Borrowed from a Rockwell post:
Democracy, the Worst Form of
Government Ever Tried
"The best argument against
democracy is a five-minute conversation with the average voter."
~ Winston Churchill
"Democracy is the worst form of
government except for all those others that have been tried."
~ Winston Churchill
Executive Summary: As the preceding quotes suggest, Winston Churchill
was deeply ambivalent about democracy. On the one hand, he was not about to
regurgitate the civics class twaddle we all ingested about Democracy with a
capital D. On the other hand, he could see no better alternative. Alas,
Churchill's political education was incomplete. The great statesman, for all
his far-ranging political knowledge, was wrong. Democracy is not "the
worst form of government except for all those others that have been
tried." Democracy is the worst form of government ever tried, period.
Democracy ranks among the gravest threats to individual rights and individual
liberty in human history. Democracy is, in certain respects, even worse than
absolute monarchy. Ignorant and arrogant modern day "champions of
democracy" need to get a clue. Assuming they are sincere when they sound
off about valuing the sovereign individual above the omnipotent state, then the
people they most need to educate about democracy are not the leaders of the PRC
in Beijing, but themselves.
Modern Ignorance, Modern Arrogance
Modern day "champions of democracy" consider democracy, or liberal
democracy, (or is it Liberal Democracy?) their secular religion, and "free
and fair elections" their holiest of sacraments. Let's hear what some of
them have to say about their religious faith.
According to the right wing, global interventionist Freedom House, which
purports to employ "rigorous analytic standards" in its annual
reports on the state of freedom in the world:
"Democracies... are political systems whose leaders are elected in
competitive multi-party and multi-candidate processes in which opposition
parties have a legitimate chance of attaining power or participating in power.
Freedom House is a clear voice for democracy and freedom around the world.
Founded... by... Americans concerned with the mounting threats to peace and
democracy, Freedom House has been a vigorous proponent of democratic values and
a steadfast opponent of dictatorships of the far left and the far right...
Freedom House is a leading advocate of the world's young democracies, which are
coping with the debilitating legacy of statism, dictatorship, and political
repression. It... promote[s] human rights, democracy, free market economics,
the rule of law, independent media, and U.S.
engagement in international affairs."
According to the federal Leviathan's compulsory, involuntary, decidedly
unfree, taxpayer-funded National Endowment for Democracy, whose motto is
"Supporting freedom around the world":
"The Endowment is guided by the belief that freedom is a universal
human aspiration that can be realized through the development of democratic
institutions, procedures, and values... the NED makes hundreds of grants each
year to support prodemocracy groups in Africa, Asia,
Central and Eastern Europe, Eurasia,
Latin America, and the Middle East."
According to exiled mainland Chinese champion of democracy Wang Dan, of
Tienanmen notoriety:
"We make no attempt to conceal the aim of the current student movement,
which is to exert pressure on the government to promote the progress of
democracy. People's yearning for democracy, science, human rights, freedom, reason,
and equality, which lack a fundamental basis in China,
have once again been aroused."
According to exiled mainland Chinese champion of democracy Wei Jingsheng,
author of "The Fifth Modernization":
"People need prosperity... to pursue their first goal of happiness,
namely freedom. Democracy means the maximum attainable freedom so far known by
human beings. It is quite obvious that democracy has become the goal in
contemporary human struggles."
What can one say in response to these "champions of democracy,"
except that they are wrong, wrong, wrong? Freedom House is wrong. The National
Endowment for Democracy is wrong. Wang Dan is wrong. Wei Jingsheng is wrong.
Freedom House for example, purports to employ "rigorous analytical
standards" in its self-congratulatory annual ritual of passing judgment on
the nations of the world.
One can only wonder what "rigorous analytical standards" Freedom
House employed when it classified Bush II's post-911 "Secure
Homeland" as "Free" and awarded it a rating of 1 for Political
Rights and 1 for Civil Liberties; while awarding mainland China, which takes
from "Unfree" Chinese less than a third of what the US federal
government takes from "Free" Americans in taxes, a rating of 7 for
Political Rights and 6 for Civil Liberties.
One can only wonder what "rigorous analytical standards" Freedom
House employed when it classified Taiwan, with its unelected US puppet
squatting in the ROC Presidential Palace since May 20, 2004, as
"Free" and awarded it a rating of 2 for Political Rights and 1 for
Civil Liberties; while classifying transparent, uncorrupt Singapore as
"Partly Free" and awarding it a rating of 5 for Political Rights and
4 for Civil Liberties.
The "rigorous analytical standards" Freedom House employed were
apparently double standards.
It's bad enough that flagrantly biased judgment calls such as these cast
doubt on Freedom House's integrity. What's worse is they cast doubt on Freedom
House's grasp of political science, of cause and effect, of the catastrophic
consequences of imposing defective political systems such as democracy upon
hapless human populations.
Freedom House, the National Endowment for Democracy, Wang Dan, and Wei
Jingsheng are united in their ignorant conflation of liberal democracy with
political liberty, and their arrogant demand that China
adopt their failed and discredited system of government.
Free market economist Thomas Sowell had some choice words for this kind of
facile thinking: "To include freedom in the... definition of democracy is
to define a process not by its actual characteristics... but by its hoped for
results."
Ancient Wisdom, Ancient Humility
Modern champions of democracy, who fancy themselves courageous defenders of
the American political ideal, have either totally forgotten or never learned
what America's Founding Fathers knew two centuries ago – – democracy is the
worst form of government ever tried.
Don't believe me? Consider the following quotes:
"Democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch. Liberty
is a well-armed lamb contesting the vote!"
~ Benjamin Franklin, leader of the
American Revolution
"We are a Republican Government. Real liberty is never found in
despotism or in the extremes of Democracy... It has been observed that a pure
democracy if it were practicable would be the most perfect government.
Experience has proved that no position is more false than this. The ancient
democracies in which the people themselves deliberated never possessed one good
feature of government. Their very character was tyranny; their figure
deformity."
~ Alexander Hamilton, Secretary of
the Treasury to George Washington, author of the Federalist Papers
"Democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts, and murders
itself. There never was a democracy yet that did not commit suicide."
~ John Adams, 2nd President of the United
States
"A democracy is nothing more than mob rule, where fifty-one percent of
the people may take away the rights of the other forty-nine."
~ Thomas Jefferson, 3rd President of
the United States
"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 death.
~ James Madison, 4th President of
the United States,
Father of the Constitution
"The experience of all former ages had shown that of all human
governments, democracy was the most unstable, fluctuating and
short-lived."
~ John Quincy Adams, 6th President
of the United States
"Between a balanced republic and a democracy, the difference is like
that between order and chaos."
~ John Marshall, Chief Justice of
the Supreme Court, 1801-1835
Surprised? You shouldn't be, not if you know your political history.
America's
Founding Fathers were visionary political philosophers confronted with the most
daunting task imaginable. Their task was not merely to found a new nation, but
to invent a new system of government. They diligently researched history to
learn what to do. History rewarded them. It taught them not only what to do,
but even more importantly, what not to do. The most important thing they
learned not to do, was to adopt democracy, the worst form of government ever
tried.
Given the Founding Fathers' fully warranted fear and loathing of democracy,
we should not be surprised that the Constitution of the United
States does not contain a single solitary
reference to the word "democracy," but instead stipulates that
"The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union
a republican form of government."
The distinction between a democracy and a republic is hardly trivial. That
the distinction between a democracy and a republic could inspire the Founding
Fathers to such passions speaks volumes. The Founding Fathers considered the
distinction between a democracy and a republic to be the distinction between
freedom and slavery, between civilization and barbarism, between prosperity and
poverty.
Not so Ancient Wisdom, Not so Ancient Humility
The following are excerpts from a 156 page citizenship manual issued by the
US War Department, November 30,1928,
explaining the difference between a democracy and a republic.
The Franklin Delano Roosevelt White House later ordered all copies of this
manual withdrawn from the Government Printing Office and all US Army posts and
destroyed without explanation:
Prepared under the direction of the Chief of Staff.
CITIZENSHIP
This manual supersedes Manual of Citizenship Training The use of the
publication
The
Constitution of the United States, by Harry Atwood, is by permission
and courtesy of the author.
CITIZENSHIP 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 is be based upon
deliberation or governed by passion, prejudice, and impulse, without restraint
or regard to consequences. Results in demogogism, license, agitation,
discontent, anarchy.
CITIZENSHIP Republic:
Authority is derived through the election by the people of public officials
best fitted to represent them. 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. Is the "standard form" of government
throughout the world. A republic is a form of government under a constitution
which provides for the election of
(1) an executive and (2) a legislative body, who working together in a
representative capacity, have all the power of appointment, all power of
legislation, all power to raise revenue and appropriate expenditures, and are required
to create (3) a judiciary to pass upon the justice and legality of their
government acts and to recognize (4) certain inherent individual rights.
Take away any one or more of those four elements and you are drifting into
autocracy. Add one or more to those four elements and you are drifting into
democracy.
Autocracy declares the divine right of kings; its authority can not be
questioned; its powers are arbitrarily or unjustly administered. Democracy is
the direct rule of the people and has been repeatedly tried without success.
Our Constitutional fathers, familiar with the strength and weakness of both
autocracy and democracy, with fixed principles definitely in mind, defined a
representative republican form of government. They made a very marked distinction
between a republic and a democracy and said repeatedly and emphatically that
they had founded a republic.
By order of the Secretary of War: C.P. Summerall, Major General, Chief of
Staff. Official: Lutz Wahl, Major General, The Adjutant General.
That was 1928. By 1952 however, the new Army Field Manual read:
"Meaning of democracy. Because the United
States is a democracy, the majority of the
people decide how our government will be organized and run – and that includes
the Army, Navy, and Air Force. The people do this by electing representatives,
and these men and women then carry out the wishes of the people.
~ The Soldiers Guide, Department of
the Army Field Manual, issued June 1952
As we can see, after being subjected to Franklin Delano Roosevelt's
fascistic New Deal, the once free American people forgot their constitutional
republican roots, and allowed themselves to be led down the populist democratic
path toward slavery.
Heaven Protect China
from Democracy
That modern day "champions of democracy" are so woefully ignorant
about something that America's
Founding Fathers knew backwards and forwards, makes one want to weep with
despair. It wasn't supposed to be this way. Mankind was supposed to become more
sophisticated with the passage of time, not more simple-minded. Mankind was
supposed to profit from precious wisdom acquired at immense cost in human
lives, not blank it from memory within a few short generations.
That modern Chinese intellectuals would wind up reflexively parroting
pro-democracy slogans is deeply discouraging, but is at least understandable.
Democracy after all, is a western innovation. Chinese intellectuals eager to be
perceived as progressive and forward thinking can be forgiven for conflating
western progress in general with western democracy in particular.
But what excuse do American intellectuals have? The wisdom of America's
Founding Fathers is not foreign history. The wisdom of America's
Founding Fathers is not Chinese history. The wisdom of America's
Founding Fathers is the vital core of America's
proud history.
Demands from Chinese citizens on the mainland for the PRC government to
adhere to the Rule of Law are entirely legitimate. In fact, they are absolutely
essential. Idealistic PRC leaders at the central government level are pressing
for such reforms themselves.
Demands from Chinese citizens on Taiwan
for the PRC government to adhere to the Rule of Law are also entirely
legitimate. Ironically, the current ROC government on Taiwan
is far less committed to the Rule of Law than the current PRC government on the
Chinese mainland.
Demands from Chinese
citizens on Taiwan
for the PRC government to adopt democracy before they are willing to see the
two sides reunited however, are myopic folly, especially coming from Pan Blue
political leaders.
Demands from foreign governments for the PRC government to adopt democracy
are the most despicable of all. Demands from foreign governments that China
be saddled with the worst form of government ever tried, can rightly be construed
as overtly hostile gestures and looked upon askance.
Heaven protect China
from Democracy!
The Best Form of Government Ever Tried
Democracy, as we have seen, is the worst form of government ever tried. But
what is the best form of government ever tried?
The best form of government ever tried, sadly, has largely been lost to
mankind's collective memory. The best form of government ever tried flourished
on Iceland
between 930 and 1262.
It is time the modern world reclaimed the best form of government ever tried
and gave it another chance. But that is the subject for another essay
altogether.
America and China, Republics not Democracies
de•moc•ra•cy
n. pl. de•moc•ra•cies
1: Government by the people, exercised either directly or through elected
representatives 2: A political or social unit that has such a government 3: The
common people, considered as the primary source of political power 4: Majority
rule
5: The principles of social equality and respect for the individual
within a community
~ The American Heritage
Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
1: the political orientation of those who favor government by the people or
by their elected representatives 2: a political system in which the supreme
power lies in a body of citizens who can elect people to represent them
[syn:
republic, commonwealth] [ant: autocracy] 3: the doctrine that the numerical
majority of an organized group can make decisions binding on the whole group
[syn: majority rule]
~ WordNet 2.0, 2003 Princeton
University
Progressive Era
The Progressive Era ... began in ... the 1890s and lasted through the 1920s
... Many reforms dotted this era, including Prohibition with the 18th Amendment
... the Income Tax with the 16th Amendment and
direct election of Senators
with the 17th Amendment. Muckrakers ... reaction-producing writers ... were
among ... the best examples of progressive reformers ...
Initiative,
Referendum and Recall, all parts of the ... fully democratic state, were ...
pioneered during the movement.
~ Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
China, like America,
was never intended to be a democracy. Dr. Sun Yat-sen, the Founding Father of
modern China,
like Benjamin Franklin, intended that the nation he bequeathed to posterity
would be "A republic, if you can keep it!" This much is beyond
dispute. The name of the nation Sun founded, after all, is "The Republic
of China." This would hardly be worth mentioning were it not for the fact
that so many people have forgotten it.
Yes, Sun made frequent and abundant use of the term "min zhu,"
i.e., "people rule," i.e., "democracy." But Sun was using
"democracy" in the greatly expanded, grossly inaccurate 20th Century
sense of the word, as if it were a synonym for republic and an antonym for
autocracy. When Sun used the word democracy, he meant republic. No one who
knows anything about Sun's "San Min Zhu Yi" (Three People's
Principles) can have the slightest doubt about this.
Sun, like America's
Founding Fathers, was a firm believer in republican government, not democracy.
Sun, like America's
Founding Fathers, was a firm believer in indirect as opposed to direct
government. Sun, like America's
Founding Fathers, was a firm believer in structural constraints as obstacles to
"democracy," aka "mobocracy."
All this should be abundantly clear from the structural constraints Sun
incorporated into the Chinese constitution, which closely mirror the structural
constraints the Founding Fathers incorporated into the American constitution.
The National Assembly is a good example. The National Assembly was Sun
Yat-sen's answer to the Electoral College. The National Assembly, like the
Electoral College, is a proudly, unabashedly "undemocratic" feature
of the Chinese constitution. The Control Yuan is another. The Control Yuan
represents Sun's attempt not only to emulate the American constitution's checks
and balances, but to enhance them.
What is the difference between a republic and a democracy?
A republic is a nation ruled by law. The highest law in a republic is its
constitution. In a republic everyone obeys the constitution.
A democracy, on the other hand, is a nation ruled by men. The highest law in
a democracy is the "Will of the People." In a democracy, everyone
obeys a man who represents the Will of the People. A man who represents the
Will of the People is better known as a dictator.
It is no accident that Pan Green Taiwan independence fascists spearheaded
the elimination of both the National Assembly and the Control Yuan. The aptly
named Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) understands only too well that
democratic political institutions such as Initiative, Referendum, and Recall,
are highly compatible with fascism, whereas republican political institutions
such as Constitutionalism, Original Intent, and the Rule of Law are
insurmountable obstacles to fascism that must first be eliminated before the
Pan Green camp can implement their fascist agenda.
It is no accident that Pan Blue "Da Zhong Guo" (Greater China)
reunificationists spearheaded the successful boycott of Chen Shui-bian's
illegal and unconstitutional "Defensive Referendum." Pan Blue
reunificationists, after all, are true blue champions of the Republic of China
Constitution and the Rule of Law.
George Orwell, in "Politics and the English Language," observed
that "The slovenliness of our language makes it easier for us to have
foolish thoughts... to think clearly is a necessary first step toward political
regeneration... the fight against bad English is not frivolous and is not the
exclusive concern of professional writers."
Truer words were never written. What language could be more slovenly than
modern political language? What thought could be more foolish than modern
political thought?
Terms such as "liberal" and "democracy" once had exact
meanings.
The term "liberal" originally meant "an advocate of
laissez-faire capitalism." A liberal was a disciple of Adam Smith and John
Locke.
Today "liberal" means "an advocate of redistributionist
welfare statism." Today a liberal is a disciple of John Maynard Keynes and
John Kenneth Galbraith. Today, the term "liberal" means the diametric
opposite of what it meant during the Enlightenment. Today bona fide liberals
have no choice but to refer to themselves as "classical liberals" or
"libertarians."
The term "democracy" originally meant "people rule," or
more idiomatically, "rule by the people." A democracy was a form of
government that stressed universal suffrage, multiparty elections, and majority
rule. Nothing more. The term did not contain any unwarranted positive connotations.
It did not imply superiority over other forms of government. It did not imply,
à la Neoconservative polemicist Francis Fukuyama, that mankind had arrived at
"The End of History" and that democracy was the final stage of
political evolution.
Today democracy is defined as the only legitimate form of government.
Rejecting democracy is not an option. "Non-democratic" is equated
with "undemocratic." "Undemocratic" is equated with
"autocratic."
Today "democracy" is no longer a scientific definition. It is a
religious catechism, to be invoked in the same breath as motherhood and apple
pie. It is a catch-all phrase for "good government," for
"enlightened government," for "progressive government," for
"social equality and respect for the individual within a community."
Today, two centuries after the American Revolution, one century after the
fascistic, populist Progressive Era, the critical distinction between a
republic and a democracy has been thoroughly obliterated. Today
"democracy" is considered a synonym for "republic" and an
antonym for "autocracy."
This sort of equivocation, enormously useful for enforcing pro-democracy
Political Correctness, has made our political language as worthless as fiat
currency following runaway inflation.
Alexander Hamilton warned that the essential nature of democracy is tyranny.
Thomas Jefferson warned that democracy is nothing more than mob rule. James
Madison warned that democracies are spectacles of turbulence and contention,
incompatible with personal security or the rights of property.
In today's America, the solemn warnings of these far-sighted champions of
republican government and opponents of democracy are treated as "er bian
feng" (wind whistling past the ears), and the proud republic established
by America's Founding Fathers has been perverted into the very system they
feared and loathed the most – – democracy.
The Republic of China under the Two Chiangs was a republic – – a flawed,
imperfect republic, but a republic nonetheless.
The Republic of China under Lee Teng-hui and Chen Shiu-bian is a
"democracy." Not a democracy in today's ambiguous, equivocal sense of
the word, but a democracy in the Founding Fathers' semantically precise sense
of the word, i.e., an elective dictatorship.
What Taiwan
needs today is not a Pan Green "deepening of democracy," but a Pan
Blue rebirth of republican government.
August
31, 2005
Bevin Chu [send him mail] is an American architect
of Chinese descent registered to practice in Texas.
Currently living and working in Taiwan,
Chu is the son of a retired high-ranking
diplomat with the ROC (Taiwan)
government. His column, "The Strait Scoop" is published on his
website, The China Desk.
Copyright © 2005 LewRockwell.com
