No. of Recommendations: 4
'the constitution was never designed to protect from corruption on the level of someone like trump...it was not within the founders' imagination' - weatherman
------------------
I agree with you. The founders did not have nearly the imagination of today's liberals.I disagree. They knew about guys like Trump, demagogues, and the how they appeal to the worst in people. They just didn't imagine the internet, the array of channels we have, twitter, Truth Social...etc
They've been with us for a long time:
“A demagogue must be neither an educated nor an honest man; he must be ignorant and a rogue.”
― Aristophanes
So of course the founders knew, even the businessman founder who is never quoted knew.
SNIP Washington, of course, was not the only framer who viewed our Constitution largely as a bulwark against demagogues. In the surviving records of the speeches given at the Constitutional Convention, the word “demagogue” was used 21 times by the framers as they crafted the Constitution’s essential checks and balances against despotism and tyranny.
“Demagogues are the great pests of our government,” said Elbridge Gerry of Massachusetts during the convention, “and have occasioned most of our distresses.” Gerry further described demagogues as “pretended patriots,” unprincipled politicians who steer the people toward “baneful measures” through “false reports.”
James Madison of Virginia twice alluded to “the danger of demagogues.” Alexander Hamilton of New York spoke of this peril of democracy more than any other delegate, naming it seven times. Demagogues, Hamilton said on the floor of Independence Hall in late June 1787, “hate the controul of the Genl. Government.”
Later, Hamilton went on to predict an ominous decline in republics from demagoguery to tyranny. As he put it in Federalist No. 1: “History will teach us that ... of those men who have overturned the liberties of republics, the greatest number have begun their career by paying an obsequious court to the people; commencing demagogues, and ending tyrants.”
Other framers who raised the red flag of demagoguery during the Constitutional Convention were Gouverneur Morris of Pennsylvania, Pierce Butler of South Carolina, and Edmund Randolph and George Mason of Virginia. Mason declared outright that “the mischievous influence of demagogues” was one of the top two “evils” that can befall republican forms of government.
This destructive risk of demagogues is one reason the 55 framers of the Constitution adopted the power of impeachment during the historic convention of 1787.
They believed uniformly that some men, though elected by the people, would be temperamentally incapable of serving the public interest under the Constitution. Therefore, they offered Congress the remedy of impeachment and removal from office.SNIP
I think many of us don't really know what a demagogue is and allow for different types. Witness all the pro-Trumpers, these are who demagogues play to. I think of Aaron Burr as a demagogue of sorts. He did tie Jefferson for the Presidency and was briefly a VP. But he tried to take Louisiana and make his own little empire. So they had them in their midst also. Every once in a while I realize a historical character was a demagogue and I didn't recognize it. I am a little slow at times. :)
https://www.latimes.com/opinion/story/2019-12-26/d...
