@krazy kaju,
krazy kaju wrote:According to the American Heritage Dictionary...
Democracy
- Government by the people, exercised either directly or through elected representatives.
- A political or social unit that has such a government.
- The common people, considered as the primary source of political power.
- Majority rule.
Democracy is tyranny of the majority, as it gives power to the majority. Of course there are ways to limit this power, like the federalist system that the United States currently uses, but the majority still rules by electing governing officials. Democracy does not seek to do what is best for the majority, it seeks to let the majority rule unopposed. In this, it is tyrannical. Rule by nobody/everybody and self-governance are only found in individualist anarchism.
You are wrong, and the dictionary is wrong. It is possible for a country to be democratic, but not a democracy, just as it is possible for someone to be athletic without being an athelete. Democracy demands unity, equality, and justice for all. No majority rule system ever does more than throw a sop to the many for their consent so long as it is needed. Democracies live on the constant need for justice, because without justice common honor is not common. So, democracies seeks consensus, not to say: look where your forefather signed his name consenting to be ruled by some distant representative; but because consent is essential for the cause of justice. Self rule will never be majority rule. It may be better to suffer a dictatorship of the majority than of a minority; but neither is preferable to self government. First; no one should have a vote in any affair without having an interest. Second, everyone having an interest should have a vote. Third, no majority however great can avoid being whittled down to the barest margin necessary to control a whole people, so that only a larger half is required to control the smaller half, until the whole people is destroyed by halves. Only when the whole people must accept every act of government all the time and every day can we expect that government will protect us from enemies foreign and native, if only by inertia.
So, do not look at what we have for government as democracy. Look only at one simple fact: For their benefit and ease, the house of Representatives has limited its number several times. Why? The Constitution says not more than one representative for thirty thousand. Is that good reason to see the population double many times while the numbers in the house remain fixed? How is it that peoples past had greater numbers of representives in relation to the population? Were they more worthy, or needy of greater representation than are we? One can represent better two people than four, or two hundred better than four hundred. How can anyone faithfully represent 280,000 citizens? The house all on its own, to keep to itself some of the outrageous power of the Senate, and to make a sellers market in political favors out of the people house, agreed to limit the numbers of representatives. If you look at our government for the single most relevant reason why government does not work for the people, that is it; that the only part of the government meant to be responsive to the people has been freed from that need by its own hand.