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Greetings, my friends.
In this modern world, we who have the privilege of living
in free, democratic countries, often overlook the dangers
of democracy.
While there is no better world system in existence that I
know of at this time, democracy can be a disastrous system
if it is not carefully controlled.
Oh - oh! I can almost feel the temperatures rising and
the tension building.... but think about it.
A democracy gives the power of government to the people.
What this means is that the people ultimately are in
charge of the policies and laws of the country.
This means that if the majority of the people think that
a certain candidate has the right answers, even if he/she
is wrong, that candidate will be elected. If enough
candidates are elected who have the wrong answers, the
wrong laws will be passed, and the country will go
downhill.
Technically speaking, the US is not and never was a democracy... It is a republic form of government in its original context. Democracy in itself is simply majority rule.. In government, this is tyranny and mob rule.... Vigilantee Justice is a typical democracy...
A republic, such as the system in the US, or a
parliamentary system, such as used in Canada or the U.K.,
uses a democratic system to elect respresentatives
of the people from across the land, but also has
intrenched laws, such as those found in the constitution,
to prevent the abuse of democracy.
An stark example of how democracy could be abused, for
example, is if a referendum was put to the people
calling for the total annhilation of a certain ethnic group
in that country. If it passed, without there being laws
already in place to prevent such obvious abuse, then the
group in question could be legally eliminated without
recourse.
Do you think that a democratic system can't go down the
slippery slope to the point where such extreme human rights
abuses or other bizarre laws could be passed?
Think again. In my country (Canada) we have as part of our
constitution a clause (Section Thirty-three of the
Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms) called The Not
Withstanding Clause.
In a nutshell, it says, "The federal Parliament or a provincial legislature may declare a law or part of a law to apply temporarily "notwithstanding" countermanding sections of the Charter, thereby nullifying any judicial review by overriding the Charter protections for a limited period of time. This is done by including a section in the law clearly specifying which rights have been overridden. The rights to be overridden, however, must be either a fundamental right (e.g., section 2 freedom of speech, religion, association, etc), a legal right (e.g., liberty, search and seizure, cruel and unusual punishment, etc), or a section 15 equality right. Other rights such as section 6 mobility rights, democratic rights, and language rights are inalienable."
The problem with the system is that 1.) any federal or
provincial government can, at its own discretion, invoke
this clause and eliminate certain laws that have been
made to protect the individual.
2.) the federal government can pass a new law that the
majority of the people of the land despise, then revoke
Section 33 (as the previous government here promised to
do had they been elected in order to make it impossible
for laws they had passed to be changed).
Either way, there are serious flaws in the system that
are open to abuse if not very closely watched.
We, who live under the great and blessed freedom of a
democratic system must be ever vigilant in protecting
our freedom and calling our elected representatives to
account, as the same system that gives us such amazing
freedom can also be used to take it all away.
Always keep your eyes open, pay attention to what the
politicians are doing, question everything they do whether
you like them or not, and get out to vote when the
opportunity arises.
Apathy is the greatest enemy of democracy.
God bless,
Dave
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