If the election in 2016 of Donald Trump to the presidency
of our country has proven nothing else, it has been a testimony to the lack of
knowledge, in general, and blind loyalty, in particular, of our electorate to
party politics—a sad state of affairs surpassed only by its threat to the very
sovereignty of our democratic republic.
Recently, I was reading a book, Marbury v. Madison: The Origins and Legacy of Judicial Review by
William E. Nelson, published by the University Press of Kansas from which I
quote:”Permanently organized political parties, as we now known them, had never
been part of British or colonial political ideology during the eighteenth
century, and they remained foreign to American political thinking as the
nineteenth century began. Leaders of government, it was thought, should act in
the interests and for the benefit of the entire citizenry, not just on behalf
of those who had voted in their favor.” One should note that the referenced period
of time is in our nation’s very beginning. It goes on to say:”One reason
Americans distrusted political factions was a fear that they would propel
society into chaos and civil strife.” Well how about that—over 200 years ago?
Look at us today.
In this case before the Supreme Court, Marbury v Madison, when Chief Justice
Marshall “used the doctrine of judicial review to curb partisan excesses and move
the nation back toward it’s eighteenth-century tradition of consensus
government, most Americans felt relieved….The rationale for judicial review
rested upon the unique American conception of sovereignty that had developed
during and after the founding era debates. Americans had then rejected the
traditional British view that the legislature possessed complete sovereignty,
and many had begun to argue instead that sovereignty lay with the people, who
by a constitution delegated limited power to the legislature.”
We have come a long way since the Revolutionary War;
the sovereignty of our people, if we would just stop and think about it, has
come a long way too. Our constitution was written behind closed doors by our founding
fathers and then submitted to our elected representatives. And who elected
them? In general, only white men who owned property and paid taxes—the elite,
about 7% of the population. Today, eligibility to vote in our nation is
established both through our constitution and by state law. I think it is fair
to say that most all of us today can vote if we are a citizen, including women— race,
creed, or color notwithstanding.
And what are we doing with this wonderful privilege
which is ours? Participation in voting is low; our knowledge of history is
minimal at best; and we, for the most part, do not “keep abreast” of current
events (and don’t care to, for that matter), preferring to leave the
responsibilities of our democracy “to the other guy”. To make matters worse, in
my opinion, we tend to “fall back” on political parties, relying on preconceived
opinions and obsolete knowledge as to just what and whom the party represents—often
unknowingly voting against one’s own interests (If you think either the Republican
or the Democratic Party are the same today as they were just a few years back,
you have another think coming and better take another look. “I’ve always been a
Democrat” or “my mother was a Republican” just doesn’t get it anymore). And
what is happening as a result? We the people are losing our sovereignty.
Through big money, dark money, lobbyists, etc. the Corporatocracy and Power
Elite are running our government; and, except for the ballot box, we the people
are substantively ignored. Now, even the Russians are affecting our elections—a
long way from 1776, don’t you think?
It’s time, don’t you think, to get off our lazy asses
and take back our sovereignty. Perhaps we should look that word up in the
dictionary as we seem to have lost sight of its meaning.
Ronald Miller
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