Moron theory of government

The lame duck session of the Michigan Legislature is over. The various anti-democracy bills are now before the outgoing governor. At the height of this lame duck season Ian Reifowitz of Daily Kos asks: Why have democracy? The answer should come rolling off our tongues. It’s in the preamble of our Declaration of Independence: “Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.”

But that runs against the “moron theory of government.” Reifowitz uses that phrase when he teaches courses on Western Civilization (Plato to NATO).

If the established values of a society see people in general as morons—i.e., people incapable of making sound choices—then that society won’t put decisions about who holds power into the hands of the people. Talking about morons with my students usually gets a smile, but the point is a serious one, namely that societies generally deny participation in the political process to those who, in the dominant view, shouldn’t be exercising it for one reason or another—or at least that’s how those who do the denying justify it.
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In all these cases, the underlying theme is the same: They. Will. Have. Power. They don’t care what they have to do in order to seize and hold as much of it as possible. They believe they deserve it, irrespective of what the people want.
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We, the American people, are not morons, and our collective decisions about whom we want to govern us matter. We are a democracy because we believe the people not only have the right, but the wisdom to govern ourselves.