Democracy and the Bill of Rights: Some Notes on Issues and Strategies

by Ward Morehouse

Failure of Democracy

We live, sadly, in a plutocracy - rule by the rich. Democracy remains an unfulfilled aspiration. Nowhere has the failure to achieve democracy been more tragically evident than in the growing inequality of income and wealth, particularly in the last decade. During the 1980s, the net worth of the 400 richest persons in America increased by 522%. During that same decade the bottom 99% lost over 5% of their share of personal income while the top 1% almost doubled its share from 8 to 14%.

This state of affairs leads to the fundamental question: How can we have a democracy when so much power and wealth is concentrated in so few hands? If we are to be true to the principles of the Declaration of Independence and the Preamble to the Constitution and to assert our sovereignty as "We the People", then we must work toward replacing corporate anti-democratic institutions that consolidate wealth and power with democratic institutions which disperse wealth and power.

How Democratic is the American Constitution?

Robert Dahl, of Yale University, one of our most eminent political scientists, sums up a lifetime of analysis of U.S. democracy in a recent book with the above title.

In this provocative book (Yale University Press, 2001) he poses the question, "Why should we uphold our Constitution?" The vast majority of Americans venerate the American Constitution and the principles it embodies, but many also worry that the United States has fallen behind other nations on crucial democratic issues, including economic equality, racial integration, and women's rights. Robert Dahl explores this vital tension between the belief of Americans in the legitimacy of their Constitution and their belief in the principles of democracy.

The Clinton and Bush-Ashcroft Assault on our Democratic Rights

This is the challenge of the moment. The work of the Bill of Rights Defense Committee in linking and encouraging hundreds of municipalities to resist the so called anti-terrorism legislation and executive orders of the Clinton and Bush-Ashcroft administrations has been crucial in the continuing fight to build a truly democratic society. The level of engagement already achieved, especially with tiny resources, is impressive but still covers only a small proportion of the total population of the country.

The Corporation and the Bill of Rights

But even if the Clinton and Bush-Ashcroft anti-terrorism legislation were repealed tomorrow, serious limitations in the defense of our basic human rights by the Bill of Rights (and subsequent constitutional amendments, especially the Fourteenth Amendment, as recognized by Arcata, California in its ground-breaking ordinance seeking to nullify the Patriot and Homeland Security Acts) would remain. Perhaps the most egregious is the usurpation of the Constitutional rights of natural persons by corporations, largely through judicial decisions over the last century and more.

The harsh reality of 21st Century America is that giant corporations bigger than most nation states govern. In the US Constitution, they are delegated no authority to make our laws and define our culture. So when corporations govern, democracy flies out the window.

This may be a depressing idea but it is not new or complicated. President Franklin D. Roosevelt, among many other political leaders, summed it up: "The liberty of a democracy is not safe if the people tolerate the growth of private power to a point where it becomes stronger than the democratic State itself."

Building Links in Arenas of Future Struggle

Political mobilization is essential in bringing about significant change in a society which aspires to be democratic and which has many of the attributes of a democratic society even as it struggles to deal with the growing inequality that makes it a plutocracy. This means coalition politics in one form or another. At the very least, those working at the national or regional level should be sharing contacts and striving to link local efforts working along parallel lines toward the same ultimate goal of achieving real democracy.

A good illustration may well lie in Arcata, California, which recently adopted the first binding ordinance prohibiting municipal employees from providing information to the federal government under the Bush-Ashcroft anti-terrorism laws and regulations. The ground work for this action was laid, in part, by a local organization, Democracy Unlimited in Humboldt County (DUHC) which led the way in one of the first municipal actions to define what role corporations should be allowed to play in that community some four or five years ago.

Key issue areas need to be canvassed for local contacts working on these issues who can then be linked in coordinated actions. The anti-corporate personhood campaign led by the Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund (CELDF) in Pennsylvania and the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom elsewhere is one good illustration. Another is the effort to get corporations out of the political process altogether (more than just "clean money" elections although that is an important first step).

Others include the campaign for worker rights led by the Labor Party and based on the First and Thirteenth Amendments, resistance to growing concentration of ownership in the media and the emergence of alternative and grassroots journalism, and the attempt to realize internationally recognized human rights within the United States.

These are exciting times to be engaged in the struggle to build a more democratic future, as well to be confronted with enormous obstacles. That struggle will be long and hard. But as President Kennedy once said, the journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.

NOTE: Ward Morehouse is a cofounder of the Program on Corporations, Law & Democracy (POCLAD) and a member of the Northampton Bill of Rights Defense Committee.