Representative government fails when corrupt politicians mostly serve corporate and other special interests. Then it is crucial for citizens to have direct democracy opportunities. This means having the right to place initiatives or referenda on ballots that can make new laws, amend constitutions, recall elected officials, or control taxes and government spending.
Though many local and 24 state governments provide rules for some ballot measures and initiatives, they have been limited by diverse establishment status quo political interests on the left and right that feel threatened by such populist citizen power.
I was impressed by the recent Wall Street Journal article by John Fund, "The Far Left’s War on Direct Democracy". He made the point that direct democracy, though sorely needed, has been successfully crushed by ugly tactics from those interests that would rather use their money and influence to control legislative and other government functions. They fear citizen power. They know how to control elections and manipulate voters. “Unfortunately, some special interests have declared war on the initiative process, using tactics ranging from restrictive laws to outright thuggery,” said Fund.
I agree with Fund’s summation:
Representative government will remain the enduring feature of American democracy, but the initiative process is a valuable safety valve. …attempts to arbitrarily curb the initiative, or to intimidate people from exercising their right to participate, must be resisted. It's a civil liberties issue that should unite people of good will on both the right and left.If this sounds reasonable to you, then the appropriate question to ask of presidential candidates is straightforward: Do you support providing more direct democracy opportunities?
Indeed, many people want some way of creating a federal ballot initiative mechanism whereby the misdeeds or inaction of government could be addressed by Americans voting directly to get the transparent and accountable government and effective public policies they want. For example, a national ballot measure to end the Iraq war would have succeeded in 2006. Putting Democrats in control of Congress did not work. Do we need the ability to recall a president because of dishonesty, incompetence and wrongheaded policies? Yes.
Also, consider that the two-party plutocracy has been able to stifle political opposition by making third party and independent candidates unable to grasp any real power, as they can in most other democracies.
In thinking about direct democracy I was reminded of the all too prevalent view that Barack Obama will challenge the traditional, money dominated two-party control of Washington politics. So, I pose this challenge to Obama: If you truly represent a force for fixing a divisive and ineffective political system, then why don’t you explicitly come out in favor of creating more direct democracy opportunities? Why not condemn all attempts to crush ballot measures and initiatives? And why not help start a national discussion of the possibility of a federal ballot initiative mechanism?
Article comments
1 - Dan Miller
If, as I fear is the case, we collectively are unable, unwilling or simply too indifferent to use the instruments presently at our disposal at the National level, what reason is there to assume that it would be otherwise with new instruments at that level? Or, for that matter, that they would not be kidnapped by the despised "special interests?"
A Federal referendum system strikes me as too clunky to work in a country with interests and needs as diverse as they are in the U.S. Why not work instead to diminish the role and the power of the Federal Government to the greatest extent possible, and to put far greater emphasis on local government?
Local governments obviously can't bring down the price of gasoline, curb inflation, make the stock and commodities markets behave, or do lots of other neat things; but neither, it appears, can the Federal Government. Local governments can have a direct impact, and can be more answerable to local residents than the Federal Government can ever possibly be.
That would, I submit, be a good start.
Dan
2 - bliffle
Well, Joel, this illustrates the problem of seeking information in the WSJ, which is an advocacy broadsheet.
If you lived in a state with Initiative and Plebiscite opportunities (such as California) you might realize that the abuses are dominated by Ultra-conservative forces that have discovered this method to demagogue people into extreme measures that seem relatively mild. The left does it too, but they don't have as much MONEY! Successful initiatives involve lots of money and there are many Big Expensive professional firms for pushing them through. You have to get a lot of signatures to get it on the ballot, all requiring signature gatherers, usually paid, all over to cajole people into signing virtuous sounding petitions.
And that's just the beginning of expenses. Initiatives are broadcast relentlessly on TV and radio with expensive ad campaigns.
We've simply got to find a better way to separate money from public policy better. A guy doesn't deserve a million times the vote power of another guy just because he has a million times more money!
3 - Joel S. Hirschhorn
Dear Bliffle:
Personally, I think California has done very well with its ballot measures, including a recall of a governor.
Dan:
Placing any hope on local government coming to the rescue of American democracy is far more impractical than any of my ideas. Ditto for fixing the federal government through elections, as if any Democrats or Republicans would ever do what was needed.
4 - Dr Dreadful
I think California has done very well with its ballot measures, including a recall of a governor.
A governor who was legitimately elected and then re-elected by Californians despite presiding over an energy emergency over which he actually had very little influence.
Bliffle is onto something here. The ballot initiative process in California has allowed conservative activists to get their way simply by shouting louder than the other folks. So in one of the most liberal states in the Union, we rather incongruously have (among other things) a three strikes law, an anti-gay marriage constitutional amendment (just struck down in the courts, but set to go on the ballot yet again in November), and a Republican governor.
I'm highly dubious about the merits of referenda and the like because it seems to me that the more things you ask the electorate to vote on, the less likely individual electors are to pay close attention to any one particular issue. They either won't vote at all or will cast their ballot without giving all sides due consideration. That doesn't seem like better democracy to me.
5 - Pablo
I could not disagree more with this article in its support of direct democracy, indeed James Madison wrote:
"…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 deaths." James Madison " Federalist #10
Direct democracy is nothing more than mob rule, and no protections for the minority to boot. There has been a much better idea regarding how our electoral process has been hijacked by corporations, and that is to no long treat corporations as a "person" in the legal sense of the word. Indeed corporations in the beginning, because of their limited liability, were licensed by the State for a particular public good. That is no longer the case however.
An interesting thing about state initiatives is that the only way that they can go around the constitutions requirement of a state guaranteed a republican (representitive) form of government is that when an initiative passes is actually amends the state constitution.
I suggest that the author do some real research on what our founding fathers had to say on the subject of direct democracy, and why a constitutional republic was chosen instead.
6 - Pablo
"It had been observed that a pure democracy if it were practicable would be the most perfect government. Experience has proved that no position is more false than this. The ancient democracies in which the people themselves deliberated never possessed one good feature of government. Their very character was tyranny." Alexander Hamilton
7 - bliffle
The Founders chose to found "a Republican Form of government" (it says so right in the constitution) because they dreaded democracy, so they chose the form invented by Plato as a defense against the democracy he saw around him, amongst whose crimes was democratically sentencing Socrates to death by raising a hysterical mob. They were learned men and took their patrician responsibilities seriously. Yes, they were elitists. Among them they spoke most of the known languages of the world and had certainly read and understood the worlds classic writings.We cannot say the same thing about most of the politicos we see today.
8 - Dave Nalle
Odd to find myself agreeing with Pablo, but he's more or less right here.
Direct democracy is mob rule. It's why you have such oppressive governments in much of the world. We had a whole discussion of this on the thread about Iran.
If you have direct democracy then every crazy faction with an agenda which can turn out highly motivated fanatics has a chance of deciding policy while the more rational majority are distracted. Or just as bad, a majority which holds oppressive beliefs can oppress minorities at will.
Joel has essentially endorsed tyranny.
Dave
9 - Baronius
"When over 80 percent of Americans see the nation on the wrong track it is fair to conclude that representative government has failed."
Quoted for Humor.
How do you get from the one statement to the other? Eighty percent of the population SURVEYED were willing to say that the country is on the wrong track. Do they mean because we're too pro-immigrant? Too anti-immigrant? Overcommitted to Iraq, or undercommitted? Do they hope for change they can believe in? Or do they just wish that gasoline were cheaper?
Temporary dissatisfaction doesn't mean that the system of government has failed. Long-term dissatisfaction among the population doesn't either: usually, compromises leave everyone feeling a little cheated. A bad batch of politicians doesn't mean that the system which produced them is a failure, unless that system promised good politicians. Our system doesn't. Quite the opposite, in fact. Our system treats all its leaders as scoundrels to be kept in check. Does your system have a way to keep the population in check? If not, then all the commenters above have a point.
10 - Dave Nalle
80% of Americans believe that we were created by God or through a process guided by God. Does that make them right? Does that mean we should teach evolution in the schools?
Dave
11 - Baronius
Dave - Yes, and No.
heh
12 - bliffle
Baronius is erroneous, again.
13 - Condor
Thank you Pablo in #5. We live with the confines of a Democratic (Constitutonal) Republic. Referring to our system of government as such is the complete rendering of our system.
What are words for anyway? They are standards and they have meaning. Legal terminology is code. And yes I have heard all the arguments concerning middle english and how language changes etc... but with 2 exacting languages such as Greek and Latin, which form the basis for much of our terminology in regards to codified law, it is important to note that the term Republic absolutely completes the definition of the U.S. system of government.
To omit it only reflects ignorance of the system.
14 - Al Barger
Brother Hirschorn sez: "It comes to this: Should we be content to put our faith in elected representatives or should we put it in ourselves? When you vote for candidates you don’t put your faith in yourself, you put it in them."
No half sensible person would put much faith in either. But voting in an initiative is not putting faith in myself - it's putting faith in the judgment of a raw majority vote of my fellow citizens. Hell, they're the same window lickers that elected these jackleg congress critters.
Putting faith in myself would be to advocate limiting the authority and influence of government in whatever form it's run.
Your example of a referendum on Iraq is the perfect example of why a national level referendum would be a horrible idea. You just can't make military policy based on passing voter whims. We had a big public vote in 02, and the big majority of Congress and the country was on board. Once we're in and committed, it won't do to just suddenly turn the other way based on a momentary public opinion poll.
Likewise, this would be an awful way to make, say, trade policy. How many voters know enough to have any business at all trying to directly make or break legitimately complicated business like trade policy?
Not like Congressmen are platonic philosopher-kings knowledgably weighing the pros and cons of each issue. The average congressschmuck seems to have as much as a vague idea what they're voting on maybe one time in three. But that's about one time in three more than the average voter.
Seriously, if we had more ballot initiatives, there are always manipulable boobs to vote for dumb crap that's in the news this week. A dozen years ago, I'm sure we could have gotten votes to suspend the constitution for the sake of finding kids on the damned milk cartons. Or this year it would be a vote to nationalize the oil companies or some equivalent nonsense.
The whole system of checks and balances is balancing all kinds of things in a 3D chess game of carefully giving both inputs and limits to keep it all together. There are certain careful inputs to assure ultimate public accountability, but not TOO much direct popular control, which can veer off into mob rule.
But yet individuals have lots of direct input, and at the most critical level affecting individual citizens - juries. Juries don't much seem to realize their power, but try getting a jury conviction in a medical marijuana case in CA. That's a big individual check on the power of government.
Then of course there is the ultimate empowerment of the individual against oppressive government: the Second Amendment right to keep guns. Vote from the rooftops!
15 - Baronius
Al, I agree with your conclusion, but I wonder...
If we had direct voting on certain issues, would people take them more seriously? These temper tantrums we see in survey data might stop if people were forced to vote on things. It's the Howard Dean Effect - he was favored in Iowa until a couple of weeks before the 2004 primary, when the voters suddenly sobered up. It's easy to whine on the sidelines, but when you're in the game, you commit.
16 - Dan Miller
Al, you say
I think you are wildly optimistic on both points. Critical resolutions in favor of motherhood and apple pie, and against child molestation, perhaps. Trvial matters such as the budget, tax legislation, social security reform, energy policy, earmarks and the like, all get filtered by staff and there is a strong tendency to vote along party lines.Dan