Miseducation About Democracy

If looks could kill
They probably will
In games without frontiers
War without tears
--Peter Gabriel

These pages have observed that one mechanism for leftists to cope with the cognitive dissonance associated with Donald Trump's election as president is to claim that his victory was illegitimate since he did not win the popular vote. An intuitive extension of this delusion is to call for an end to the Electoral College. Many leftists are making such a call.

To the extent that some Americans might view subjecting presidential elections to a national popular vote, Prof Williams suggests that miseducation by the school systems is a primary culprit. This miseducation begins with the premise that the United States was founded as a democracy. As these pages have frequently observed, Prof Williams notes that the United States was founded as a federal republic, not a democracy. The word 'democracy' does not appear in either the Declaration or the Constitution. He includes classic quotes from Madison, Randolph, Adams, and Hamilton all voicing contempt for democratic designs.

Williams goes on to discuss the Electoral College as device for upholding a republican form of government and for breaking the grip of majority rule votes in presidential elections.

That few people can coherently explain our founding ancestors' logic against democracy and their corresponding efforts to thwart it constitutes ignorance of fundamental civics--miseducation that leftists seek to exploit today.