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From: tonyw@ubvax.UUCP (Tony Wuersch)
Newsgroups: net.politics
Subject: Re: Is this a Republic or a Democracy?
Message-ID: <124@ubvax.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 8-Mar-85 15:18:45 EST
Article-I.D.: ubvax.124
Posted: Fri Mar  8 15:18:45 1985
Date-Received: Thu, 14-Mar-85 05:43:45 EST
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> > In fact, the United States
> > is a democratic republic, a place where we elect our representatives
> > (the distinctive trait of a republic) in popular elections (the distinctive
> > trait of a democracy). 
> > 
> > 						John Wallner
> > 						bmcg!john

People could be pretty easily conned if everytime they saw a distinctive
trait they identified it as the real thing.

Seems to me that were the United States really a representative democracy,
the verdict decided by the popular election would be an unbiased
representation of the eligible voting population.  Then representatives
would be representative.  If a democracy doesn't have to be representative,
then what is democracy for in the first place?

Of course, we all know that in the U.S., huge percentages of the voting
population don't vote.  Hence the final verdict is heavily biased against
the sides favored by the non-voting population.  Hence the so-called
democracy is not representative.

The only way to guarantee a truly representative democracy is to guarantee
that practically all eligible voters vote, by voluntary or involuntary means.
A biased representative democracy has the distinctive traits and little more.

I lean to the republic side of this question.

Tony Wuersch
{amd,amdcad}!cae780!ubvax!tonyw