Democratic ideals of US government

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Democratic ideals of US government발음듣기

[Instructor] What we're gonna do in this video is discuss some of the foundational ideas for the United States of America.발음듣기

And we could start at the most foundational of ideas and that's the notion of natural rights.발음듣기

John Locke, one of the significant Enlightenment thinkers describes rights like life, liberty.발음듣기

And you might expect me to say pursuit of happiness which is what we see in the Declaration of Independence but John Locke refers to life, liberty and property.발음듣기

But even though his version is a little bit different than what ends up in the Declaration of Independence most historians believe that Thomas Jefferson was heavily influenced by John Locke's idea of natural rights when Jefferson wrote the Declaration of Independence.발음듣기

And the idea here is that these are rights that people should be born with that should never be taken away from them.발음듣기

And in the video on social contract we talk about the idea of why someone would form a government.발음듣기

They would form a government, they would give some rights to a government in order to protect these basic rights things like life, liberty, property the pursuit of happiness.발음듣기

And so you might have some other rights that one would say in a state of nature people might have the right to do physical harm on others the right to imprison others the right to tax others.발음듣기

But in a social contract we decide, hey, instead of everyone trying to figure out things on their own let's give these rights to a government and in exchange, the government should protect all of these rights for the individuals.발음듣기

And, once again this is review from the social contract video.발음듣기

This is a notion of a social contract.발음듣기

Now the next question is, all right so if we are willing to engage in the social contract with a government what type of a government should it be?발음듣기

And throughout most of human history governments have been things like monarchies where you have a single individual maybe a king or queen, an emperor some type of a conqueror, who is the sovereign who rules over the state.발음듣기

But you could have, you could instead of having one you could have a small group, which would be an oligarchy or you could go to the other extreme where the people are sovereign.발음듣기

And the word for that and this is a key idea for the United States is popular, popular sovereignty the people are sovereign.발음듣기

The government is accountable to the people.발음듣기

Sometimes this could be referred to as democracy.발음듣기

Now the Founding Fathers of the United States were a little bit suspicious of pure democracy or direct popular sovereignty.발음듣기

They were afraid that if you start having factions and a majority faction were to come to power if you have a straight democracy, then they might use that power to strip some of the natural rights of say their political enemies or people that they just don't agree with.발음듣기

And so you have this other idea of limited government.발음듣기

Limited government.발음듣기

And some of the key things that limit the government you could just say generally the rule of law things like the Constitution, including how the government is structured the checks and balances in it.발음듣기

The Bill of Rights, clearly is a check on government.발음듣기

And you don't just have limited government when you have a democracy you could have a limited government even in a monarchy.발음듣기

The United Kingdom is officially a constitutional monarchy where you have a monarch who's sovereign has very limited powers because of things like the rule of law.발음듣기

Now the last idea that we're gonna talk about in this video is the notion of a republic, or the idea of republicanism.발음듣기

Because the Founding Fathers didn't actually like calling the United States a democracy.발음듣기

Instead, they favored calling it a republic.발음듣기

And the word republic can mean different things to different people today depending on what context you use.발음듣기

To some folks, today, it means any form of government that's not a monarchy.발음듣기

To other folks it means, okay, you have a democracy you have popular sovereignty but you have limited government.발음듣기

You still have rights that protect minorities rights that make sure that even if people are not in the majority, they are protected.발음듣기

To the Founding Fathers they had a version of this notion of republic.발음듣기

They did view a republic as something that would prevent the passions of an unfettered pure democracy.발음듣기

But they thought it came mainly by having a representative democracy that if you had a smaller group of elected representatives as opposed to everyone getting involved in every issue that they could calm the passions of the crowds so to speak.발음듣기

They also thought it was logistically more practical.발음듣기

Sure, ancient Athens could have something closer to a pure democracy, but that was just a small city state.발음듣기

Well, here, even the 13 colonies were significantly more vast, and obviously the United States would become even more vast than that.발음듣기

And to appreciate this notion of republic right over here is a quote from James Madison in The Federalist Papers, Number 10.발음듣기

And just for some context on the what The Federalist Papers even were as we mentioned shortly after the Declaration of Independence the Founding Fathers start drafting the Articles of Confederation.발음듣기

They go into effect in 1781.발음듣기

But this is really a loose confederation of states that each, individually, think of themselves as sovereign states.발음듣기

And it's really a pact that they'll engage in war together, diplomacy together, free trade.발음듣기

But you have Shays' Rebellion and it's very clear, and we'll talk about this in other videos, that the Articles of Confederation are not powerful enough.발음듣기

And so you have a constitutional convention in mid 1787, in which James Madison is a central figure.발음듣기

Some people discuss him as the Father of the US Constitution.발음듣기

They draft what is today the Constitution but then they have to sell it to the states in order for it to be ratified.발음듣기

Alexander Hamilton has the idea of,발음듣기

Hey, why don't we publish a series of papers?발음듣기

And they eventually publish 85 papers which will collectively be known as The Federalist Papers.발음듣기

And Hamilton writes most of them but he also recruits James Madison and John Jay.발음듣기

And Federalist Papers, Number 10, which is perhaps the most famous is James Madison's discussion of how do you avoid factions taking over the government and doing things that are not in the interest of the people.발음듣기

And I encourage you to read all of Federalist Papers, Number 10.발음듣기

But I have a very small quote here.발음듣기

And this is James Madison's' notion of what a republic was and he thought the United States should be republic.발음듣기

The two great points of difference between a democracy and a republic are: First, the delegation of government in the latter, so he's talking about a republic, to a small number of citizens elected by the rest."발음듣기

So he's really talking about representative democracy.발음듣기

But he thought this was a key component of being a republic.발음듣기

Secondly, the greater number of citizens and greater sphere of country over which the latter may be extended.발음듣기

That only through a representative government could you actually govern over 13 colonies or even beyond 13 colonies.발음듣기

And that's why, today, obviously you might've had something closer to a pure democracy in ancient Athens, which was a city state.발음듣기

But, today, almost any democracy is some form of representative democracy which James Madison would consider to be a republic.발음듣기

But if you wanted to classify the United States today a fair term might be it is a democratic republic.발음듣기

You definitely have popular sovereignty the people are considered sovereign but they don't rule directly they rule through representatives which by Madison's definition would make it a republic.발음듣기

So now that you're armed with some of these basic ideas I encourage you to engage even more with some of the founding documents for the United States.발음듣기

And on top of the Declaration of Independence and the US Constitution, I encourage you to read as many of the Federalist Papers as possible because it's really an explanation of the ideas behind the US Constitution.발음듣기

And you should start with Federalist Papers, Number 10.발음듣기

As you'll see, James Madison is quite insightful.발음듣기

He predicts how factions might form how parties might form, and not always do things in the interest of its people.발음듣기

But I'll leave you decide whether he was right whether forming a republic helps this notion of factionalism.발음듣기

And look at the world that we are in today and think about whether James Madison would be happy or maybe he would be a little bit uncertain about how things turned out.발음듣기

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