Consensual Government, Intellectual History, Liberal Arts

On Democracy, Part Eleven

by Dave Seng

Part ten can be found here.

In this post I examine the classical influence on the founding of America and the vision of James Madison.

Now we must jump many years to the founding of the American republic. It is not surprising to find that the founders of America were influenced by classical thought – and all the values of the Western intellectual and political tradition can be seen in the American State Papers and Federalist Papers, including debate, dissent, civic virtue, and the free exchange of ideas. The classical influence of early America can be discovered from the works they read, the architecture they built, and the documents they wrote. One obvious piece of evidence rests in the fact that the authors of the Federalist Papers wrote under the names of significant Roman leaders. Furthermore, many of the founders such as John Jay, Alexander Hamilton, and James Madison, were well versed in the classics and read Latin.

In America, constitutional government evolved from the idea of constitutional monarchy found in Europe. Although the founders envisioned a republic and not a democracy (they were very cautious of an extreme democracy), America finally became a popular democracy in 1828 with the election of Andrew Jackson. Nonetheless, at the beginning of American Republicanism was the conviction that consensual rule was possible and that governments existed to protect citizen’s natural rights and to promote the common good of all people.1 This is the idea of classical liberalism and has become the social-political theory that stresses freedom from undue governmental interference and views the state as the guarantor of the basic liberties and rights of the individual. This is basically a classical idea; however, a thinker like Aristotle would see a closer relationship between the individual and the state.

In the early days of the American republic, there was much debate about the constitution itself. The parties were divided between those who wanted a stronger national government, the federalists, and those who wanted more sovereignty among the individual states – the antifederalists. The friends of the Constitution (the federalists) had the advantage of superior intellectual firepower. Among the federalists were the two most eminent men in America at the time, Benjamin Franklin and George Washington.2 Washington himself declared that the choice lay between the Constitution and disunion. Hamilton, Madison, and John Jay, under the joint pseudonym “Publius,” wrote a long series of newspaper essays explaining and extolling the new document.3 These essays were later published in book form and are considered the greatest intellectual defense of the Constitution by some of the early Republic’s greatest thinkers.

For example, James Madison, one of the writers of the Federalist Papers, was very concerned about the role of human nature and the propensity for people to divide into factions. For Madison, factions are different than regular political parties. He defines a faction as, “a number of citizens, whether amounting to a majority or minority of the whole, who are united and actuated by some common impulse of passion, or of interest, adverse to the rights of other citizens, or to the permanent and aggregate interests of the community.”4 In other words, factions are those groups which will seek there own power illegitimately and disregard the rights of others in the process. Factions do not regard the democratic principle of equality as an important ideal nor understand or value the idea that in a democracy harmony is essential. People have to be united – a government for the people and by the people must first of all be supported by the people and truly believed in if it is going to work. Madison understands the corrosive effects of factions on a consensual government. Nonetheless, it seems to be part of human nature to divide into factions as soon as individuals are given the freedom to do so. Madison was concerned about how to keep a faction from becoming a tyranny on one hand and how to maintain fair representation on the other. But Madison understood that factions would be a problem to any liberal republic because it is so basic to the human instinct,

The latent causes of faction are thus sown in the nature of man; and we see them everywhere brought into different degrees of activity, according to the different circumstances of civil society. A zeal for different opinions and many other points as well of speculation as of practice; an attachment of different leaders ambitiously contending for pre-eminence and power; or to persons of other descriptions whose fortunes have been interesting to the human passions, have in turn divided mankind into parties, inflamed them with mutual animosity, and rendered them much more disposed to vex and oppress each other than to cooperate for their common good. So strong is this propensity of mankind to fall into mutual animosities, that where no substantial occasion presents itself, the most frivolous and fanciful distinctions have been sufficient to kindle their most violent conflicts.5

Madison understands that factions are a part of any liberal society. He is also aware that there are only two solutions to the problem of factions. The first is to eliminate the cause of factions. But this would require the elimination of liberty, an unacceptable option. The other is to give every citizen the same interests, passions, and opinions – and this option is clearly impossible. Madison knows there will always be independent thinkers. So the third option for Madison is to control the effects of factions. Madison believes the best possibility for this rests in the rule of law and to allow factions a voice in their own government.6 He explains, “The regulation of these various and interfering interests forms the principal task of modern legislation, and involves the spirit of party and faction in the necessary and ordinary operations of the government.”7 Much like Aristotle, Madison understands the value of allowing differing parties a voice in their own government functioning under legitimate legal protection and constraints (consensual government always seeks a check on majority rule to ensure the rights of the minority). Of course, when factions are in the minority they are less likely to prevail in their evil intentions. Madison’s concern rests in what could happen if a faction became a majority. Madison concludes that a pure democracy can not protect itself from this phenomenon. “From this view of the subject it may be concluded that pure democracy, by which I mean a society consisting of a small number of citizens, who assemble and administer the government in person, can admit of no cure for the mischiefs of faction.”8 He goes on to explain,

A common passion or interest will, in almost every case, be felt by a majority of the whole; a communication and concert result from the form of government itself; and there is nothing to check the inducements to sacrifice the weaker party or an obnoxious individual. Hence it is that such democracies have ever been spectacles of turbulence and contention; have ever been found incompatible with personal security or the rights of property; and have in general been as short in their lives as they have been violent in their deaths.9

For Madison then, a pure democracy is a government in which every citizen participates, is small in size, and contains no check on majority rule. It is unclear, however, if any such government has existed because the ancient Athenians functioned under the rule of law, and was regulated by assembly, councils, and archons. Rome itself transformed from a republic (also under the rule of law) to an empire without becoming a direct democracy. Nonetheless, Athens was close to being a direct democracy and Thucydides does point out the mob mentality of the Athenians after the death of Pericles. But the point that a democracy can become a tyranny is a legitimate concern, the French revolution being the primary example. The ancient Greek political thinkers were all aware of the tyranny of the majority. And there was nothing more they hated than tyranny.

Next time, I will examine the particular definition of republic held by Madison.

1 Goodwin, Gerald, Richard Current, Paula A. Franklin. A History of the United States. 2nd ed. (New York: Alfred A Knopf, 1985), 119.

2 Ibid., 131.

3 Ibid.

4 The Federalist, Great Books Of The Western World, Vol. 43, ed. Robert Maynard Hutchins, (Chicago: Encyclopedia Britannica, 1952), 50.

5 Ibid.

6 Hamilton believes most factions arise from differences between the propertied and non-propertied classes.

7 Ibid., 50.

8 Ibid. 51.

9 Ibid.

Consensual Government, Education, Intellectual History, Liberal Arts

On Democracy, Part Nine

by Dave Seng

Part eight can be found here.

Education is always necessary for any democracy regardless of time and place if it is to succeed. Megabyzus was correctly concerned about a government that was run by the uneducated. If citizens lack the abilities to read, write, discern ideas, and critically think about important questions, they will not be able to differentiate good policy from bad, excellent laws from those that are immoral. If citizens are uneducated it will be impossible for them to contribute intelligently to the important discussions of the day. In addition, if citizens lack a good education they will not be able to adequately judge a debate. Public debate, however, is essential to democracy. Often, an uneducated populace will uncritically believe the first thing they hear rather than reflecting on the facts critically and weighing evidence carefully – the very reason Thucydides wrote his grand history of the Peloponnesian War. “So little pains do the vulgar take in the investigation of truth, accepting readily the first story that comes to hand,” he tells us.1

The Greek way of education was called Paideia and means something close to “general education.” It was not a specialized form of education but it did give the student the skills to read philosophy, literature, history, to speak persuasively, and to write meaningfully. Paideia did not prepare the student for a specific vocation – the student would find an apprenticeship for that. What the Greek student did learn was how to write, speak critically, and read carefully. The study of history gave the student a sense of the importance of the past as it influenced who they are and becoming to be. The study of literature captured the beauty of language and imagination. And learning philosophy and mathematics allowed the ancient student to think rationally, logically, and critically. This gave the student the general ability to think and communicate in a rational, articulate, and careful manner. They did not have what is today known as “cultural studies” but writers like Aristotle, Herodotus, and Thucydides wrote a lot about other cultures and the Athenians would assimilate the useful ideas they discovered from other civilizations. (Herodotus could arguably be called the first cultural historian.)

Plays were also a form of Greek education. From such playwrights as Euripides, Aeschylus, Sophocles, and the works of homer, Athenians would learn of their history, a sense of tradition (but not always accept tradition for tradition’s sake), and reflect on ideas. Playwrights would often question the ideas of the government and investigate values and civic priorities – as in the case of Sophocles’ Antigone – where the playwright examines the great questions of moral and civil law. The Greek theatre was a place to explore ideas and provide an education for the citizens.

The purpose of Greek education was to create excellent citizens. There was a symbiotic relationship between the state and educated citizens. Part of the role of the state, the Athenians believed, was to produce morally excellent citizens. Then, the educated citizens would be able to make wise decisions regarding the state and foreign policy. Paideia is the kind of education that makes for better citizens. The Athenians believed that “better” meant having more arête or excellence, virtue, or strength.2 It includes the idea of having the inner strength to do the right thing. Athenians believed that good education would make young people better able to use good judgment, to live reverently, and to make decisions with justice.3 Throughout the ages, the Western intellectual tradition has emphasized that education serves the purpose of making morally excellent citizens. As Robert Hutchins explains,

The aim of liberal education is human excellence, both private and public (for man is a political animal). Its object is the excellence of man as man and man as citizen. It regards man as an end, not as a means; and it regards the ends of life, and not the means to it. For this reason, it is the education of free men. Other types of education or training treat men as means to some other end or are at best concerned with the means of life, with earning a living, and not with its ends.4

There is a teleology and significance to learning that goes beyond earning a living. This is an essential and important difference between classical Greek education and the contemporary American conception of education.

Education, in the popular American mind, is for the purpose of getting a job. And American institutions of higher education have blindly accepted this notion. Now, the state and schools will educate its citizens to be good contributors to the state economy, (which in the end amounts to a form of socialism). The state is not primarily concerned with creating excellent citizens as in the classical tradition, but in creating subservient workers who can perform a trade to better the economy. Many who have been educated in this model learn a vocation and can become successful at their trade, but generally do not know how to carefully read, think or write critically about the most important questions of life. Many do not know how to think deeply about critical issues of the day, or how to handle intelligently the obstacles and challenges of life that might occur later in one’s existence. A purely vocational training qualifies one for little more than slave labor – and man is seen as a means to an end but not the end itself. On the other hand, following the Greek idea of paideia, someone with a liberal arts or humanities education is prepared to think broadly and across different fields of inquiry, consider opposing views, weigh evidence, and follow logical reasoning. These skills, based on careful reading and articulate communication are valuable for any number of employers and are really the best education for life itself. Learning should not cease when one finishes college. A liberal arts education will allow anyone to continue the life long process of learning – also skills valuable to employers in the ever changing workplace. More and more, employers are seeking individuals who can change skills quickly and those with a humanities or liberal arts education are able to do this since they are accustomed to move from one field of inquiry to another (such as history, philosophy, or literature). They are trained to read, write, and communicate well. Nonetheless, the pragmatic emphasis of a liberal arts education is a by product of what preparing for life should be. A pursuit of wisdom, learning and eloquence in education is the best preparation for life and work. State education often misses the point that education should prepare one for life and to become a more excellent citizen, not just to become workers in the state economy. The idea that the individual exists for the benefit of the state is a very narrow view of human life. Economics is not the only reality in life. Bill Clinton’s phrase “it’s the economy stupid” is a shallow understanding of human existence. Economics are important but it is only one element among many in determining a valuable, holistic approach to life and learning.5 A recovery of the classical idea of paideia will be a positive move towards a better democracy. Robert Hutchins explains the connection of democracy with liberal education,

This Western devotion to the liberal arts and liberal education must have been largely responsible for the emergence of democracy as an ideal. The democratic ideal is equal opportunity for full human development, and, since the liberal arts are the basic means of such development, devotion to democracy naturally results from devotion to them. On the other hand, if the acquisition of the liberal arts is an intrinsic part of human dignity, then the democratic ideal demands that we should strive to see to it that all have the opportunity to attain to the fullest measure of the liberal arts that is possible to each.6

The liberal arts teach human beings how to be free. The devotion to inquiry, free exchange of ideas, and rationalism allows citizens to think carefully about the most important questions of life – including, what is the best form of government? What sort of thing is justice and how should it be distributed? And does ethical theory hold implications for the community and state? These questions and how they have been answered have powerful implications for society and liberal democracies. A liberal arts education teaches us to strive for personal and public excellence, to think rationally, and to live well in a free society.

In the next post, we will further examine the role of education in classical Greece and explore why Pericles called Athens the “school of Hellas”.

1 Thucydides, 354.

2 Woodruff, Paul. First Democracy: The Challenge of an Ancient Idea. (New York: Oxford University Press, 2005), 193.

3 Ibid.

4 Hutchins, Robert. The Great Conversation: A Reader’s Guide to Great Books of the Western World. (Chicago: Encyclopedia Britannica, Inc., 1994), 49.

5 A strictly economic study of political reality often misses the point of human nature. Humans rarely function in strict economic categories; rather they are driven by non-economic and non-rational impulses. Irrational emotions and passions often drive people more than economics as is seen in the American economy where it is commonplace to consume more than one needs.

6 Hutchins, The Great Conversation, 50.

Consensual Government, Intellectual History, Liberal Arts

On Democracy, Part Eight

by Dave Seng

Part seven can be found here.

The Western ideas of legal restraint on majority rule, freedom, and equality are likely to impede and hinder the execution of the most extreme elements of human nature. Of course, when these values are discarded, ignored, or distorted the most probable result is terror, holocaust, or genocide. The absence of law, custom, and tradition does not produce a utopian paradise or more “individual” freedom, but chaos, destruction, and often, tragically, the loss of life. When people in a democratic society no longer believe in the institutions that have provided for a strong society, anarchy and all sorts of horrors are the ultimate end results. The veneer of civilization is frighteningly thin when it comes to human nature. Without custom, tradition, and a shared common culture based on law and accountability to hold human nature at bay a society is more likely to implode on itself than flourish. The ancient Greeks held a tragic and existential view of the world where human beings struggled for life in a fixed and absolute world rooted in human nature (a human nature mixed with virtue and vice) but understood that human nature itself had to be restrained. As Aristotle reminds us in his Ethics, “no moral virtue develops in us by nature; rather we have the potentiality for good implanted within us that can grow only through habit and custom.”1

In these earliest examinations of the idea of democracy, there are several important ideas that have continued throughout the ages that shape the discussion of Western liberal democracies. These ideas are the rule of law, education, the free exchange of ideas, and a tragic, existential understanding of human nature. Of course, these are not the only ideas essential to democracy, but the ancient Greeks understood these ideas as the most essential.

Herodotus explains that an important element of democracy is that everyone ought to be considered equal before the law. The Greek word isonomy conveys the idea that everyone is equal before the law. If someone places himself or herself above the law or discounts the written laws, then lawlessness and tyranny results. (Of course, a democracy may elect a tyrant or dictator that functions under the rule of law with the consent of the people – as the twentieth century witnessed with Hitler in Germany.) The presence of law does not necessarily make a government democratic but there is a democratic impulse if it is admitted that no person ought to be above the law. This democratic ideal is realized when everyone falls under and has recourse to the same laws. A poor citizen can, or ought to win any legal case against a wealthy person if he has the law on his side. Citizens must really believe this if it is going to work (again, if citizens no longer believe in the institutions of democracy a break down in that democratic society will occur). Historically, the West has provided ways and opportunities to correct bad laws while preserving the ultimate rule of law. Civil disobedience is a way to accept a law, and show that it is bad while at the same time honoring the rule of law. Dissent itself is a Western value.

The Greeks had a high regard for the rule of law. Socrates, rather than breaking the law when he was given the opportunity, chose to drink the hemlock. And when Xerxes asks one of his Greek assistants why the Spartans will not flee from him (due to his overwhelming army), Herodotus records, “For though they be freemen, they are not in all respects free; Law is the master whom they won; and this master they fear more than thy subjects fear thee.”2 In addition, the great historian Thucydides indicates the Greek respect for law and the abuses which occur when it is disregarded in his account of the revolt at Corcyra. He writes, “Indeed, men too often take upon themselves in the prosecution of their revenge to set the example of doing away with those general laws to which all alike can look for salvation in adversity, instead of allowing them to subsist against the day of danger when their aid may be required.”3 When law is discarded it will be difficult to find help from it when it is really needed. The greatest of the Greek writers all understood the importance of the rule of law and how its presence could be a democratic influence in society and the state. Rome during its Republican phase understood this too. The Concilium Plebis, election of Tribunes, and the Law of the 12 tables all worked together to support the rule of law.

The Greek idea that everyone should be equal before the law is the basis of modern liberal constitutions. Of course, this ideal is rarely met in the course of human history, including the Greeks – the law in Athens was not always fair – but the mere idea that no one should be above the law and that laws need to be written to provide equal access to all is an idea that should be taken seriously. Isonomy was the Greek ideal that everyone was equal before the law. This idea occurred first to the Greeks and not with the Hittites, Assyrians, or Egyptians. Even Hammurabi’s elaborate code of ordinances and procedures gave preferential treatment to the wealthy. Nonetheless, the rule of law does permit a space to be made for all people to be considered equal.

As we saw earlier, Herodotus’ debate between Megabyzus and Otanes is the first in history to examine the charge that democracy is nothing more than mob rule. Megabyzus was concerned that democracy is rule by the mob. But Otanes was equally concerned with this and countered that a true democracy rested on the rule of law. It is the rule of law and the idea that everyone is equal under the law, that protects citizens from a tyrant and a lawless mob. This is why he used the word isonomy. The rule of law holds everyone accountable and protects the weak from tyranny. Democracies can become a form of tyranny but only if the rule of law is discarded. The charge that democracies can become a rule of the mob or a form of tyranny is a legitimate concern. Nevertheless, when reverence and respect for the rule of law exists among the common citizens, mob rule is impossible. Mob rule will only exist when others place themselves above the law. In ancient Greece, laws were written on tablets of wood or marble and posted so all could see them. Everyone had access and the benefit of written, public, and accessible laws. In order to read the laws, however, education was necessary.

Next time, we will explore how education benefited the earliest democracies and what that means for our own day.

1 Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, Great Books Of The Western World, Vol. 9, ed. Robert Maynard Hutchins, (Chicago: Encyclopedia Britannica, 1952), 348.

2Herodotus., 233.

3 Ibid, Thucydides, 438.

Consensual Government, Intellectual History, Liberal Arts

On Democracy, Part Seven

by Dave Seng

Part six can be found here.

Although Otanes’ vision of consensual rule failed, his dream of democracy lived on. Euripides (485 – 406 B.C.) an Athenian playwright who often defended democracy in his tragic plays profoundly examines the idea of democracy in his play The Suppliants. In this play, Theseus comes to the aid of Adrastrus who wants to burry his fallen comrades. Adrastus (king of Arogos) tried to conquer Thebes but failed and appeals to Theseus (king of Athens) for help. Burial rights were very important to the ancient Greeks and sometimes resulted in war when these rights were not granted by the opposing army. In The Suppliants however, Euripides uses Theseus as a spokesman for democracy. Theseus claims that he can not do anything without the sanction of the city. He explains, “For them [the people] I made supreme, when I set this city free, by giving all an equal vote.”1 Then, Euripides provides a fascinating exchange between a herald from Thebes promoting monarchy and Theseus presenting and defending democracy. The herald asks to speak to the despot of Athens. Naturally, Theseus takes exception with this statement and corrects the herald. “Thou hast made a false beginning” states Theseus, “in seeking here a despot. For this city is not ruled by one man, but is free. The people rule in succession year by year, allowing no preference to wealth, but the poor man shares equally with the rich.”2 The herald answers Theseus with a critique of democracy. He says that the land he comes from is ruled by one man only, not by the mob. And further explains that the uneducated will not be qualified to govern a city. The uneducated would gain a reputation by beguiling with words the populace just to seek self enrichment. Theseus provides three arguments in favor of democracy. He believes the rule of law, free speech, and a consensus of the brightest and most talented citizens will work together to provide harmony, order and stability in a democracy. Theseus explains his first argument,

Naught is more hostile to a city than a despot; where he is, there are in the first place no laws common to all, but one man is tyrant, in whose keeping and in his alone the law resides, and in that case equality is at an end. But when the laws are written down, rich and poor alike have equal justice, and it is open to the weaker to use the same language to the prosperous when he is reviled by him, and the weaker prevails over the stronger if he have justice on his side.3

According to Euripides, the best and surest way to maintain equality, defend freedom, and protect from tyranny is the rule of law. Both constitutional and procedural law is necessary to democracy because, ideally, it will protect the commonality from tyranny, provide a barrier to mob rule, and make available a just legal standing for all citizens regardless of their economic status.

Theseus’ second argument for democracy is based on the notion of free speech, debate, and dissent. When citizens are considered equal before the law they have the freedom to provide a voice in their government. Citizens should be able to speak freely about the important political issues they face. Theseus explains how this should work,

Freedom’s mark is also found in this: ‘Who hath wholesome counsel to declare unto the state?’ And he who chooses to do so gains renown, while he, who hath no wish, remains silent. What greater equality can there be in a city? 4

Theseus indicates that those who have good counsel to offer the state are welcome to do so and those who wish to remain silent are free not to participate. Equality rests in the idea that all are free to either contribute to the betterment of the city or not. Theseus third argument is based on the idea that democracy requires young and intelligent citizens.

Again, where the people are absolute rulers of the land, they rejoice in having a reserve of youthful citizens, while a king counts this a hostile element, and strives to slay the leading men … for he feareth for his power. How then can a city remain stable, where one cuts short all enterprise and mows down the young like meadow-flowers in springtime?5

Theseus understands the value a young educated and intellectual class will bring to the state. And history has proven him correct. It is common knowledge that one of the attributes of tyranny is the elimination of the intellectual and educated class in society. Tyrants do not want to be challenged by those who can think independently or question the assumptions of a tribal or despotic regime. A democracy, however, thrives and succeeds on a reserve of young talented and enthusiastic independent thinkers. All regimes understand the power of ideas. Ideas move men and society more often than economics or government programs. No war is ever fought strictly on material grounds but on the ideas and passions that rightly or wrongly motivate armies to fight. Blaise Pascal once quipped, “opinion is queen of the world.”6 Ideas are important and most despotic regimes are atavistically afraid of an educated and articulate population. Tyrannies do not want the free exchange of ideas because they know that the power of ideas could remove them from rule. Democracies are not immune to bad ideas either but the rule of law, open debate, free exchange of ideas, and the values of discussion and dissent are more likely to provide a stable society where grievances can be addressed in a productive manner.

Next time we will explore how the Western ideas of legal restraint on majority rule, and the notions of freedom and equality are likely to impede and hinder the execution of the most extreme elements of human nature.

1 Euripides, Aeschylus, Sophocles, Euripides, Aristophanes., Great Books Of The Western World, Vol. 5, ed. Robert Maynard Hutchins, (Chicago: Encyclopedia Britannica, 1952), 261.

2 Ibid., 262.

3 Ibid., 262.

4 Ibid., 262.

5 Ibid., 262.

6 Pascal, The Provincial Letters, Pensees, Scientific Treatises, Great Books Of The Western World, Vol. 33, ed. Robert Maynard Hutchins, (Chicago: Encyclopedia Britannica, 1952), 228.