How do we restore democracy to the United States?

[Southerly Gentleman]

Why is it that American democracy in enslaved to the Southerners? They're not significant enough to warrant such power much less competent enough to wield it. It is the educated coastal elites that will usher in a new age of American dominance, not irrelevant xenophobic laborers.

yo San Lumen, is that you bro?

[Belovakia]

America was never a Democracy. It has been and will be a Constitutional Republic. Democracy is just Mob Rule in my opinion.

[Southerly Gentleman]

America was never a Democracy. It has been and will be a Constitutional Republic. Democracy is just Mob Rule in my opinion.

how is America not a democracy?

[Bakery Hill]

Why is it that American democracy in enslaved to the Southerners? They're not significant enough to warrant such power much less competent enough to wield it. It is the educated coastal elites that will usher in a new age of American dominance, not irrelevant xenophobic laborers.

Peak liberalism? D:

[Mattopilos]

The electoral college is an anachronism, and it undermines the most basic principle of democracy (that every person's vote is equal in worth). Also, voter ID laws as they exist today are little more than poll taxes that purposefully depress turnout among Democratic-leaning demographics, and no, Hillary Clinton did not win the popular vote because of undocumented immigrants voting. This is a far right lie, and a stupid one at that.

Also... "filthy urban dwellers"? That's you insulting many of your fellow posters.

America was never truly a democracy, so why make it one? America is a representative republic.

Plus, I don't happen to care about offending people...

I don't think you understand what democracy means if you think America is not one.

[Mattopilos]

America was never a Democracy. It has been and will be a Constitutional Republic. Democracy is just Mob Rule in my opinion.

Although I love to call democracy mob rule, America is in fact a democracy - a representative democracy.

[Genivaria]

Why is it that American democracy in enslaved to the Southerners? They're not significant enough to warrant such power much less competent enough to wield it. It is the educated coastal elites that will usher in a new age of American dominance, not irrelevant xenophobic laborers.

Hamiltonians unite!

[Grinning Dragon]

America was never a Democracy. It has been and will be a Constitutional Republic. Democracy is just Mob Rule in my opinion.

Although I love to call democracy mob rule, America is in fact a democracy - a representative democracy.

The founding fathers established a Constitutional Republic.

As there is a degree of depravity in mankind which requires a certain degree of circumspection and distrust: So there are other qualities in human nature, which justify a certain portion of esteem and confidence. Republican government (that of a Republic) presupposes the existence of these qualities in a higher degree than any other form. Were the pictures which have been drawn by the political jealousy of some among us, faithful likenesses of the human character, the inference would be that there is not sufficient virtue among men for self government; and that nothing less than the chains of despotism can restrain them from destroying and devouring one another.

- Madison federalist 55.

An elective despotism was not the government we fought for...

- Jefferson
If I remember correctly a Representative Democracy lacks a written Constitution limiting The Majority

[Southerly Gentleman]

An elective despotism was not the government we fought for...

- Jefferson
If I remember correctly a Representative Democracy lacks a written Constitution limiting The Majority

a written constitution limiting the majority would still fit most definitions of democracy.

[Mattopilos]

- Jefferson
If I remember correctly a Representative Democracy lacks a written Constitution limiting The Majority

a written constitution limiting the majority would still fit most definitions of democracy.

It is more like a form of democracy that keeps controls in place in an attempt to prevent the unwanted effect of The Majority, which is "Mob Rule".

[Venerable Bede]

- Jefferson
If I remember correctly a Representative Democracy lacks a written Constitution limiting The Majority

a written constitution limiting the majority would still fit most definitions of democracy.

It technically places the parliament above the plebs, since they control the constitution.

[Southerly Gentleman]

a written constitution limiting the majority would still fit most definitions of democracy.

It technically places the parliament above the plebs, since they control the constitution.

Yes, but the plebs can also change the constitution in some nations via referendums and the like.

[Elwher]

a written constitution limiting the majority would still fit most definitions of democracy.

It technically places the parliament above the plebs, since they control the constitution.

As it should be, in a government of laws, not a government of men.

[Forsher]

- Jefferson
If I remember correctly a Representative Democracy lacks a written Constitution limiting The Majority

a written constitution limiting the majority would still fit most definitions of democracy.

As long as the constitution can change (even if it is very difficult to change... as is the case in the US) and change is a function of peoples' opinions and we interpret democracy to be nothing more than the "people's rule" then yes.

That is why I think American Independence should've been different... Or if british government wasn't simply dumb at the point of raise taxes like crazy and spark an anti-monarchist feeling among the population.

They weren't.

Turns out some people want to have their cake and eat it too. This is not surprising... possibly it describes the course of history remarkably well.

... America isn't a democracy, it is a republic. Secondly, the electoral college has been around since the start of the nation, so I am unsure what you mean by, restore.

^

This claim has been attacked repeatedly and been defended from those attacks... never. I wonder why...

America was never a Democracy. It has been and will be a Constitutional Republic. Democracy is just Mob Rule in my opinion.

how is America not a democracy?

lol some random crap some dead dudes said.

Case in point:

Although I love to call democracy mob rule, America is in fact a democracy - a representative democracy.

The founding fathers established a Constitutional Republic.

As there is a degree of depravity in mankind which requires a certain degree of circumspection and distrust: So there are other qualities in human nature, which justify a certain portion of esteem and confidence. Republican government (that of a Republic) presupposes the existence of these qualities in a higher degree than any other form. Were the pictures which have been drawn by the political jealousy of some among us, faithful likenesses of the human character, the inference would be that there is not sufficient virtue among men for self government; and that nothing less than the chains of despotism can restrain them from destroying and devouring one another.

- Madison federalist 55.

An elective despotism was not the government we fought for...

- Jefferson
If I remember correctly a Representative Democracy lacks a written Constitution limiting The Majority

I see your dead dudes and raise you an even deader dude:

"I beseech you, in the bowels of Christ, think it possible that you they may be mistaken"

QED.

a written constitution limiting the majority would still fit most definitions of democracy.

It is more like a form of democracy that keeps controls in place in an attempt to prevent the unwanted effect of The Majority, which is "Mob Rule".

It's also completely unnecessary,, if that's the only purpose of a written constitution... as shown by Real Life.

Not that written constitutions must succeed in constraining (electoral) majorities.

It technically places the parliament above the plebs, since they control the constitution.

Yes, but the plebs can also change the constitution in some nations via referendums and the like.

I suggest that parliament's decision is a function of electoral outcomes, which you can see are unambiguously a function of "the plebs". I will demonstrate this via analogy. Pretend that there are some functions:

E = X + 4
G = ln(E)

if C is the result of f(G) then there is some e such that C = ln(e)

=> C = ln(x+4)

That is, if we imagine that C is analogous to constitutional change we have thus used this maths based analogy to show that whatever electorate's constitution has been change is dependent upon the people, i.e. people have power. (Disclaimer... my maths may be terrible... you get the idea, yes?)

Also, notice, this is not a particularly democratic country... there is some bias (+4) going on. I guess the pure democracy has G = E.

Don't try and understand the variables... they don't have meaning. It's 4x = 6x stuff really.

It technically places the parliament above the plebs, since they control the constitution.

As it should be, in a government of laws, not a government of men.

I will quote me at you (the deader dude was the nefarious Lord Protector, Oliver Cromwell):

"One seeks a vehicle to combat the machinations of the legal profession and its clients through legislation."

Law should reflect society. It shouldn't change constantly but nor should it be static. Nor should the Law be above Man... it is something that we have developed to play our myriad games, it is not something Other.

But if we return to my "maths" above, notice how I made Government the natural log of the election? This is because log increases slowly. Although, again, I should emphasise that I am not particularly good at maths* and that this stuff doesn't really have a lot of meaning... it does, I think, illustrate the idea, though, which was the point.

*Perhaps Salandriagado will read this post. As far as I remember, he's actually good at maths so if I've done something completely stupid above I and he sees it, I'm sure I'll end up in the gallery of stupid quotes... this is the nature of forums, in the long term you end up with some sort of long term quality control.

[Southerly Gentleman]

Yes, but the plebs can also change the constitution in some nations via referendums and the like.

I suggest that parliament's decision is a function of electoral outcomes, which you can see are unambiguously a function of "the plebs".

E = X + 4
G = ln(E)

if C is the result of f(G) then there is some e such that C = ln(e)

=> C = ln(x+4)

That is, if we imagine that C is constitutional change we have thus used maths to show that whatever electorate's constitution has been change is dependent upon the people, i.e. people have power. (Disclaimer... my maths may be terrible... you get the idea, yes?)

Also, notice, this is not a particularly democratic country... there is some bias (+4) going on. I guess the pure democracy has G = E.

can you define your variables? I'm struggling to see what you're doing with them or how it pertains to democracy.

[Forsher]

I suggest that parliament's decision is a function of electoral outcomes, which you can see are unambiguously a function of "the plebs".

E = X + 4
G = ln(E)

if C is the result of f(G) then there is some e such that C = ln(e)

=> C = ln(x+4)

That is, if we imagine that C is constitutional change we have thus used maths to show that whatever electorate's constitution has been change is dependent upon the people, i.e. people have power. (Disclaimer... my maths may be terrible... you get the idea, yes?)

Also, notice, this is not a particularly democratic country... there is some bias (+4) going on. I guess the pure democracy has G = E.

can you define your variables? I'm struggling to see what you're doing with them or how it pertains to democracy.

That's what I meant by "this stuff doesn't really have a lot of meaning" a little bit further along... there isn't really an interpretation of this.

I mean, if you imagine that X is the number of votes received by the party that also happened to win the election, we see that this particular party has some sort of systemic advantage. Maybe, for instance, they've managed to gerrymander 4 votes for sure. So, you can kind of make some sort of interpretation there... but 4 votes?

If you look at G? We could, for instance, assume that G is defined purely for values of E such that G is in the interval [0,1] but ln(4) is 1.39 (2dp) so that doesn't really make sense. Perhaps, it's [0,100] with each element of that interval corresponding to the percentage of the party's policy that is implemented. In this sense, the constitutional change C happens to be the proportion of their policy such that some policy the party has that changes the constitution is implemented, i.e. it's a particular value of G. This isn't particularly realistic and, to my mind, is sufficiently unrealistic that it's not a meaningful interpretation (but it's the best I could do). For instance, policy also depends on time and the existing policy (path dependency)... maybe this is some bizarre regression.

Anyway, the idea was really simply to show that just because I define G based on E (or government based on representation rather than referenda) that doesn't mean that G doesn't depend on the plebs (because the electoral outcome determines representation). Or, perhaps a better way of putting it that doesn't involve mucking around with (bad?) functions, the effects of the election are felt through representative government, i.e. people still have power in representative government, therefore, representative government is democratic.

Um, maybe I should just say that x is some means of representing the outcome of the election. C is some thing that a government has done and it is a function of that government. But that government is a function of the election (represented, somehow, by x) and thus things that a government does is a function of people... and if this is true, you have democracy.

[Infected Mushroom]

You can't restore something that's never been gone.

[The Portland Territory]

Very simple

get rid of the electoral college and have all votes be equal, make gerrymandering illegal and all districts drawn by a independent commission and ensure everyone who is a citizen has the right to vote without being impeded in any way.

I think this is one of the few times when you and I agree on something

[Telconi]

Very simple

get rid of the electoral college and have all votes be equal, make gerrymandering illegal and all districts drawn by a independent commission and ensure everyone who is a citizen has the right to vote without being impeded in any way.

How would you accomplish an independent commission?

[Washington Resistance Army]

Very simple

get rid of the electoral college and have all votes be equal, make gerrymandering illegal and all districts drawn by a independent commission and ensure everyone who is a citizen has the right to vote without being impeded in any way.

How would you accomplish an independent commission?

By stacking it with Democrats of course.

[Yorkers]

Repeal the Direct Election of Senators Amendment
Federal prohibition on felons voting
Federal prohibition on non-citizens voting
National Voter ID system, provided free to all citizens
Limit campaign season to three months before the election
Abolish SuperPACs
Prohibit campaign fundraising from banks and utility companies

[Yorkers]

Very simple

get rid of the electoral college and have all votes be equal, make gerrymandering illegal and all districts drawn by a independent commission and ensure everyone who is a citizen has the right to vote without being impeded in any way.

You can abolish gerrymandering by requiring that all congressional districts correspond with municipal and county boundaries.

[Great Minarchistan]

That is why I think American Independence should've been different... Or if british government wasn't simply dumb at the point of raise taxes like crazy and spark an anti-monarchist feeling among the population.

If you think the taxes on the American colonies were punitive, you should read up on them.

High or not, american people were clearly not happy with tariff hikes.

[Yorkers]

That is why I think American Independence should've been different... Or if british government wasn't simply dumb at the point of raise taxes like crazy and spark an anti-monarchist feeling among the population.

If you think the taxes on the American colonies were punitive, you should read up on them.

It's not that they were punitive, it's that they were not consented to. Didn't we all learn "No Taxation Without Representation" in elementary school?

Also, it was part of a long list of transgressions, most onerously, Britain prevent Americans from settling the Ohio Country, even though many had just fought and died to conquer those lands just ten years before.

[Genivaria]

If you think the taxes on the American colonies were punitive, you should read up on them.

It's not that they were punitive, it's that they were not consented to. Didn't we all learn "No Taxation Without Representation" in elementary school?

Also, it was part of a long list of transgressions, most onerously, Britain prevent Americans from settling the Ohio Country, even though many had just fought and died to conquer those lands just ten years before.

Because the Empire didn't want to cause trouble with the natives.