WHAT ARE WE, A REPUBLIC OR A DEMOCRACY?

A May 3rd Newsweek article by Kurt Eichenwald entitled "Don't blame Trump: American Democracy was broken before he muscled in," suggests that "democracy" is supposedly a source of pride for Americans, yet held in contempt by too many citizens. The argument supports Donald Trump's contention that, even if he does not get to 1,237 delegates in the election process, he should get the nomination because he would presumably amass more than any other candidate. Anything less would be un-democratic. Eichenald concludes that "Democracy is not complicated: Whoever gets the most votes is supposed to win. That's it."

While most Americans tend to subscribe to basic democratic principles, and generally consider "democracy" and "republic" to be one of the same thing, there are substantive differences between those two concepts. History tells us that our Founding Fathers were adamantly opposed to democracy.
John Adams contended that: "Democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts and murders itself. There was never a democracy that did not commit suicide." James Madison, in Federalist Paper no. 10, wrote: "In a pure democracy there is nothing to check the inducement to sacrifice the weaker party or the obnoxious individual." The politicians were not the only ones critiquing democracy as a form of government. Chief Justice John Marshall suggested that "between a balanced republic and a democracy, the difference is like that between order and chaos." The framers adopted a compromise that fell somewhere between the ancient Greek democracy and the Roman republic, between (perceived) mob rule and stability. As it was understood, in a true democracy the majority ruled in all cases, regardless of consequences for individuals or for those who are not in the majority on an issue. The republic, as instituted, was set up as a representative form of government, ruled according to a constitution limiting governmental powers, and protecting the individual's rights against the desire of the majority. To insure that every state would follow suit, article 4, section 4, of our Constitution reads: "The United States shall guarantee to every State in the Union a Republican form of Government. And our Pledge of Allegiance, composed in 1892 and adopted by Congress in 1942, states clearly: "I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and the Republic for which it stands....."

Many historical documents were designed to emphasize our republican institutions, although there were times when explanation and indoctrination converged. Notably, in 1928, the U.S. Army produced a document which defined democracy and republic as follows: "A democracy is majority rule and is destructive of liberty because there is no law to prevent the majority from trampling on individual rights. Whatever the majority says goes! A lynch mob is an example of pure democracy in action. There is only one dissenting vote, and that is cast by the person at the end of the rope. A republic is a government of law un der a constitution. The constitution holds the government in check and prevents the majority (acting through their government) from violating the rights of the individual. Under this system of government a lynch mob is illegal. The suspected criminal cannot be denied his right to a fair trial even if a majority of the citizenry demands otherwise."

Over the years the distinction between these two forms of government began to soften. Democratic countries modified majority rule by adopting a system of proportional representation, balancing the interests of multiple factions in their society, and by forcing the use of coalition governments. A significant exception to this development has been the growing dominance of populist governments with an absolute majority in countries like Hungary and Poland. Their leaders were able to rewrite constitutions without input from opposition parties. Most of us subscribe to republican principles included in our Constitution, including "checks and balances" and the "Bill of Rights." While we contrast these with our understanding of a "pure" democracy, and while we reject its down-side, some of us are first in line to complain when majority rule is not applied, and when republican rules work against our interests. Political candidates running for president are complaining about an un-democratic selection process in both parties. Caucuses tend to be un-democratic, while "winner-take-all" primaries , while democratic, don't protect the voices of voters who end up losing. The Electoral College is a republican construct designed to prevent large, heavily populated states from running roughshod over small, sparsely populated states. However, polls show that 70 of the voting public supports a National Popular Vote bill, which would guarantee the Presidency to the candidate who receives the most popular votes in the entire country.

Ultimately, the discussion surrounding our institutional identity is as simple as it may appear convoluted. Structurally we are a republic. Emotionally we tend to believe that many of our consequential decisions ought to be based on democratic principles.