I am tired of hearing people talk about democracy as though it were a virtue. It isn’t. In fact, democracy is immoral! This is also why I take offense to those who claim this nation is a democracy: it is not. The men and women who created this nation may have missed the mark of perfection, but they were anything but immoral. However, those who have been working to turn this nation into a democracy for the past one-hundred and twenty-plus years most definitely are immoral and — frankly — I am sick and tired of their voices preaching to us about who and what we should be. It is high time someone explained that those who seek democracy are tyrants — period!
Natural Law recognizes the individual, not society. This is because the individual exists in nature, society does not. Society is an artificial construct; a man-made thing: an abstraction; a linguistic tool that makes it easier to treat individuals as a single entity. But you and I are real. We can and do exist outside of society. We do not need society to survive. Place us on a deserted island and we do not change; we can continue as we are, and with all the same Natural Rights we possessed in society. However, the moment we are placed on that deserted island, society changes — it ceases to exist (at least for us). This is why Natural Law focuses only on the individual and why — under Natural Law — justice is concerned only with the preservation of the individual’s rights. Now, I ask you: what right can be more important to the individual than free will?
Free will is our most fundamental right. Our free will is the one thing we posses to which no one else can claim a right. How can you claim a right to something you cannot possess? Your free will is an inherent and inalienable part of who and what you are. In fact, without your free will, you cease to be you. This is also why no one can force you to think or believe anything you do not want to think or believe. This does not mean they cannot make you pay a price for clinging to your thoughts and beliefs, but it does means that, so long as you do not surrender your will to another, no one can make a claim to your will because no one can force you to think or believe something against your will. This is why Natural Law is self-evident: because you always retain your claim to your free will. The rest of our Natural Rights are all derived from there.
Once we understand the origin of our Natural Rights and how they are derived from Natural Law, we recognize that our rights are responsible for the existence of universal morality. In short, an immoral action is an action that trespasses against the Natural Rights of another individual. So long as an individual is acting within the confines of Natural Law, any trespass on their Natural Rights is — by definition — an immoral act. This is why democracy is — by definition – an immoral act. Now let me prove it in the most forceful way I can. Just answer the following by saying ‘yes or no:’
If majority were to vote to allow theft, would that be a moral action?
If the majority were to vote to allow slavery, would that be a moral action?
If the majority were to vote to allow rape, would that be a moral action?
If the majority voted to allow murder, would that be a moral action?
If society voted to allow genocide, would that be amoral action?
Now, before you try to tell me these questions are not representative of reality, please stop, because — at one point in time — every one of these actions have been ‘legal’ under ‘the law’ somewhere in the world, and they were all enacted by ‘democracy.’ If you doubt me, look it up, and start with socialist democracies. That will shorten your workload considerably.
So, back to my questions: if the majority of people say something should be legal, does that make it moral? If you answer ‘no,’ then you have just admitted that democracy is immoral. And no, it does not matter ‘how it is used:’ it is an inherently immoral action. If someone tries to argue that democracy is neither moral or immoral and that it depends upon how people use it, then the same argument can be made for all five of the actions in my questions. I can make a sound, valid and rational argument justifying theft, slavery, rape, murder and even genocide. This is because democracy is predicated on the majority of people forcing their will onto the minority. Thus, by definition, democracy is the act of trespassing on the free will of other people. That violates Natural Law, thus, it is the definition of an immoral act.
This is why our founding fathers did not construct a democracy. This nation was founded as a representative republic, and there is a world of difference.
“Remember, democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts, and murders itself. There never was a democracy yet that did not commit suicide.”
— John Adams
“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
“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
“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
Our founders understood Natural Law, and although they couldn’t enact a perfect application of its principles, they did construct a document that has come closer than man has and is likely to ever come: the U.S. Constitution. This is why would-be tyrants have been working tirelessly for more than a century to turn America into a democracy: so they can free themselves of the constraints of the Constitution and — in the process – Natural law. These people appeal to ‘democracy’ to get the people to support their violations of the law. Obama has been doing it with his ‘phone and pen,’ but so have the Republicans. The Constitution lists several things for which the President shall be impeached, and Obama has done them, yet the Republicans have said they will not do their duty to enforce the law. These people — all of them, on both sides — care more about their personal power than the law. In their hearts, they are no better than those who used democracy to violate the written law some two thousand years ago:
“But they cried out, away with him, away with him. Crucify him………..Then delivered he him therefore unto them to be crucified….”
John 19:15-16
[NOTE: the crucifixion of Jesus was a violation of both Jewish and Roman law, but it was done to appease the demands of ‘the majority’ for the sake of those in power — both Roman and Jew. But this is not meant as an attack on the Jews. Rather, it is an attack on each of us. How different are any of us today when we support and/or justify others who manipulate and break the law in our names? Please, I beg you, consider this the next time you accept the old argument of “If you don’t vote for this devil, then the other devils will win.” If you knowingly and willingly vote for immoral representatives, then you are willingly joining them in their crimes.]
My boyfriend’s quote was the best. Dug this post.
Joe,
Excellent post.
Joe – I applaud you for another excellent and insightful post. You have a knack for sliding the most powerful ideas in when I least expect them. This one you drove home in your closing comment:
“Please, I beg you, consider this the next time you accept the old argument of “If you don’t vote for this devil, then the other devils will win.” If you knowingly and willingly vote for immoral representatives, then you are willingly joining them in their crimes”.
As you are well aware (but some of your readers may interpret from this), the problem is not with the (im)morality of the representatives. The problem is with the very notion of voting.
Voting IS IMMORAL, because voting is SLAVERY. By its very nature, it says the free will of an individual will be constrained by a group decision (‘vote’).
To those of you who are still voting, you are THE PROBLEM, as you are all tyrants and traitors violating my Natural Law Rights by voting. Anyone who still believes in a system of elected re-presentatives does not understand their true Natural Law Rights, and is still asleep at the wheel, enslaving the rest of us in their slumber. Wake up!
Liberty,
While I appreciate your compliments, I fear I may be about to anger you a bit. If voting is in the form of a pure democracy, then yes, I would agree with your assessment that it represents a form of slavery for the minority. HOWEVER, voting — in and of itself — is not immoral. If one is voting under a Social Contract that is in agreement with Natural Law, then voting is not only moral, not voting becomes immoral.
I think I should explain this better, so thank you, you just gave me an idea for my next post. Hope there are no hard feeling between us 🙂
Joe – fear not. For what is the point of discourse, if views cannot be challenged? How can my views expand, if I cannot consider the views of another with an open mind?
Your point is well-taken, and I appreciate you taking the time to clarify. What I had not considered before your response was central factor:
CONSENT
Without consent, voting and imposition of obligations via threat of violence upon non-voters is immoral.
With consent, adults can freely enter contract with each other.
I confess I need to search for some of your earlier writings on the Social Contract, because I am fuzzy on what it entails or how one enters into it, and I don’t recall signing such a contract. 🙂
You’ve raised some interesting questions in my mind. What is the nature of consent? Can consent be withdrawn? Under what circumstances? What if I don’t consent?
My comments above were from a non-consent scenario. For example, I don’t consent to confiscation of my labor (taxes), although I would willingly contribute to causes or services I believe in (roads, fire, ambulance, etc.). I don’t consent to stripping of my rights and liberties in the name of safety – I choose freedom instead. I don’t consent to re-presentative government – I present myself, and don’t want another (re)presenting on my behalf.
You said:
“If one is voting under a Social Contract that is in agreement with Natural Law, then voting is not only moral, not voting becomes immoral.”
Completely agree. If you have entered a contract to participate, and then fail to do so, you are in breach of contract which is immoral.
The challenge I see here is twofold. One, the definition and scope of said Social Contract. And two, “in agreement with Natural Law.”
I’m pretty sure the first item was a subject of your writings (I need to go back and re-read). The second seems a bit more problematic, as I can see how it could exist in theory, but I am unaware of any government in any time that has been in alignment with Natural Law.
I look forward to your next article.
Liberty,
I haven’t finished my next post yet, but from what you just wrote, I suspect we are already in agreement. 🙂
While you wait on my lazy self to finish that next post, might I suggest you look under the heading at the top of this blog labeled “NATURAL LAW.” The last post is about the Social Contract, but you sort of have to go through everything under that header, in order. Otherwise, you may not fully understand the foundation for my post of Natural Law (then again, it is just as likely that you will understand because you are WAY ahead of me — in which case, I apologize in advance 🙂 )
I should have time later today, so I’ll see if I can finish that next post. Hope you had a safe and Happy New Year! 😀
I disagree on is the statement that we are not a democracy. Originally, we were not, and I think our framers tried to instill safeguards to prevent us from ever becoming a democracy, but we did. The American people abandoned the Constitution and adopted democracy, in the first half of the 20th century. It will, now, require a major crisis revert back.
Stephen,
I understand what you are saying, and you are technically correct. However, I think you missed the fuller context of my essay. I am writing here from the perspective of the ideal, the way things are supposed to be — not the way they are. Still, if we look at how they actually are, we are not yet a direct democracy. There are still remnants of the republican system left, and I believe those few remnants may well be the only thing that has kept us from total ruin.