Conflict and Polarization – Part 2, The Rule of People
Our nation was born out of a Monarchy, in which the rule of the King encompassed all authority. The Declaration of Independence started the revolution and our Constitution defined our Union. The defining concept was that we would invert the power system from the rule the elite to the rule of the people. The concept is, we are all endowed by our Creator with certain unalienable rights and that, we the people, delegate power to government in limited and clearly defined areas.
In a Monarchy, the King has the power. In a Democracy, the majority has the power. In a Republic, the rule is the rule of law, not the whim of the majority or the king. This gives rise to the Constitution, which is the catalyst for our identity, direction and law. Without it, we are adrift without definition.
At the close of the Constitutional Convention of 1787, Benjamin Franklin was queried as he left Independence Hall on the final day of deliberation. In the notes of Dr. James McHenry, one of Maryland’s delegates to the Convention, a lady asked Dr. Franklin “Well Doctor what have we got, a republic or a monarchy.” Franklin replied, “A republic . . . if you can keep it.”
The common error of the uneducated American public is that we are a democracy, and that if we can sway a majority then we can rule. But the safeguards to keep us from being a monarchy are also the safeguards to keep us from the rule of the majority. That safeguard is the Constitution. It may have been written by old white men (in reality the life span in those days was quite short, so by today’s standards they were young men). A pure democracy cannot last, for it is dependent on the popular ethos of the time, the passion and popularity of people or of movements or of emotions. It soon degenerates into mob rule, where issues need no basis of law and no context of rational process.
Today’s left leaning mobsters advocate violence toward politicians who do not follow the popular emotion of the moment. Maxine Waters threatened, “They’re not going to be able to go to a restaurant, they’re not going to be able to stop at a gas station, they’re not going to be able to shop at a department store,” Waters said. “The people are going to turn on them, they’re going to protest, they’re going to absolutely harass them.” The illusion of this ‘leader’ is that by whipping up the mob, you can get your way. But this only works in a pure democracy, but in a constitutional republic. There is not room for the rule of the mob here.
The problem is in the ignorance of the American left who do not understand the structures and safeguards of the rule of law. The Constitution provides a legal framework and a process by which the three branches of government administer their limited power. There is no forth branch, The Mob.
