Supermajority

“ Indeed, the necessary effect of the concurrent majority is, to make the government more popular — that is, to require more wills to put it in action, than if any one of the majorities, of which it is composed, were its sole element — as will be apparent by reference to figures. ”

“ A majority in Congress, according to their interested and perverted views, is omnipotent. * * * Numbers with them, is the great element of free Government. A majority is infallible and omnipotent. 'The right divine to rule in Kings,' is only transferred to their majority. ”

“ When a majority is included in a faction, the form of popular Government, on the other hand, enables it to sacrifice to its ruling passion or interest both the public good and the rights of other citizens. ”

“ Majority rule, under certain prescribed conditions, is a necessary constituent of any practicable democratic organization; but the actions or decisions of a majority need not have any binding moral and national authority. ”

“ Does not our legislation wear the features of a vast conglomerate? Are we conscious of any national leadership? Are we not, rather, dimly aware of being pulled in a score of directions by a score of crossing influences, a multitude of contending forces?
This vast and miscellaneous democracy of ours must be led; its giant faculties130 must be schooled and directed. Leadership cannot belong to the multitude; masses of men cannot be self-directed, neither can groups of communities. We speak of the sovereignty of the people, but that sovereignty, we know very well, is of a peculiar sort ”

“ This great statesman was sufficiently astute to predict the rule of the majority for generations to come, but I doubt if he anticipated the character of the men to whom the majority would delegate their power. ”

“ The popular will is expressed in two ways, which are quite distinct and relate to different provinces: First, collectively, by majority, in regard to blended, mutually involved interests, such as the large economic and political concerns of the community ”

“ This Republic is the chosen home of minorities, of the less power in the presence of the greater. It is a common error to speak of our distinction as consisting in the rule of the majority. Majorities, the greater material powers, have always ruled before. ”

“ One pre eminently democratic quality our party with this glorious record unmistakably possesses, to do it justice, far beyond all true democracy, namely, a colossal respect for popular majorities. A majority it must have at all costs, and since it would have hard work to convince one, it buys its majority wherever it can. ”

“ The dominant majority, for the time, would, in reality, through the right of suffrage, be the rulers — the controlling, governing, and irresponsible power; and those who make and execute the laws would, for the time, be, in reality, but their representatives and agents. ”

“ An organization glorying in a leader who tells you with cynical frankness that he is in politics for his own pocket all the time? Can you hope to reform that crowd from the inside by moral suasion and the charm of a virtuous example? ”

“ The gradation of reasoning, "that each individual ought to be governed by the majority of some party: that a majority thus obtained, is a genuine republican majority: and that it is both the government and the nation," seizes upon the amiable and honest respect of the people for their representatives, and rewards them for their virtues by the calamities of a war, entered into contrary to the true wishes of themselves. ”

“ Only, be sure you please to say, 'Do it differently to satisfy me, John Ruskin,' and not to satisfy Mr., Mrs., and the Miss and Master Smith of the great majority. The great majority is the majority of the little, you know, who will come over to you if you don't think of them—and if they don't, you will bear it. ”

“ We must ask ourselves tonight how we can forge and wield a popular majority from one end of this country to the other, a majority united on basic, positive goals with a platform broad enough and deep enough to endure long into the future, far beyond the lifespan of any single issue or personality. ”

“ It is to us a matter of indifference what party triumphs, or who is uppermost. The Government may change to-morrow, and the day after, and so on for a month long, and yet we remain just as we were. Monarchy, Commonwealth, Democracy—what you will—may rule the hour, but the sous-lieutenant is but the servant who changes his master. ”

“ I mean the rich men who without marked qualifications for important position, and without having earned promotion by useful and distinguished public service, seek high office merely on the strength of their money, either to use its power for their own advantage, or to add the conspicuous honors of high political station to their wealth. ”

“ In such a country as ours—a democratic one—the masses are governed by a few great leaders; these leaders, whether in power or not, are still the almost despots who rule us. Their actions give fruit and coloring to the character of the sections over which they sway their autocratic sceptres. ”

“ Why should the upper-lobby be left in the possession of a few hundred persons, when there are thousands upon thousands whose strong heads have conquered for their country a high place amongst the nations of the world, and for themselves influence and substantial power and wealth? ”

“ A few, a very few in comparison with the less fortunate majority, acquiring a competence, removed to other localities, and in not a few instances, have become conspicuous figures in the world of business, politics and finance. ”

“ We are all (and here Fog raised his voice to the highest key, and struck the board sharply with his hand) FOR and AGAINST everything! How else can we be with the majority? What is the New-Light Quodlibetarian Democracy, but a strict conformity to the will of the majority? Against that and that only we never go!— (tremendous applause.) As Levi Beardsly said, Perish Commerce, Perish Credit!—and I say, Perish Currency, Banks, Sub-Treasury, Constitution, Law, Benton, Amos, Van—I had almost said perish Old Hickory—but always go with the MAJORITY! ”

“ In a country governed by party as strictly as England is to-day, the majority in the upper House must at any one time belong to one side or the other. If the majority shifted, there would not be permanent irritation in the same quarter ”

“ I am not aware that history furnishes any example in which a number of these political atoms or corpuscles have coalesced into a body, and learned to feel themselves one people, except through previous subjection to a central authority common to all. [2] It is through the habit of deferring to that authority, entering into its plans and subserving its purposes, that a people such as we have supposed receive into their minds the conception of large interests common to a considerable geographical extent. ”

“ All this is evidently true of superiors in general—superiors in riches, authority, and understanding, taken together. And need I say how much of this whole superiority goes along with riches? It is no small part of it which arises out of riches themselves. In all governments, particularly in our own, a good share of civil authority accompanies them. Superior or natural understanding may, or may not; but when it does not, yet riches afford great opportunities for improvement, and may command information: which things together are equivalent to natural superiority of understanding. ”

“ Those rulers, whatever name they may go by, who turn to what constituents, leagues, the press are saying or doing, to guide them as to the course they are to follow, in the faith that the will of the majority is the ultimate and only possible arbiter, will never deliver or strengthen a nation however skilful they may be in occupying its best places. ”

“ Every enlargement of the powers of the government which may be made, every measure which may be adopted to aggrandize the dominant combination which may control the government for the time, must necessarily enlarge, in a greater or less degree, his patronage and influence. With their enlargement, his power to control the other departments of the government, and the organs of public opinion, and through them, the community at large, must increase, and in the same degree. ”

“ Another matter which needs to be treated quantitatively is the degree of democracy, oligarchy, or monarchy in an organization. No organization belongs completely to any one of the three types. There must be executive officers, who will often in practice be able to decide policy, even if in theory they cannot do so. And even if their power depends upon persuasion, they may so completely control the relevant publicity that they can always rely33 upon a majority. ”

“ Instead of observing how from the chief, little above the rest, there is, under certain conditions, evolved the absolute ruler, entirely subordinating the select few and the many; and instead of observing how, under other conditions, the select few become an oligarchy tolerating no supreme man, and keeping the multitude in subjection, we have now to observe the cases in which there is established a coöperation between the first and the second. ”

“ The will of the effective majority tends to be the will of a political organisation, and that in turn is determined partly by the character and inclination of the few outstanding politicians who, by gaining the ear of the multitude, have got themselves accepted as party leaders ”

“ In early times we always find the chiefs possessing the greatest ascendancy over their people. How is it they lose this authority? Is it not when, to the influence of blood and station, they have added the influence of wealth? ”

“ We go through all the processes which the Constitution prescribes, we produce an [129] enormous majority, and we express the opinion of that majority, but still the noble Lord and other noble Lords, less intelligent, but more remote, tell us that they are not convinced. ”

“ But we must turn from particular classes and ranks of men to the whole body of the population, exclusively of that great section of it which unhappily lay outside the observation of any but a very few writers—whether poets or historians. In the people at large we may, indeed, easily discern in this period the signs of an advance towards that self-government which is the true foundation of our national greatness. ”

“ The boy, whom we have traced intent upon the revival of the pastimes of the people, had expanded into the statesman, who, in a profound and comprehensive investigation of the elements of public wealth, had shown that a jaded population is not a source of national prosperity. ”

“ Though the habit, general in past times, of regarding the powers of governments as inherent, has been, by the growth of popular institutions, a good deal qualified; yet, even now, there is no clear apprehension of the fact that governments are not themselves powerful, but are the instrumentalities of a power. ”

“ How has it been possible thus long for leaders to control the masses, except that the masses have permitted others to act for them, and that without rendering any account for such action? The time for such representation has passed. ”

“ Why, what in the name of common sense—what interest or feeling of yours or mine, or any man's you ever spoke to, except the shopkeeper, do Alderman A—— or Lord C—— D—— represent? They represent property—and we have none. They represent rank—we have none. Vested interests—we have none. Large capitals—those are just what crush us. ”

“ These are all the unavoidable consequences of the government of the numerical majority, in a country of such great extent, and with such diversity of institutions and interests as distinguish ours. They will continue, with increased and increasing aggregation, until the end comes. ”

“ Running through all the good behaviour of this crowd, however safe and free it looks, there is, there always must be, a central force holding it together. Where does that central force come from? From the crowd itself, you say. ”

“ We arrive, that is to say, at the conclusion that, if we mean by government the devising, the passing, and the administration of this and of that measure, the genuine power of the many, even under the most popular constitution, becomes less and less in proportion as the greatness and the civilisation of the country increase. The voice of the many is heard as loudly as ever ”

“ A clique which can control the federal government will have a power of self-aggrandizement which no men have ever had yet. It is this outlook on the future which is opening before us which made the subject of economics and politics seem to me worth attention at this time. ”

“ Our own divisions are expressed in terms rating from the smallest in stature, which are called tits; these form the masses, but with a sensible diminution in numbers from an upward tendency to the second degree of elevation from the majority. ”

“ Such a minority, with such a leader, composed of gentlemen of the Greatest and most independent fortunes in the kingdom, against a majority of fourteen only, influenced by power and force, and fetched from all corners of the kingdom, must have its weight, and produce the most happy consequences to the public." Chatham Correspondence, vol. ”

“ The principal popular force was an aristocratic force, acting with the co-operation of the gentry and yeomanry, and resting on the loyal fealty of sworn retainers. The head of this force, on whom its efficiency depended, was the high nobility. But the high nobility killed itself out. ”

“ I am not one of those who, wherever they go, make it a constant practice to disparage the higher orders, and to exalt the populace at their expense. There are many capitals in which the high aristocracy, the lords and ladies, the sons and daughters of nobility, constitute the most remarkable and the most interesting part of the population. ”