As critiques come in, they’ll be collected here and responded to.

This objection that in a direct democracy the decision makers are not accountable is hard to swallow, since the supposed accountability of the decisions made in a purely representative system is tenuous and seriously compromised, and since that accountability is theoretically to…the People.

As well as being just as accountable to constitutional objections in court as representative lawmaking, citizen lawmaking is, unlike representative lawmaking, directly accountable to the People.

One of the real problems with purely representative government is that “the People aren’t accountable” for the actions of their governments. Citizenship becomes a vague privilege stripped of real responsibility, with all blame reserved for politicians, the accountability of which is generally doubted. This problem of non responsibility is corrected with a little direct democracy.

The only way the accountability objection to direct democracy would make any logical sense is if human nature were really so bad that voters consistently indulged their worse instincts against their own enlightened self-interest more often when deciding an actual issue than they do electing a candidate. Given the basic human ability to learn, this is a dubious claim, but this territory is covered elsewhere.

Boosters of the accountability objection sometimes point to fascist governments’ use of referendums to consolidate power. This again is an incomplete reference to a history that in fact illustrates the crucial difference between state actors controlling what questions the public can respond to, and the critical right of the people or a minority of them to place something on the public agenda. In fact, perhaps the Holocaust might have been prevented if German voters had had the right of initiative, and the political rights of German Jews had not unanimously been stripped by their supposed representatives.

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The at the time bizarre definition of republic vs. democracy by Madison, trying to sell the US Constitution to the people of New York, becoming accepted, is something that, along with many other often insidious anti-democratic rationals and institutions, arose as a reactionary response to the period of great democratic reform in the Populist and Progressive Eras. It is in short total hokum.

To the founders and anyone who gives the matter much thought, it is clear that a republic is dependent as much as possible on the will of the people. The writings of the founders themselves, dictionary definitions both at the time and today, the opening lines of both the Constitution and Declaration of Independence, the Supreme Court, and leading constitutional scholars like Sanford Levinson and Akhil Reed Amar, are all in agreement that what we today call direct democracy is entirely consonant with if not crucial to the republican ideal.

It is in fact the Bill of Rights—adopted after the Constitution thanks to great unhappiness by the many people who felt betrayed by it’s undemocratic nature but forced to accept it for lack of an alternative—that protects the rights of individuals and minorities, not the so-called republican structure of government.  For more on the principles of republicanism, you might start with the author of this nation’s founding document.  As for Madison’s unique and, in hindsight, at times naive argument in the Federalist Papers regarding the advantages of a “republic”, it was not so misunderstood by the people of New York.

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It was to protect the ability of one minority to enslave another that our federal constitution wasn’t made more democratic.  Historically, representative government has been far more damaging to the rights of minorities as we think of them today than direct democracy.  Provided constitutional safeguards, which can be made as strong as we think necessary, the courts are still more likely to intervene when direct democracy infringes a minority’s rights than they are when a legislature does.  The only minority that representative government is really designed to protect is the rich and powerful.

In terms of race, New York City is uniquely immune to the problem of tyranny of the majority, since there is none.

It is already true that all local laws must be general.

In a real democracy the necessary ability of a political minority to communicate their position to all voters is guaranteed.  Thus in a real democracy a minority is both more difficult to actively discriminate against legislatively since they are more difficult to demonize, and more difficult to neglect and ignore, as they can force any grievance that inspires sympathy among a small portion of voters onto the ballot as often as is necessary.

The only alternative to a system of abiding by the well considered will of a diverse majority, as has been demonstrated with tragic effect repeatedly, is force.

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Certainly people are capable of both hilarious and horrific stupidity. Yet, even though politicians know better than anybody how easily people can be fooled, you won’t often hear them expressing anything less than the most profound faith in the judgment of the people.

Doing so would lay bare the absurdity of this criticism’s unspoken assumption: that politicians are an exception. That somehow upon election they are endowed with special mental and altruistic abilities the rest of us can only dream of. One thing elections are demonstrably not, is a gauge of smartness or kindness.

If people are supposedly not smart enough to be trusted with making a decision on an issue effecting them, how are they more fit to select an individual—a process in which reason plays less of a role—to make all those decisions for them? Particularly if so many of the parameters of that selection are not in the people’s control?

It is precisely because humans are flawed, in more than just their intellect, that it’s important to get as much input, double-checking, and transparency for big decisions as possible.

In terms of decision-making tools, today the people could easily institute a process many times more deliberative, informed, and accountable than anything our elected representatives do. Even in our current system, the amount of actual consideration the average bill receives is frighteningly small. None of the people we elected read the Patriot Act before passing it. When a decision is made at the polls by the people, it invariably receives far more thorough consideration. Where a voter doesn’t have the time to inform themselves, they are guided by trusted endorsements, or abstain, or reject the measure, retaining the status quo.

Questions of human governance are at their heart questions of human nature, which has shown itself across cultures and time to be both very flexible in the extremes of behavior that it can adopt as the norm in a given society, and very reliable in how it reacts to basic conditions. People do not bother to inform themselves if they have no say. Voter participation and civic understanding are reliably higher in places with the right of initiative. Compounding the problem, without direct democracy the regulators of the media, education, and elections are often those least interested in the people being informed critical thinkers.

The well understood role of the successful politician is to act as our surrogate parent, protecting us from whatever boogieman—terrorists, immoral city dwellers, dirty immigrants, dumb hicks, complicated decisions—is effective, so that we can remain irresponsible children, and they can act as middleman. The age of middlemen, be it of information, culture, history or power is coming to an end, and it’s time for us to grow up.

Not that we should get rid of politicians. They perform many valuable services, not the least of which is capably dealing with all sorts of issues in the interests of and at the behest of their otherwise occupied constituents. The best provide leadership.

Incidentally, in contemplating how malicious or dumb humans are, it’s a good idea to parse fiction from fact. It bears pointing out that the basic conventions of narrative storytelling, media competition for eyeballs, and compatibility with advertising all require the employment of not very democratically promising conceptions of human nature. Stories about cooperation, sound judgment, everything being decided peacefully, having concerns beyond wealth and romance, etc., don’t often make what passes for “good TV”. In a sense, it’s a great testament to our democratic potential that Americans are, given their relative comfort, at all politically conscious and striving for reform after a century of institutional schooling, saturation by sponsorship driven media, and endless misinformation.

In my experience, the worst forms of dumbness are the result of a lack of democracy. True democracy after all is much more than just majority rule.

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A respected professor that Jay approached for guidance on this effort, while open to being convinced otherwise, writes:

As to initiative and referendum, having spent the better part of two decades in California, I’m a skeptic. Corporate interests figure out right quick that they can take advantage with high-priced, deceptive campaigns for cleverly-named initiatives that mislead voters and trap the left and other opponents into spending all their energy reacting.

This is a common view. While entirely accurate however, it is not complete. Many on the left share it, and I’ve spoken with some progressive activists who think things would be better in CA without the process. However, the vast majority of Californians and those living in any of the 24 states and D.C. with initiative rights, would not be willing to part with the process as it exists in their state.

However, I believe firstly this skepticism is critically flawed in several ways, and secondly New York City is not California, and the initiative process being proposed here has key differences with theirs.

In terms of errors, turning from and giving up on the judgment of the people is both strategically (and morally) about the worst thing any political party or movement can do in a democratic system. Yes the media system is poorly regulated and corrupt. Yes money runs the show. These are very real problems that infect our system, but it’s a mistake to throw the baby out with the bath water. (In fact, these problems are generally ultimately the fault of federal government policies, and unlikely to be effectively reformed without expansion of I&R to the national level.) People rarely suggest that we completely scrap representative democracy because of some of the extremely poor governance it sometimes results in. The solution in both cases is to reform and improve the ever evolving flaws. Human greed finds ways to protect and advance its agenda in every system, the keys to fighting it are transparency and making lawmakers as independent from corrupting influences as possible. This is actually easier to do with the people than it is with their representatives, for several reasons that are intrinsic to human nature and the way it has played out in shaping government and the public sphere in this country.

Certainly corporate interests have made use of I&R since its introduction in the early 20th century, and any attempt to regulate this flaw has run up against the Supreme Court’s (i believe) errant equation of money with speech under the First Amendment, absurd corporate personhood under the law, and the death of the Fairness Doctrine under Reagan which had required access to broadcast media for both sides of a campaign. Some of these problems might now be reduced with the continuing decline of broadcast media as the primary information source for voters. In any case, if the initiative and referendum process were so wonderfully advantageous to big money, one would expect it to have spread quite a bit since its introduction over a century ago. Instead its expansion continues to be fought every step of the way by the usual suspects, and for good reason.

Corporate interests have a much easier time getting their way directly lobbying politicians, from whom they have less to fear, since they’re vulnerable to character assassination, have almost perfected their unaccountability to the people, and need a lot of money to get and keep their job. Lacking a people’s right of referendum to intercede, they’re a much surer bet than debating an actual issue in the public forum.

Historically, money spent on an initiative is in fact not a good predictor of an initiative’s success. It is much more effective at defeating an initiative, and per dollar, worth many more votes when given by citizens instead of special interests. In general, when people see a law being backed or funded by a group whose interest they know do not align with their own, like a corporation, it causes them to vote against it, thus the degree of financial disclosure and voter information is crucial. From a corporate perspective this all makes direct democracy essentially only a liability, since the best they can generally hope for is keeping the status quo, at great expense. And what they can’t do, is prevent an issue from being raised and put on the public agenda.

The initiative process has done some great things for California and many other states. There have been some stumbles, true, and some of the laws passed I may disagree with, but if I had everything my way it wouldn’t be very democratic. Some initiatives are blamed by legislators for their own failures. Certainly the courts have thrown out the unconstitutional ones. While I sympathize with folks’ exhaustion with having to fight bottomless pockets, I&R is in fact one of the most effective ways of doing so. When it comes to the initiative process, its all about taking the initiative..

In terms of differences between CA and NYC, probably the most significant is one of scale. Massive signature requirements in California that must be met in a limited time, effectively keep all but the most well heeled proposals off the ballot. The cost of running a successful ballot campaign in New York would be much more accessible, both due to lower signature requirements and to the many opportunities afforded by its geographic density. In New York, we also have a very progressive campaign finance system our initiative process might plug into, which would be a first nationwide. The electorate is also, compared with many others, media savvy, and in terms of public conversation, has greater opportunity for interaction, community organization, and exposure to diversity of opinion.

All this doesn’t even include the possibilities of fully using today’s technology to allow for a real communal dialog. We may be able to set up a costless online petition process that is designed to maximize public deliberation and mitigate the role of money and media without violating state law. If this turns out to be the case, New York City could bring democracy into the 21st century. Why this hasn’t happened yet elsewhere is both a mystery and perhaps a testament to representatives’ resistance to democratic governance.

It’s true that some crummy laws have been passed in CA and elsewhere by initiative. Unfortunately those same laws have pretty much all been passed by legislatures in other states, too. Sometimes the process is used cynically for political gain. But there are many issues, from clean and fair elections to healthcare reform to labor rights to education funding to environmental protection, on the good governance and progressive agendas that historically have often been most effectively advanced in the legislative arena by exercising the right of initiative. Some common goals critical to the health of our civilization will be difficult if not impossible to obtain without there being a process for the people to find and secure their enlightened self interest no matter how corrupt their government might be. The dialogue that is democracy goes in both directions, but we’ll never get anywhere if we fail to take responsibility or only think defensively.

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