While I was at Cato University two subjects often came up: whether voting was a natural right, and democracy as mob-rule. I had a few thoughts about these this morning and hope to share them.#

Voting: A Natural Right?#

First, what are these terms "voting" and "natural right" that I am referring to? The definition of Natural Rights is fairly easy: "Rights that belong to people simply because they are human beings."#

But the definition of "voting" is more difficult. For the clarity of this argument I will use "A regular say in the government that you live under." But perhaps a clearer definition is "A regular in the government that you are citizen of." The importance of the second will become clear.#

So, I will now say that voting is not a natural right, defined as such. This is because the role of government is to protect natural rights, therefore a natural right cannot pertain to government, because it does not exist when natural rights are defined.#

This is more clear from the second definition, it implies that voting is contingent on being a citizen of a government, rather than a human being. Thus voting is a civil right that may, or may not, be granted by a government depending on how it defines 'citizen.' For example, we have seen the definition of citizen change in many ways from Athens, to Rome, to England, to the early United States, etc.#

For those screaming in the back that a human being must be allowed to choose how his government operates, I say no, he must allowed to choose his government. Because a government must protect natural rights this is not troublesome for a person may reject his government and choose another while retaining his life, liberty, and property--natural rights.#

This right to choose government is derived from natural rights. Basically, and I won't go into too much depth because it has been done before, the government exists to protect our natural rights on our behalf. We can protect these rights on our own but often times it is useful to help one another out, this free association is an early form of government. Refer to Locke, Bastiat, or Rand, for details of this argument.#

Democracy: Tyranny by the Majority?#

Democracy: A government controlled by the people governed through voting, either directly on decisions or on representatives. (Note: For the purpose of this section, government does not refer to a just limited government, but a government like those found in the "real world"--for example, the United States or Canada.)#

One argument against democracy is that it enables the majority to command the minority and harm the protection of their natural rights. The case goes from the extreme of all the whites voting that the blacks do not have rights worth protecting to the more mild case of the majority voting away a store keeper's freedom to not associate with certain individuals, i.e. not allow them in his store.#

It has recently occurred to me that in many cases democracy actually serves as a tool for one minority to command another minority or the majority. I do not look at specific examples but identify the desire for this end in the political agendas of certain groups.#

The argument: Take for instance, the call by certain groups to cease the sale of product X in market Y (cigarettes to children, for example.) These groups would like to command the government, through democracy, to make this illegal. However, they could do this without the government if they truly represented a majority of X purchasers* simply by boycotting and hurting the company's bottom line. By calling for government intervention they acknowledge that the majority does not agree with them and they are a minority with a special agenda.#

* A second thing to notice is that in the absence of government on those actually involved in market Y or the sale of X are concerned.

Democracy, it seems, is a tool that is most powerfully used by minority groups to meddle with the natural rights of other groups, minority or majority. The effectiveness of such a minority seems to stem primarily from the package deals offered by parties in most democracies.#

Notice, of course, if the government is sufficiently limited to be unable to ignore natural rights indefinitely then the problem is moot because the demands of the minority cannot be met by the government.#

However, even constitutional limited governments like the United States were vulnerable. I attribute this to an initial case of a majority voting away the rights of minority--either by an Amendment to the Constitution or a law that remains in place--thus setting a precedent for future abuses by smaller groups. This fits nicely with the theological principle that evil is only borne of evil.#

Conclusion#

I offer no resolution to these problems or interpretations. My point is simply to state an idea, not to say that a democratic government with universal suffrage** as a civil right is undesirable, merely that a practical limited government like the one described by the U.S. Constitution is not an iron-clad protector of liberty. Instead, liberty must be constantly re-won and defended against those Statists and dictators who would try to rob us of it.#

** Another short note on universal suffrage. When the Constitution states that human beings have some right that is to be protected and thus not infringed upon or some law that may not be based, does this essentially remove suffrage from the supporters of such a law? They may vote on the law, but they are ignored because the Constitution precludes its passing. (Of course, this is not the case in real life with Constitution Amendments and the ability of Congress to pass laws that are only later revealed to be un-Constitutional. But, is such a thought interesting?)#