Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness, Version 4.0

In August of 1619, a ship appeared on this horizon, near point comfort, a coastal port in the English colony of Virginia. It carried more than 20 enslaved Africans, who were sold to the colonists. No aspect of the country that would be formed here has been untouched by the years of slavery that followed. On the 400th anniversary of this fateful moment, it is finally time to tell our story truthfully.

The New York Times Magazine

Anti-Racism as a New Religion

In the vacuum created by the decline of traditional religion in America, a new religion is taking the world by storm. This is the religion of anti-racism. If Americans can come to a consensus on anything today, it is that slavery and racism are wrong. The popularity of the best-selling book How to Be an Antiracist by Ibram X. Kendi and the 1619 Project of the New York Times led by reporter Nikole Hannah-Jones attest to the strong desire of Americans to address the legacy of racism.

These popular narratives share themes with a large number of courses on Critical Race Theory taught in major universities that

“view racism as institutional and as baked into both American law and society…. that doctrines such as the intent requirement (the idea that discrimination must be intentional in order to be actionable) as overly narrow and reformist rather than structural in nature.”¹Introduction to UCLA course Law 266, Critical Race Theory, https://law.ucla.edu/academics/curriculum/critical-race-theory

Critics of critical race theory argue that it is a narrative disconnected from reason, science, and neutral principles of constitutional law.²For example, Jeffrey S. Pyle wrote in the Boston College Law Review (Vol. 40, p. 788), “Critical race theorists attack the very foundations of the liberal legal order, including equality theory, legal reasoning, Enlightenment rationalism, and neutral principles of constitutional law. These liberal values, they allege, have no enduring basis in principle, but are mere social constructs calculated to legitimate white supremacy.” This criticism describes the way Critical Race Theory is used and taught today, because its doctrines are disconnected from reason and evidence if not opposed to science, and even math,³https://www.hoover.org/research/seattle-schools-propose-teach-math-education-racist-will-california-be-far-behindseattle as a form of white supremacy. But critical theory is not possible without reason, science, or the Enlightenment, and proponents of Critical Race Theory who say otherwise reveal an ignorance of critical theory.

The hyperpartisanism in American politics exists because the founding principle of “consent of the governed” has been circumvented. The US Constitution was designed with checks and balances and a consensus of three-fifths, two-thirds, or three-fourths votes to prevent moneyed interests from using the government. This is often referred to as a “super-majority.” Further, a bill would need to be passed in two houses, the House representing the a consensus of people and (before the 17th Amendment) a consensus of the states. This was to ensure the bill was in both the interests of the people and the states. The “consent of the governed” is what makes a government legitimate in the eyes of its citizens.

A System Off Its Rails

The United States system of government by consent has gone off its constitutional rails. I say “rails” because the Constitution defines the framework and boundaries of legislation. These boundaries, or rails, were established both to protect the citizens from themselves, and to prevent special interests from controlling legislation. In the United States today almost no legislation is passed by consent of the governed and nearly everything is passed by special interests. Thus the system is not considered legitimate by large numbers of citizens.

While, the Constitution created no vehicles for the representation of moneyed interests or corporations, legislators have gradually figured out ways to serve them, rather than the people who elect them. Numerous rules of legislation, laws, and even constitutional amendments have created a new set of rails for special interest legislation and political parties have become the trains that deliver it.

Voting for Groups Creates Plutocracy

Party names on ballots transform a government of the people into a government by groups.  Most of the time voters will vote for a group they identify with rather than an individual candidate. After the election, it is those groups that control the corridors of power and the government. The government becomes a plutocracy in which the primary financial funders of the political parties control the legislation. This is one reason the United States today is neither the Democracy democrats talk about, nor the Republican form of representative government the U.S. Founders sought to create.

Group Names on Ballots Make Representatives Accountable to Groups, not Individual Citizens

Imagine who people might vote for on a ballot like this:
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