Framework for Democracy
Summary: The core documents of the United States embody principles, hopes, and dreams of freedom that exist because of a robust non-governmental, non-economic sphere where individual citizens organize themselves for the common good. From the social contracts of the Mayflower Compact, to the Declaration of Independence, the Preamble to the Constitution, the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights, citizens in the United States have retained their rights. They have voluntarily granted some of these rights to government, and explicitly retained some rights (such as religion, speech, and assembly). The place where citizens act upon these rights, is the nonprofit, independent sector. Nonprofit organizations are a way for minority interests to be represented and to advocate for changes and new ideas. They help to protect minority rights.
The Declaration of Independence lists in detail the grievances of the colonists against the English crown.
“The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States...
He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good...
He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:
…For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:
For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:
For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for
us in all cases whatsoever.”
http://www.archives.gov/national_archives_experience/charters/declaration_transcript.html
The colonists had lived under a democratic social contract, they understood the role of social capital, and they saw their self-interest to be breaking from the injustices of the British government.
The signers of the Declaration of Independence formed a new government based on these key ideas.
In writing in support of the new constitution, James Madison focuses on the tendency of government to break into warring factions and threat all to prevalent in our current century.
Among the numerous advantages promised by a well constructed Union, none deserves to be more accurately developed than its tendency to break and control the violence of faction…
The instability, injustice and confusion introduced into the public councils, have in truth been the mortal diseases under which popular governments have everywhere perished…
Complaints are every where heard from our most considerate and virtuous citizens, usually the friends of public and private faith, and of public and personal liberty; that our governments are too unstable; that the public good is disregarded in the conflicts of rival parties; and that measures are too often decided, not according to the rules of justice, and the rights of the minor party; but by the superior force of an interested and over-bearing majority. However anxiously we may wish that these complaints had no foundation, the evidence of known facts will not permit us to deny that they are in some degree true. . . . These must be chiefly, if not wholly, effects of the unsteadiness and injustice, with which a factious spirit has tainted our public administrations…
The inference to which we are brought is, that the causes of faction cannot removed; and that relief is only to be sought in the means of controlling its effects…
The smaller the society, the fewer probably will be the distinct parties and interests composing it; the fewer the distinct parties and interests, the more frequently will a majority be found of the same party; and the smaller the number of individuals composing a majority, and the smaller the compass within which they are placed, the more easily will they concert and execute their plans of oppression. Extend the sphere, and you take in a greater variety of parties and interests; you make it less probable that a majority of the whole will have a common motive to invade the rights of other citizens; or if such a common motive exists, it will be more difficult for all who feel it to discover their own strength, and to act in unison with each other...
Publics
Source: Clinton Rossiter, ed., The Federalist Papers (1961), 77-84.
http://www.constitution.org/fed/federa10.htm
The preamble to the United States constitution sets forth clearly the understanding that the government is the result of a social contract. The government is a voluntary association.
We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.
http://www.archives.gov/national_archives_experience/charters/constitution_transcript.html
The Constitution of the United States was unique in history, because the power remained with the people. Only limited authority was given to government, all other authority is retained by the citizens.
The U.S. government needs its citizens permission to increase its power, not the other way around.
Citizens then act on this reserved power through their engagement in other, non-governmental, associations.
U.S. Government was designed NOT to be able to act quickly. The founders were afraid of state power. To move an agenda forward requires consensus among the American people and 51% in agreement. The nonprofit sector provides a place for social experimentation to try out new ideas and to gain enough approval for the government to act.
The first ten amendments clearly state the rights of the people. The first amendment is particularly visible in the nonprofit sector.
First Amendment
“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.”
Many of the issues discussed that require the protection of the first amendment are issues supported by groups of citizens organizing themselves in the nonprofit sector.
For instance:
- One hundred percent of the religious institutions in the United States are, by definition, a part of the nonprofit voluntary sector.
- The act of assembly requires more than one person, and the right to assemble for public purposes happens in the nonprofit sector.
- Frequently people of like purposes organize themselves into nonprofit organizations specifically to gain strength in their petitioning of government for changes they desire.
Fifth Amendment
“No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a grand jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the militia, when in actual service in time of war or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offense to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.”
In addition, the right to a jury trial is made possible by citizen willing to serve on a jury, basically as volunteers with minor expenses paid by the state.
http://www.archives.gov/national_archives_experience/charters/bill_of_rights.html
