NationStates Jolt Archive


REPUBLIC OR DEMOCRACY (Definitions by US Government)

Windly Queef
13-02-2005, 02:43
*It's funny how a simple idea has motioned everyone to think we [Americans] are what we aren't. I believe FDR was the first to really sell people on the whole 'Democracy' thing. Then the idea is enacted on, and the Consitution ignored.


The following was taken from U.S. Government Training Manual, No. 2000-25 dated WAR DEPARTMENT, Washington, November 30, 1928 and prepared under direction of the Chief of Staff.

DEMOCRACY: A government of the masses. Authority derived through mass meeting or any other form of "direct" expression. Results in mobocracy. Attitude toward property is communistic- negating property rights. Attitude toward law is that the will of the majority shall regulate, whether it be based upon deliberation or governed by passion, prejudice, and impulse, without restraint or regard to consequences. Results in demagoguism, license, agitation, discontent, anarchy.

REPUBLIC: Authority is derived through the election by the people of public officials best fitted to represent them. Attitude toward property is respect for laws and individual rights, and a sensible economic procedure. Attitude toward law is the administration of justice in accord with fixed principals and established evidence, with a strict regard to consequences. A greater number of citizens and extent of territory may be brought within its compass. Avoids the dangerous extreme of either tyranny or mobocracy. Results in statesmanship, liberty, reason, justice, contentment, and progress.
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The reader now has the difference between a Democracy and a Republic. In the beginning scenario, you could in a Republic build anything you wish on your property, paint any buildings any color you wish, landscape as you wish, and you most certainly could not be charged rent on property you own. (By the way, the ordinances are not made up but exist in many cities or parts of cities across this land.)

In a Democracy, all are subject to the whims of the few or the majority, although it is usually the few dictating what cannot be dictated when one is free and living in Liberty. After all, it is seldom that the majority of People even vote. If not, then the majority is actually a minority of all the People.

The writer hopes that the reader understands that Liberty - the free expression of all Rights - exists only when Rights cannot be voted or legislated away. Republic is the only form of government that demands this.

You decide. Do you want a democracy in which the many or the few can tell you what to do, or do you want a Republic in which the individual man and woman are the sovereign, with all Rights and expression of Rights defended?
Nsendalen
13-02-2005, 02:45
Jeez, that's so far skewed it's a Normal.
Itinerate Tree Dweller
13-02-2005, 02:50
The democracy is the state you live in.
The republic is the nation as a whole.
Vegas-Rex
13-02-2005, 02:57
We're a Democratic Rebublic: ruled by set laws and representatives ultimately chosen by the people. We can be moblike or effective depending on how things turn out.
Windly Queef
13-02-2005, 02:59
Ask the War Department in 1928; then ask those whom wrote the Consitution. For some reason, I think their writings will be more or less an objective opinion of such. What people desire is totally different, though.

I would assume some people on this board would want the Constitution thrown away, in place of the will of 51% of them (or muchless). Others are more conservative, and want only portions of it ignored. Yet it's rare that anyone respects that document as it is. We weren't legally meant to be this way.
Windly Queef
13-02-2005, 03:02
The democracy is the state you live in.
The republic is the nation as a whole.

The state is still a Republic, per the definition up above. The state Constitution puts down the restrictions and roles of the said government. As long as it's within those restraints, then a republic of representives votes in a democratic fashion. That doesn't imply a democracy. The difference is subtle, but there is a difference.
Windly Queef
13-02-2005, 03:11
In other words...

Representives vote for their 'people'.

They're limited in what they can pass, if it doesn't follow 'the Constitution' or their own.

In a Constitution based Republic, a nation can have states within a common set of rules, while any state can move progressively to their own political directions. As long as they stay within their restraints, then they are deemed pausible.

Restraints is the key word.