Madisonian Democracy

Madisonian Democracy was based on the idea that human are self interested. Factions would be form due to common interest. There would be fragmented power to avoid the tyranny of majority and minority power. The point of the Civil Rights Movement was to have minority fight against tyranny of the majority, and they wanting their basic rights. With their hard effort they were able to pass the Civil Rights Act. They did use Madisonian Democracy but it fail. This was due to the fact te court could not enforce the policies properly, could be time consuming, did not end discrimination, dealt with many symptoms, and had a roll back.

The events and achievements of the Civil Rights Movement and the continuing struggle for civil rights equality since that time can demonstrate the strengths of Madisonian Democracy in America because it was able to make a change, had a big influence to people and set standard for progression.

The Madisonian Democracy was created by James Madison who opposed tyranny by the use of trust alone. In effort to prevent the force of tyranny between the power of majorities and the power of minorities, they need to structure the government in which the powers of the government are separated into three branches which is the executive, the legislative, and the judicial. These three branches of government are independent from each other, but often time would cooperate by necessity. This type of government is focused on limiting power of the individuals in government. Competing group factions channeled through fragmented Democratic Institutions. Cooperation and compromise between factions necessary for any collective action.

Madisonian Democracy is pretty similar but yet different to majoritarian and participatory concepts of democracy. The benefits of Madisonian Democracy is being able to dampen/control majority tyranny, access/openness to prevent minority tyranny, might promote general public interest, and might provide a stable government. The disadvantage to this is status quo bias. Majoritarian democracy is when the majority rule over society. This can lead to “”tyranny of the majority””, where there is an oppression of the minority groups within a society. Government by majority of people would follow what the majority want, and this comes close to idea of “government by and for the people””. The benefit of majoritarian democracy is that it helps unified the power, it is the simplest way to organize, can be effective, and lead to a stable government. The disadvantage about majoritarian democracy is that power can be corrupts, high chance are “tyranny of the majority”, and can be bad if it creates a divided society. Participatory democracy is when individual citizens decide to participate in political decision-making and choose policies that affect their lives. This is a system of government where they do not rely on the elected representative to govern on their behalf, but rather themselves. The benefit of participatory democracy is that there is an increase in political involvement, true form of representing the people, and most likely that corruption is reduced. The disadvantage can be extremely costly to be involved, minority often have little say, and there would still be corruption but a bit less. While there benefits for the different types of democracy, there is also disadvantages as well.

The Madisonian Democracy was created in wanting to prevent the tyranny of the majority, where majority would benefit from the policies, without any regard for the minority rights or welfare. By placing the government so they have no direct control of the majority, this separate the powers of the different institutions, and construct a system of checks and balances. The system power will be divided and shared among multiple institutions, so help reduce the possibility of tyranny of majority rule. This requires cooperation and compromise, but by doing so can reduce its efficiency, but it is necessary for any collective action. The results would lead to status quo bias, dampen/control majority faction, access/openness to prevent minority tyranny, promote general public interest, and somewhat of a stable government. Madisonian Democracy does work in some ways. The US government is fragmented and accessible. Power and resources are widely distributed between the groups and this happens through a political process of interest group bargaining. This would lead to a result of politic and society not being dominated by elite, there would be some compromise, and generally lead to a fair result with a stable society. This all leads to helping shaped the important political events that happen throughout history.

The Civil Rights Movement have achieved many great policy outcome that is able to help make a difference for the better. Thanks to the Civil Rights Movement, the thirteenth amendment was able to be implemented, and this help abolish slavery in 1865. This is really important because it help those who slave to slowly have their equality and rights. Another important event is the Women Rights to vote which happen in 1920. This gave women more right to vote without it being discriminative to women. There was also the Civil Right Act where the “due process” come to play. The point of the “due process” because it was a safeguard from random denial of life, liberty, or property by the government outside the penalty of law. The Voting Right Act was another big achievement where it provided rights for minority people to vote with a literacy test or a grandfather clause. The point of the grandfather clause was a clause excuse certain race of people to vote and it is a piece of legislation affecting their previous rights, privileges, or practices saying they are not able to vote due to these factor. These policies outcomes was able to be achieve by the Civil Rights Movement. There were many court cases that was able to help the Civil Rights Movement. For instance, Brown v. Board Education where it was ruled that separating public school for black and whites kids was considered unconstitutional. This demolished the Plessy v. Ferguson case of “separate but equal” claim. This would later on lead to Boston riots, white fight, and private school. The Civil Rights Movement have achieved many great accomplishment that was able to lead us far in making a difference for us.

It is hard to determine whether or not Madisonian Democracy would be successful or a failure if it was demonstrated by the Civil Rights Movement. If it is successful there is many benefits to it. First one would be that it ensure equal protection for all which lead to no discrimination for anything. Second one is that it prevent majority from oppressing, so elite are not dominating the politic and society. Third one is it help give minority rights and interest, so what they say do really matter. The last one is that it is able to balance individual rights and liberties against legit national interest. These is what make the Civil Rights Movement successful if Madisonian Democracy really work. It great if it was a successful but there are chance of this being a failure as well. A possible chance that if it does not work there would many veto points so nothing gets done or approved to make the change. Another problem would be status quo bias, where there was already a preference on the current affair. Likely no opinion would change that person mind to side with the opposer. An lastly, if failure chance are high that there still be a continuation of inequality, discrimination, and oppression that would still be happening. So it is hard to say the quality of the Madisonian Democracy is able to help the Civil Rights Movement or not.

Even though we made it far through achieving great things for equality for everyone, there is still a continuing struggle to accomplish this. There is still discrimination that we still face til this day and this is after policies and rules has been implemented. There is really so much these policies can actually do help us achieve equality. There is bound to be a group of people that would have their own opinion in believing what they want to be. It is hard to change a person mind but it is not impossible. Inequality is still there but as time pass, the amount of people starting to speak out, and people fighting for what they believe is right there is bound to be change that would happen even if it takes hundreds of years. Just like Women equality was due to them speaking up and fighting for what they believe in that makes women have more rights. For instance, like the right to vote (1920). Though there is still inequality that happens in society against women but nothing is done in a quick instance but need time for it to progress.

The events and achievements of the Civil Rights Movement and the continuing struggle for civil rights equality since that time can demonstrate the strengths of Madisonian Democracy in America because it was able to make a change, had a big influence to people and set standard for progression.

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