Only 22% of the nation’s likely voters believe the government today has such consent.
A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds a wide partisan gap on the question. Democrats are evenly divided as to whether or not the government has the consent needed for legitimacy. Only eight percent (8%) Republicans and 21% of unaffiliated voters believe it does.A better question, maybe: what percentage of the people do you think consents to the government? And, by the way, what percentage does it take to make the government legitimate?
My answers would be: if you mean consenting to continuation of highway, police and fire services, probably 90%; if you mean consenting to 'a fundamental transformation of America,' probably 22%. As to the second question, I have an answer I'll keep back for the moment, because I don't wish to prejudice your answers.
20 comments:
I was concerned about the phrasing of the question, so I followed the link. I needn't have worried about this one, but I do not like the phrasing of the 2d question: Members of Congress almost always get re-elected. Is this because they do a good job representing their constituents or is it because the election rules are rigged to benefit Members of Congress?
There is, of course, at least one more option, and so this question seems to me invalid. That third option is because of the power of the incumbency, which is a mish-mash of, among other things, the devil the voters know, who hasn't done too terribly; better funding, both from Party and from left over monies from the last (successful) campaign; better Party support on intangibles. Incumbents really only tend to be at risk--even in this day of the Tea Party organizations, albeit these have increased the risk--in districts that are more or less evenly divided between party adherents or that have a significant unaffiliated population. But that is decreasing with gerrymandering--another factor in the ability of an incumbent to get reelected.
As to your second question, a large part of this answer depends, as a practical matter, on who has the most guns. Our own consensual government was born out of a war effort that was roughly evenly split among loyalists, revolutionaries, and don't-cares.
Then our Constitution was ratified by only 9 of 13 States when it took affect (although ratification ultimately was unanimous among the States), but each State's consent was by a majority vote of the people's representatives. And New York's assent was by a very bare majority, and Rhode Island had to be brought in with economic blackmail.
I'm not sure there is a hard per centage. Originally, it would have to be unanimous, else the decisions of those who declined would have less value than they are morally worth. And it should remain unanimous; any that cease to grant consent can leave. Or tacitly, they're continuing to consent by staying.
But we express our consent or lack, at least to the personnel manning the government, every time we vote. When we, as a people, withhold our consent, we either express that at gunpoint (which some did some time ago, with disastrous results all around), or with a restructuring of our government, which we've done 27 (17) times through amendments.
But these amendments, while requiring a super majority of the States, practically still works out only to a bare majority of the people.
Eric Hines
"Government " to most people means the President, the Houses of Congress, and the Judicial.
But the second "government" are the vast acronym bureaucracies who issue edicts without any accountability at the polls, and they are indeed "a swarm of officers sent among us to harass us and eat out our substance."
Over at PJ media, a retired cop wrote an article critical of Indiana's new law allowing people to legally resist a LEO who was acting illegally. The response, from an audience of presumably law abiding conservatives, was astonishing- the level of distrust and suspicion of law enforcement,particularly in the areas of civil asset forfeiture and "dynamic entry" , was overwhelming.
Apparently the new policing tactics have managed to inspire in the middle class , the same feelings about the police that was formerly found only in the ghetto. Extrapolating this trend is extremely disturbing. We need cops- we need them badly. But we need them to be our allies, not our nemesis. But as long as it is a net return $$ wise to bust a taxpayer for some chickenshit manufactured offense, and a net loss to pursue a real criminal, I fear the trend is not going to stop. And every XYZ agency has an army of LEO's to enforce the plethora of minutia they call regulation, and they are willing to kick down your door to do it, even if there is no conceivable threat to the public.
Apparently the new policing tactics have managed to inspire in the middle class , the same feelings about the police that was formerly found only in the ghetto.
We're having a contested Sheriff election here this year. I recently met with the Democratic candidate (there are also three Republican candidates, telling you something about the political divide here in this part of Georgia). Nice fellow, although he seemed more physically fit for being a grocer than a policeman; one of his opponents is a former Marine, and the simple physical comparison does not work to his advantage.
That said, the real reason I won't be voting for him is because of his platform. He wants to zone the county, so that there will be police coverage in all areas of it. Currently there is almost none; deputies are concentrated in the small towns, but out here in the rural areas we see a cop drive by about once every year or so.
He'd like to change that, but to my way of thinking it's an undesirable change. The police resources are better concentrated in the urban-ish areas, where there is some useful work for them to do. More, I don't want police around. They would serve no purpose here but to find ways to fine the public for doing the things we do naturally (like driving too fast for the opinion of the legislature in Atlanta; or the creation of certain forms of drink unacceptable to the tax collectors. One of the local high school science teachers is a friend of mine, and he quite legally operates a still at the school to craft alcohol for embalming purposes and sanitation purposes. I gather that many of his students look on it as a sort of vocational program).
We have no actual crime, the discouragement of which is the only benefit that police provide the average person. The heavily armed nature of the community is more than adequate for that purpose. So, what purpose the police? If a terrorist group should decide that rural Georgia was the right place to strike, they'd be inadequate; and for the actual disturbances we have, they're overkill that the government would have to find a way to justify.
I expect they'd do nothing but run speed traps and roadblocks looking for drugs and motor vehicle code violations. Maybe they'd run inspections for the kind of fines and asset seizures you're talking about. All that sounds like a general decline in the quality of life to me; like inviting a plague of locusts to live with you.
Although I should rush to add that the police in Athens, which is not far away, serve a useful purpose that justifies their existence. I just don't want to import policemen here, where they'd be constantly asked to justify the cost of fielding them... most likely by bringing in lots of extra fines.
Mr. Hines:
As to your second question, a large part of this answer depends, as a practical matter, on who has the most guns. Our own consensual government was born out of a war effort that was roughly evenly split among loyalists, revolutionaries, and don't-cares.
So, are we as Americans committed to the proposition that, say, a non-consensual rate of 1/3rd justifies violent rebellion? Is legitimacy lost at that point, or is it only lost if it's the third who have the guns who don't consent?
An informal poll at Festung Kleinrot suggests that there is no trust in the POTUS, our local elected officials are OK, our elected national officials are OK now that Sen. Hutchinson is retiring, and the majority of federal civilian bureaux and agencies are utterly untrustworthy and should at least be gutted if not abolished. The local police (as opposed to the two sheriffs) are fine but not the SWAT team. The SWAT unit is a seemingly-militarized police force and I'll just leave it there. Note, this is a highly unscientific poll.
LittleRed1
The thing that really bothers me on a personal level, is how often a call for police assistance turns into an arrest or worse for the very parties calling for help.
Locally, we had a mentally retarded guy call 911, the cops showed up, he was disoriented and standing behind his bedroom door and they shot him. Apparently he had an axe, but whether or not he threatened them was very questionable. He was behind a closed door. Just like Jose Guearna(sp?) they let him bleed out before getting medical attention for him. Or that poor guy in Long Beach a couple of years ago, who was sitting on his stoop with a garden hose sprayer, a neighbor called 911 and said he had a gun, the cops surrounded him surreptitiously then abruptly challenged him and shot him after his startled reaction. . Or the guy who was killed at the Nevada costco store, because he had a legal concealed firearm and some store clerk called the cops.( Moral to this is if you carry, do not print. It could mean your life.) .
Our local county sheriffs are a good lot, as far as i can tell, but the higher up you go the worse it seems to get. Our local prosecutor is on a 13 year quest to put away our rifle club xo because of an alleged machine gun, which no one can seem to account where it has been and who had it. . One would think 13 years in court, three dismissals, and a guy representing himself would somehow meet the standards of double jeopardy, but no. Now the country is after our club as well. They say it is not related. Sure.
The poll strikes me as meaningless on its face because there's no fundamental agreement of what "consent of the governed" means.
Also, I don't see how one can divorce the notion of consent from "what are you willing to do about it?".
Words are cheap, so if we're only talking words more people would be inclined to say they do not consent. Tie consent to an actual consequence and I'm guessing the number of people who would say they haven't consented goes way down.
Actually require them to prove they have done that something (whatever it is) and I'm guessing it approaches zero.
Yeah, I don't think the poll as such means anything. The concept does, though, so I'm wondering what to make of it.
A certain amount of non-consent is unproblematic, simply because in a democracy there is always an unhappy minority. Any given person will thus not consent to every government action; so there's got to be some tolerable level of nonconsensuality.
Not consenting to a government action, though, is different from rejecting the legitimacy of the government itself. I can't imagine we're anywhere near 78% (the inverse of 22%) on that, even in theory. People are rightfully angry about the way government behaves; but I don't get the sense that a majority has started to think that the government isn't legitimate any more.
Or even Mr. Hines' third-or-so with guns.
Still, I wonder to what degree the government anymore seeks our consent. More and more it seems like we're going through the motions of elections, but promises made don't get filled, and public outrage -- over things like the health care law -- is set aside or ignored. When states enact hugely popular laws (whether restrictions on partial birth abortion or immigration enforcement), they're often set aside in favor of an assertion of Federal authority to make people accept what they don't want.
That's the right road to get to a loss of legitimacy, whether or not we are there yet.
Still, I wonder to what degree the government anymore seeks our consent. More and more it seems like we're going through the motions of elections, but promises made don't get filled, and public outrage -- over things like the health care law -- is set aside or ignored.
I don't think government sought the consent of the governed more in earlier times, though. If anything, I'd guess they did that less rather than more.
How would government seek our consent, were they even inclined to do such a thing? And what would that consent be worth, given the fact that most folks aren't paying attention. How much is consent based upon ignorance/apathy really worth?
Well, they might have paid some attention to the 2010 elections, and course-corrected rather than doubling-down; or they might have taken notice of the proliferation of anti-abortion legislation in the decades since RvW, and reconsidered whether a thoroughgoing pro-choice policy could be said to in order with the consent of the governed. Or they could even now align their immigration policy with Arizona's, at least in Arizona: having won the point that they have the right to it, they could at least have the decency to show some respect for what the population has clearly indicated that it wants.
More formally, we could restore a certain degree of federalism, and indeed even further it to the local levels more than we do.
Just to take a trivial example, but one where the practical behavior of the people indicates non-consent to the government's scheme, think of speed limits. Now, in fairness I should admit that this is the one area in which I regularly violate existing law; otherwise I generally try to abide, as far as I am able (although I am becoming persuaded of T99's suggestion that there is a duty to disobey what she called "impertinent" laws).
Still, it's not just me. In fact, I'm usually the slowest guy on the road around here, even though I may be speeding. Nobody around here gives any obvious indication that they've even looked at the speed limit signs. We buy these things with tax revenues and hire people to post them and maintain them, but they have no effect whatsoever because the people don't consent to be bound by the law. Not just a minority, almost nobody seems to consent to it.
So why shouldn't the community have the right to alter the law, since it has a standard it plainly prefers? Why should we have a law that plainly contradicts the popular will on a point like this? It's not for any public good that the law does, because it has no effect (at least, none here, where the law is unenforced as well as ignored). So why not align the law with what the people really consent to on the subject of driving speeds?
I can kind of buy the counterargument that the Federal government should set the speed limits on roads that it pays for, and the state on state roads; but why shouldn't the county set speed limits on roads that it pays for? Most roads aren't state highways, let alone Federal roads.
I don't know that you've really established that any of the measures you cite reflect the will of either the majority of citizens or the majority of voters, though.
That's a problem. Voting is a mechanism that allows people to record a broad set of preferences but it doesn't conclusively prove popular sentiment wrt specific issues. California's referendums do that, and in some cases what allowed them to be overturned was a perceived conflict with the state constitution.... which is something conservatives usually applaud when the outcome doesn't run counter to their policy preferences.
I'm not seeing a general rule here that can be applied in a practical manner. Polls are unreliable and swing back and forth. Governing by poll would subject the public to ping-pong style lawmaking.
Voting is too general, and anyway most voters are not well informed.
It's an interesting question, but I'm not seeing a practical alternative to the system we have now.
Ah, but you've hit an important point. There are no practical suggestions for reform. Any constitutional amendment would require an unattainable supermajority of states.
If we are on the road to ruin, we shall stay on it. The only question is, how soon the end?
So, are we as Americans committed to the proposition that, say, a non-consensual rate of 1/3rd justifies violent rebellion?
Nah. I'm not putting a number on it, just noting a history. And noting the duty of which our Declaration of Independence reminds us:
But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is [the people's] right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.
Which also is vague concerning a necessary threshold. We don't need a hard number here anymore than we need a law or regulation to tell us everything we must, or must not, do.
Eric Hines
Any constitutional amendment would require an unattainable supermajority of states.
Hard, yes, but not unattainable. We've done it 17 times, including recently (I discount the Bill of Rights; these amendments were passed to fulfill a promise made to get the basic thing ratified).
And it should be hard to get an amendment, else the Constitution would be nothing but a hard to understand, 100-year-old document. We are, after all, trying to alter the social compact to which we all agreed; a significant majority of the members should be called on to agree to the change before it can take effect. Even if it's the flawed supermajority I described above.
Eric Hines
Yes, someday things might be different. If the Republic survives long enough, political realignment is sure to occur.
However, if we are on the road to ruin, that first "if" is a big one.
"So why shouldn't the community have the right to alter the law, since it has a standard it plainly prefers? Why should we have a law that plainly contradicts the popular will on a point like this? It's not for any public good that the law does, because it has no effect (at least, none here, where the law is unenforced as well as ignored). So why not align the law with what the people really consent to on the subject of driving speeds?"
Because we all know that lines are important. Sure we cut the corner from the sidewalk to the walkway and step on the grass, so it dies there, but the rest of the lawn is in good shape because it says 'keep off the grass'. Most standards in life aren't fully or consistently met. We are imperfect and know it. We also know we need some sense of limit, so if the speed limit is 65, sure we all drive 75 (or 80) but if it were 75, we'd be doing 85, some 90. Human nature. Best to learn to live with it, and still maintain some sort of ideal, rather than forcibly restrain it, or pretend we're better than we are.
As for consent, when you can convince enough of your countrymen that the government is illegitimate, consent has been revoked. Until then, consent exists, but that by no means should be taken as a mandate- it's a minimum standard only. Our founding Fathers worked hard to persuade their fellow Americans that it was time to throw off the shackles of the King, and it wasn't an easy thing to do. Even men with the talents and commitment possessed by that group were put to the test to make it even that far, much less to win victory and freedom. It's a daunting task to be sure.
We also know we need some sense of limit, so if the speed limit is 65....
In the particular case, this isn't necessarily true. The German autobahns have no speed limits--or didn't when I was there--and their accident rate was no worse than ours. And some transgressions were handled on the spot: there was an incident on a winter autobahn, in very dense fog and on a black ice-coated roadway. One auto driver decided he'd had enough and stopped driving in it. Trouble is, he stopped on the roadway, in the lane in which he'd been...creeping along. A truck driver encountered him in that fog, and after a display of driving skill, he recovered control of his truck, stopped (on the shoulder), went back to the stopped car and beat the s*t out of the idiot masquerading as a driver. Problem involved, no government's man involvement necessary.
To the larger point, we do need articulated limits, but when they're the patchwork that is Federal laws, or the interface between Federal and state/local, or adjacent local, the practical existence of limits is problematical. Add to that when the folks causing the problem--e.g., a speeder causes an accident--are not held fully accountable for the problem--e.g., the speeder's insurance still is required to pay off the speeder's injuries--the limits are further diluted.
We've lost the accountability part of that, and the local limits have lost the most, and they should be the most important.
Eric Hines
Not all that long ago, Montana had no speed limit and had relatively few fatalities. This article has some interesting thoughts, but I think it's flawed- when the total number of incidents you're looking at is in the single digits per year, you need to also look at things like how many days of below freezing temps in one year vs. another and other possible influences. I think the German Autobahn works for two main reasons- 1. It's much more involved to get a drivers license in Europe (I know that in most countries, changing a tire used to be a required part of the exam). 2. German culture- they are very good followers of rules and tend to be orderly in their conduct, so there is discpline in lane selection and such, and I'm sure they have a higher percentage of seat belt wearers. A liberty based culture such as ours is likely not to work so well with no speed limits everywhere.
...there is discpline in lane selection and such....
I'd say more courteous than disciplined, although it works in the same direction. German drivers were at pains, for instance, on approaching a merging lane to shift left a lane or two to give the merging traffic room to merge safely--at highway speeds.
I see that rarely here, with resulting traffic jams and accidents where two different lanes of traffic are coming together. Comparing this with the behavior I generally see in Metroplex traffic where the traffic already is slowed by a construction-blocked lane and everyone politely taking turns and letting traffic merge, my impression is that American drivers tend more to obliviousness than to indiscipline generally (eliding the irony of that dichotomy).
Eric Hines
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