Ladies & gentlemen:

In my previous article titled "The Price of Incremental Lawlessness" I pointed out the difference between a Constitutional Republic that provides basic unalienable rights to everyone, versus a Democracy where 51% or more of the people make decisions affecting their neighbors, and where no individual rights are considered unalienable to anyone.

Here's a case in point:

Most people would assume a Southern Oregon town like Central Point, Oregon would be largely conservative and populated by fiercely independent citizens who understand, appreciate and staunchly defend the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. I know I certainly did, but I was dead wrong, and this little tale I'm about to unfold is but a warning and an example of why true democracies historically survive no more than 200 years before they are overthrown.

It all started with a Central Point City Council that unilaterally decided they knew what was best for everybody else, so they passed a ban on smoking in most public establishments, whether privately owned or not. Bars, tobacco stores, homes and motel rooms are exempt. They had very good reasons for passing the ban, since everyone now knows smoking will make you sick and kill you, and that second-hand smoke is just as bad as first-hand smoke and on and on and on...

Well, some of the local folks were rightfully infuriated and attempted a failed recall effort to remove the offenders. The fact that the recall effort failed should have been my first clue that things were not as they should be in Central Point, Oregon, but my natural optimism and oft-displaced faith in human nature wouldn't allow me to see what was coming next.

What came next was an incredibly stupid mistake. A special election was held September 19, 2000 to decide the fate of the ban. In the purest form of a democracy, 51% or more of the residents of Central Point were allowed to trample on the rights of 49% of less of their neighbors, and trample away they did. As it turned out, 63% of the voters opted to keep the ban, and in retrospect it was a done deal from the onset.

Smokers are now in the minority, and many non-smokers are almost violently opposed to smoking, so in typical human nature fashion, the non-smokers forced their will on their neighbors who were just too stupid to listen to the warnings and had to be forced to comply. That's the way human nature works, and that is why our Founding Fathers elected to form a Constitutional Republic rather than a Democracy.

You see, our Constitutional Republic, if observed and enforced, prevents this kind of nonsense. It guarantees certain unalienable rights to the citizens where it concerns their own private property and privately held businesses. Had the Central Point City Council any respect for individual rights they never would have enacted the ban in the first place, and had the opposition to that ban taken them to court instead of allowing a special election to decide the issue, the outcome might have been different. I say "might", because in today's United States it is tough to find a judge who staunchly and fiercely defends individual rights anymore. Socialism in all it's forms is gaining ground in America, and Central Point, Oregon is its most recent victim.

Issues involving personal habits like smoking always seek their own level without government interference. If enough non-smokers boycott a business because smoking is allowed there, then the owner will be brought into compliance or go out of business. Either way, that is his or her decision to make and not that of self-righteous, benevolent dictators like the Central Point City Council who apparently swore an oath to uphold and defend the Constitution of these United States in vain.

But a Democracy is a two-edged sword that cuts both ways. For example, now that the precedent has been set, 51% of more of the voters in Central Point could ban the ownership of dogs or cats within the City limits. 51% or more could decide that your house must be a certain color and that you must cut your lawn every week or face a very stiff fine. 51% could decide guns don't belong in Central Point. I could go on and on.

The opportunity to force your will on that of your neighbor with a 51% hammer is just too irresistible for most folks, especially if they deeply and emotionally believe they are right, and that is why our Founding Fathers established a Constitutional Republic in this land -- and not a Democracy -- to keep those emotions in check and preserve the basic rights of the individual whether in the majority or not.