Have you been deceived? When the Founders established our government, did they give us a democracy or a republic? If you have been led to believe that our country is a democracy, you have been deceived!

Not only did our Founders establish a republic, they warned about democracy. James Madison, known as the father of the U.S. Constitution, wrote in “Essay #10” of the Federalist Papers, “…democracies have ever been spectacles of turbulence and contention; have ever been found incompatible with personal security or the rights of property; and have in general been as short in their lives as they have been violent in their deaths”.

The difference between a republic and a democracy was once widely understood in America. The U.S. War Department (now the Department of Defense) taught the difference in a training manual (No. 2000-25) published on Nov. 30, 1928. This official U.S. government document, used at the time for the training of American military personnel, said this of democracy: “ A government of the masses” “Results in mobocracy” “Attitude toward property is communistic – negating property rights” “Attitude toward law is that the will of the majority shall regulate, whether it be based upon deliberation or governed by passion, prejudice and impulse, without restraint or regard to consequences.”

It went on to say: “Our Constitutional fathers, familiar with the strength and weakness of both autocracy and democracy, with fixed principles definitely in mind, defined a representative republican form of government. They made very marked distinction between a republic and a democracy … and said repeatedly and emphatically that they had founded a republic. The United States of America is a constitutional republic consisting of the federal government and the state government. The federal government has specific powers delegated to it through the United States Constitution, while each state government gets its power by its state constitution.

The U.S. Congress is not allowed to make any law it wants; it is bound by this constitutional mandate. The Tenth Amendment states “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.” The Constitution authorizes the federal government to protect our God-given rights and to provide for the common defense. Nowhere does it allow the federal government to provide foreign-aid handouts, unemployment benefits, subsidized housing, food stamps, price supports, or any other share-the-wealth schemes.

Tragically, much of the legislation that Congress passes is unconstitutional. This abuse of authority happens because Americans have lost sight of basic principles. Your congressmen and state legislators have taken an oath to support and defend the constitution. Whenever a new bill comes up for a vote, they should ask themselves: Is it constitutional? If it is not, they should vote against it. If they do not vote against unconstitutional legislation, you should ask them why.

Reprinted with permission of the John Birch Society. By Lawrence Paulsen