Democracy

The last great Act of Parliamentary reform was passed in 1884, and established democratic government based on Household Suffrage throughout the whole of the United Kingdom.

From whichever side the topic is approached, there will appear to be a real inconsistency between democratic government, i.

The ideal of democracy, in short, is government for the good of the people by the people, and in accordance with the wish of the people;

secondly, that you should vote, not only for peace, but also for alliance with Philip, in order that any states which were taking note of what the Athenian democracy was doing might fall into utter discouragement on seeing that, while you were summoning them to war, you had at home voted to make both peace and an alliance;

Let no man among you forget this, but let each bear distinctly in mind that when he enters a court-room to sit as juror in a suit against an illegal motion, on that day he is to cast his vote for or against his own freedom of speech.

But as each man of you would be ashamed to desert the post to which he had been assigned in war, so now you should be ashamed to desert the post to which the laws have called you, sentinels, guarding the democracy this day.

Moreover, gentlemen, I think that you would come to a sounder judgement in this matter if you would observe this further truth, that the present law removes just the one advantage which the rewards of a democracy have over those of other constitutions.

So the law which destroys confidence in the rewards takes away the one thing that gives a higher value to rewards which you bestow.

For not the receipt of a flatterer’s pay with its taint of shame, but to be honored, where speech is free, as one who is deemed worthy—that is true glory;

As you all know, the name you give to our government is democracy, but I see that some of you listen with more pleasure to those who advocate the opposite to it.

So oligarchy, presumably, looks better to you than democracy!

There was, as it seems, a time in your history, men of Athens, when the democracy compelled any man whom it observed to be prudent and honest to perform public service and to hold office, not through lack of those who wished to do so—for, while deeming the city to be fortunate in all other respects, in this one particular I consider it has never been fortunate, that the supply of those who wish to …

Why, yes, he said, that is the constitution of democracy alike whether it is established by force of arms or by terrorism resulting in the withdrawal of one of the parties.

We have next to consider, it seems, the origin and nature of democracy, that we may next learn the character of that type of man and range him beside the others for our judgement.

And the tolerance of democracy, its superiority to all our meticulous requirements, its disdain or our solemn pronouncements made when we were founding our city, that except in the case of transcendent natural gifts no one could ever become a good man unless from childhood his play and all his pursuits were concerned with things fair and good,—how superbly it tramples under foot all such ideals, c …

for when the states had got a moderate government, and security of action, they went on to absolute liberty, and did not value the specious advantage of good laws which they received from the Athenians.

After this, wishing openly now to change the government at Samos to a democracy, Thrasybulus the son of Lycus, and Thrasylus, (for these were the chief leaders in the revolution,) bound all the soldiers, and, most of all, the oligarchical party themselves, by the most solemn oaths, that they would assuredly be governed by a democracy, and live in concord;

but about two months after his departure the Thasians began to fortify their city, as wanting no more aristocracy in conjunction with the Athenians, but daily looking for liberty to be given them by the Lacedaemonians.

Now we, believing that for men like ourselves and you democracy is a grievous form of government, and convinced that the commons would never become friendly to the Lacedaemonians, our preservers, while the aristocrats would continue ever faithful to them, for these reasons are establishing, with the approval of the Lacedaemonians, the present form of government.

he was establishing a democracy in Thessaly along with Prometheus, and arming the serfs against their masters.

But I, Critias, am forever at war with the men who do not think there could be a good democracy until the slaves and those who would sell the state for lack of a shilling should share in the government, and on the other hand I am forever an enemy to those who do not think that a good oligarchy could be established until they should bring the state to the point of being ruled absolutely by a few.

And all oaths sworn at Athens or in the army or elsewhere for the overthrow of the Athenian democracy I annul and abolish.

If anyone shall suppress the democracy at Athens or hold public office after its suppression, he shall become a public enemy and be slain with impunity;

That is how you come to be walking about this city alive—hardly the fate which you deserved after making a living as a common informer under the democracy, and becoming the tool of the Thirty under the oligarchy to avoid having to disgorge your profits.

Is it possible that the gods have chosen such an envoy?

you are by far the most barbarous of all the gods.

but at that time the people, having become master of affairs, established the constitution which now exists, in the archonship of Pythodorus, the people being thought to have justly taken the constitution, since it had effected its own return.

Eleventh was the one after the return from Phyle and from the Piraeus, from which it has continued down to the present, ever taking on more power for the multitude.

Democracy is the least bad of the perversions, for it is only a very small deviation from the constitutional form of government.

Democracy appears most fully in households without a master, for in them all the members are equal;

Hence even in tyrannies there is but little scope for friendship and justice between ruler and subjects;

For what fatal or dangerous act will he shrink from, men of Athens,—this polluted wretch, infected with hereditary hatred of democracy?

I am sure you would have him put to death for trying to overthrow the democracy.

if everyone in the city copied the audacity and shamelessness of Aristogeiton and argued in the same way as he, that in a democracy a man has an unlimited right to say and do whatever he likes, as long as he does not care what reputation such conduct will bring him, and that no one will put him to death at once for any of his misdoings;

Neither you nor your ancestors ever repented of observing these rules, for it is the salvation of democracy that it overcomes its enemies either by good counsel or by arms, but submits to its laws either by free choice or under constraint;

I am surprised to see the same men urging the city, in the interests of the Egyptians, to oppose the King of Persia, but dreading him where the Rhodian democracy is concerned.

Then again, Athenians, it is right that you, living under a democracy, should show the same sympathy for democracies in distress as you would expect others to show for you, if ever—which God forbid!

Seeing that Chios and Mytilene are ruled by oligarchs, and that Rhodes and, I might almost say, all the world are now being seduced into this form of slavery, I am surprised that none of you conceives that our constitution too is in danger, nor draws the conclusion that if all other states are organized on oligarchical principles, it is impossible that they should leave your democracy alone.

Accordingly I entreat all the gods and goddesses that what is best for the democracy of the Athenians and for those who bear goodwill toward the democracy, both now and for time to come, I may myself be moved to write and the members of the Assembly to adopt.

You will not find me to have done wrong on the score of any of my measures, or a fit person to be deprived of my civic rights or destroyed, but a man who is as much devoted to your democracy as the best patriots—not to say anything invidious —who of all men now living has accomplished most in your behalf and of all men of my time has available the most signal tokens of devotion to you.

And yet, Athenians, though the culprits—mark whether my words are true—deserved death, it is not through them that the democracy is endangered.

But the private houses of those who rose to power were so modest and so in accordance with the style of our constitution that the homes of their famous men, of Themistocles and Cimon and Aristides, as any of you can see that knows them, are not a whit more splendid than those of their neighbors.

The real danger to democracy no one is bold enough to name;

He has joined the clique that wants to get rid of democracy,—that regards the established political order as an inconstant wave,—mere midsummer madness.

Observe in conclusion that, apart from all other reasons, the conviction of this man is eminently desirable in view of your future relations with Philip.

But just reflect, men of Athens, that the Achaeans in the Peloponnese enjoyed democratic government, and one of their democracies, that of Pellene, has now been overthrown by the Macedonian king, who has expelled the majority of the citizens, given their property to their slaves, and set up Chaeron, the wrestler, as their tyrant.

My own advice, as I said at the start, is to believe them when they say that we ought to abide by the joint agreement, unless, when they insist on our abiding by the oaths, they interpret them as not forbidding any act of injustice, or imagine that no one will be sensible of the change from democracy to tyranny or of the overthrow of a free constitution.

for I believe that nothing becomes a democratic people more than zeal for equity and justice.

For whatever the majority are in a democracy, such appears also the common character;

But it is fitting that all who have acquired anything hold it securely — and that too in a democracy, and among you, who pride yourselves most on administering your own affairs lawfully and justly — but most of all, I think, the honours and the favours;

for I have so lived all my life till now that no man either under the oligarchy or under the democracy has ever charged me with any offense, whether of violence or injury, nor will any man be found to have sat either as arbitrator or as judge upon my actions.

And since in addressing a king I have spoken for his subjects, surely I would urge upon men who live under a democracy to pay court to the people.

Also I think that not only the people of the Peloponnesus in general but even the adherents of democracy, whom we consider to be especially unfriendly to us, are already yearning for our protection.

We are concerned about our polity no less than about the safety of the whole state and we know that our democracy flourishes and endures in times of peace and security while in times of war it has twice already been overthrown, but we are hostile to those who desire peace as if suspecting them of favoring oligarchy, while we are friendly to those who advocate war as if assured of their devotion to democracy.

But I know that it is hazardous to oppose your views and that, although this is a free government, there exists no ‘freedom of speech’ except that which is enjoyed in this Assembly by the most reckless orators, who care nothing for your welfare, and in the theater by the comic poets.

For it is this which plunged us into our present state of disorder, which overthrew that democratic government under which our ancestors lived and were the happiest of the Hellenes, and which is the cause, one might almost say, of all the ills which we both suffer ourselves and inflict upon the rest of the Hellenes.

I acknowledge that I am going to speak at length of the institutions of Sparta, not taking the view, however, that Lycurgus invented or conceived any of them, but that he imitated as well as he could the government of our ancestors, establishing among the Spartans a democracy tempered with aristocracy—even such as existed in Athens —, enacting that the offices be filled, not by lot, but by electio …

So that no one of the citizens felt about the offices as they now do, but they then sought to escape from them much more than they now seek to obtain them, and all men were agreed that no truer democracy could be found, nor one more stable or more beneficial to the multitude, than that which gave to the people at the same time exemption from such cares and sovereign power to fill the offices and b …

oligarchy, democracy, and monarchy, and that of the people who live under these all who are wont to place in charge of their offices and of their affairs in general those of their fellow-citizens who are most competent and who will most ably and justly direct the affairs of state—all these, I hold, will govern well, under any type of polity, both in their domestic relations and in their relations …

Addressing a Hindu audience I say I advocate democracy because it leads to civil equality, but that the practical rule of Government in India is not embodied in the formula, “One man, one vote.

that it has saved English institutions from democratic imperialism;