Posted on 02/25/2005 2:38:35 PM PST by Tailgunner Joe
Art. 4 Sec. 4 Par. 1
Democracy: Operates by direct majority vote of the people. When an issue is to be decided, the entire population votes on it; the majority wins and rules. A democracy is rule by majority feeling (what the Founding Fathers described as “mobocracy”). Example: in a democracy, if a majority of the people decides that murder is no longer a crime, murder will no longer be a crime.
Republic: Where the general population elects representatives who then pass laws to govern the nation … a republic is rule by law. Our republic is a form of government where power is separated, [our Founding Fathers knew that people are basically weak, sinful and corruptible, (Jeremiah 17:9)], pitting men against each other, making it difficult to pass laws and make changes.
John Witherspoon, signer - “Pure democracy cannot subsist long nor be carried far into the departments of state – it is very subject to caprice and the madness of popular rage.”
Zephaniah Swift, author of America’s first legal text - “It may generally be remarked that the more a government resembles a pure democracy the more they abound with disorder and confusion.”
Benjamin Rush, signer - “ a simple democracy … is one of the greatest of evils.”
John Quincy Adams - “The experience of all former ages had shown that of all human governments, democracy was the most unstable, fluctuating and short-lived.”
Noah Webster - “In democracy … there are commonly tumults and disorders … Therefore a pure democracy is generally a very bad government. It is often the most tyrannical government on earth.”
James Madison - “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.”
John Adams - “Remember, democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts, and murders itself. There never was a democracy yet that did not commit suicide.”
Fisher Ames, author of the House language for the First Amendment - “A democracy is a volcano which conceals the fiery materials of its own destruction. These will produce an eruption and carry desolation in their way. The known propensity of a democracy is to licentiousness which the ambitious call, and the ignorant believe to be liberty !! NOTE … look at today’s sexual freedoms.
Gouverneur Morris, signer and penman of the Constitution - “We have seen the tumult of democracy terminate … as [it has] everywhere terminated, in despotism … Democracy! savage and wild. Thou who wouldst bring down the virtuous and wise to the level of folly and guilt.”
Samuel Adams – “… it does not require a majority to prevail, but rather an irate tireless minority keen to set brush fires in people’s minds …”
What is the source of law for the American republic? According to Founder Noah Webster: “Our citizens should early understand that the genuine source of correct republican principles is the Bible, particularly the New Testament, or the Christian religion.”
In our republic, murder will always be a crime, for it is always a crime according to the Word of God. In the American republic, principles that do not change and which are certain and universal in their operation upon all the members of the community of man were the principles of Biblical natural law … the basis of our Declaration, Constitution and legal system.
Professor Montesquieu, a French professor, author and legal philosopher who wrote the highly influential book, The Spirit Of The Laws, (which was read and studied intently in America) was the source of our division of power in our government. Baron Charles Montesquieu was the second most frequently quoted source, next to the Holy Bible, out of all the references used by our Founding Fathers.He was the source of our division of power in government; (i.e.. legislative, administrative, judicial) claiming Isaiah 33:22 as the source; the Lord is our King, the Lord is our Judge and the Lord is our Lawgiver. Montesquieu identified the rule of law as “natural law” which is based on the Holy Bible. He identified the rule of law as “principles that do not change”. Natural Law is the law God gave His people through the Bible and the Ten Commandments.
In 1748, Montesquieu wrote; “Nor is there liberty if the power of judging is not separated from legislative power and from executive power. If it [the power of judging] were joined to legislative power, the power over life and liberty of the citizens would be arbitrary, for the judge would be the legislature if it were joined to the executive power, the judge could have the force of an oppressor. All would be lost if the same … body of principal men … exercised these three powers.
Our Founding Fathers gave us an Electoral College because we are a Republic … not a democracy. The Electoral College follows the principle of elected representation. It was designed to further promote the ideals of balance, and of separation of powers. It gives the smaller States true representation in a fair and just manner by allowing their voices (as well as rural America) to be heard. It prevents the control of the Nation by highly populated urban centers, thus reducing the risk of elections being bought or won by fraud where power could be consolidated.
Noah Webster - “When you become entitled to exercise the right of voting for public officers, let it be impressed on your mind that God commands you to choose for rulers, just men who will rule in the fear of God. The preservation of a Republican government depends on the faithful discharge of this duty; if the citizens neglect their duty and place unprincipled men in office the government will soon be corrupted; laws will be made, not for the public good, so much as for selfish or local purposes; corrupt or incompetent men will be appointed to execute the laws; the public revenues will be squandered on unworthy men; and the rights of the citizens will be violated or disregarded. If a Republican government fails to secure public prosperity and happiness, it must be because the citizens neglect their divine commands and elect bad men to make and administer laws.”
Jedediah Moore, Founding educator -“To the kindly influence of Christianity we owe that degree of civil freedom, and political and social happiness which mankind now enjoys. In proportion as the genuine effects of Christianity are diminished in any nation … in the same proportion will the people of that nation recede from the blessings of genuine freedom …All efforts to destroy the foundations of our Holy religion, ultimately tend to the subversion also of our political freedom and happiness. Whenever the pillars of Christianity shall be overthrown our present Republican forms of government, and all the blessings which flow from them, must fall with them.”
George Mason, father of Bill of Rights - “We are now to rank among the nations of the world; but whether our independence shall prove a blessing or a curse must depend upon our own wisdom or folly, virtue or wickedness …Justice and virtue are the vital principles of a republican government.”
1. Divine – coming from God’s natural laws and His ten commandments.
2. Human – Matters that are not commanded or forbidden by God’s natural law.
U.S. Supreme Court, 1892 – “Our laws and our institutions must necessarily be based upon the teachings of the Redeemer of Mankind. It is impossible that it should be otherwise; and in this sense and to this extent, our civilization and our institutions are emphatically Christian.”
Benjamin Franklin – “We have been assured, Sir, in the Sacred Writings, that ‘except the Lord build the house, they labor in vain that build it.’ I firmly believe this; and I also believe that without His concurring aid we shall succeed in this political building no better than the builders of Babel.”
James Madison, Father of the U.S. Constitution - “We have staked the whole future of American civilization, not upon the power of government, far from it. We have staked the future of all our political institutions upon the capacity of mankind for self-government; upon the capacity of each and all of us to govern ourselves, to control ourselves, to sustain ourselves according to The Ten Commandments of God.”
George Washington, father of our country – “It is impossible to rightly govern the world without God and the Bible.”
On the fourth of July 1787, the entire convention was assembled in the Reformed Calvinistic Church, assembled there by the direction of Edmond Randolph of Virginia. The sermon and prayer was conducted by Rev. William Rogers – a portion of his prayer; “We fervently recommend to the Fatherly notice … our Federal Convention … Favor them, from day to day, with Thy inspiring presence; be their wisdom and strength; enable them to devise such measures as may prove happy instruments in healing all divisions and prove the good of the whole; … that the United States of America may form one example of a free and virtuous government…
May we … continue, under the influence of Republican virtue, to partake of all the blessings of cultivated and Christian society.”
John Witherspoon, signer, member of the Continental Congress, served on over 100 committees, a teacher who influenced students who included; a President -James Madison, a Vice President, three Supreme Court Justices, 10 Cabinet members, 12 Governors, 21 Senators, 39 Representatives as well as numerous delegates to the Constitutional Convention and state conventions. He served as President of Princeton University. His quotes;
1.“Cursed be all that learning that is contrary to the cross of Christ.”
2.“Whoever is an avowed enemy of God; I scruple not [do not hesitate] to call him an enemy of his country.”
3. John Adams at Witherspoon’s death said: “A true son of liberty. So he was. But first, he was a son of the Cross.”
John Hancock, signer –“The very existence of the Republic … depends much upon the public institutions of religion.”
Alexis deTocqueville, the Principle of Sovereignty of the People in America - “ It dominates the whole of American society. The Americans applied this principle even before their Revolution. Its growth was a result of the Revolution … in America the sovereignty of the people is neither hidden nor sterile as with most other nations; mores recognize it, and the laws proclaim it; it spreads with freedom and attains unimpeded its ultimate consequences.”
Chairman’s comment; Our Founding Fathers chose a Republic over a Democracy for many reasons; primarily because they remembered the most infamous “democratic” vote in all history. [i.e.] The lesson of a bureaucrat some 2000 years ago who turned to a crowd and asked which prisoner should be released – the crowd yelled - “give us Barabbas”. The ‘will of the people’ spoke that day. When the bureaucrat asked the people what should be done with this innocent, this Jesus, the crowd responded with a loud – CRUCIFY HIM.
Jesus was crucified by a majority vote exercising pure democracy which was the emotional, changing rule of the mob or as we call it today mobocracy. This is the reason our Founding Fathers wanted a Republic, a government based on the rule of law which could not be changed by the whims of the people.
Samuel Huntington, signer and Governor of Connecticut - “While the great body of freeholders are acquainted with the duties which they owe to their God, to themselves, and to men, they will remain free. But if ignorance and depravity should prevail they will inevitably lead to slavery and ruin.” Republic vs. Democracy
United States Constitution
“The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican form of Government.” [Not a democracy.]
Pledge of Allegiance – “I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the Republic for which it stands …”
As Benjamin Franklin was leaving the building where, after four months of hard work, the Constitution had been completed and signed, a lady asked him what kind of government the convention had created. A very old, very tired, and very wise Benjamin Franklin replied; “A Republic, ma’am if you can keep it.” (Webster’s dictionary definition: a government in which supreme power resides in a body of citizens entitled to vote and is exercised by elected officers and representatives responsible to them and governing according to law.) WARNINGS
End of Warnings
GOD’S LAWAll our laws are arranged into two different classes.
AT THE CONVENTION
Great article joe.
Interesting & provocative. One pines for the neoplatonist ideals atimes. Bump for further review...
Bookmark!
Thanks for posting this.
http://www.wordiq.com/definition/United_States_Republican_Party
In the 1850s, following the disintegration of the Whig Party, the Southern wing of the Democratic Party became increasingly associated with the expansion of slavery, in opposition to the newly revamped United States Republican Party.
The New Democrat movement of the 1980s and 1990s, however, has moved the Democratic agenda in favor of a more centrist approach. This is a primary complaint of many members of the Green Party, leading some Greens, such as David Cobb, to declare, "The Democratic Party is where progressive politics go to die."
http://www.wordiq.com/definition/United_States_Democratic_Party
I urge everyone to read about the founding, the history, and the definition of both parties.
The democratic process is an integral part of the republic. To be precise the US is a "democratically elected representative republic". Democracy has become a catch all term to refer to any form of government having a direct participation of the people in the election of their leaders.
Save for later reading.
Give em hell Joe...
Democratic republic is redundant and an oxy-moron..
great job joe!
Bookmarked
read later
Not so sure about that, not every republic is democratic, and not every democracy is a republic.
The 2 are not interchangable.
I remember one time a long winded fellow arguing with everyone that we were a "constitutional democratic republic".
A Banana republic is a democracy not a republic at all...
The American Republic is unique among governments. and among republics as well.. This republic has rights given by god and the government has nothing to do with them.. That is our government can not legally take them away (legally) or even to modify them.. Its the difference between Rights and Privileges.. All other governments grant privileges to their people.. We have some rights with additional privileges..
Canada and no URPean governments havn't any rights at all.. merely privileges.. What their governments give it can take away.. Not so here.. according to our Constitution.. Thats why the assault on God in America.. An attack on the guarantor of those rights and its attack on those rights.. Cause if God didn't grant those rights, who did..
Americans have not seen this yet, generally, but the LAWYERS have..
Not really.
To be "democratically elected" means that the people "en masse" directly decide what the rules of each election will be, as well as who is to be elected, and when. Once you do that you wind up with chaos - mob rule.
No one elected under these circumstances can truly be "representative" of the people since the people (the mob) can reelect another "representative" at their whim.
That's certainly what the Founders had in mind when they made this a Republic - not a Democracy.
Not necessarily, the people do nominate and elect their representatives "en masse", but they do so under existing election laws and predetermined proceedure enacted by their elected representatives. Pure democracy would be a referendum on every single issue. If you take the "democratically elected" out of the equation, you would have a representative rebublic installed by only a certain portion of the population, say land owners for example. Our present sytem has aspects of both pure Republicanism and pure Democracy.
Great article only question itraises is HOW to get it recieved and adhered to by a majority of our "mere politicians" whom I hear many graduate with degrees in
governemnt and reading the US Constitution is not even a
requirement.why bother with such a "living document" anyway.
They are taught ,however ,that the Court is final arbitor and that Constitution says whatever they say it says.
If you read early communications between Adams Jefferson, Madison there were grave concerns concerning the judiciary finally concluding idealy that they (judges) would use restraint. Guess you can't win em all.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.