The Electoral College: A Check on Excess Democracy

As a delegate in the U.S. constitutional convention, Governeur Morris stated on July 19, 1787 that the proposed National Executive (i.e. the U.S. President) should be “a firm guardian of the people and of the public interest.” (1)  Given this role, Morris maintained that it “cannot be possible that a man shall have sufficiently distinguished himself to merit this high trust without having his character proclaimed by fame throughout the Empire.” (2)   In other words, presiding requires a requisite credibility or stature that may be difficult to find in a territory on the scale of an empire.

The E.U. has obviated this problem by having presidencies of particular E.U. governmental bodies the a state government serving in the E.U. Presidency, a figure-head “office” based on a six-month rotation. The U.S., on the other hand, put all of their eggs in one basket in terms of having one president with substantial power in being commander in chief and having a legislative veto as well as a “bully pulpit.” Considerable emphasis is thus placed on the office’s selection process.

In the constitutional convention, Morris believed that the people at large “would be as likely as any that could be devised to produce [a President] of distinguished Character.” (3) Morris was assuming that at least one candidate can be found whose character has been proclaimed by fame throughout the Empire. Differing from Morris, Gerry argued on July 19 in the convention that the “people are uninformed, and would be misled by a few designing men. He urged the expediency of an appointment of the Executive by Electors to be chosen by the State Executives.” (4)  In other words, suitable candidates could exist, but the people would not be sufficiently aware of their characters to discern the wheat from the chaff.

Electors selected by the governors and presidents of the States would be of lesser number and thus able to come to know the candidates and thus avoid electing a lemon. However, Williamson, also on July 19, “had no great confidence in the Electors to be chosen for the special purpose. . . . They would be liable to undue influence.” (5) Even so, the convention voted that the President would be appointed by electors to be chosen by the State legislatures.

Williamson turned out to be right; the political parties have had tight influence on the States’ electors. The electors would also prove to be excessively subject to the influence of the  citizens who vote for them, rather than being a check on the passions and ignorance of the wider public.  In other words, the selection process has come to enervate an intended check on the democracy of the moment (e.g., the flavor of the month).  Presidential elections have become virtual popularity contests.  The matter of finding someone with sufficient maturity and credibility to preside over the common good has been lost.  Accordingly, the presidents have been highly partisan—even going against their campaign promises for political expediency. My point is that we can look beyond the individual presidents and find that the selection process itself is perhaps biased against producing good governance.

It seems to me that a better alternative would be to have the governors of the States meet together to select the U.S. President. The governors are apt to know the candidates (or can meet them), and could assess them from the standpoint of presiding and executing law. Lest this alternative be thought to slight representative democracy, it could be pointed out that governors are popularly elected and thus accountable to the people.

In actuality, the alternative is both rooted in democracy and capable of providing a check on some of its drawbacks (e.g., popularity contests). Perhaps having the governors select the office would prompt voters to take their governor races more seriously. Additionally, this alternative might provide a needed check on the encroachment of the Federal Government onto the domains of the States (i.e., beyond the enumerated powers in the US Constitution), since the State governments lost their involvement in the U.S. Government in 1913 when U.S. Senators were no longer appointed by the State governments.

In short, the move would strength democracy as well as federalism. This is merely one alternative; doubtless other good ones exist as well.  My main point is that such alternatives should be dug up and debated using the American media and our representatives as conduits. We ignore the bias in the selection process at our own peril. Slighting the problem is itself indicative of the danger in the current process.

1. James Madison, Notes in the Federal Convention of 1787. New York: Norton, 1987, p. 324.

2. Ibid.

3. Ibid., p. 327.

4. Ibid.

5. Ibid., pp. 328-29.

Royalty: Natural or Exaggerated?

On April 29, 2011, the world watched in utter fascination as a crown prince in one of the E.U. states married a wealthy commoner in London's Westminster Church--the same edifice in which Queen Elizabeth had married in 1947.  The prince is of course William, and his bride is Kate (or Catherine to the purists), who in one hour's time went from being the daughter of two wealthy commoners to royalty.  It is as though she leap-frogged from “the many” past “the few” to join “the one”--the firm. My question is whether these distinctions, involving birth as well as wealth, are natural in terms of human nature or exaggeraged artifices borne of excessive privilege and power.

The seemingly-eternal tripartite division was on display during the wedding, as throngs watched large screens in large parks and crowded pubs while a relative few, which had been invited to attend the ceremony in person, took their seats inside the church after which the royal family arrived with great attention to each individual member. Of course, “the one” literally refers to the person of the monarch, Queen Elizabeth II, who uniquely stood deliberately silent as the congregation sang “God Save the Queen.” One might ask whether having a living human be the subject of a national anthem evinces a category mistake wherein a person is taken for the nation as a whole (i.e., an abstraction). Does aristocracy go so far as to end up as standing for a nation itself?

Thomas Jefferson and John Adams both referred to a natural aristocracy of virtue and talent. Such differences do indeed exist between people, and thus are generally agreed to be quite natural. Indeed, most people view it fitting that distinguishing people by their character or effort is a perfectly valid basis for rewards. The two American founders also wrote of an artificial aristocracy based on birth and wealth. While nobility and royalty are typically associated with the latter, a monarch may also serve as a check on the sort of artificial wealth that grabs more than it is entitled to on the basis of character and effort. In other words, a king or queen, being in the job for life, can in theory protect titles from simply being bought. This potential benefit of royalty implies a downside to the aristocracy in the American republics wherein what counts is the size of one’s bank account rather than whether one has been raised well and is talented.

In virtually any of the American states, for example, a boorish used-car businessman or subprime mortgage salesman who has become newly rich by providing lemons could join a country club and thus be reckoned as part of his city’s aristocracy. Similarly, wealthy CEOs like Lew Glucksman and Dick Fuld of Lehman Brothers could be members of the most exclusive country club in New York and yet lack “gentlemanly traits.” Such qualities cannot be purchased like some commodity traded by investment banks; instead, a gentleman is fashioned from birth. Such natural aristocracy is beyond the reach of the vast wealth of the sort like the envious Glucksman and the childish Fuld even if they could buy themselves into exclusive country clubs. In a European state such as Britain, however, the monarch could theoretically forestall a grasping capitalist from buying a title. Hence, even a rich CEO in Europe can remain a commoner regardless of his or her wealth, which in an American state would clearly differentiate him or her from the masses in terms of exclusivity and privilege.  This is not to say, however, that European aristocracy and royalty are without their downsides.

That Kate Middleton, a millionaire’s daughter, would be lumped together with the other “commoners” only to become royal in marriage ignores the rather obvious economic distinction between rich and poor. That is to say, because of Kate's parents’ wealth, there was something artificial in Kate being referred to as a commoner before her wedding. Moreover, royalty itself might be a highly artificial construct in so far as royals come to believe they do not share humanness with other people.

The director Ken Loach points to the irrationality in the behavior of “commoners” when they ignore the artificiality that is in the expectations of royals. Good people “have knelt before the Queen at some point in their lives. . . . the woman you’re kneeling before represents all that is wrong with this country—inherited wealth, inherited privilege, the apex of the class system. Let’s have a bit more dignity than to crawl before that woman, please.” In other words, subjects as well as monarchs are adults and they should all act the part. There is something undignified for people such as the Middletons who created a business from scratch regressing to childlike behavior in front of a person simply because that person is regarded as the symbol of the state. Furthermore, there is something insulting in the royals referring to the Middletons as commoners because the appelation does not recognize the family's achievement in business.

Perhaps Europeans have the potential benefit in royals acting as a check on ugly usurpers grabbing off too much societally, yet at the cost of artificiality in the royal-aristocrat-commoner distinction wherein the common human denominator in all three is ignored or relegated. Ironically, I suspect that the royals themselves may be among the casualties in the severing of a recognition that we are all human beings. In addition to holding themselves to standards of behavior that may be at odds with human nature itself, royals may tend to forget that commoners are just as human as are nobles and royals. For example, we all die, and none of us knows what, if anything, is in store for us after death. So while there are real and artificial distinctions, there is also the shared basis in all of us being human. Accordingly, my instinct should I come in contact with a royal would be to relate to him or her simply as another person, whose need for genuine human contact is just as real as mine.

Source on Ken Loach: “Between Commodity and Communication: Has Film Fulfilled Its Potential?” International Socialist Review, 76 (March-April 2011), 28-44, p. 44.

See my related essay, "On the "Wedding of the Century': History Made or Manufactured?"

The U.S. House of Representatives: An Aristocratic or People’s House?

“Between 1984 and 2009, the median net worth of a member of the House rose by more than 2 ¹/₂ times, according to the analysis of financial disclosures, from $280,000 to $725,000 in inflation-adjusted 2009 dollars, excluding home ­equity. Over the same period, the wealth of an American family has declined slightly, with the comparable median figure sliding from $20,600 to $20,500, according to the Panel Study of Income Dynamics from the University of Michigan.” This comparison excludes home equity because it was not included in congressional reporting.
These statistics support the view extant in the U.S. Federal Constitutional Convention that relative to all of the representatives in the legislatures of the several states, the “few” in the U.S. House of Representatives gave that body an aristocratic quality. This fear did not necessarily translate into a belief that the federal system itself would be consolidated as a consequence. Even so, aside from the growing economic distance between the U.S. House reps and their constituents, the increasing wealth can be taken as a baleful indication of a funneling of wealth and political power in ever tighter circles. In other words, the statistics support those who urge that more governmental power be shifted from Congress back to the semi- and residual-sovereign state legislatures.
While it is true that the delegates at the federal convention feared excess democracy, which was notably against the interest of creditors such as themselves, in the state legislatures (e.g. Massachusetts), it can be argued that his bias left them (and the constitution they drafted) vulnerable to political (and economic) consolidation, with Congressional power (and wealth) effectively setting its own limits. The statistics may give an unsuspecting public pause in taking seriously the proposition that the federal system should be readjusted so as to achieve better balance, which in turn enables more viable checks on the abuse of power—whether in Washington, D.C. or Topeka.

Source:

Peter Whoriskey, “Growing Wealth Widens Distance Between Lawmakers and Constituents,” The Washington Post, December 26, 2011.

The U.S. Senate as Protector of the Interests of the Rich

In the U.S. Constitutional Convention, Governeur Morris said on July 2, 1787, that the “Rich will strive to establish their dominion & enslave the rest. They always did. They always will. The proper security [against] them is to form them into a separate interest.” (Madison, p. 233) By this he meant the U.S. Senate. The democratic principle in the U.S. House and the aristocratic spirit in the U.S. Senate “will then controul each other.” (Madison, p. 233) Having the State Legislatures appoint their U.S. Senators—as was the case until 1913—would defeat the independence of the Senate, and hence its function as a check on the excesses of democracy in the U.S. House.  Such excesses had just been evinced in Shays’ Rebellion in Massachusetts, wherein the legislature there had sided with the former soldiers who had not been paid for their service but were still to make payments on their debts.

In other words, one of the purposes of the U.S. Senate as originally envisioned was to protect property (including creditor interests). The assumption was that the representative democracy of the U.S. House would favor the lower classes.  Although the amounts spent on Senatorial campaigns in after the turn of the twenty-first century practically guarantee that the seats would defend the interests of the rich, that the Senators are elected by citizens rather than appointed by State governments must compromise the U.S. Senate as a check on the democratic excesses in the U.S. House. Even as this check has been enervated, the protection of wealth function endures. 

Indeed, given Shaws’ Rebellion the check on excess democracy is really just the protection of property, which is practially guaranteed anyway by the amounts needed to run for the U.S. Senate.  Not surprisingly, in 2010 the medium wealth of a U.S. Senator was roughly $2.8 million. It is worth quoting from Governeur Morris again—this time from July 19 in Convention. “Wealth tends to corrupt the mind & to nourish its lvoe of power, and to stimulate it to oppression.” (Madison, p. 323)  As the number of electors per member of the U.S. House has increased, even that body could be said to evince a moneyed aristocracy.  The question may thus be raised: Is there a sufficient check against the rich in the national legislature?

Governeur Morris claimed in convention that the U.S. President “should be the guardian of the people, even of the lower classes” on account of the wealth-interest in the U.S. Senate. (Madison, p. 322). However, if the wealth interest has gained a foothold in the U.S. House and even in the presidency itself, that check may well be insufficient and nugatory. A return of domestic functions of government to those of the respective States could perhaps evince a greater weight for what Morris calls “the Mass of the people.” (Madison, p. 323)  At the very least, the lower houses of the State governments are not dominated by the rich. This was precisely what the delegates of the convention wanted to check, and the creation of a general government was their solution. It is no wonder that it has become top-heavy both at the expense of federalism and the poor.

Source:

James Madison, Notes in the Federal Convention of 1787 (New York: Norton, 1987).