[Excerpt from] The Walter Capps Memorial Speech
Federation of State Humanities Councils Annual
Meeting
Washington,D.C., November, 2000
[Editors note: The original speech delivered by David Skaggs at the Federation of State Humanities Councils National Conference held in November 2000 in Washington, DC]
As Iowa reviews its changing portrait and the discernible shift toward a more heterogeneous society – as indicated by the newly released census figures – let's consider the thoughts of David Skaggs, head of the Democracy and Citizenship Program at the Aspen Institute.
... Last summer the President signed a bill making electronic signatures legally binding and enforceable in electronic commerce. I believe we're likely to see in the next election cycle in California an initiative to amend the state constitution to permit the circulation and signing of initiative petitions on the Internet. That initiative will pass. The next cycle there will be ... [a] petition to authorize ...voting on-line. That will pass. Next will be an initiative to have regular, periodic ...on-line election days, say, every quarter or so. And, perhaps not right away, that will pass. And soon, then, the question will arise: Why do we need those guys in Sacramento, anyway?
... the reason that this somewhat outlandish scenario is even slightly plausible is that most Americans have little understanding of and appreciation for the virtues of representative democracy.
What is it about representative democracy, about legislatures, that I find so special? It is the accountability among legislators to each other because their votes are public. It is the bargains made among them over time, in which in order to get anything done, each must be aware of the needs of colleagues and of colleagues' constituents. It is the reality that there is nothing to be gained from gratuitously ignoring the interests of others if they don't really conflict with your own, or if both can somehow be accommodated. It is the built-in deterrent against running roughshod over minority interests, because those who happen to lose this vote may be part of the majority the next time. It is the organic way in which, in a nation--even larger, more diverse, more complex--representative institutions force us to deal with, to respect the needs of, to honor the values of folks who are different. Legislatures are key places where "E Pluribus Unum" is made real. ...