THE BALLOT BOX

"The idea of restraining the right of suffrage to the freeholders... would create division among the people, and make enemies of all those who should be excluded."

John Rutledge

Alexis Tocqueville, decades after the Philadelphia Convention had this to say about ancient democracies and ancient republics:

What was called the People in the most democratic republics of antiquity was very unlike what we designate by that term. In Athens all the citizens took part in public affairs; but there were only twenty thousand citizens to more than three hundred and fifty thousand inhabitants. All the rest were slaves, and discharged the greater part of those duties which belong at the present day to the lower or even to the middle classes. Athens, then, with her universal suffrage, was, after all, merely an aristocratic republic, in which all the nobles had an equal right to the government.

The struggle between the patricians and plebeians of Rome must be considered in the same light: it was simply an internal feud between the elder and younger branches of the same family. All belonged to the aristocracy and all had the aristocratic spirit...

http://xroads.virginia.edu/~HYPER/DETOC/ch1_15.htm

What is democracy and what is a republic?

I was always taken by the conclusions of Tocqueville discussing this issue as he compared America to countries both ancient and 'modern' on the European Continent.

Yeah I was taught that Athens, a city/state represented pure democracy but as Alexis points out, the Greek’s pure democracy amounted to inclusion of 20,000 human beings along with the exclusion of 330,000 human beings in their democratic model.

They omitted this fact in my middle school and high school experience.

I recall from my high school Latin that the Brothers Gracchi of Ancient Rome—who resembled our Kennedy Brothers in my readings—lobbied for land redistribution among the masses and for more inclusion of peoples into their society. Both of the Gracchi were clubbed to death after they had reached ultimate power and of course the Kennedy Brothers were shot.

The point to be made is that the vast majority of humans residing in Rome by the time of the Caesars were slaves or members of the Latin version of the unwashed.

So the battle between the plebeians and the patricians was a battle between the top 5% of the population and the 5% of the Roman population who represented the mercantile class. (I have to add here that the Gracchi Brothers were seeking more suffrage as far as a percentage of the Roman population than just Plebeians and Patricians)

America, to my mind, represented the achievements of the mercantile class; the monied class.

So the mercantile class had to come up with a plan and a propaganda that would somehow turn this new aristocracy into a meritocracy in the mind of the masses. But you had to keep the masses participation in the new democracy to a minimum.

The capitalists during the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia were more worried about the peasants revolting than the slaves revolting.

That is why only propertied owners could vote for their state legislatures and that the state legislatures would vote in the Senators to represent them in Congress. At least this was the case in most of the colonies. This idea will never completely go away even though we have a 17^th Amendment forbidding this type of ignominy.

In the category of initiatives that are going nowhere fast, Louie Gohmert, a Republican representative from Texas, wants to repeal the 17th Amendment and go back to having senators appointed by state legislators, rather than directly elected. http://www.economist.com/blogs/democracyinamerica/2010/03/appointing_senators

Get it? Republicanism.

The further you could remove the human being from the electoral process, the easier it would be to get representatives in Congress who would bow to the needs of the mercantile class.

When you read the tomes written by folks like Calhoun; this South Carolina Senator (where else would this pig come from?) would go on and on speaking about republicanism in the context of Rome; ancient Rome. And this was the case for many Southern politicians and professors.

But Senator Calhoun did not accept such a bold justification for the destruction of slavery. In an 1837 speech that would come to represent the political and racial ideology of the South throughout the following tumultuous years, Calhoun proclaimed that slavery—not freedom for all—defined the Union. Calhoun argued that slave labor, peculiar as it had become to the American South, had formed "the most solid and durable foundation on which to rear free and stable political institutions."²⁴ In other words, Calhoun and many other southerners believed that the enslavement of black people provided for a more just and democratic society for white people. A seemingly weak argument, perhaps, but the South Carolinian cited history as proof and noted that the relationship between master and servant is one that had characterized all "civilized" societies dating back to ancient Greece and Rome.
http://www.shmoop.com/causes-of-civil-war/race.html

 Now the Southern states have worked for this Greek/Roman model to keep as many revolting peasants off of the electoral screen and the New South and the conservative West are echoing those sentiments today; even in the face of Civil Rights Legislation over the last five decades as well as Constitutional Amendments.

The right will always seek to limit the definition of who actually qualifies to be a citizen. http://www.thedemocraticstrategist.org/strategist/2010/08/behind_the_gop_anchor_babies_s.php

Many Southern and Western States have worked hard to keep the revolting peasants off of the election lists. http://www.jackandjillpolitics.com/2011/03/poll-exams-poll-taxes-voter-id-same-purpose-voter-suppression-the-gop-plans-for-2012/

The South had worked for Poll taxes where only those who paid fees could vote. The 24^th Amendment makes this practice illegal today. http://www.u-s-history.com/pages/h425.html

The South had worked for literacy tests, so that only those able to correctly answer mandated test questions, could vote. http://www1.cuny.edu/portal_ur/content/voting_curriculum/11th_pdfs/11th%20Lesson%206_Voting%20%2866-75%29.pdf

Now, the more conservative legislatures are attempting to keep college students from voting, those without paid for I.D.'s to vote, and to keep those without proper Providence from voting. http://voices.washingtonpost.com/44/2011/03/video-foolish-college-kids-jus.html but this type of talk from the fascists might lead to unconstitutional action on the part of the state in violation of the 26^th Amendment. http://www.topix.com/forum/city/mount-sterling-ky/T37OJR6EHA3C9NSJ8/p2

In many states it is difficult if not impossible for a rehabilitated felon to vote. This classification relates to more than five million people and their ability to vote. http://felonvoting.procon.org/

Many on the right would bar people on welfare from voting. http://www.topix.com/forum/city/mount-sterling-ky/T37OJR6EHA3C9NSJ8/p2

Anything that the repubs can do to limit the number of voters in any election has been enacted or proffered as far as proposed legislation. http://poseycountydemocrats.com/voting%20info.htm

The right wing plutocrats always seek to limit the vote.

The republicans always seek to limit the number of citizens who will be able to breach the courthouse doors.

The republicans will always seek to redefine citizenship.

The republicans will always seek to keep those who have lost their citizenship through incarceration from ever voting in state or national elections.

The republicans will always seek to extort the upper class mercantile class for more money to keep them in office by brainwashing the masses into thinking that they are part of the formula.

The republicans will always seek to reduce the number of governmental workers who work for the benefit of the peasant class.

The Greek/Roman model of 'democracy' and 'republic' will always be with us!

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POSTSCRIPT

The 1787 delegates practiced a wide range of high and middle-status occupations, and many pursued more than one career simultaneously. They did not differ dramatically from the Loyalists, except they were generally younger and less senior in their professions.[8] Thirty-five had legal training, though not all of them practiced law. Some had also been local judges.[9]

• At the time of the convention, 13 men were merchants: Blount, Broom, Clymer, Dayton, Fitzsimons, Shields, Gilman, Gorham, Langdon, Robert Morris, Pierce, Sherman, and Wilson.

• Six were major land speculators: Blount, Dayton, Fitzsimons, Gorham, Robert Morris, and Wilson.

• Eleven speculated in securities on a large scale: Bedford, Blair, Clymer, Dayton, Fitzsimons, Franklin, King, Langdon, Robert Morris, Charles Cotesworth Pinckney, and Sherman.

• Twelve owned or managed slave-operated plantations or large farms: Bassett, Blair, Blount, Butler, Carroll, Jenifer, Jefferson, Mason, Charles Pinckney, Charles Cotesworth Pinckney, Rutledge, Spaight, and Washington. Madison also owned slaves, as did Franklin, who later freed his slaves and was a key founder of the Pennsylvania Anti-Slavery Society. Alexander Hamilton was opposed to slavery and, with John Jay and other anti-slavery advocates, helped to found the first African free school in New York City. Jay helped to found the New York Manumission Society, Hamilton was an officer, and when Jay was governor of New York in 1798 he signed into law the state statute ending slavery as of 1821.

• Broom and Few were small farmers.

• Eight of the men received a substantial part of their income from public office: Baldwin, Blair, Brearly, Gilman, Livingston, Madison, and Rutledge.

• Three had retired from active economic endeavors: Franklin, McHenry, and Mifflin.

• Franklin and Williamson were scientists, in addition to their other activities.

• McClurg, McHenry, and Williamson were physicians, and Johnson was a college president.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Founding_Fathers_of_the_United_States

First draft @ http://onceuponaparadigm.wordpress.com/2011/04/14/suffrage/