In part 1 of this article, I covered some of the wisdom proclaimed by Americans of earlier times regarding the FACT that our nation was originally founded as a constitutional republic, and NOT as a democracy, which our Founders rightly feared as one of the WORST forms of government. I refer you again to the man who wrote at length about “republics and democracies”, one of my long-time heroes, John F. McManus, the President Emeritus of The John Birch Society, and author of the article in the January 18, 2021 issue of The New American magazine, titled, “ A Republic, If You Can Keep It”, from which, once again, I quote freely.
Back in 1952 the U.S. Army issued the new Field Manual 21-13, titled The Soldier’s Guide, which proclaimed the wonders of “democracy”. This manual was totally incorrect when it stated: “Because the U.S. is a democracy, the MAJORITY OF THE PEOPLE decide how our Government will be organized and run.” (Emphasis in the original manual). This praise of one of the worst forms of government known to man was, in my opinion, deliberate. The ancient Greeks, in their city-states, knew from experience just how hazardous to civic peace and real freedom democracies could be. Our Founders and those who came after them knew the same, for they had studied ancient history. Even in our 20th century, wise people were warning (and still are) about the severe dangers of a “democratic” form of government. For example:
- In 1931, in England, the Duke of Northumberland wrote a small book titled, “The History of World Revolution”, in which he said: “The adoption of Democracy as a form of Government by all European nations is fatal to good Government, to liberty, to law and order, to respect for authority, and to religion, and must eventually produce a state of chaos from which a new world tyranny will arise.”
- In 1939, two famous historians, Charles and Mary Beard, added their strong warning against “democracy” and in favor of remaining historically accurate, when in their book, America in Mid-passage, they wrote: At no time, at no place,…through no chosen agents, had the American people officially proclaimed the U.S. to be a democracy. The Constitution did not contain the word or any word lending countenance to it….When the Constitution was framed no respectable person called himself or herself a democrat.” (Quite an astute statement, because in my opinion, especially today, NO ‘respectable person’ would sink so low as to refer to himself or herself as a “democrat”, which is tantamount to declaring oneself as an ‘enemy of freedom’).
- Back in the 1950’s, Clarence Manion, Dean of Notre Dame Law School, gave his appraisal of “democracy”: “The honest and serious student of American history will recall that our Founding Fathers managed to write both the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution without using the term “democracy” even once. No…state Constitution contains any reference to the word.”
- In 1961, the Founder of the John Birch Society, Robert Welch, gave the memorable speech titled, “Republics and Democracies”, in which he said, “This is a Republic, not a Democracy. Let’s keep it that way.” In his talk Welch presented evidence proving that our Founders had established the U.S. as a ‘republic’ and had condemned ‘democracy’, warning that collectivist forces over many decades had worked to convert our American republic into a democracy in order to bring about a dictatorship. Welch understood well that “democracy” isn’t merely a final political goal but is a means to an end—the end being a Marxist/collectivist tyranny where the government elites rule over the serfs, as ALWAYS has happened in Marxist/communist dominated countries.
- In the 20th century, British writer K. Chesterton observed, “You can never have a revolution in order to establish a democracy. You must have a democracy in order to have a revolution.”
- Back in 1939, communist revolutionary Mao Tse-tung, a tyrannous butcher of the first magnitude in China, boldly proclaimed the absolute communist truth: “Taken as a whole, the Chinese revolutionary movement…embraces the two stages, i.e., the democratic and the socialist revolutions, which are essentially different revolutionary processes, and the second process can be carried through only after the first has been completed. The democratic revolution is the necessary preparation for the socialist revolution, and the socialist revolution is the inevitable sequel to the democratic revolution. The ultimate aim for which all communists strive is to bring about a SOCIALIST AND COMMUNIST SOCIETY.” (Emphasis mine).
If you’re familiar with The Communist Manifesto, you’ll recall that one of the “maxims” of his Marxist ‘New World Order’ was, “From each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs.” Most astute Americans who are relatively historically literate know that the “socialist revolution” which has been inundating the U.S. and its people has been going on for many generations, going back into the early decades of the 19th century. Imitating Marx, back in January, 1964, one of the WORST men to ever contaminate the presidential office, Lyndon B. Johnson, informed his countrymen in a speech: “We are going to try to take all of the money that we think is unnecessarily being spent and TAKE IT from the ‘haves’ and give it to the ‘have nots’ that need it so much.” Like many Dumbocrats of that time, LBJ was a corrupt progressive who practiced the Marxist principles of pitting class against class and race against race. Compared to the maggots that are running our national government today, however, old LBJ was a champion of free enterprise!
So WHY have the “powers that be”, who have run our federal government for generations, done their utmost to convince the American people that they live in a “democracy” and have always lived under that form of government? Could it be that they know the lessons of history that teach that “democracies” always destroy themselves, and always degenerate into various forms of TYRANNY? Perhaps we Americans need to restudy the wisdom of the 18th century historian, Alexander Tytler, Lord Woodhouselee (in Great Britain) who argued, “A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the voters discover that they can vote themselves largesse (freebies) from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates promising the most benefits (from the government) with the result that a democracy always collapses over loose fiscal policy, always followed by a dictatorship.”
Let’s face it---this push for “democracy” has only been possible because our venerable U.S. Constitution has been, and still is being, IGNORED, VIOLATED, AND CIRCUMVENTED. Our Founders defined and strictly limited the powers of the federal government because they rightly feared government. Our Constitution enumerates certain powers which were granted to the federal government—powers that DID NOT include most of the programs and giveaways it presently performs, such as agricultural subsidies to farmers, housing assistance programs, financial assistance to educational institutions, food stamps, etc. etc. and so forth! Under our once-honored constitution, Congress is NOT allowed to pass whatever law it pleases, but is ONLY authorized to pass laws that are constitutionally permitted.
I leave you with the following great wisdom from Robert Welch’s insightful speech back in 1961:
“Man has certain unalienable rights, which do not derive from
government…. And those…rights cannot be abrogated by the
vote of a majority any more than they can by the decree of a
conqueror. The idea that the vote of a people, no matter how
nearly unanimous, makes or creates or determines what is
right or just becomes as absurd and unacceptable as the idea
that right and justice are simply whatever a king says they are.
Just as the early Greeks learned to try to have their rulers and
themselves abide by the laws they had themselves established, so
man has now been painfully learning that there are more
permanent and lasting laws which cannot be changed by either
sovereign kings or sovereign people, but which must be observed
by both. And that government is merely a convenience, super-
imposed on Divine Commandments and on the natural law that
flows only from the Creator of man and man’s universe.”
I believe that Robert Welch defined the noble purpose of the Constitutional Republic we inherited from our brave and self-sacrificing Founders. It’s a shame that so many modern Americans not only do not subscribe to this wisdom, but seem so willing to be convinced by the vermin of the mainstream media and our vast bureaucracy that “democracies’ and “republics” are the exact same thing. As history has amply demonstrated, and, as I fear, our near future will verify, THEY ARE NOT!