[ti:What Did Democracy Mean to the US Constitution’s Writers?]
[by:www.21voa.com]
[00:00.00]更多听力请访问21VOA.COM
[00:00.04]A Committee of Five, John Adams, Thomas Jefferson,
[00:05.84]Benjamin Franklin, Roger Sherman and Robert Livingston,
[00:11.48]worked together to write the U.S. Declaration of Independence.
[00:16.56]They are among the leaders known as America’s Founding Fathers.
[00:22.32]The Declaration of Independence states a list of wrongs
[00:27.12]done against the people of the newly formed states by Britain’s king.
[00:32.88]They include the dismissal of “Representative Houses repeatedly”
[00:38.36]because they resisted the loss of “the rights of the people.”
[00:44.68]The Declaration also notes that any form of government
[00:49.60]gets its “powers from the consent of the governed.”
[00:55.56]Some experts note, however, that the men who would go on to write
[01:00.64]and sign the U.S. Constitution were some of the richest people in America.
[01:07.84]They also say these same men were not fully open to democratic ideas.
[01:15.80]Andrew Wehrman is an associate professor of history
[01:19.88]at Central Michigan University.
[01:23.24]He says the leading Americans who wrote the Constitution
[01:27.72]did not think of the new country as a direct democracy.
[01:33.04]“It was never meant to be a sort of direct democracy,
[01:36.68]where all Americans would get to cast a ballot on all issues,” he said.
[01:43.20]Instead, Wehrman believes that they thought the vote
[01:46.80]was for the wealthy and educated.
[01:50.40]Wehrman also says the founders expected common people,
[01:54.60]the poor and uneducated, to take part indirectly.
[01:59.76]This would be through their local government, at town halls and meetings,
[02:04.36]and through protest actions like boycotts.
[02:09.04]They were very concerned about rule by a mob.
[02:12.36]Wehrman said some of the founders “thought
[02:15.80]that democracy was a dirty word.”
[02:19.28]Even John Adams, he notes, did not want poor people or women to vote.
[02:26.08]Bruce Kuklick is a retired professor of American history
[02:31.20]at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia.
[02:35.92]He says the framers of the Constitution
[02:39.80]had a very different idea of democracy than Americans do today.
[02:46.24]“The founders didn't want this sort of democracy at all.
[02:50.96]The Constitution is written so that citizenship rights
[02:55.60]are very, very limited,” he said.
[02:59.48]“Because once you let everybody participate…
[03:03.08]You're likely to have people come to power
[03:06.48]who appeal to the frenzy of the masses.”
[03:10.44]Wehrman notes that the framers of the Constitution
[03:15.24]saw to it that only one part, or one branch, of the federal government,
[03:21.52]the House of Representatives, was elected by the people in a direct vote.
[03:28.52]The Electoral College chooses the president.
[03:32.76]The presidents select the Supreme Court justices and,
[03:37.40]until the early 1900s, senators were selected by state legislatures.
[03:46.52]It was only after the ratification of the 17th Amendment to the Constitution
[03:52.80]in 1913 that U.S. senators were afterwards elected by direct popular vote.
[04:02.16]Wehrman says leaders like James Madison and Alexander Hamilton
[04:08.96]believed that state legislatures had gone too far
[04:13.84]and that too many people were voting in elections.
[04:18.36]For example, New Jersey gave the right to vote to people
[04:23.16]who lived in the state and met a property requirement.
[04:28.08]That included women and African Americans,
[04:33.20]who were able to vote from 1776 until 1807,
[04:39.76]when the state restricted voting rights to white men.
[04:45.56]“They (the founders) thought that there were too many voices
[04:51.00]in the state legislatures… that they were beholden
[04:55.36]to the interests of the common man,” Wehrman said.
[05:01.20]So what would people like Alexander Hamilton, John Adams
[05:06.16]and the other framers of the Constitution think about America today?
[05:12.40]“I think they would all be sort of delighted
[05:14.88]that the general framework that they created
[05:17.68]is still in action,” Wehrman said.
[05:22.44]They might even be open to change.
[05:24.80]After all, they included a process for amending the Constitution.
[05:30.88]They made changes in the early days of the Republic
[05:33.96]with the ratification in 1804 of the 12th Amendment.
[05:39.56]It established separate Electoral College votes
[05:42.92]for president and vice president.
[05:46.32]That change kept political adversaries of opposing parties
[05:50.64]from serving in the same administration as president and vice president.
[05:57.24]But even with these facts, Kuklick believes,
[06:00.92]the Founding Fathers would be considered reactionaries today.
[06:06.04]“[They] didn't want what came to be.”
[06:08.76]He added that in the 1800s,
[06:11.48]America changed from having a limited group taking part in government
[06:16.20]to one that people “now completely accept as being the democratic way.”
[06:22.20]Democracy in action today might not be exactly what the founders expected.
[06:28.88]However, some experts say that money and power
[06:32.36]continue to play an important part in U.S. politics.
[06:37.88]I’m Jill Robbins.
[06:39.84]And I'm Mario Ritter. 更多听力请访问21VOA.COM
END OF TRACK. "END OF TRACK." The two men bowed. "Whoever was that person you were talking to?" she enquired, as soon as they stood together. The took of triumph faded from her eyes, she had grown worn and weary. The roses were wilting on the walls, the lights were mostly down now. Hetty, looking in to see if anything was wanted, found herself driven away almost fiercely. I only saw Master Jervie once when he called at tea time, The year 1747 was opened by measures of restriction. The House of Lords, offended at the publication of the proceedings of the trial of Lord Lovat, summoned the parties to their bar, committed them to prison, and refused to liberate them till they had pledged themselves not to repeat the offence, and had paid very heavy fees. The consequence of this was that the transactions of the Peers were almost entirely suppressed for nearly thirty years from this time, and we draw our knowledge of them chiefly from notes taken by Horace Walpole and Lord Chancellor Hardwicke. What is still more remarkable, the reports of the House of Commons, being taken by stealth, and on the merest sufferance, are of the most meagre kind, sometimes altogether wanting, and the speeches are given uniformly under fictitious names; for to have attributed to Pitt or Pelham their[112] speeches by name would have brought down on the printers the summary vengeance of the House. Many of the members complained bitterly of this breach of the privileges of Parliament, and of "being put into print by low fellows"; but Pelham had the sense to tolerate them, saying, "Let them alone; they make better speeches for us than we can make for ourselves." Altogether, the House of Commons exhibited the most deplorable aspect that can be conceived. The Ministry had pursued Walpole's system of buying up opponents by place, or pension, or secret service money, till there was no life left in the House. Ministers passed their measures without troubling themselves to say much in their behalf; and the opposition dwindled to Sir John Hinde Cotton, now dismissed from office, and a feeble remnant of Jacobites raised but miserable resistance. In vain the Prince of Wales and the secret instigations of Bolingbroke and Doddington stimulated the spirit of discontent; both Houses had degenerated into most silent and insignificant arenas of very commonplace business. "It certainly will be. Miss Widgeon," answered Maria, with strictly "company manners." "One who has never had a brother exposed to the constant dangers of army life can hardly understand how glad we all feel to have Si snatched from the very jaws of death and brung back to us." "Just plug at 'em as you would at a crow, and then go on your way whistlin'?" persisted Harry. "Hurroo!" echoed Hennessey; "that's the ticket." "Come forward, keeper," continued the baron, "and state how these arrows came into your hands!" "Yes." HoMEJULIA京香2018下载
ENTER NUMBET 0015cytssk.com.cn
www.wozun.com.cn
zggjc.com.cn
www.sdqlhg.com.cn
www.yihaidg.com.cn
chemmate.com.cn
madero.net.cn
www.didizan.com.cn
chinapig.net.cn
www.r8ozz.net.cn