of top-down policy making in the direction of (what do we call it now?) Post-New Federalism. States pushed back against the federal government in the 1970s, giving rise to Nixon’s New Federalism that sought to reign in Big Gov. But to no long-term avail. Both parties in the United States grant far too much power to themselves, to Washington. And since the buzzword of today is “culture” as in “the culture wars” we are reminded of another insight offered at the Founding: Anti-Federalist writers predicted the dangers and inevitable failure of attempts at a unified morality, enforced via federal laws and a Supreme Court. Institutional frameworks matter for culture too. Dictating the lives of what has become (and what was already then) a geographically and demographically diverse country has failed.
Today, local and state laws and institutions might save us the worst excesses of those attempting a totalizing cultural hegemony. As COVID has shown, Americans are more than happy to play real life Oregon Trail, voting with their feet to move to states with policies that serve their family, their business, and their lives. Maybe we should read, reconsider, and heed some of the Framers’ advice. Their constitutional design served a purpose and some version of it still has a place to help America through its current and future ills.