The Clio messenger. (Clio, Mich.) 1907-current, 1920-07-15
Democracy or Autoeraey2


thority TO enforce the laws.
Democracy or Autocracy7
All down through history two the
cries of government have been at war.
One is that the majority shall rule
the other, that the minority shall rule.
The people struggling for freedom
have battled for the former; the few
seeking special privileges have fought
for the latter. The first is democrat
ic, the second autocratic. No compro-
mise is possible; there is no middle
ground. These two antagonistic ideas
have nothing in common; like parallel
lines, they can never meet, in their
nature they are separate and apart.
The government of the late kaiser Of
Germany, the government of Nicholas.
the autocrat of Russia, were founded
on the idea that the minority shall
rule. History shows that minority
rule has always enslaved the major
ity. The rule of q minority over
majority means slavery for the many.
Ii is human nature. The principle
always works the same result. II IL
is political meeting and the minor
ity runs II, the result is a machine
and q boss. When il is a nation, you
have a bureaucracy and dictator, de-
irving his power not from the consent
of the governed, but from the bay
onets OF the army. There may be room
for honest differences of opinion be-
tUaau hnnacf p1ar ON many questions
but there is not any room for differ
ence of opinion among honest free
men on the proposition that minority
rule is a menace.
In Article III Of the bolshevik con-
stitution we find incOntrOvertible evil
dence that the government Of soviet
Russia is built on the tyrant's stone,
minority rule. Section % reads:
1.-The All-Russian congress is COM
posed of representatives of city sow
cts in the ratio of one delegate for
every $4,000 voters, and of represent
atives of the soviets of the provinces in
the ratio of one delegate for every
$4,000 inhabitants"
Discrimination Against Peasants.
No explanation is given for basing
the representation in congress from
the cities on the number Of voters,
while the representation in congress
from the provinces Is based on the
number of inhabitants. The words are
not synonyms, a voter is an inhabit-
ant Of certain age and possessing GER
tain qualifications. An inhabitant is
anyone who lives Ina the province, re-
CARELESS of age or qualifications. IL
the word inhabitant Is given the same
meaning that the word voter is given,
then ii is apparent that the constitu-
ton unjustly dscriminates against
the poor peasant" AS they have had
no general elections in Russia. il is
impossible to give the official construc-
ton of these two words. II the word
inhabitant means any man, woman or
child living In the province, the dis
termination against the poor peas
ants" is just as obvious, although IL
does not go to the same length. AS
an Illustration, IL we read this i'm
portant provision of the constitution
giving to the word inhabitant the same
meaning as we give to the word voter,
then we see that the voters of the
city have one congressman for every
$1,000, while the poor peasants"
have one congressman for every 1885,
600. If we construe the word voter
10 mean the qualified legal voter, and
the word inhabitant TO mean any hui
man being living in the provinces, we
learn that the people of the city have
,,a ..,u.,.ao,on fnr avary 900