(C) Daily Kos This story was originally published by Daily Kos and is unaltered. . . . . . . . . . . The Importance of Democracy [1] ['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.'] Date: 2023-10-22 Just so that everyone, other than the SCOTUS, is clear on this: Gerrymandering is unconstitutional. Don’t believe me? Here’s a snippet from the Constitution: The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government, and shall protect each of them against Invasion; and on Application of the Legislature, or of the Executive (when the Legislature cannot be convened) against domestic Violence. [Article IV, Section 4] The first part of this, “The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government”, means that the people of the state are supreme and get to run their state. In other words, this guarantees that each state (broadly speaking) is a democracy, and the federal government (including the Supreme Court) is require to make sure. I’m quoting you the full section so that you can see this clause in context. The section goes on to say that the federal government is supposed to protect states against invasion and domestic violence (basically, armed rebellion). Why did the founders include this stipulation in the Constitution? Note that this was not controversial. It wasn’t added as an amendment when the Bill of Rights was passed. It’s part of the original text. (Note, originalists.) The primary consideration was to protect the young country from being taken over by a powerful nation. The consideration was to protect us from a European power (England, France, Spain). These foreign powers were monarchies. The point of “republican form of government” is its opposition to “monarchy” or other autocracy/plutocracy. The founders were alarmed that the U.S. would come to be ruled by an aristocracy or other forms of government that took away the will of the people. They were intimately familiar with what the English monarchy had done, stripping individuals of their rights (sometimes torturing them, taking all their property, disinheriting their children, and generally abusing power). They didn’t want it here, and they were pretty darned determined not to have it here. Where it says “republican” it means that the people have sovereignty, not a single person or a group of people. It’s a way of ensuring that individuals are not abused. The concern about invasion and armed rebellion is that a foreign power (monarchy) could conquer a state or induce an insurrection there, and get that state to reorganize to recognize some person as a monarch. If one state could be converted to a monarchy, it would weaken the United States, potentially causing other states to be taken over by monarchy, and thereby undermining the unity of the country. This section was intended to prevent foreign monarchies from dividing and conquering the United States. The supreme consideration of the people at the Constitutional Convention was to ensure the country would survive. They went to extreme measures, even allowing some states to retain slavery, because they believed (and I believe they were correct) that if they allowed any state to break from the union, it would doom the union. And I believe future leaders (think of Abraham Lincoln) also considered this a core principle. Democracy in every state is that important. It is existential for our country. And, I’m sure this is one of the reasons fascist and other would-be dictators are keen to gerrymander states. This has a very important implication for today. If we let states like Mississippi or North Carolina gerrymander, then they are no longer really democracies, because a minority can thwart the will of the majority. If we allow states to go that way, then it undermines the United States as a whole, potentially subjecting all of us to the will of that minority. Gerrymandering is a direct attack on the supremacy of the people. It means that a minority can control the government of a state. As such, it is completely unconstitutional, based on Article IV, Section 4. The SCOTUS, unfortunately, never got the picture. They are incompetent at interpreting the Constitution, at least this part of it. (And apparently many other parts, considering their misunderstanding of the right to privacy, which is an inherent human right, and therefore protected by the Tenth Amendment.) They are so backward, they haven’t even caught up with the Constitutional Convention. But if the public really understands the core concept embodied in Article IV, Section 4, they will eventually force the Supreme Court to enforce this part of the Constitution as (I believe) the founders intended. Please help get the word out. This piece is from a comment I wrote on “The GOP’s secret to protecting gerrymandered electoral maps? Claim privilege” by ProPublica (here). However, I think this point is critical enough that it should be it’s own post, so I’m reprinting it here. [END] --- [1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/10/22/2200979/-The-Importance-of-Democracy?pm_campaign=front_page&pm_source=latest_community&pm_medium=web Published and (C) by Daily Kos Content appears here under this condition or license: Site content may be used for any purpose without permission unless otherwise specified. via Magical.Fish Gopher News Feeds: gopher://magical.fish/1/feeds/news/dailykos/