Chapter 5

Democracy and Its Decline

Democracy is a very bad form of government...

but all the others are so much worse.

- Former U.K. Prime Minister Winston Churchill

Former United Kingdom Prime Minister Winston Churchill, a longtime British statesman, noted historian, and 1953 winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature, highlights in the above quote how democracy is a bad form of government. Subsequently he offers how all other forms of government are much worse.

Critical thinking takes place in an issue area. In this book the issue area is civic life where democracy is the key component. The history of world democracy and in particular United States democracy are the main topics of this chapter. Democracy in a larger world context is covered in Chapter 6.

This chapter surveys democracy and presents several insights that are not often taught in most secondary school curriculums. First, we define democracy. Second, we survey the history of democracy. Third, we look at several issues pertaining to U.S. democracy as it developed over the past 250 years. Finally, we introduce how democracies decline, including decline in the United States over the last decade. With the information in this chapter U.S. citizens will be better prepared to employ critical thinking in their civic lives.

Before reading this chapter, the reader may want to review the U.S. Declaration of Independence, U.S. Constitution, U.S. Bill of Rights, and The Federalist and Anti-Federalist Papers[1] as the below material supplements these foundational U.S. documents.

What is Democracy?

There are several differing definitions of democracy. In the time of the ancient Greeks it simply meant “rule by the people.”^[2] A more modern definition sees democracy:

…as a system of government with regular, free and fair elections, in which all adult citizens have the right to vote and possess basic civil liberties such as freedom of speech and association.^[3]

Democracy has been around since the Stone Age. When members of groups or clans of ancient hunter-gathers worked together to decide what actions to take (where to hunt, where to live, etc.), this internal consultation was a crude version of democracy. In the 6^th- to 2^nd-centuries BCE (Before the Common Era, ex-B.C.) the Greek city-states and Roman Republic experimented with forms of direct democracy where free, adult, male citizens would meet to discuss and vote on community issues. The Greek city-state and Roman Republic experiments with democracy later returned to forms of authoritarian rule as existed elsewhere in the ancient world. It was not until the 17^th through 19^th-centuries CE (Common Era, ex-A.D.) that representative democracy, as we know it today, began to emerge. Representative democracy entails citizens voting for their representatives, who then meet, discuss, and vote on societal issues. After the American Revolutionary War (1776 to 1783 CE), the United States created the first democratic constitution based on representative democracy. Over the next two centuries representative constitutional democracy spread to other world countries. In 2024, non-governmental organization (NGO) Freedom House assessed how only 84 of the 208 countries and territories rated, or 40 percent, are free democracies—with this percentage seen decreasing over the past several years.^[4] Overall, only approximately 20 percent of the entire world population live in free democracies. The remainder of the world consists of partly free and unfree countries, the majority authoritarian ruled, like what existed before the 18^th- and 19^th-centuries.

Two main non-authoritarian alternatives have emerged for improving both representative democracies and governance worldwide. First, political scientists have offered the alternative of creating stronger democracies with the resulting governing system called polyarchy.^[5] This option is discussed further below. Second, over the last two centuries communism has become a competing governing alternative. Communism can be defined as "the state of being of or for the community." There are several theories of communism as a governing system. The best known communist theory was initially developed by German philosophers Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, who called for the end of inequality and formation of classless, stateless societies, which work hand-in-hand with an economic system of socialism (see further discussion of Marx’s theories in Chapter 6).^[6] While some of today’s world countries have achieved conditions of polyarchy, none have instituted communist governing systems as theorized by Marx and Engels.

A Short History of Democracy before the U.S. Constitution

During the 6^th- to 2^nd-centuries BCE, Greek city-states, especially Athens, experimented with direct democracy.^[7] In these communities, free, adult, male citizens could participate in governing. The citizens would meet frequently in person to discuss and debate societal issues and then vote on their city-state’s policies and actions. Because the city-states were relatively small, it was not a burden on citizens to travel to meetings. Women, slaves, foreigners, and minors were not allowed to participate in these early versions of democracy. By some accounts, at least half of the approximately 1,000 Greek city-states participated in direct democracy. In the 4^th- to 2^nd-centuries BCE, some Greek city-states formed federal leagues to coordinate and direct their foreign and military affairs. The early Greek democratic experiment eventually failed as city-states resorted to authoritarian rule (aristocrats, tyrants, dictators, etc.). Greek philosophers Plato (428-347 BCE) and Aristotle (384-322 BCE) opposed direct democracy for several reasons, including the slow speed of democratic city-state crisis (war) decision-making and their assumptions citizens were not necessarily qualified to make important city-state decisions.

The Roman Republic joined the Greeks in experimenting with direct democracy beginning in 509 BCE.^[8] At the time, Rome was also a small city-state, and their form of direct democracy was similar to the Greeks. As the Roman Republic expanded to become the Roman Empire, encompassing territory surrounding the entire present-day Mediterranean Sea, direct democracy was hampered by the large population in the Empire and the long distances from Rome where citizens would have to travel to participate in governing meetings. Thus, the Roman Empire began experimenting with representative democracy where citizens were appointed or elected to travel to Rome and vote as representatives from their outlying regions. This governing structure collapsed in 27 BCE when the Romans came under authoritarian imperial rule by emperors. The idea of democratic governance did not disappear with the end of the Greek democracies and Roman Republic but remained alive in European discourse.

With the decline of the Roman Empire and as Europe moved into the Middle Ages (500-1500 CE), authoritarian rule was still the standard across most of the world, including Europe. Authoritarian monarchs, aristocrats, church leaders, dictators, and oligarchies often ruled through consultation with groups of advisors. For example, English King William I (1028-1087), nicknamed William the Conqueror, regularly called aristocratic meetings of nobles, knights, and senior clergy to advise him on matters important to his kingdom.^[9] During this same era, the English nobility also began to hold their own councils with subordinate nobles, knights, lords, and local clergy.

The English Parliament traces its origins to just after the signing of the 1215 Magna Carta by King John I (1166-1216). The Magna Carta established several rights applying to English nobles and stipulated the king would periodically summon into service a Great Council of nobles and senior clergy to provide advice on the administration and direction of the kingdom.^[10] In 1236, the Great Council was dubbed the Parliament—from the old-French word meaning “discussion or discourse.”

During his 50-year reign, English King Edward III (1312-1377) transformed the Kingdom of England into one of the most formidable military powers in Europe and directed vital development in legislative and governmental processes.^[11] In 1341, Edward III separated the English Parliament into upper and lower chambers, which later evolved into the House of Lords (for nobility, senior church officials) appointed by the king, and the House of Commons (for baronets, knights, lords, and other commoners summoned to Parliament). Over time, the English people (male, freemen) were allowed to elect their representatives to the House of Commons. One legacy of the 11^th–century CE forward in England was the transition from a centralized crown-dominated kingdom to one with a more decentralized governmental structure to distribute justice and collect taxes. This governing structure was staffed by professional administrators (often nobles, knights, jurists, clerks, and soldiers).^[12] Edward III was one of the first to experiment with ceding legislative and judicial power to the Parliament as he allowed major decisions and court cases to be argued and voted on in both houses of Parliament, with the results presented to him for final decision. Not all of Edward III’s successors relied as extensively on Parliament. Over the next approximate 300 years there arose a tug-of-war between English monarchs and their Parliaments over the exact power held by Parliament.

The English monarch and Parliament struggle over power created a national crisis in the mid-1600s CE resulting in the English Civil Wars (1642-1660), which altered British governance and the course of democracy forever.^[13] The roots of these civil wars included disagreements over both governance and religion. Prior to 1642, Parliament still only acted in an advisory role to the monarch. The Parliament could be summoned or adjourned as the monarch saw fit. The only true power the Parliament possessed was the ability to increase tax revenues above the normal course of regular revenues available to the monarch. English King Charles I (1600-1649) thought he was only responsible to God and not to the Parliament or citizens of his kingdom. After being crowned king in 1625, he failed to work with and at times often even refused to communicate with Parliament. From 1629 to 1640, he adjourned Parliament and resorted to personal authoritarian rule. During this period, Charles I was forced to limit his finances to only previously approved Parliamentary sources and was forced to resort to some creative financing to fund his regime. The kingdom’s population was generally happy with this arrangement as having no Parliament meant no new taxes.

Conflict arose in Scotland and Ireland over Charles I’s governing. He decided to reform the Church of Scotland in the late-1630s and make it more like the Church of England. Originally Great Britain (England, Wales, Scotland) consisted of Roman Catholic countries with the Roman Catholic Pope and his delegates (archbishops, bishops) having a significant say in a country’s governance. In 1534, King Henry VIII broke with Rome and created the Protestant Church of England (Anglican Church). The monarch was the head of the new Church of England. While its theology was Protestant (but not Calvinist), the new church largely maintained the organizational structure, pageantry, and rituals of the Roman Catholic Church. Thus, the Church of England followed the Episcopalian approach to church-governance—meaning church authority (doctrines, etc.) and interpretation of church teachings flowed top-down within a strict hierarchy of archbishops, bishops, or other senior church leaders, interpreting sacred texts and directing church activities. This approach allowed limited local church autonomy.

The Church of Scotland; however, had adopted a Presbyterian approach (Calvinist) to church-governance—meaning church authority and the ability to interpret church teachings resided in a bottom-up structure starting with the members of the congregations. The congregations hired ministers and elected a council of elders to oversee local church activities, while any hierarchy above individual churches existed primarily for administrative purposes. The Presbyterian form offered checks and balances in church activities, while ensuring local church autonomy. As the leader and a devout member of the Church of England, Charles I mandated the Church of Scotland adopt a Church of England prayer book, restore the church governing structure of bishops, and adopt other trappings of the Church of England. These mandates caused an armed rebellion among the Scottish.

In Ireland, which had retained their Roman Catholic religion under the loose direction of the Roman Catholic Pope, the people rebelled against the strong-armed rule of Charles I’s appointed officials. The Irish felt the policies of Charles I infringed on both their personal and religious rights. With armed rebellions arising in Scotland and Ireland, Charles I was forced by 1640 to fund an Army to put down the rebellions—but he could not raise taxes to fund an Army without the approval of a Parliament, which he was forced to reconvene.

King Charles I summoned the English Parliament, which became known as the Long-Parliament, as it remained in session from 1640 to 1660. The Parliament was not initially interested in overthrowing the monarchy but saw King Charles I’s need for Army funding to fight the Scottish and Irish as a chance to negotiate for reforms to Parliament’s powers. Rising tensions between King Charles I and the Parliament, mainly the king’s refusal to negotiate, resulted in the outbreak of the English Civil Wars in 1642. The war centered on resolving how England, Ireland, Scotland, and Wales would be governed. On one side of the war was King Charles I and his supporters (Cavaliers), which included royalists loyal to the monarchy and those who still had strong sentiment for the Roman Catholic Church. Charles I’s strongest support was in rural areas. On the opposing side was the Parliament and their supporters (Roundheads), many who were staunch Protestant Puritans and detested the Roman Catholic influences remaining in the Church of England. The Parliamentarians tended to be supported in the cities and towns and by the Royal Navy. The English Civil Wars included three separate phases of fighting, 1643-1646, 1648-1649, and 1649-1651, with battles, skirmishes, and sieges across England and Wales. In the early years of the English Civil Wars, Europe was also engulfed in the Thirty Years’ War (1618-1648) initially fought in Central Europe. While there were several causes of this war, it was initially fought between opposing Episcopalian (Roman Catholic) and Presbyterian (Protestant) principalities but later expanded into a geopolitical war encompassing most of central and western Europe. An estimated 8 million soldiers and civilians were killed during the Thirty Years’ War.

In 1649, King Charles I was captured by the Scottish and turned over to the Parliamentarians. He was charged with treason and tried by a sham commission made up of selected members of the House of Commons. Charles I was found guilty and beheaded on January 30, 1649. Also In 1649, the Parliament formally banned the monarchy, disbanded the House of Lords, and declared the Commonwealth of England to be ruled by the House of Commons and a Council of State. During the early-1650s, Puritan Parliamentarian Oliver Cromwell (1599-1658), a member of the Council of State, assumed personal rule of the new Commonwealth as the Lord Protector (military strongman) as the Parliament debated the future form of British and Irish governance. Two years after Cromwell’s death in 1658, King Charles I’s son, Charles II, at the time exiled in mainland Europe, was invited to resume the British and Irish monarchy, retroactive to 1649, provided he agreed to jointly govern with the consent of Parliament. Over the next 250 years, the British House of Commons slowly assumed greater powers to where it now possesses the primary role in United Kingdom governance. Today, the United Kingdom Prime Minister, the head of government, is elected from the members of the House of Commons. The reestablished House of Lords has taken on a more advisory and ceremonial role. The British monarchy remains the United Kingdom head of state and still has certain ceremonial and formal approval duties in the kingdom’s governance.

The British were still in the early years of establishing its colonies in North America as the English Civil Wars raged. The first British permanent settlers landed in North America during the spring of 1607.^[14] They landed at a site later named Jamestown, Virginia Colony, where they were initially governed by a king-appointed council. English King James I, Charles I’s father, authorized the Virginia Company of London, which mounted the Jamestown expedition. The first council voted Edward-Maria Wingfield as the council president. Wingfield was the only investor in the Virginia Company to sail with the first settlers. As president of the council, Wingfield clashed frequently with the Jamestown military leader, Captain John Smith. Wingfield was eventually deposed by the council and returned to England in summer 1608. Smith was later elected the new council president but subsequently departed the colony in fall 1609, never to return, after being injured in a mysterious gunpowder accident.

King James I and the Virginia Company decided to disband the previous council structure and instead govern the colony through a king-appointed governor. In summer 1610, Baron Thomas West (1577-1618), 3^rd Baron De La Warr, arrived at Jamestown as the first governor. West was the largest investor in the Virginia Company and had been a soldier, politician, and successful merchant in England. The three ship resupply fleet carrying Governor West included new settlers, provisions, a medical doctor, and 150 mercenary soldiers—all funded by West himself. West departed Jamestown in 1611, having been inflicted with either malaria or scurvy. For the remainder of the British Colonial period in Virginia (1607-1776) the colony was governed by crown-appointed governors, who were advised by a local King/Queen’s Council, with council members normally recommended by the governor and appointed by the crown. Usually, the wealthiest and most influential settlers made up the council. Tensions often existed between the governor and their councils, sometimes resulting in the recall of the governor to England, or at times the governor would simply disband the council. These tensions continued and grew at times even more conflictual until the 1776 American Revolution.

In 1619, the Virginia Colony Governor Sir George Yardley directed the election and convening of the Virginia House of Burgesses, the first elected representative legislative body in the New World. There were approximately 2000 British settlers in Virginia at the time, living on both sides of the present-day James River from its mouth on Chesapeake Bay to 30-40 miles upriver (west). As in England, only adult, male, freemen (normally property owners) were allowed to vote for House of Burgesses members. The Virginia House of Burgesses acted in an advisory role to the colony governor. Thus, the governor had two advisory bodies, the King/Queen’s Council (appointed and acted much like the then British House of Lords) and the House of Burgesses (elected and acted like the then British House of Commons).

As the North American colonial settler populations grew and expanded farther west and north of Jamestown, by 1634 several counties had been created in Virginia. Outside Jamestown, counties were largely self-governing as they followed a similar structure as existed in English counties (shires). Following crown and governor directions, county officials were generally elected by adult, male, freemen. By 1634, there were several African freemen, having earned their freedom like indentured servants after arriving in Virginia starting in 1619. Counties included an assortment of governing officials in descending order of precedence: County Lieutenant (executive duties), County Commission (legislative duties), County Clerk (official records: births, marriages, deaths, land transactions, etc.), County Sheriff (tax collection and law enforcement), County Justice of the Peace (local magistrate or judge), and County Surveyor. There was also a County Commandant appointed to lead the county’s militia. Not all counties fielded all these officials as smaller or less populated adjacent counties sometimes shared officials. The Virginia colony’s new landed gentry formed their own untitled aristocracy, who were those predominantly filling the early colony and county governing and militia officer positions during the colonial period.

North of Virginia in the New England colonies different governing structures emerged. New England colony governance began with the 1620 arrival of the Pilgrims and their creation of the Mayflower Compact, the first governing document for the new Plymouth Colony. The Plymouth expedition was chartered by King James I and was originally headed for present-day New York (then part of the Virginia Colony) but was blown off course by bad weather and eventually landed in present-day Plymouth, Massachusetts. This expedition included mainly Church of England separatists, and a few adventurers and tradesmen. The separatists, like the Puritans to follow them, felt the Church of England had not done enough to remove the trappings of the Roman Catholic Church from its organization and services. Landing outside of the Virginia Company charter area, some of the adventurers and tradesmen raised the issue as to whose laws they must follow. To alleviate conflict among the settlers, the Mayflower Compact established that Plymouth Colony would be governed based on the principles of liberty and law and order. The compact called for a self-governing structure all settlers would follow where they would create laws, ordinances, acts, and offices for the good of the colony, while at the same time living within the Christian faith. The Plymouth Colony adult, male settlers elected their own governor.^[15]

In 1629, King Charles I chartered the Massachusetts Bay Company. Initially the charter allowed about a dozen company stockholders among the 400 Puritan settlers to elect a governor, deputy governor, and seven assistants to enact and enforce the colony’s laws.^[16] Arriving just north of Plymouth Colony and with the new colony capital in present-day Boston, this group of nine governing officials became known as the General Court. Later the number of assistants in the General Court expanded, and more adult, male settlers were allowed to vote. Those voting had to be members of the Congregational (Puritan) Church. At the local town level, Congregational churches were self-governing as adult, male members were allowed to elect a minister and establish church rules beyond the colony rules enacted by the General Court. This follows the Presbyterian approach to church governance. Starting in 1634, the colony towns were allowed to elect freemen deputies to share power with the General Court in passing laws and approving taxes. Eventually, the General Court and town deputies were both required to approve new laws and taxes. The first colony governor, John Winthrop, later separated the General Court and town deputies into a two-house legislature. By the 1640s, colony government had evolved into an elected representative system based on the consent of the governed—a situation that did not exist in England at the time.

While sometimes wrongly characterized as a theocracy, the largely Puritan government in the Massachusetts Bay Colony was based on a separation of church and state. While the Puritans accepted this separation, they also believed government could not be totally separated from God. The Congregational Church had no legal role in colony government. However, the government was expected by the church to pass laws protecting the church and punishing religious sins such as blasphemy (cursing God), heresy (false religious beliefs) and adultery. Thus, the colony’s strict laws were driven by the Puritan interpretations of The Bible and the teachings of the church. The punishments for violating religious laws included fines, whipping, confinement to stocks, banishment, or death.

Not all Massachusetts Bay Colony settlers agreed with the strict Puritan laws and their interpretations of The Bible. Reverend Roger Williams was tried for sedition and heresy, found guilty, and banished from the colony in 1635 for spreading "new and dangerous ideas." Williams travelled southwest of the colony and established the Providence Plantations, which later became the Rhode Island Colony receiving its own royal charter in 1644. Williams created a refuge for people persecuted for their beliefs, including Quakers and Jews. The governance of the new colony offered what Williams called "liberty of conscience," including staunch advocacy for religious freedom, separation of church and state, and fair dealings with Native Americans, plus the colony took a strict anti-slavery stance (against enslaving both Africans and Native Americans). In 1638, Williams founded the first Baptist Church in America.

Another group of Christian dissidents also seeking freedom from the strict Puritan governing policies of the Massachusetts Bay Colony moved in 1638 to Aquidneck Island and established the settlement of Portsmouth (in present-day southeastern Rhode Island). On March 7, 1638, the dissidents signed the Portsmouth Compact, which is offered as the first document in American history severing political ties with England (more implied than specific as in the Compact text the king is not mentioned). The purpose of the Portsmouth Compact was to establish an independent colony that was Christian in character but non-sectarian in governance. Some have characterized the Portsmouth Compact as the first North American instrument for governing as a true democracy. Portsmouth Colony later became part of Rhode Island Colony.

In the 1660s, King Charles II began imposing royal rule over the Massachusetts Bay Colony. An English royal court cancelled the Massachusetts Bay Colony charter allowing self-rule. After following a governance structure based on a representative system and being all but independent of the British king and Parliament for over 30 years, the imposition of royal rule caused political resistance and a rebellion in Boston. In 1689, the Massachusetts Bay Colony settlers agreed to a new charter with then English monarchs King William III and Queen Mary II. A crown-appointed governor was assigned. However, the elected town deputies remained and were allowed to choose a Governor’s Council (General Court). The crown-appointed governor was given the power to veto any law passed by the representative General Court and town deputies. Additionally, the requirement was abolished that only allowed freemen to vote who were members of the Congregational Church. A new voter requirement based on male property ownership was instituted.

As more settlers arrived in the North American colonies, each colony established its own governing structure. Most included a crown-appointed governor. The colonies normally fielded an elected representative legislature, which could pass laws, levy taxes, and raise a militia—with approval of the governor. There were many events and causes leading to the 1776-1783 American Revolution, but the most salient was the disagreement over the way the British governed the colonies and the way the colonists thought they should instead be treated as full British citizens. With the support of only an estimated 40-45 percent of the colonies’ populations, the American Revolution began.

The United States’ Democratic Experiment

As fighting continued in the American Revolution, the second Continental Congress began work on the governing structure of a new independent North American country consisting of the 13 British colonies in revolt. A committee submitted the draft governing document to the Continental Congress in July 1777, and it was finally ratified by all 13 colonies in March 1781—seven months before the Battle of Yorktown ensured the colonies’ victory in the American Revolution. This initial governing document was entitled the Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union (hereafter Articles). It was here the term United States of America was formally incorporated. The Articles were designed to ensure the states (former colonies) maintained their independence and sovereignty. The Articles established a weak central government with its highest body being a Congress of the Confederation (hereafter Congress). There were no executive, executive agencies, or judicial powers allocated to the central government. The internally elected President of the Congress held the highest national office under the Articles—but held no real authority except trying to administer the Congress (similar to herding cats).

The Articles ended in failure. The Congress’ representatives were negligent in attending Congressional sessions, causing important items to often go undebated and missed voting. For example, the 1783 Treaty of Paris ending the American Revolutionary War was not ratified for several months due to the Congress’ inability to field a quorum. The Congress was provided no power to tax. Instead, Congress was required to request funding from the states, and the states often failed to honor those requests. The Congress had the power to raise an Army, but its efforts lacked funding and the ability to recruit soldiers within the states. The same was true for funding and recruiting a Navy. Tariffs on domestic and international commerce were the responsibility of the states, with each state having its own tariff rules and enforcement mechanisms. Each state and the Confederation were allowed to issue money—resulting in monetary chaos. With the decentralized government revealed as ineffective, and with small rebellions breaking out across the states, Alexander Hamilton led an effort, approved by former Commanding General of the Continental Army George Washington, to convene the 1786 Annapolis Convention to discuss amending the Articles. Hamilton and his allies’ real intention (hidden agenda) was to convene a body to write a federal constitution with a stronger central government, which resulted in the 1787 Philadelphia Convention (Constitutional Convention).

The 1787 Philadelphia Convention drafted the world’s first democratic federal constitution.^[17] The Convention was in session from May 25, 1787 to September 17, 1787, when the draft constitution was sent to the states for ratification. A total of 55 representatives from 12 states attended the Convention—Rhode Island never sent representatives. The representatives, today considered important members of the U.S. Founding Fathers, were knowledgeable and experienced men from across the Confederation. One notable missing representative was Virginia’s Thomas Jefferson who was serving as the Confederation’s Minister to France. Jefferson supported a stronger central government and provided his inputs to the Convention through correspondence with John Adams, James Madison, and George Washington (although it sometimes took weeks for correspondence to cross the Atlantic). The Convention began with the election of George Washington as Convention President. The representatives next agreed on the Convention’s agenda and rules for the proceedings. The representatives then began discussing, debating, and voting on different governing issues. Often only 30-40 representatives were in attendance on any given day, but the proceedings continued as quorums were present. The Convention discussions and proceedings were kept secret. At the end of the Convention the final draft U.S. Constitution was published in newspapers. The best record of the proceedings was kept by James Madison and published after his death in 1836 in a document entitled Notes of Debates in the Federal Convention of 1787.

There were no guarantees the draft U.S. Constitution would be ratified by the required nine states. As critics of the new Constitution surfaced, Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, and John Jay wrote 85 articles under the pseudonym “Publius” to explain the need for a constitution, provide insight into the thinking behind various sections of the draft U.S. Constitution, and argue for its ratification. These articles were addressed to the citizens of New York and were published first in several New York newspapers and later in newspapers across the Confederation. The articles were later compiled and published as the Federalist Papers and are today still an important reference for jurists and constitutional scholars.^[18] Simultaneously, several anti-federalist articles were published in newspapers across the Confederation with arguments against the draft U.S. Constitution. The loss of state sovereignty to a stronger federal government, and the failure of the draft Constitution to guarantee certain rights to individuals and the states (see further discussion below), appeared to be the main arguments of the anti-federalists.

The new U.S. Constitution was ratified and enacted in 1788. The required nine states ratified the new Constitution by June 21, 1788. By late July 1788, eleven states had ratified the new Constitution and planning for the new federal government began. George Washington was elected and inaugurated as the first President of the United States on April 30, 1789. His first cabinet consisted of Vice-President John Adams, Secretary of State John Jay (temporary until Thomas Jefferson returned from France in 1790), Secretary of Treasury Alexander Hamilton, Secretary of War Henry Knox, and Attorney General Edmund Randolph. Jay later served as the first Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court. Working with the new U.S. Congress, Washington, his cabinet, and Jay took the lead in building the foundations of the U.S. government based on the prescribed structure in the new U.S. Constitution.

Issues and Challenges in Drafting a Democratic Constitution

Constitutional Convention representatives could draw from an array of historical experiences and philosophical works as their work proceeded. They were aware of the history of British governance and the often-contentious relationships between British monarchs and Parliament. They understood how religious conflicts caused wars killing millions of people in Europe over recent centuries. They were familiar with British Colonial rule since 1607, especially as experienced in their lifetimes. They worked from principles set forth in the 1776 U.S. Declaration of Independence. They had the experiences of the thirteen states’ individual constitutions, where some had been in existence since near the start of the American Revolution (1776-1783).

The Convention representatives also knew the political philosophical writings of Hobbes, Locke, Montesquieu, and Rousseau, among others, who influenced their thinking. English philosopher Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679) in his noted work Leviathan (1651) offered a treatise on the basis of legitimate government, including how a country needed a strong central government to avoid evil and civil war. English physician and philosopher John Locke (1632-1704), who grew up during the English Civil Wars (1642-1660), published his ideas on government in several books, including his noted Two Treatises of Government (1689). His work is considered the foundation of today’s political liberalism and included, among other tenets, the sharing of government power between an executive and legislature, governance by consent of the people, citizen rights and the responsibility of the government to protect those rights, religious toleration, and separation of church and state. French philosopher Montesquieu (1689-1755) in his book The Spirit of the Law (1748) authored his theory of separation of powers. Genevan philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778) published among other works his Discourse on Inequality (1754) and The Social Contract (1762), which are part of the foundations of modern political and social thought. Rousseau’s books theorized about how to establish a political community while addressing the problems of commercial society (i.e., the rise of capitalism). 

The challenge of the Constitutional Convention representatives was to take their knowledge and experiences and develop a constitution acceptable to all thirteen states. There was no example to follow of a federal democratic governing structure—the U.S. Constitution was the first. The crafting of the new Constitution required significant discussion and compromise. Some of the major issues and challenges the representatives faced included:

Separation of Power

No one wanted a powerful authoritarian leader for the new federation. The states had just fought the American Revolution rejecting the abusive British imperial monarchy as a form of government. George Washington allegedly turned down an offer to become the U.S. king—but this is more myth than fact. In keeping with Montesquieu’s ideas surrounding separation of powers, the Convention representatives developed a governing structure with three branches—executive, legislative, judicial. Each branch was given its own specific duties and responsibilities, creating a checks-and-balances system on federal power.

The executive branch was headed by an elected president and developed into a structure of departments and agencies carrying out the work of the federal government. The president was both the head of government and head of state. The president’s main powers included approving bills passed by the legislature, vetoing bills he disagreed with, being the commander-in-chief of the Army and Navy, nominating federal judges and senior executive branch officials (except the elected vice-president), and pardoning individuals where federal justice was not considered served. While not a monarch or dictator, the presidential powers in the U.S. Constitution are considerable.

The legislative branch consisted of the U.S. Senate (first appointed by state legislatures—after 1913 elected statewide) and an elected U.S. House of Representatives. The legislative branches’ main powers included passing bills to establish federal policy and creating the executive branch structure (departments, agencies, programs, etc.), overriding presidential vetoes with a two-thirds majority vote, passing bills to raise taxes and fund the federal government, approval of federal judges and senior executive branch officials nominated by the president (Senate only), ratification of foreign treaties (Senate only), impeaching (House only) and removing (Senate only) elected or appointed officials in all three branches of government for misconduct.

The judicial branch includes the U.S. Supreme Court and “…such inferior Courts as the Congress may …ordain and establish.”^[19] Today, the federal court system consists of the 9-member U.S. Supreme Court, 13 subordinate appeals courts, and 94 district and territorial courts. The district and territorial courts are the primary adjudicators of the laws of the United States and are where federal trials are conducted. District and territorial court rulings may be appealed to the appeals courts and U.S. Supreme Court, which is the senior appellate (appeals) court for not only the federal courts but also for state supreme courts. The federal judicial branches’ powers were strengthened after the executive and legislative branches acquiesced to the U.S. Supreme Court ruling in Marbury v. Madison (1803) establishing the principle of judicial review, meaning federal courts could strike down laws and federal actions found to violate the U.S. Constitution or other U.S. federal laws.

Tyranny of the Majority

As part of designing the separation of powers and in creating a balance of power across government branches in the new Constitution, many of the Convention representatives were concerned with the “tyranny of the majority.” This is when a voting body has a majority consensus, and the minority voters’ inputs are either steamrolled or ignored. The creation of the U.S. Senate was in part a measure to thwart the tyranny of the majority. States with smaller populations were afraid states with larger populations and more House representatives would overpower the interests of the smaller states. This resulted in what is known as the Connecticut Compromise creating a bicameral Congress with a separate House of Representatives and Senate. The House representatives were elected for 2 years using a proportional measure based on total U.S. population (census taken every 10 years beginning in 1790). The Senate, on the other hand, would have two representatives (senators) from each state, appointed (later elected) for 6 years. Under this structure, the House represented the people, and the Senate represented the states.

Today, Congressional federal elections are decided by a majority vote for candidates in their electoral district (House) and statewide (Senate). Within the House of Representatives items are passed based on a majority vote—creating an aspect of the tyranny of the majority. The Senate; however, took actions to dampen the possible tyranny of the majority. In the early-1800s, Senate rules incorporated the concept of a “filibuster” for senators opposing an issue to delay or end the consideration of a controversial bill or action. Later, the Senate also enacted a three-fifths (60 percent) voting requirement on most bills and appointments. The filibuster and three-fifths vote requirements lessen the chances of a tyranny of the majority in Congressional actions.^[20]

Voting Rights

We the People…, as the preamble to the U.S. Constitution starts, did not constitute all the people. Following common practices of the British government and North American colony voting, the drafters of the U.S. Constitution limited voting and office holding to adult, male, freemen (white or black). Women, slaves, Native Americans, and non-U.S. citizens could not vote or hold office. Later, the post-U.S. Civil War (1861-1865) thirteenth, fourteenth, and fifteenth amendments to the U.S. Constitution combined to free U.S. slaves and give the former male slaves the right to vote and hold office. Still, for almost 100 years after the 1870 passage of the fifteenth amendment, state and local laws and procedures nicknamed “Jim Crow,” mainly in southern states, enforced segregation actions obstructing former slaves and their descendants from voting or holding office—situations often enforced through violence. State and local governments enacted policies such as poll taxes and literacy tests to restrict black voting. The 1920 nineteenth amendment gave adult women the right to vote. The Indian Citizenship Act of 1924 made Native Americans U.S. citizens but allowed states to decide if they could vote—some did and some did not. Some states and local governments enacted policies similar to Jim Crow laws to prohibit Native American voting. It was not until the passage of the 1964 Civil Rights Act and 1965 Voting Rights Act that racial discrimination in voting was prohibited at all levels of government. Today, some state and local governments continue to pass laws restricting the ability of minorities to vote.

Problem of Slavery

Most Constitutional Convention representatives knew the brutal institution of slavery could not continue forever. Representatives from northern states were often anti-slavery abolitionists but realized to keep the southern slave states in the federation required they not directly threaten slavery. The southern state economies were largely based in agricultural production on plantations worked by slaves. Thus, the convention tweaked the institution of slavery around the edges, kept southern states happy, and “kicked-the-can-down-the-road” concerning abolishing slavery in the future.

The U.S. Constitution allowed in calculating electoral populations that slaves could not vote but were counted as three-fifths of a person to bolster the political power of the less populated southern states. This concerned how many representatives each southern state could send to the House of Representatives and the number of Electoral College votes the state yielded for electing the U.S. president and vice-president. Thus, slave states wielded more power in the Congress and in electing the president and vice-president than their adult, male, freeman population would have otherwise allowed. Also in the U.S. Constitution was the prohibition of the international slave trade continuing after the year 1808 (roughly 20 years after the Constitution’s estimated ratification). The federal 1807 Act Prohibiting Importation of Slaves was later passed and made effective on January 1, 1808. This prohibition of the international slave trade was not a burden on southern states. The Central Atlantic slave states of Virginia and North Carolina had an abundance of slaves that could be sold into the Deep South where slave death rates were highest and the demand for new slaves greatest. Demand for slaves was satisfied by the lively internal-U.S. slave trade and the continued illegal smuggling of slaves into the United States, mainly from the Caribbean. With the topic of slavery roiling U.S. politics in the first half of the 19^th-century, slavery was formally abolished after the U.S. Civil War in the 1865 thirteenth amendment.

Individual and States’ Rights

One of the major anti-federalist criticisms of the draft U.S. Constitution was the lack of protection of individual and states’ rights. Those opposing the U.S. Constitution argued basic individual and states’ rights were not included in the structure of the new Constitution. Those favoring the Constitution argued states could expand individual rights in their own constitutions. This did not silence the opposition. James Madison took the lead in researching and drafting what became the U.S. Bill of Rights, which became the first 10 amendments to the U.S. Constitution on January 18, 1792. Madison studied the anti-federalists’ arguments about deficiencies in the new Constitution and the concerns of other critics. Historically he consulted the Magna Carta (1215), Massachusetts Body of Liberties (1641), English Bill of Rights (1689), Virginia Declaration of Rights (1776), which became part of the first Virginia Constitution, and U.S. Declaration of Independence (1776). He also reviewed the individual rights in all state constitutions and created an initial list of 19 proposed amendments covering individual and states’ rights not otherwise cited in the new Constitution. After revisions in the U.S. Congress, 12 of these proposed amendments were sent to the states for ratification. Only 10 of these rights survived the state ratification process. The amendments augmented the Constitution by providing specific guarantees of individual rights, limitations on government power in judicial and other proceedings, and a specific declaration that all powers not specifically granted to the federal government by the Constitution are reserved to the states.

Role of Political Parties

The U.S. Constitution does not mention political parties. President George Washington warned against the rise of political parties. As his Farewell Address near the end of his second term as president, he published a letter to “Friends and Fellow Citizens,” which included a warning against political parties. He felt political parties should be repressed in an elected government of the people as they would “…distract the government from their duties, create unfounded jealousies among groups and regions, raise false alarms among the people, promote riots and insurrection, and provide foreign nations and interests access to the government where they can impose their will upon the country.”^[21] Washington was quite the accurate fortuneteller of future U.S. politics.

Washington raised the red flag about political parties at a time when they were already forming during his presidential terms. Thomas Jefferson led the southern and rural-based Democratic-Republican Party and Alexander Hamilton led the northern and business-based Federalist Party. These parties and their descendants have played a major role in every federal election and overall U.S. governance since Washington’s departure from the presidency.

Not addressing political parties in the Constitution left almost no possibility of coalition government in the United States. The structure of the Constitution unknowingly all but limits the country to only two main political parties. Third parties have arisen across U.S. history but have had minimal effects on electing U.S. federal government officeholders. Some third parties have elected individual U.S House members and even senators, but none have been competitive in electing presidents or vice-presidents. Without the mention of political parties or multi-party coalitions in the Constitution, combined with the president and vice-president taking office after receiving a majority of electoral votes, the chance that multiple parties can unite and govern together is severely hampered. Multi-party ruling coalitions have become a standard in many democracies in the world where legislatures choose the president or prime minister.

Difficulty to Amend

The Philadelphia Convention representatives purposely made amending the U.S. Constitution difficult. This could be seen as another step in thwarting the tyranny of the majority, where popular political parties or demagogues might attempt to change the Constitution in ways not in the best interests of all the citizens. For a Constitutional amendment to be considered it must be proposed by a two-third vote in both the House of Representatives and the Senate, or by vote of two-thirds of state legislatures. Proposed amendments must then be ratified by three-fourths of state legislatures. Thus, only the most important issues concerning federal government structure and operations or individual and states’ rights are normally the subject of proposed amendments. Since 1788, only 27 amendments to the U.S. Constitution have been ratified—with the first 10 being the U.S. Bill of Rights. This contributes to the long life of the U.S. Constitution. What the Constitution did allow was how federal laws, statutes, and regulations could be enacted to provide the details of governing the United States. This is a major activity of the legislative and executive branches of government. The supplementing of the structure of the Constitution with more detailed laws, statutes, and regulations must follow constitutional principles and allows for changes that occur based on issues such as societal change, crisis management (political and economic), technological improvements, and other domestic and international situations.

Ongoing Constitutional and Legal Challenges

The U.S. Constitution was a brilliant effort by the Convention’s 55 representatives. However, it is still not perfect. There have been numerous calls to amend the Constitution to address today’s problems, with some going so far as to argue a need for a new constitution.^[22] There are certain political and societal issues that have not been addressed adequately either in the Constitution or by the legislative or executive branches. Experts highlight the Constitution creates a decision-making system and today it is not making decisions on important issues.^[23] Some of these political and societal issues could be resolved through legislation, but some might require Constitutional amendments. Today’s major issues include:

Bias in Voting

Political bias in voting results from a combination of gerrymandered voting districts, unregulated campaign financing, and state voting restrictions. States gerrymander districts to place voters supporting one particular party in the same district to ensure a bias (advantage) for that party in electing members of their own legislatures, the U.S. House of Representatives, and in presidential electoral voting. Unregulated campaign financing allows wealthy individuals and corporations to support candidates friendly to their interests, thus creating disproportionalities in the resources available to all candidates in the campaign. This leads to “the wealthy getting the government they pay for (see Wealth and Political Influence discussion below).” State voting laws often make it more difficult for certain minorities and political party supporters to vote. This biases the overall vote in these states by using tactics such as limiting poll stations in some areas, not allowing mail-in or drop-box voting, limiting early voting for those who must work on Election Day, clearing of voter registration rolls, overly strict voter identification procedures, and many others—sort of a Jim Crow-lite.

Court Politicization

Politicization of the federal courts can be a serious problem. Since presidents nominate and the Senate approves all federal judges (except immigration judges who work for the Department of Justice) this process tends to place judges on the bench who favor the political ideology of the political party of the nominating president. Federal judges are frequently accused of ruling based on the party ideology or desires of the president who nominated them to the federal bench, rather than ruling on the Constitution or U.S. law. This is not true in all cases but has happened enough to create distrust of the federal courts among citizens. The Senate judicial approval process does not provide much of a check on this situation as in the Senate the latest rules only require a majority vote to approve judgeships. The problem of politicizing the courts is magnified by the fact federal judges (less immigration judges) are appointed for life and can only be removed for misconduct (impeached), retirement, or death—thus those who tend to politicize their rulings can keep doing so for decades.

U.S. Citizen Voting Discrimination Outside States

Representative voting by all U.S. citizens is a problem outside of U.S. states, including in Washington D.C. and U.S. territories (Puerto Rico, U.S. Virgin Islands, Guam, etc.). These U.S. Citizens are not represented by elected officials in the U.S. Congress. At most, U.S. territories may send a delegate to the House that can participate in discussions but not vote on legislation. Thus, representation in the Congress is biased toward U.S. state citizens. There have been discussions of making Washington D.C. and Puerto Rico states whose population sizes would qualify for at least one voting member of the U.S. House of Representatives. However, as states Washington D.C. and Puerto Rico would also qualify for two U.S. senators and there is currently no U.S. political will to increase the Senate by four members, especially four members who will likely vote liberal.

Lack of Electoral College Fairness

Electoral College voting as currently structured does no ensure the democratic ideal of “one person, one vote” in electing U.S. presidents and vice-presidents. The Electoral College was created in part to provide representative fairness for U.S. southern states in the days of slavery. Each state receives the number of electors equal to the combined number of senators and congressional representatives from the state. Today, most states employ “a winner takes all” approach, whereby the candidate winning the statewide popular vote receive all the Electoral College votes for that state. This has resulted in instances where the presidential or vice-presidential candidates winning the Electoral College vote did not win the popular country-wide vote. Some argue the Electoral College should be eliminated to correlate with the ideal of “one person, one vote,” thus allowing winning candidates to be elected by a country-wide popular vote. Others argue the Electoral College is a unique and necessary element of U.S. federalism. A movement entitled “National Popular Vote” (NPV) is gaining support for a new state-based approach that “…preserves the Electoral College, state control of elections, and the power of the states to control how the president is elected.”^[24] Under the NPV, states determine how they will assign electors. The NPV approach calls for citizens to vote for a presidential slate, but before electors are assigned, all participating states in the NPV compact will determine the country-wide popular voting results and assigned electors based on the national results—thus ensuring the same candidates win both the electoral and popular votes. Whether a Constitutional amendment, federal law, or a series of state laws are enacted, the issue of the Electoral College requires addressing.

Wealth and Political Influence

Being wealthy or politically influential often drives how some U.S. citizens are treated by the government. Income inequality is a major source of bias affecting non-wealthy U.S. citizens.^[25] Here, the wealthy are considered those in the top 10-20 percent of citizens based on their incomes and financial and property holdings, while the other 80-90 percent of citizens are considered non-wealthy. Some pundits have even offered that the moderate-income U.S. middle class—often considered the foundation of democracy—is decreasing in size due to forces related to growing income inequality. Many of the non-wealthy suffer from low-paying jobs, lack of good health care, poor housing, food insecurity, poor education, and other societal afflictions, while the wealthy do not. Neither the legislative nor executive branches have adequately addressed this situation. To solve this problem would require a redistribution of national wealth. With an egalitarian ideology focused on the good of all society (see Chapter 6), some government leaders have made attempts to address aspects of income inequality. They have been generally thwarted by the individualistic ideology focused on the good of individual politicians and selected wealthy interests (see Chapter 6) that places major emphasis on citizen self-sufficiency and on maintaining the support of wealthier citizens—those who would have to pay for redistribution of wealth through higher taxes and lower profits.

Many U.S. citizens believe current interpretations of the U.S. Constitution are also biased toward the wealthy as it protects wealthy over non-wealthy citizens.^[26] The wealthy tend to donate large amounts of money to political campaigns to protect and serve their interests. This also gives them easier access to federal officeholders, in the legislative, executive, and judicial branches. In the U.S. Justice system, it is felt that the wealthy receive preferential treatment as they can afford more and better lawyers and have greater influence over law enforcement actions, prosecutorial decisions, and judicial rulings. It is widely believed the wealthy and politically powerful are given special consideration in the justice system as to whether they will be indicted for crimes. The perception of wealthy and politically powerful figures getting special treatment in the justice system creates a wedge of mistrust with non-wealthy citizens who believe the judicial system is rigged to protect the wealthy.

Fairness to Native Americans

Native American status remains a problematic issue in the United States. Native Americans were barely mentioned in the U.S. Constitution. According to the U.S. Government Accountability Office, there are 574 ethnically, culturally, and linguistically different federally recognized Native American tribes.^[27] The history of British and U.S. relations with these tribes has been one of broken promises, broken treaties, and violence. This history can be characterized as a planned 400-year ongoing genocide. This has resulted in seizure and forced evacuation of tribal lands, relocation of tribes to reservations on often non-productive lands, and reeducation of Native American youth to destroy their cultural identity. Tribes have also been abused by state governments and federal and state justice systems. The result is that Native Americans have the same serious problems of non-wealthy citizens cited in the above income inequality discussion. Action is required to clarify the exact level of sovereignty the tribes possess under federal and state governments as it is often interpreted dissimilarly by different levels and branches of government. Action is also needed to help elevate tribal members’ quality of living, especially in terms of their health care, education, and employment.

Democracy Advancement and Assessment

As discussed previously, direct democracy first emerged in the Greek city-states and Roman Republic in 6^th-century BCE. As it grew into the Roman Empire, the Roman Republic also experimented with representative democracy. Both Greece and Rome later reverted to authoritarian rule. It was not until 1788 that the U.S. Constitution created the first formal representative democratic government. Over the 19^th- and 20^th-centuries several representative democracies began to emerge around the world. Western Europe first saw the rise of representative democracy in the 18^th- and 19^th-centuries, most notably in Great Britain as the Prime Minister and House of Commons assumed responsibility for British governance. Other democratic European countries followed. Newly independent Latin American countries in the early-19^th-century adopted democratic presidential systems due to their admiration for George Washington. When several of the Latin American countries created their governmental structures, they failed to implement a separation of powers as the constitutions they approved created imperial or unitary presidencies who could legislate and rule by decree (outside the normal legislative process) and who directly controlled the country’s judiciary. As former colonies of the British Empire gained independence worldwide in late-19^th- and 20^th-centuries, they primarily adopted the British parliamentary (Westminster) democratic governing structure, and many kept the British monarch as their head of state.^[28] Some Latin American unitary presidential systems and small-country Westminster systems can be described as “elected dictatorships” due to power vested in their heads of government. Democratic countries in Africa and Asia often have similar strongman conditions.

U.S. Yale University political theorist Robert A. Dahl offered the next step beyond new, transitional, or weak democracies was when countries reached the level of political polyarchy.^[29] Under the pluralist theoretical approach, polyarchy is a stronger form of democracy than what many world countries previously achieved. Under polyarchy, political outcomes are achieved through a competitive process (cooperation, discussion, and compromise) by often unequal interest groups—political, economic, and social. Dahl highlighted how a polyarchy must be accompanied by a modern market economy (see Chapter 6) and a modern society. One important characteristic of polyarchies is their expansion of individual citizen rights. Figure 5.1 lists Dahl’s proposed political institutions (rules) required to achieve polyarchy.

As discussed in Chapter 1, NGO Freedom House publishes an annual report on Freedom in the World^[31] assessing the levels of political rights and civil liberties in world countries and selected territories—scale 0 (worst) to 100 (best). Freedom House offers their assessment captures the real-world situation concerning implementation of political rights and civil liberties and not just what may be found in laws and regulations passed in countries and selected territories. Freedom House bases their assessments on the standards in the 1948 United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights and includes Dahl’s polyarchy institutions in Figure 5.1. Political rights are assessed for electoral processes, political pluralism and participation, and functioning of government. For civil liberties they assess freedoms of expression and beliefs, associational and organizational rights, rule of law, personal autonomy, and individual rights. The Freedom House assessments result in an index rating world countries and select territories as either free, partly free, or not free. Many scholars consider Freedom House’s combined index ratings of political rights and civil liberties as the best rating of a country’s level of democracy.

Using the Freedom House index combining their political rights and civil liberties scores, and assuming a benchmark (mine) where any country or territory reaching polyarchy has achieved a score of 95 or better on the Freedom House index, only 22 of the 208 total world countries and territories could be considered polyarchies in 2024. The top countries with scores close to 100 were the Scandinavian countries of Norway, Sweden, and Finland, plus Australia, New Zealand and Canada, among others. There were another 18 countries or territories with scores of 90 or higher, meaning they are good candidates to become polyarchies. Eighty percent of the world population lives in countries or territories considered partly free or not free with index scores of 70 or below.^[32] See Figure 1.1 for the steep decline in U.S. Freedom House ratings over the past decade.

Signs of Democratic Demise

Freedom House subtitled their 2025 Freedom in the World report “The Uphill Battle to Safeguard Rights.”^[33] They documented how worldwide the trends in numbers of free (democratic) countries have been decreasing. Harvard University professors of government Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt address the process of world democratic decline in their book How Democracies Die.[34] They highlight how the overthrow of democratic governments by military coup has greatly decreased since the 1991 end of the Cold War. Instead, the more recent democratic declines are from forces working from within democratic governments that move slowly toward more authoritarian rule.^[35]

Levitsky and Ziblatt offer how the institutions of a democratic country create guardrails protecting their government. Institutions, as used here, are not just the brick and mortar, equipment, and people of a government, but are more appropriately the rules of politics, economics, and society allowing the country to function. Formal rules are solid guardrails enacted through constitutions, laws, statues, court rulings, ordinances, regulations, standard operating procedures, and other rules formally instituted in writing and where officials can be held accountable by the courts or administrative processes for their compliance. Informal rules are considered norms, consisting of soft-guardrails, often not published in writing but understood as how institutions should function or government officials should act. When democracies decline slowly from internal sabotage, it is usually after leaders are first legally elected and then they begin attacking the governing norms and eventually the formal institutional governing system of the country. Using a comparative methodology, where conditions in multiple world countries over time were studied to establish trends and patterns, Levitsky and Ziblatt identified the most common norms assaulted in declining democracies. Figure 5.2 summarizes the governing norms they found are most often broken as a democracy declines and moves toward more authoritarian government. Freedom House’s annual Freedom in the World empirical reports correspond closely with Levitsky and Ziblatt’s comparative findings on democratic decline.

Figure 5.2 norms of mutual toleration (No. 1) and institutional forbearance (No. 2) are the most critical norms required in a functioning democracy.^[37] When these norms are regularly broken by one side of the political spectrum or another, democratic decline is well underway. Political extremism encourages the breakdown of institutional forbearance.^[38] It should be noted that most of the items listed in the right column of Figure 5.2 are often not illegal as they do not break formal governing rules. In some cases, civil or criminal suits could be filed against some of the actions in the right column of Figure 5.2, but for the most part the actions define norms (informal rules) that most government officials or political candidates should avoid breaking but where there is little or no accountability for those breaking them.

Levitsky and Ziblatt’s work explains why U.S. democracy has declined over the past decade due to violations of the Figure 5.2 norms. The result has been an extreme polarization of U.S. politics and a resultant decrease in societal trust leading to the destruction of political norms.^[39] The Figure 1.1 empirical decline in U.S. democracy over the last decade is a direct result of the Figure 5.2 described attacks on political and civil norms. It is almost as if some of the U.S. governing elites over the last decade used Figure 5.2 as their “playbook.”

Winston Churchill’s quote at the start of this chapter implies democracy is worth saving as there is no governing system better. World historical experience reveals there is no governing system better than democracy when considering the personal freedoms and quality of life of a country’s population. Maintaining democracy is hard work. As Levintsky and Ziblatt remind us, country democratic breakdown is not inevitable nor irreversible.^[40] Actions may be taken to strengthen democracies, even if they have been in decline as is the case for the United States over the last decade. Ideally, we hope to avoid a situation of the United States continuing its path toward declining democracy as it promotes actions (see Chapter 9) to help strengthen democracy through improved civic education and critical thinking. Chapter 6 next provides a deeper analysis of world governing systems and the societal conditions they create.

Notes

1. See Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, John Jay, Samuel Bryan, and Patrick Henry, The Federalist and Anti-Federalist Papers (e-artnow, 2018-- in Amazon Kindle digital version). ↑

2. Robert A. Dahl, Democracy and its Critics (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1989), 14.↑

3. Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt, How Democracies Die (New York: Penguin Random House, 2019), 6 (in Amazon Kindle digital version).↑

4. Freedom House, “Freedom in the World 2025,” https://freedomhouse.org/report/freedom-world/2025/uphill-battle-to-safeguard-rights (accessed June 9, 2025).↑

5. Dahl, Chapters 16-20.↑

6. Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, The Communist Manifesto (London, J.E. Burghard, 1848—reprinted New York: Simon & Schuster, Inc., 1964).↑

7. Dahl, Chapter 1.↑

8. Ibid, 27-28.↑

9. For further discussion see: David Crouch, The Normans, The History of a Dynasty (London, UK: Hambledon Continuum, 2002), Chapter 4.↑

10. For further discussion see: Robert Bartlett, England Under the Norman and Angevin Kings, 1075-1225 (Oxford, UK: Clarendon Press, 2000), 64-67.↑

11. For further discussion see: Dan Jones, The Plantagenets, The Warrior Kings and Queens Who Made England (New York: Penguin Random House Books, 2012), Parts V, VI, and VII.↑

12. Ibid.↑

13. For further discussion see: Michael Braddock, God’s Fury, English Fire: A New History of the English Civil Wars (New York: Penguin, 2008).↑

14. Information on governance in Jamestown and the Virginia Colony was compiled from numerous sources, including Ancestry.com, online encyclopedias Wikipedia and Britannica, The Jamestown Society (www.jamestowne.org), and other references. Several of my ancestors were early Jamestown and Virginia Colony settlers and I conducted this research as part of my family genealogy studies. ↑

15. “Mayflower Compact,” https://www.mayflowercompact.org/ (accessed November 30, 2022). ↑

16. For further discussion see: Constitutional Rights Foundation, “Puritan Massachusetts: Theocracy or Democracy,” Bill of Rights in Action newsletter, Vol. 29, No., fall 2013, https://docslib.org/doc/12887789/puritan-massachusetts-theocracy-or-democracy (accessed December 2, 2022).↑

17. For further discussion see: John R. Vile, The Writing and Ratification of the U.S. Constitution: Practical Virtue in Action (Lanham, MD: Rowan and Littlefield Publishers. Inc., 2012) and Catherine Drinker Bowen, Miracle at Philadelphia, The Story of the Constitutional Convention May to September 1787 (New York: Little Brown and Company, 1966).↑

18. See Hamilton, Madison, Jay, Bryan, and Henry.↑

19. U.S. Constitution, Article III (The Judicial Branch).↑

20. The “Tyranny of the Majority” limits in the U.S. Senate have been weakened in the past two decades as approval of federal judges and senior government officials, plus some budget actions, have been reduced to Senate majority (50 percent plus 1) votes and not the earlier prescribed 60 percent vote.↑

21. Wikipedia, “George Washington’s Farewell Address,” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Washington%27s_Farewell_Address#Political_parties (accessed November 24, 2022).↑

22. George William Van Cleve, Making a New American Constitution (Denver, CO: Maroon Bells Press, 2020).↑

23. Ibid.↑

24. National Popular Vote, “Agreement Among the States to Elect the President by National Popular Vote,” https://www.nationalpopularvote.com/written-explanation (accessed January 15, 2023). ↑

25. Ibid.↑

26. Ibid.↑

27. U.S. Government Accountability Office, “Tribal and Native American Issues,” Issue Summary 2022, https://www.gao.gov/tribal-and-native-american-issues (accessed December 2, 2022).↑

28. Anthony H. Birch, The British System of Government 8^th ed. (London: Unwin Hyman, 1990).↑

29. Dahl, Chapter 15.↑

30. Dahl, 221.↑

31. Freedom House.↑

32. Ibid.↑

33. Ibid.↑

34. Levitsky and Ziblatt.↑

35. Ibid.↑

36. Ibid, 22-23, 102-105.↑

37. Ibid, 101.↑

38. Ibid, 161.↑

39. Ibid, 8, 114.↑

40. Ibid, 8.↑