As we wrap up the month of June, here are a couple of quotes from some of America's Founding Fathers on the Declaration of Independence and on Democracy itself...
(1) This was the object of the Declaration of Independence. Not to find out new principles, or new arguments, never before thought of, not merely to say things which had never been said before; but to place before mankind the common sense of the subject, in terms so plain and firm as to command their assent, and to justify ourselves in the independent stand we are compelled to take. Neither aiming at originality of principle or sentiment, nor yet copied from any particular and previous writing, it was intended to be an expression of the American mind, and to give to that expression the proper tone and spirit called for by the occasion. - Thomas Jefferson, letter to Henry Lee, 1825
(2) Democracy will soon degenerate into an anarchy, such an anarchy that every man will do what is right in his own eyes and no man's life or property or reputation or liberty will be secure, and every one of these will soon mould itself into a system of subordination of all the moral virtues and intellectual abilities, all the powers of wealth, beauty, wit and science, to the wanton pleasures, the capricious will, and the execrable cruelty of one or a very few. - John Adams, An Essay on Man's Lust for Power, 1763
Both make excellent points above. Jefferson reminds us that the Declaration of Independence didn't invent new rights for the people, it merely stated that all have an inherent right of freedom and equality that no government can take away without due cause. And John Adams, Jefferson's contemporary, reminds us of democracy's inherent flaw - the ability to, with a simple majority, to give and take at will.
