Democracy Dbq

The Constitution of the United States of America is seen as a vastly democratic document, allowing democracy to flourish here. But is it truly as democratic as believed? Was a democracy even the intended goal of the writers? Well we’ll just have to figure that out. Starting with, who the writers of the Constitution were. Then what a pure democracy even is. Followed by four separate parts of the Constitution and the extent to which that they are democratic. Ending with the answer to our question.

Constitutional Conventions was where the Constitution was written up. The Conventions started in the summer of 1787 and did not end until the Constitution was finished, two years later in 1789. In total there was fifty-five delegates sent to the convention.

However, there was no set number of delegates to send. Therefore some states were overrepresented and others were underrepresented. The conventions were held in secret, with only the wealthy involved. The delegates came under the premise that the Articles would only be tweaked, but once there they decided that the Articles needed to replaced with a new document that would give the federal government more power. The delegates decided this by themselves without the public’s knowledge or say so, and made this decision without the real power to do so. The public did not know about any of this was happening until the Articles were replaced with the Constitution. All of the fifty five delegates came from the wealthy class, none of them were poor. Fifty four of the delegates, while a part of the wealthy class, were merchants, lawyers and government officials.The one other delegate was a farmer but he was a wealthy farmer. Thus he was still a part of the wealthy elites. However these delegates, the wealthy elites, were the minority in both the North and the South. They had a great deal of power and wealth but there was only a wee number of them.
As the minority, the wealthy elites did not want a pure democracy because in a democracy, the majority has the power.

A pure democracy is a government where in, the government is told what to do by the people when they, the people, vote directly on laws, issues and politics. Which means they would lose their considerable amount of power, and most likely their wealth as well, to the majority. The majority that made up approximately eighty to ninety percent of the population. The majority that was mostly made up of poor farmers and slaves. However indentured servants, unskilled workers and skilled workers made up fifteen to thirty percent to the population, and thus a part of the majority. The elites knew that the new document had to give the majority enough power and say, so as to make them happy enough so that they do not rebel. Like Shay and the other poor farmers did. As much as they did not want nor intend for the Constitution to be a democracy, they did intend for it to be more democratic than a monarchy. Which is what most other countries had. They did achieve that too. The Constitution actually resembles a republic than a democracy. A republic is when the government is told what to do by the people through elected representatives, thus indirectly telling the government what to do.

Due to the writers not intending for the Constitution to be a pure democracy, just democratic enough, there are parts that are fairly democratic and other parts that are minisculely

democratic.
The Preamble starts with,” We the People.” This does sound substantially democratic. It portrays and reinforces that the power of the government comes from the people. It also sounds inclusive. That everyone is a part of this. However, the people that wrote this were all white men that were a part of the wealthy elitist class and they wrote this in secret. These writers had no right to say that they speak for the people when the people themselves did not know. The people did not consent to this nor were the writers elected to write this. Honestly it seems like it was only used as a way to sway the people, as a piece of propaganda. Much like in the Declaration of Independence these words were used to sway the people to rebel,” all men are created equal” and “endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness”.
In Article I, Section 2, Paragraph 1: “The House of Representatives shall be composed of Members chosen every second year”. This part is considerably democratic. The representatives have two year terms. Which means that if a representative does something the people don’t like, they only have a short while until they can vote for a new replacement representative. Conversely if a rep. does something the people like, they can vote to keep that rep. In office. Thus giving the people more power and control over the House of Representatives. However further in the same paragraph is,”the Electors in each State shall have the Qualifications requisite for Electors of the most numerous Branch of the State Legislature.” This has unclear language, which is the writer's intent in obfuscating. But once sifted through, the meaning is found to be not democratic. The qualifications spoken of are as follows: white, male, and own property. These qualifications just happen to exclude females, non-whites and those who do not own property. Which adds up to about eighty percent of the entire population. It miraculously does manage to include the writers and the rest of the ruling class. This keeps the power among the ruling class and thus among the minority. Which is the intention of the writers, who are the minority.
In Article I, Section 5, Paragraph 3: ”Each House shall keep a Journal of its proceedings, and from time to time publish the same,”. This is copiously democratic. This allows the people to see what is happening in Congress. Such as the bills being introduced, who is voting for what, etc. However it continues with,” excepting such Parts as may in their Judgement require secrecy.” This is minisculely democratic. This means that they, Congress, can determine if and what is published. This allows for them to hide information from the public, legally.
The original Electoral College is diminutively democratic. The people have little to no role, and the little role they do have is either small or indirect. Such as, “The legislature of each state may in any manner they choose, select the electors.” This means that state legislature can select electors in absolutely any way they want to. Such as by wealth, or appearance, or any other way possible. It also allows for an ample amount of discrimination, which is not surprising. It was the late seventeen-hundreds.
The Constitution is limitedly democratic. It is not a pure democracy, it is not even half democratic. Which was the the intent of the writers of this document. They did not want a pure democracy. They did not want the majority to have the power. And they achieved that. As shown by the qualifications that exclude the majority in A.I, Sect.2, Par.1. It is also shown in A.I, Sect.5, Par.3 with the allowance that Congress has the legal right to determine what is secret and therefore withheld, concerning their journals. And that which is not secret and therefore may be published to the public.