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Aristotle showed how it is that people can be ruled by The One, The Few, or The Many — and called these three: Monarchy, Aristocracy, and Polity. But when government becomes authoritarian and not subject to law, the three forms morph into disgraceful versions of themselves. The disgraceful (illegitimate) versions were called:
Tyranny
Oligarchy
Democracy
Tyranny is the illegitimate and disgraceful “rule-of-one” over the many. Oligarchy is the illegitimate and disgraceful “rule-of-the-few” over the many. And Democracy is the illegitimate and disgraceful “rule-of-the-many” over the few. Under Aristotle’s interpretation, democracy is just “mob rule” where the biggest mob gets to rule.
The genius of American Exceptionalism was to account for all 3 kinds of breakdowns in liberty and in justice — where people no longer have a government constrained by the rule of law. Because despotism can come in three forms, a system of checks and balances and divided power was created in the USA for the first time on Earth.
The result, the U.S. Constitution, is the oldest current constitution — having outlived all others.
To split some power from the Executive and toward the people, the House of Representatives was created, where representatives are elected by a popular vote. To split power toward the individual and sovereign states, the Senate was created, where senators would be hand-picked by state legislatures.
But when progressives had control of US politics in 1913, they passed the 17th Amendment and changed Senate elections so as to be decided by popular vote, undoing the wisdom of the founders of the United States of America.
Events since 1913 have grown progressively worse.
Reference
Aristotle, Politics. https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.01.0058%3Abook%3D3%3Asection%3D1279b
“Deviations from the constitutions mentioned are tyranny corresponding to kingship, oligarchy to aristocracy, and democracy to constitutional government; for tyranny is monarchy ruling in the interest of the monarch, oligarchy government in the interest of the rich, democracy government in the interest of the poor, and none of these forms governs with regard to the profit of the community.”