Respecting Democracy (2000)
Dear Editor of the Atlanta Journal Constitution:
Leave it to a totalitarian state to misunderstand the "most basic definition" of democracy. According to the Beijing Youth Daily (Constitution, November 17, 2000), that is majority rule. But totalitarian states have always claimed that. Before the Greeks invented democracy, they invented tyranny, the rule of one man who claimed the support of the masses of people as opposed to the aristocracy. Dictators ever since have been saying they ruled because they had the support of their people or ruled with their best interests in mind. The Greeks, however, didn't like tyranny with or without popular support, and replaced it with something more reliable, the rule of democratic law. The majority passes the laws, and then everyone follows them no matter how they voted. That is what still holds our democracy together. The great danger for us now, as it is in other, less stable democracies and was for the Greeks, is that someone will claim the rule of law is less important than the will of a particular group, even a majority, of people at that particular moment in time. Above all right now we must let the law, through the courts and lawyers, decide how our laws apply, and then accept that as best for democracy.
Sincerely,
Sally MacEwen
Leave it to a totalitarian state to misunderstand the "most basic definition" of democracy. According to the Beijing Youth Daily (Constitution, November 17, 2000), that is majority rule. But totalitarian states have always claimed that. Before the Greeks invented democracy, they invented tyranny, the rule of one man who claimed the support of the masses of people as opposed to the aristocracy. Dictators ever since have been saying they ruled because they had the support of their people or ruled with their best interests in mind. The Greeks, however, didn't like tyranny with or without popular support, and replaced it with something more reliable, the rule of democratic law. The majority passes the laws, and then everyone follows them no matter how they voted. That is what still holds our democracy together. The great danger for us now, as it is in other, less stable democracies and was for the Greeks, is that someone will claim the rule of law is less important than the will of a particular group, even a majority, of people at that particular moment in time. Above all right now we must let the law, through the courts and lawyers, decide how our laws apply, and then accept that as best for democracy.
Sincerely,
Sally MacEwen