Ben Franklin Was a Little off Target
Here’s a refresher on the story: People outside the constitutional convention in 1787 waited to hear what kind of government the members came up with. This was shortly after the revolution. What constitution we would have was being debated and it was not at all clear which kind would be chosen. Some wanted a very democratic system. Some wanted, not quite a king but a lifelong president who had very broad power. Some wanted essentially an aristocracy, allowing only the rich and powerful and well connected to be in positions of making decisions with very little influence from the people.
The story, probably made up later, was that when they were done and leaving the convention hall a woman asked Ben Franklin what kind of government the nation would have. His answer was, “A republic, if you can keep it”.
A “republic” meant a representative democracy. Representatives would make decisions but they would be selected by voters. Some current conservatives try to twist “republic” into meaning we should not be a democracy at all, but that’s not true and not what the members of the convention meant, by their own words.
But perhaps a better quote would have been, “A republic, if you want it”. After all, there had just been a strong disagreement within the convention because of those who wanted the public input as removed as possible from influence on the decision makers, being sure more democracy wouldn’t work. They thought either the public doesn’t know enough (always debatable) or it would be chaotic, or the majority would rule like a tyranny over minorities. That is minorities such as minority religions or any other groups not in the main. That’s why our constitution acknowledges rights, so even a minority religion or other group has freedom too.
But our nation’s history has always had a tension from those who don’t quite buy the idea of democracy. In any given time there are those who feel a strong leader or group would get things done better. That might mean allowing the top to indulge in some corruption, and might mean some rights are lost, but the idea is, that’s the only way to get things done. Actually trying to have democracy and all our rights fully enforced is too unwieldy and just doesn’t get things done. With our long Congressional stagnation you could see where people might feel that way.
There are also always those who are just greedy. On the large scale it’s those among the leaders of industry and finance who warp the system to their benefit without regard for how that conflicts with what voters want or with the peoples’ rights. On the small scale, consider white people during the Jim Crow era who supported it, because making black people work almost like slaves made whites richer and they liked that.
On a still smaller and more subtle scale there’s a form that has always been around and continues today. The idea, most promoted by Republicans, to minimize regulation so industry and finance can run unhindered. If that results in some people getting hurt by unsafe work conditions or unsafe products, well, that’s just the price that prosperity requires. Likewise the top-down, supply-side economics that focus on letting the rich maximize the gap between the wealthy and everyone else under the same rationale.
And how have Republicans, especially, but also too many Democrats, and others pushing the same ideas, how have those policies and leaders and office holders managed to keep those ideas going? Keep the votes often almost 50-50 on related issues? Because so many of us kind of agree. Yeah, that candidate might be more favorable to business owners than to unions, but if I vote for the other one who is pushing democracy and rights, we might keep those rights but be poorer, or so we’re told. But if I vote for the one favoring the rich, we might lose some protection of rights, we might end up with a bigger divide between the top and the rest, but maybe I can end up on the winning side of that divide.
It’s the same old trade off in different forms. The idea that it’s just not practical to have all that democracy and all those rights. It’s too unworkable. We should just accept that a certain amount of damage and corruption and unaccountable centralized power is the way things need to work. And too often too many of us tend to lean that way. That’s obvious in our most recent presidential election where a little over half the voters chose a corrupt, narcissistic, power hungry, abusive candidate who had tried to lead an insurrection to overthrow our democracy and rights once already.
So the question that should have been posed is not, “if you can keep it”. The question is, do enough of us lean that direction, favoring democracy and rights over partial authoritarian rule? The question to the woman and to the nation as a whole is not about keeping it. What it’s about is, “if you want it”. So, do enough of us even want it?
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