Free Republic

By the time Election Day arrives, millions of Americans will have contributed to a presidential candidate this year. Hundreds of political organizations -- from the Sierra Club to the NRA, from MoveOn.org to the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth -- will have taken an active part in the campaign, supported by Americans from every part of the political spectrum. All of this is democracy in action, and it is so commonplace that we take it for granted. Yet this kind of mass citizen involvement in the political process is a relatively recent phenomenon, spanning less than a half-century of our...