Popular Sovereignty is self-contradictory,
unless it is expressed in a manner favorable to its own perpetuity and
integrity.
The assertion of the doctrine of popular Sovereignty is, consequently,
rather the beginning than the end of democracy. There can be no
democracy where the people do not rule; but government by the people is
not necessarily democratic. The popular will must in a democratic state
be expressed somehow in the interest of democracy itself; and we have
not traveled very far towards a satisfactory conception of democracy
until this democratic purpose has received some definition. In what way
must a democratic state behave in order to contribute to its own
integrity?
The ordinary American answer to this question is contained in the
assertion of Lincoln, that our government is "dedicated to the
proposition that all men are created equal." Lincoln's phrasing of the
principle was due to the fact that the obnoxious and undemocratic system
of negro slavery was uppermost in his mind when he made his Gettysburg
address; but he meant by his assertion of the principle of equality
substantially what is meant to-day by the principle of "equal rights for
all and special privileges for none.
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