At the conclusion of the Constitutional Convention where the U.S. Constitution was being developed, Benjamin Franklin was asked by a citizen, “Doctor what have we got, a republic or a monarchy?”
Franklin responded, “A republic, if you can keep it.”
Those words echo through the years and are more relevant today than ever, as this debate has been elevated to an intense level and is the source of most of our political angst today.
Franklin knew that there were forces within the government and the nation that didn’t agree that a Constitutional Republic was best for America. These opponents wanted a pure democracy where majority rules.
While we have democratic institutions within government, the Founding Fathers wanted us to be ruled by representatives elected by an electoral process that would ensure what the founders felt would preserve the nation and constitution they had just drawn up.
Today this debate has reached a fever pitch as the President and other Democrats defy the constitution and rail against the Supreme Court that increasingly insists on strict adherence to this founding document.
They keep referring to “our democracy” knowing full well we do not live in a democracy but rather it is a “constitutional republic.” They seem to think that by repeating it enough, they can convince the electorate that we are, or should be, a Democracy. They fight against the Electoral College and want to replace it with the popular vote where big cities would dictate our laws. In this scenario, New York City, Chicago, Los Angeles, and other large cities would rule, to the detriment of the nation as a whole.
This is why Democrats resist election integrity laws and want to bring in as many illegal aliens as possible. You see, in their view, all residents should be allowed to vote no matter if they are “legally” allowed to vote or not.
So instead of Republicans “wanting to suppress the vote,” Republicans battle to limit the vote to people who have a legal right to vote.
Democrats want to open the vote up to non-citizens, criminals, dead people, etc. This is why they resist voter ID as it makes it hard for them to “find” votes in close elections.
Voter ID makes it easy to vote but hard to cheat. Democrats don’t like that.
“Finding votes” for close elections has gone on for decades in Chicago. When President Obama was sent to Washington, this practice spread through the land. The practice undermines the integrity of the vote, disenfranchises legal voters and causes people to give up on the process. These things are very destructive to our nation and eventually lead to totalitarianism.
People often ask me why I am such a staunch conservative Republican. My answer is always that I want to help conserve our precious Constitution, just like Benjamin Franklin said we would need to do.
Frank Shannon
Mesquite, NV
