I’m disappointed with the current state of politics in the United States of America. Not because the candidates I've voted for have won or lost. Not because policies have, or have not, gone the way I think they should. I’m disappointed because, it seems to me, running the country has become a power game, and elections more a sport than a time to come together and decide the business of our government.
The very language used--horse race, winning team, point spread--turns them to game. The candidates come out “boasting” of their feats, and deriding the opponents’, posturing reminiscent of the mudslinging that precedes wrestling matches.
Commanding our government is not a wrestling match. In his letters, Thomas Jefferson states, "The equal rights of man, and the happiness of every individual, are now acknowledged to be the only legitimate objects of government." Since we, as the people, are the government, our job becomes to promote and ensure the liberty and opportunity of everyone--not ourselves, not the few, not even the majority, but all.
According to Jefferson, again, this is done, not through wrangling, but through honest pursuit of truth. He further contends that it is the expression of differing opinions that uncovers truth. "Difference of opinion leads to enquiry, and enquiry, truth,” he wrote to P. H. Wendover, in 1815. Uncovering truth means honest debate and honest discussion.
I do not hear that taking place. I hear a lot of positioning, I hear a lot of rhetoric, I hear a lot of buzzwords and sound bites. True discussion would have each person truly hearing and understanding others’ positions. True discussion would clarify the rhetoric and define the buzzwords. True debate would tell not just what, but how something could be accomplished. I believe true debate would bring us, not to a 51-49 split, but to general agreement.
Dr. Phil often asks people on his show: “Are you fighting to be right, or are you trying to resolve the issues?” I think, as a nation, we should ask ourselves the same question.
Our job is not to decide a winner, or even to choose the person who presents the best ideas. Our job is to figure out how best to safeguard the liberty and happiness of our citizenry. When we have done that, we send the person to the capital whom we deem best able to carry out our wishes.
In 1787, Alexander Tyler, a Scottish history professor at The University of Edinburgh, made the statement: "A democracy is always temporary in nature . . . . A democracy will continue to exist up until the time that voters discover that they can vote themselves generous gifts from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates who promise the most benefits from the public treasury, with the result that every democracy will finally collapse due to loose fiscal policy, which is always followed by a dictatorship."
Tyler saw that each of the great civilizations of history followed a pattern “from bondage to spiritual faith; from spiritual faith to great courage; from courage to liberty; from liberty to abundance; from abundance to complacency; from complacency to apathy; from apathy to dependence; [and] from dependence back into bondage."
Our founding fathers thought Tyler was wrong. They had great faith in the human desire for justice, and in the human ability to reason. "If ever the earth has beheld a system of administration conducted with a single and steadfast eye to the general interest and happiness of those committed to it, one which, protected by truth, can never know reproach, it is that to which our lives have been devoted," wrote Jefferson to James Madison, in 1826.
It would be a shame to lay their work to waste, and to return to the bondage against which they revolted.
*In light of upcoming elections, I am reprising this essay. I think it still applies, not only to the United States' system, but to all democracies. My hope is that it will spur people to think about the purpose of government--and the part(s) they might play in achieving and maintaining a system that benefits everyone equitably.
