Tuesday morning I took a walk to the Jackson School library in
Morgan Hill to cast my vote. I feel lucky I live in a time and
place that lets me to participate in the process of democratic
rule.
Tuesday morning I took a walk to the Jackson School library in Morgan Hill to cast my vote. I feel lucky I live in a time and place that lets me to participate in the process of democratic rule.
Years ago, I made it a tradition on Election Day to walk to the polling place. I always feel like I’m in a Norman Rockwell painting as I stroll through the neighborhood with my voting pamphlet in hand.
Tuesday’s walk of several blocks took me about 10 minutes to complete. But in a sense, it was part of a much longer walk through history. It was a journey that started as an experiment in the Athens of the 5th century B.C. And over the last 2,500 years, that journey still continues.
Outside the system of democracy, rulers are essentially tyrants. Leaders gain power through military might, political conspiracy or heredity — and their whims of justice become law. The people are there to serve the ruler.
In the age of the progressive leader Pericles starting around 450 B.C., the ancient Greeks turned that outdated idea on its head. Rulers are there to serve the people. Quite a new-fangled concept at that time, and no one knew where it would lead.
Ancient Athens was a city-state of about 10,000 people. Not all of them voted. Women, slaves, men under the age of 18, and those not born in Athens had no political rights. In a great irony of history, democracy was born out of Athenian slavery. Slaves provided free citizens the luxury of time to assemble and debate issues and make votes.
The Romans, always keen on other people’s good ideas, took the Greek concept of democracy and add their own twist. Athens was a direct democracy — people with the right to vote made the decisions by casting a black or white stone. Fine for a community of 10,000.
But Rome with its millions of citizens had no practical way to tally up the votes. Thus evolved the idea of representative democracy — a “republic.”
In the Roman Republic, officials elected to the Senate were expected to act on their own best judgment of the needs and interests of the people.
Overall, the concept worked — although not perfectly. But with the rise of despotism of the Roman Empire, democracy essentially went underground for a long winter’s hibernation.
During the Middle Ages, free cities of Germany, Italy and Flanders upheld some forms of democratic tradition. In 1215 in England at Runnymede (near what is now the city of Windsor), nobility forced King John to seal the document known as the Magna Carta — “The Great Charter.” This established a concept of Parliament in which the sovereign authority had to share power with nobility. This signaled the end of the king’s one-man show. He now had to share the political stage with others.
After the great plagues that wiped out much of the European population during the Middle Ages, a rich commercial middle-class arose. This growing middle-class possessed the wealth and leisure time necessary to participate in governmental affairs.
The Renaissance idea of humanism — that human beings indeed have great value and are not just the chattel of God — led to an awakening of equal political and social rights. Renaissance thinkers also promoted a renewed interest in the ancient Greek and Roman democratic principals.
The first popular rebellion against monarchy occurred in England during the Civil War starting in 1662. A country squire and member of parliament named Oliver Cromwell proved military superiority over the Royalists.
It all came to a climax when the victors chopped King Charles I head off in 1649. The Biblically-supported “Divine Right of Kings” was essentially flushed down the toilet of history. Next in the great journey along the road of democracy came an American twist: July 4, 1776. (Need I say more?) The signing of the Declaration of Independence proclaimed the people’s right to overthrow a tyrannical form of government if that government no longer serves the common interest.
The next stage of the journey followed shortly after on Sept. 15, 1787, when the U.S. Constitution was accepted by delegates of all states represented at the Constitutional Convention. It set up our nation with a government based on democratic innovations presented to us from the ages of history including the ancient Greeks and Romans. Its framers were dubious it would work at all.
The great American experiment evolved in the last 217 years. Civil Rights has seen the often violent struggle to allow African-Americans the right to vote. The Nineteenth Amendment gave women that right in 1919. And in the late 1960s, the voting age was lowered to 18 years.
At Jackson School on Tuesday, I and other voters throughout California stepped into voting booths and faced the next stage of the road of democracy — voting with a Silicon Valley twist. An electronic voting machine made it simple and quick to make my selections by touching choices presented on a digital screen.
What would ancient Pericles and the other Athenians have thought of such a gadget? Surely their black and white stones cast into a Grecian vase would seem downright primitive. But it’s still the same overall stupendous idea — government for the people and by the people.
Martin Cheek is the author of ‘The Silicon Valley Handbook.’
