The Sidney herald., 1961-02-08
On The Differences Between
A Democracy And A Republic

Historically both words, Democracy and Republic, have been
Nor is there any denial that these shades overlap to some extent
dictionaries, to regard democracy as the generic Fl term a. and and a re- re.
public as merely one species of democracy. This is not supported
The word democracy comes from the Greek, and is concerned
from IN very beginning with the form of rule, or the source of
governmental power and the method by which it is exercised.
oig mrch 4 AZ . y p @e RT0p and n no@nGet OF rule dd by Ggra an naa autocTa c, or
this rule by the people to degenerate into mobocracy that by the
government to speak Of Of it as a democracy y@s l'''Si 70 any
"the nnbiiic affairc" o. roW tbe acOmro ug L ,oai ;, Inc t5a 9ny
how those public affairs are conducted or the common wen-being
originated ever had a republic, or any. thing resembling one.
tuted so much of our language into deceptive reversals, the term
has been applied, almost universally and with ready acceptance,
to Such widely different states as Rome in its earliest centuries,
Venice, Poland in the 10th through the 18th centuries, the United
Netherlands Confederation of the same period, the Swiss Re-
public, various French governments, and the United States of
AmerIca a; Some y these were mSnarchleS leven at times absolute
five democracies. so far as the form of government is our con-
statesmen and political scientists and historians and the inform
was ruled according to the well established laws whether set
forth by statutes, by precedents, or by written constitutions
and not simply by the whim of the monarch. or of the oligarchy,
or of a temporary majority of the voters. "The rule of laws, not
is the essence of the whole difference between a democracy
and a republic. Democracy is the rule of men, not bound by laws
built Up by demagogues to support the demagogues' disdain for
tradition and precedent = which laws cannot be changed except
= Fvoen4 T ub uti1i1ed Nv 49, 9e n gi+ tvJ w tTy VGS rnoI
city-state or an American township or village, democracy has
is no longer practicable, and it is necessary for the voters to
select representatives to make the actual decisions and do the
governing for them, does the deterioration into a moboGracys
a representative democracy" from early stability through mob
once again, was telescoped by the French Revolution into a period
OF a few short years. This was beaeuse Of the excessive steam
for the course Of a Representative democracy" as a form of
government for large units. nevertheless.
Although our republic was established before the French
Ee tEo Q had supplied this horrible example, our founding
cracy. They wan!ed no part of one for our national government.
publican form Of eoVernmenf toes each 6 Of Of { se 70 se Se45in states, rf It
does not even mention a democracy or a democratic form of
government once. And one of the very few times the FederaliSt
Papers (which tell us most of what we know about the thinking
that went into our constitution even mention a democracy, is in
Federalist Paper No. 10, where Madison does so in order TO show
If Washington and Hamilton and Jefferson and Madison and
al = the other great men of our constitutional convention had
forms OF government, they would have provided something else.
believe, and both mans age-old experience with government
and Dbl his most t carefully reasoned e theories support their choice;
archy does presuppose the ultimate responsibility of the COVER
public but only a king by-in theory, anyway-the consent of the
governed. So that the governed do have the inherent right, and
usually the opportunity, to make changes even in the basic laws
through which the republic functions. And when the govern
mental form is the same as that of a Representative democracy"
the danger of a breakdown of the legal guard rails of the re-
So that the greatest fault Of a republic is the likelihood of it's
deteriOrating into a democracy. And of this, too, our forefathers
end Of the Constitutional Convention: what have you given us,
MI. franklin, his answer was: "a republic, Madam, if you
His fear was well founded. For today, because of the utterly
constitution itself we have already gone far towards losing that
whims of the electorate, which made us a republic instead of a
democracy. The formerly slow erosion of our constitutional guar
1GOC OC(0thC q NJ AObSNhS oNoy OlOC1 lO IL dIhlu
Administration and those which have succeeded it. First, the
Executive Department began to attack and crcumvent the Con-
Sttuion. Then the Legislative Department began supinely to
surrender its rights and to fail in its duties under the Consttu-
ton. And then the Judicial Department began, in brazen and
criminal violation of the oaths of office Of individual justices,
lesser courts. Until today the conversion of our republic into
a democracy and the preparatory steps sor making it a mobo-
cracy are already far advanced. With the tyranny of a complete
ly lawless dictatorship as the ultimate stage and goal
OF course none Of this just happened. The tremendous forces
at work, deliberately to speed up this degeneration of our re-
public, can best DC typfied by the large foundations. They have
for decades been working under the secret but visible directive:
60 to change the economic and political structure of the United
States mat 1t can be comfortably merged with Soviet Russia.
They have set the pace for the whole oemagogic tribe that
many of them unaware of where they were heading or who was
pushing them has sought not only to make is a democracy but
10 convince the American people that we are supposed to be a
democracy. For acceptance of that change, from a republic, is
an al-inclusive step of tremendous importance on the road to the
rule of a Communist tyrant, with neither laws nor precedents
majority rule" as the unchecked and immediate arbiter of the
fate Of minorites and majoriies alike is the great and dangerous
criminal fraud, which our forefatherS so much feared, and tried
as well as they knew how to prevent
In summary, democracy is government by majority vote,
whether direct in a pure democracy or by one step removed in
a representative democracy. 1t provides no protection of the
rights of minoriues nor even Of the best interests of the major
tiles themselves, against the sudden whims of the electorate or
the results of the voters gullibility. And those who. through
ignorance or greed or Indifference, will allow their glorious re-
public to be converted into so despcable a pretense OF civilized
government, deserve the ultimate ensaivement INTO which that
transition is designed to lead them. But the framework of what
was given us by our ancestors is not yet destroyed The destruc-
ton now going on can be stopped and inner damages an-with
enough determination-stl be repaired. Ours is a republic, not
a democracy. Let's keep it that way.
C~o~co~oJ pu Y Cfrdv Grouu