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Certainly not the first time this has been been posted, but . . .

Not long ago on FR there was great criticism made by some against others who made the distinction between a democracy and a republic.

Both interesting and important are the distinctions made between a democracy and a republic by the United States War Department (now called the Department of Defense) in 1928, in Training Manual No. 2000-25. This manual was “Prepared under the direction of the Chief of Staff” for military officers on the subject of citizenship. We reproduce the pertinent portion of Training Manual 2000-25 here.

A DEMOCRACY:
: A government of the masses.
: Authority 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 upon deliberation or governed by passion, prejudice, and impulse, without restraint or regard to consequences.
: Results in demagogism, license, agitation, discontent, anarchy.

A REPUBLIC:
: Authority is derived through the election by the people of public officials best fitted to represent them.
: Attitude toward [governance] is respect for laws and individual rights, and a sensible economic procedure.
: Attitude toward law is the administration of justice in accord with fixed principles and established evidence, with a strict regard to consequences.
: A greater number of citizens and extent of territory may be brought within its compass.
: Avoids the dangerous extreme of either tyranny or mobocracy.
: Results in statesmanship, liberty, reason, justice, contentment, and progress.

Helping us to more clearly understand the results of democracy, Professor Alexander Tytler penned the following words in America over 230 years ago, when the American colonies where still under the British Crown.

A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the voters discover that they can vote themselves largesse from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates promising the most benefits from the public treasury, with the result that a democracy always collapses over loose fiscal policy, always followed by a dictatorship.

The average age of the world’s greatest civilizations has been two hundred years. These nations have progressed through this sequence: From bondage to spiritual faith; from spiritual faith to great courage; from courage to liberty; from liberty to abundance; from abundance to complacency; from complacency to apathy; from apathy to dependence; from dependence back again to bondage.