America

Tyranny without monarchs: America

In a modern rendering of Nietzsche's declaration "God is dead," America offers modern man the ability to assert the same regarding democracy. If American democracy, a victim of terminal cancer dating back nearly a century, is not yet dead it will be soon. Who destroyed it, one asks? Similarly, the post-Holocaust question "who killed the Jews?" The same answer: you and I, our parents, the rich, the powerful, the poor in essence, everyone and no one, our evolution and our ignorance.

"We would like to live as we once lived, but history will not permit it," said John F. Kennedy. But America has sacrificed too many of the liberties granted to its people and its own liberal tradition surrounding John Locke's "social contract," the government's protection of the individual. Within that agreement, citizens are afforded the power to overthrow an oppressive government - their own, not one in Iraq - so as to guarantee themselves liberty. On the same note, Thomas Jefferson once said "Never trust your government. The price of freedom is eternal vigilance. A revolution is needed every twenty years just to keep the government honest."

Which brings us to our first point, the overbearing power of government and the ignorance of mainstream political doctrines. Modern liberals, who have perverted the classical principles beyond recognition, now fight, at the least, for gun control and perhaps the banning of firearms altogether. Modern conservatives, entirely forgetting why, argue in favor of the Bill of Rights.

What seems as faraway problems to most of us, the American government daily increases its power over the individual through the PATRIOT Act, the abandonment of protection against unconstitutional search and seizure in some states, enormous taxation for superfluous programs, the undertaking of multiple undeclared wars and the destruction of human life. The purpose of America's tripartite government and the ability for branches to check one another in order to balance power diminishes as each of those branches equally violates the limits of its power. The citizens are left to defend themselves and as Jefferson said, "The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to keep and bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government." But imagine George Orwell's character Winston Smith fighting against Big Brother in "1984." Is it still possible? Or has Uncle Sam already claimed too much power for himself? Smith writes, "If there is hope, it lies in the prole[tariat]." Like in "1984" America largely comprises proletariat, the working class, which has grown far too docile in the last half century to see a need to regain forgotten rights and the importance of maintaining the right to bear arms.

Those rights, now in consideration of the economic level, began to be lost to attrition at the start of America's woes: our entrance into World War I. Abandoning its isolationist policies, America began its history of feeding the military industrial complex - aiding America from the Great Depression, yes, but also serving as a basis for the government to justify war in other ways, denying public opinion or manipulating it through irrationality. As a result, America grants itself a free ticket to mold the world like a piece of clay according to its own want. As a result, the international community turns into a divided world of haves and have-nots, just as we see it taking place now within America's own borders.

In America, the gap between the rich and poor continues to grow. While classical liberalism and the philosophers of the Enlightenment supported, as did the Founding Fathers in their wake, the laissez-faire system of capitalism, they did not intend for the system to grow to oppressive extremes. As American writer Gore Vidal puts it, "The genius of our ruling class is that it has kept a majority of the people from ever questioning the inequity of a system where most people drudge along, paying heavy taxes for which they get nothing in return."

America's history of economics should be likened to the construction of a pyramid; at the base broad and even like wealth. But as time goes on, the growing elevation of the pyramid makes each new level smaller and smaller, more and more concentrated until there exists no wealth but in the top-most, elite block of stone.

Jefferson predicted this evolution, writing "If the American People ever allow private banks to control the issue of their currency, first by inflation then by deflation, the banks and the corporations that will grow up around them, will deprive the people of all property until their children wake up homeless on the continent their forefathers conquered." Hence, the slippery slope of depravation, as we see it inching forward today, divides the few rich from the masses of impoverished until democracy can no longer sustain itself. Andrew Jackson predicted similar socioeconomic progress, saying "If the people only understood the rank injustice of our money and banking system there would be a revolution before morning," though obviously nothing of the sort has ever taken place.

But history shows us when economic gaps reach a breaking point, Marxism prevails, the pyramid collapses violently and the base begins again but with new direction. Franklin D. Roosevelt once said "The hope of the republic cannot forever tolerate either undeserved poverty or self-serving wealth," yet capitalism continues to evolve, supporting both.

In a democracy, each of these problems can be solved and as Bill Clinton put it, "There is nothing wrong with America that cannot be cured with what is right in America." But those words were obviously spoken before the 2000 presidential election, when American democracy proved to the citizens its incapability and failure to hear the people's voice. Additionally, Congress's failure to pass campaign finance reform perpetuates the two party system in every election. Voters are not offered a realistic third choice candidate and never two from the same party, despite their potential worthiness. As Vidal once said, "Apparently, a democracy is a place where numerous elections are held at great cost without issues and with interchangeable candidates."

Furthermore, the pathetic pool of candidates adds to the voting problem. When Gov. John G. Rowland accepts deals from businesses under the table which result in federal investigations, what does this say about Connecticut voters? We have either made a terrible choice or have received a man we did not expect. In other cases, officials display their disrespect for voters' interests, putting the notion of a democratic republic at odds with itself.

While voting should be the last resort of protection against government, before citizens exercise their right to bear arms according to the intentions of the Bill of Rights, it has proved a failure to bring unselfish, capable candidates into office or to hold a major election without the blunders of Florida ballot counters.

The Founding Fathers, who above all understood America, what it was and should have been, foresaw the destruction of itself. John Adams, a heavy proponent of the natural rights of man, a drafter of the Declaration of Independence and the second U.S. President, once said "Remember, democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts and murders itself. There never was a democracy yet that did not commit suicide."

But as modern Americans, we have a responsibility: "we dare not forget today that we are the heirs of that first revolution," as Kennedy once said. American democracy, where "The common people [are] considered as the primary source of political power," has lost its essence. The people have been, or are being, robbed of their power as well as their natural rights day by day. American history now reaches an age where we see a historical cycle and a new need has grown again similar to the desperation prior to the Revolution.

As Thomas Paine said, "Open your eyes. Accept the painful truth. Do something to correct the wrong."

Sources:

[1] "Another right bites the dust". The Daily Campus. 5 April, 2004.
[2] The Twilight of American Culture. Berman, Morris. 2000.
[3] "The American Heritage College Dictionary".