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quote by Thomas Jefferson
So, translated into plain English the slogan means that America's form of government is a representative democracy rather than a direct democracy - which everyone here knew all along. --[[User:Ed Poor|Ed Poor]] <sup>[[User talk:Ed Poor|Talk]]</sup> 21:45, 11 November 2007 (EST)
So, translated into plain English the slogan means that America's form of government is a representative democracy rather than a direct democracy - which everyone here knew all along. --[[User:Ed Poor|Ed Poor]] <sup>[[User talk:Ed Poor|Talk]]</sup> 21:45, 11 November 2007 (EST)
::: Thomas Jefferson certainly had a different understanding. Thomas Jefferson wrote a letter to Isaac H. Tiffany on August 26, 1816, which certainly contradicts the understanding of Birchers. With respect to the ancient Greeks, Jefferson wrote:
"They had just ideas of the value of personal liberty, but none at all of the structure of government best calculated to preserve it. They knew no medium between a democracy (the only pure republic, but impracticable beyond the limits of a town) and an abandonment of themselves to an aristocracy or a tyranny independent of the people."
Jefferson then also pointed out that:
"It seems not to have occurred that where the citizens cannot meet to transact their business in person, they alone have the right to chuse the agents who shall transact it; and that, in this way, a republican, or popular government, of the 2d grade of purity, may be exercised over any extent of country. The full experiment of a government democratical, but representative, was and is still reserved for us."
==DEMOCRACY vs REPUBLIC==
==DEMOCRACY vs REPUBLIC==