Keeping the Republic
Jeffery Tyler Syck, “Keeping the Republic,” The Vital Center 1, no. 1 (Fall 2023): 45–49.
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Through education, religion, and culture we must inspire the American people and ourselves to rise above the all-consuming passion for equality. To infuse our democratic society with republican virtue, and live up, even if just a little, to the challenge Benjamin Franklin gave us so many Septembers ago.
In our modern age where everything is filmed, or streamed, or at the very least closely monitored by reporters, it is hard to imagine the most consequential political debates taking place in private. Yet this was exactly how the constitutional convention was conducted. For five months the country’s greatest statesmen and intellectuals sat cloistered away in Independence Hall, crafting a new constitution for our freshly birthed nation. On the last day as the convention was breaking apart, a collection of concerned citizens gathered outside the door. Amongst the throng was an older woman who boldly asked the convention’s eldest delegate, Benjamin Franklin, what sort of constitution they just finished writing. He replied with a warning: A republic if you can keep it.
It is common for historically minded Americans to quibble when others call the United States a democracy. This is an understandable impulse, most of us whether intentionally or not have taken Dr. Franklin’s challenge to heart. I do, however, wonder how many of us really understand the difference between these two regimes and the history of those terms in the United States.
Defining the Terms
Despite the prevalence of contradictory and competing definitions of democracy in the modern day, the meaning of the term has been fairly stable throughout history until recently. Democracy simply means the rule of the majority, and a democratic government is one that can best reflect the wishes of the greatest number of citizens. The heart of a democratic society—for regimes are defined not just by their politics but also by their culture—is the idea of equality. It is society in which there is little or no social hierarchy and everyone is treated roughly the same.
Contrasting with this, the aim of a repub--lican regime is to create harmony—both political and social—by cultivating a consensus between classes and individuals. A republican society aims for a culture in which humans live harmoniously, each fulfilling his chosen role and deferring to those who are chosen to lead. In the age of Greece and Rome, the path to the republican regime was thought to be through nurturing virtue among the citizens of the republic. As the English poet Thomas Addison once put it: “A Roman soul is bent on higher views: To civilize the rude, unpolished world […]; To make man mild, and sociable to man; To cultivate the wild, licentious savage with wisdom, discipline, and liberal arts.”
Republicanism in America
The collapse of the Roman Republic and the brutal governments that followed in its wake seemed to quash this very possibility, which is why the American founders—like most modern republicans—rejected the classical emphasis on virtue as the foundation for a republican government. Their solution instead was a more institutional one. Assuming that men are not angels, and never will be, they set out to create a structure of government that would prevent the selfish human passions from ever dominating the regime. They intended not to create an inspiring arrangement but rather a practical one. The founders sought not to end selfishness but deploy and restrain it. This is the most obvious arrangement of our federal consensus but instead as a path to enacting institutions. The American system is designed to channel vicious passion through the general structure of its government. Each of the three branches of government is engineered to compete with the others for power, which explains why the branches so often share powers with one another in ways that encourage political clashes. Further, there is a more human element to the system of checks and balances. Madison frankly states in Federalist 51 that one of the best ways to ensure that each branch keeps its fellows in check is not just through power sharing but also through the “personal motives” of the officeholders using ambition to counteract ambition. The framers knew that each officeholder would have a personal stake in the success of his branch, and this would ensure that the branches maintained a healthy level of political competition.
Despite this carefully planned institutional structure, things began to go downhill rather quickly. In true republican fashion, the founders organized the regime to try and restrain majority tyranny. But almost from the moment of ratification, the American people tired of being lectured about democratic despotism by the wealthy and educated political classes.
Ruins of the Roman Forum.
John Quincy Adams witnessed this dangerous trend, and he insisted the republican order needed to stimulate selfless virtue amongst the populace through strong moral education. He argued that no republic—perhaps no regime—could survive without some effort to inspire humans to rise above their own selfishness. In the last year of his presidency, Adams articulated his classical republican vision with startling clarity. He argued that the constitution of the United States had three stages until it would achieve political perfection.
The first was the separation from England and the formation of a regime dedicated to natural rights. The second stage arrived by uniting the various states under one national government and constitution, thus bringing order to the otherwise chaotic principle of popular sovereignty. These first steps accomplished, Adams argued that it was time to look forward to the third stage of America’s constitutional development. He declared that Americans must work to “adapt the powers, physical, moral, and intellectual of this whole union, to the improvement of its own condition: of its moral and political condition” (Speech at Groundbreaking of the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal, July 4, 1828). In short, he argued that the Constitution had established the primacy of natural rights and created institutions that would protect those rights, but now it must work to improve the virtue of the nation’s citizens.
The Rise of Democracy in America
In the end, Adams proved unable to stem the tide. Beginning with the triumph of Andrew Jackson in the election of 1828, America began its ongoing transition to such a regime. Jackson spoke for the American people when he declared that “democracy shows not only its power in reforming governments but in regenerating a race of men and this is the greatest blessing of free government.”
So if we are honest with ourselves, we have not much kept the republic as Dr. Franklin hoped we might. Americans now see our institutions not as a means to create the wishes of the greatest number of voters.
Any institution that stands in the way of the majority is now threatened. Almost all state and local officials, from the soil inspector to the judges, are elected. Senators and party nominees are likewise chosen by popular vote. Those republican institutions that remain are constantly criticized. Calls for the abolition of the Electoral College have been unceasing since Jackson himself first proposed the idea, and in recent years the Senate has even come under fire.
Given the incredibly divided nature of our times, institutions that prevent majority tyranny and encourage political harmony seem more vital than ever. We should stand up for them, and we should strengthen them. We are increasingly a democracy, but our republican institutions serve an important role worth preserving.
It seems unlikely, though, that America could ever return to its more republican past. Democracy is a hard thing to roll back, and the nostalgia that I imagine many of us feel for the glittering age of Washington and Jefferson is not always that helpful in addressing the ills of the present. But I do not want us to despair too much. For all the issues with democratic institutions, the democratic society that created them has a lot going for it. The French political thinker and astute scholar of American society, Alexis De Tocqueville, shared our concern. In his famous work, Democracy in America, however, he went to great pains to show the joy that a less hierarchical society can bring with it.
Tocqueville shows this most clearly in his chapter on the family. He first describes the aristocratic family. In such families, the father exercises near total control over the children: both imparting his wisdom and arranging the future direction of their lives. The result is that when the children do begin to shape their own lives, it tends to be an act of rebellion that separates the children from their parents.
In a democratic society, Tocqueville observes the father only possesses significant control over the children when they are too young to do much for themselves. As soon as children reach the age of reason, however, they are free to live their life as they wish. Tocqueville frankly admits that this loosely structured arrangement bears very little resemblance to the family as it has been understood in previous centuries, though he makes equally clear that the freedom innate in the democratic family makes possible a more intimate and loving relationship between parents and children. The sweetness of this close and egalitarian family “is so great that even partisans of aristocracy allow themselves to be taken by it, and after tasting it for some time, they are not tempted to return to the respectful and cold forms of” the previous ages.
Tocqueville declares that this is the nature of a democratic society. It often destroys or obscures old social conventions, but those which survive are based far more fully upon genuine affection between individuals. This is because if the formality of the old customs are stripped away, then humans are left to be truly themselves and we allow the possibility of a society that is built upon affection for humans as they are, rather than a society structured by rules and conventions. In the final analysis, Tocqueville did not see how any man could deny the tender wholesomeness of such a foundation for civilization.
A Virtuous Democracy
Of course, Tocqueville did not think this vision of democratic society was automatic. It required not just equality but freedom. This is what sets a liberal democracy apart from a democracy simply: the concern for human liberty. For Tocqueville freedom had a unique meaning. It was neither aristocratic privilege nor a lack of external restraint upon the individual but instead the ability to govern oneself. By this, he did not just mean politically, but also the ability to control our own passions and achieve great things. In short, for Tocqueville freedom requires virtue.
Here we return to John Quincy Adams’ insight. America is now more or less a democracy. But to ensure that it is a democracy worth living in requires that it maintain republican elements. As I said earlier, this of course means protecting republican institutions, but perhaps more important is encouraging republican virtue—which is itself a trickier business. As much as we may wish, the law can only do so much to cultivate human virtue.
John Quincy Adams often liked to quote his hero Cicero to argue that virtue is only genuine if it is freely learned and maintained. So, from a policy perspective, there are things we can do to create the conditions in which virtue might flourish even if we cannot mandate goodness.
“Perhaps the greatest way we can revive republican virtue has nothing to do with politics, but instead with our private lives. Work diligently and constantly to be as selfless as possible. Banish resentment and political anger from your disposition.”
First, we must ensure widespread liberal arts education. No education is complete without a serious study of history, literature, mathematics, science, philosophy, or religion. All these subjects in their own way, and when taught correctly, instruct students in the permanent things—the things that have been true in all ages and upon which mankind can build a solid moral outlook.
Second, we must guard against ardent secularity. I do not mean to imply here that we should have a state religion or that religion itself should play a much greater role in the shaping of public policy than it already does. What I mean is that there are moves in the social sphere to banish religion very carefully from any public space, and these must be discouraged. Whether we are believers or not, religion can provide a strong foundation for local communities and republican virtue. So we should encourage religious charter schools, advocate for school prayer in our public schools, and ensure that people are allowed to live according to their religious convictions as much as possible.
Third, we must address the problem of poverty. Studies show that poverty makes likely the collapse of the family than any other factor. Too often, crippling poverty leads to a collapse of virtue and inevitably separates the poor from the civic life of the nation. Not out of any failing on the part of poor people themselves, but out of the tragic economic situation they find themselves in. How we solve this issue is a matter I will leave to the economists, but it clearly should be at the forefront of our minds.
Perhaps the greatest way we can revive republican virtue has nothing to do with politics, but instead with our private lives. For virtue is better encouraged and cultivated in the private sphere, and here we can all play a part. Be active in your community, work to improve the lives of those around you, and perhaps most importantly seek to be virtuous yourself. Work diligently and constantly to be as selfless as possible. Banish resentment and political anger from your disposition.
In short, work day and night to build a more virtuous core to our democratic society. Through education, religion, and culture we must inspire the American people and ourselves to rise above the all-consuming passion for equality. To infuse our democratic society with republican virtue, and live up, even if just a little, to the challenge Benjamin Franklin gave us so many Septembers ago.
