As Benjamin Franklin, the sage and senior member of our constitutional convention, was leaving its final session, a woman called out to him, “What kind of government have you proposed for us?” He famously replied, “A republic, if you can keep it.” In the almost two years that followed that day in September 1787, the proposed government was explained and defended in a series of newspaper op-eds that became known as The Federalist Papers, which endures as a classic in political and constitutional theory. In this collection, one finds a definition of a republican government and how it differs from a democracy. One also finds an enumeration of the weaknesses of democratic government that came to light in direct experiences and in the long historical record of human efforts at governance. One even finds worries about the weaknesses of republican government along with an exploration of possible remedies for them. All of this is elemental to the historian or political analyst who has attended to the founding years of the American Republic.
We must then wonder why, in the current alleged “crisis of democracy,” so many of our journalists and leading universities refused or forgot to start their inquiries and reflections from what was right there before them. Why not build on the wisdom of that period, which President John F. Kennedy once called our golden age for thoughtful statesmanship, comparable to the golden age of Ancient Greece? Why not use precise naming and description, the very foundation of wisdom in more than one philosophical system? Such descriptions could be “the crisis of republican government,” or perhaps “the crisis of our democratic republic” or “the crisis of our constitutional republic.”
So much of the language around us and in newly founded institutes or initiatives or projects for the study of democracy is marked by misleading descriptions of what we have in this land and what notable American leaders have aspired to. One local professor writes, seemingly apologetically, “We do not, of course, have perfect democracy.” We are led to assume that we understand the meaning of perfect democracy, and we seek it. What might such perfection be?
Some decades ago a Notre Dame professor (happily never a part of our strong political science department), shortly after leaving our community, burst into the national news with a proposal for all citizens to participate in voting on important national legislation via their home computers. In other words, a national plebiscite on all important matters. Socrates exposed the error of such a goal by observing that a ship at sea should not, especially in stormy waters, pick its captain by vote of the sailors. National plebiscites and radical egalitarianism are indicators of an uninformed and simplistic understanding of the keys to good and stable government and reveal no awareness of the remedies discovered for the historic weaknesses of democracy. A chief such remedy is the republican form of government itself.
A current Notre Dame professor writes wisely and wholly in accord with the teaching of the American philosopher John Dewey, when she says, “The starting point of a democracy is having an informed citizenry that can discuss and debate different political ideas in civil conversations.” Dewey, an icon for so many champions of democracy, insisted that the essence of democracy consists not in the actual voting and tallying of votes; rather it is in the character of the discourse and thought that leads up to the vote. Had Dewey and our local political scientist been using language more accurately and wrote of republican government rather than democratic, it would still be true that how we deliberate before we vote is critical to the success of republican government. We do have a long way to go, and one of the first steps is to know and understand all the rich constitutional features of our American Republic.
Among the possible accurate names indicated above is “democratic republic.” That descriptive phrasing is the work of an eminent political theorist, Martin Diamond, who spoke here at Notre Dame in 1976 when this community celebrated the bicentennial of our national independence. So, following his lead, in what sense is our republic democratic? In two respects this is so, first: All authority exercised under our Constitution goes back to choices made by the people in selecting political leaders both in the states and at the national level. Thus even our federal judges, with their life tenure, exercise authority by presidential selection and senate approval, and the president and senate are chosen by the people. There are no hereditary offices in our fundamental law. Secondly, the Constitution itself rests on the approval of the people; it rests, in other words, on the rights of the people affirmed in our moral constitution, the Declaration of Independence.
Many of the recent cries over the “crisis of democracy” and “threat to democracy” were not only exaggerated, but were also partisan shorthand for directing attention at then-President Trump’s rhetoric on January 6. Those cries would have been better formulated, as a crisis posed to our republic by lawlessness. Perhaps then that flaw would have been easier seen as widespread in our society including our universities. Perhaps then it would have been seen that President Trump’s speech and some of his other efforts represented, not legally culpable lawlessness, but the pushing of one interpretation of one aspect of how our fundamental law, the Constitution, should work. This was an interpretation embraced by at least some Democrats at every counting of electoral votes in recent Republican presidential victories. Happily, this was not an understanding that then-Vice President Pence, following sound conservative advice, embraced.
Can we inform our current discussions with precise naming and accurate descriptions? Can we truly learn from our past experiences? Do we have the honesty to face up to the fact that democracy is not an assured given, but has always been problematic? It is not a reality or a sacred value like human life. With proper safeguards, it can be a solution to the great difficulties of living together in community with respect for human dignity.
Let me end by noting two hopeful welcome developments in the aftermath of our recent election. One is found in our capacity to notice that the United States has experienced and benefitted from a populist cleansing of an entrenched ruling class at several points in our history. The elections of Thomas Jefferson, Andrew Jackson, and Theodore Roosevelt were all seen by many as threats to our Constitution and way of life. One need not champion every one of the measures of these populists in order to appreciate that reforms came from these perceived perilous moments, good results facilitated by the procedural and other limits of our Constitution. There is no reason to think that the deep state, the administrative state of a highly powerful central government, is the final form of an illusory perfect democracy or our democratic republic.
Finally, we must notice and appreciate the peaceful, orderly, and friendly efforts at transition exemplified by President Biden and other Democratic office holders. This is affirming the best of our Constitutional practices. These efforts are, no doubt, at least partly inspired by a desire to justly shame President-elect Trump for his handling of transition four years ago. Some Republicans will likely see these efforts as virtue-signaling hypocrisy alike to the embrace of the “threat to democracy” refrain by the universities and the media. Let us, however, recall the wise observation that hypocrisy is the deference that vice pays to virtue. And let us hope that this is a bit of real public virtue and a little light coming through the clouds. Virtue in citizens and their leaders is the critical ingredient for “keeping” a stable and good republican government in our land.
Walter Nicgorski is a Rover faculty advisor and Professor Emeritus in the Program of Liberal Studies.
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