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All political systems, excepting direct democracy, are oligarchical. The question today is not whether the few or the many will rule the state. The question, said Max Weber, is what kind of oligarchy will it be? The favored answer, since time immemorial, has been “aristocracy,” or “rule by the best.” But who are the “best”? The warriors? The priests? The rich? The intellectuals? Monarchists hold that the best person is ordained by God or the Church, especially on account of his lineage. Given the circumstances of the American Revolution, America’s Founding Fathers were opposed to monarchy and aristocracy; therefore, presidents would be elected every four years, congressmen every two years, and senators would be appointed. The election mechanism, the independent power of the states, and the courts, were conceived as checks on executive and congressional power. Under the Constitution, America is only a democracy one day in every two years; that is, in November, on a Tuesday that follows the first Monday, of every even numbered year. What the Framers of the Constitution feared, above all, was ochlocracy (i.e., mob rule) where the majority might pass a bill of expropriation against the propertied classes. This, they knew from ancient history, would end in a leveling despotism.
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