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American Democracy: Within the United States of America

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American Democracy: Within the United States of America
Within the United States of America, there seems to be a consensus that this land was and is made for the free people of the earth. Most of us believe that the democracy we have in place is infallible, that nothing short of God could destroy it. And although some of us have complaints with what the government is doing, most of us believe that our voices are heard loud and clear, if only we would be caring enough to say anything. Yet I believe there are pros and cons to our "democracy", that although there is representation, powers that we cannot control keep it from being what some would call total democracy. And to its credit, it might not even be a bad thing to keep it the way it is. Within this essay, I am first going to go over the define democracy and label the type that the U.S. uses, then talk about how it is deemed democratic and undemocratic. Next I will in detail, go over how much our democracy has grown over the years, and lastly establish my two cents on our style of democracy. Yet through all the times, I believe we give freedom to those who still seek such a freedom, which in my opinion is the best thing about American democracy. The basic definition of democracy is a "Government by the people, exercised either directly or through elected representatives". Yet there is so much more to this word than the Webster's dictionary can give. As Berman and Murphy try to explain it, all they can say is that "Democracy has evolved over time in America-and is still evolving,"(5). It is like a living organism, always changing as long as there are freethinking people in this country. Although many people all around the world view America as having the perfect democracy, ours really consists of a representative democracy. "As the size of the country grew, then, democracy became less pure and direct" (Berman, Murphy 13), so to counter that, the people needed to make politics more streamlined. So instead of us normal people voting on everything on


Bibliography: Berman, Larry, Bruce Murphy. Approaching Democracy. Upper Saddle River, New Jersey. Pearson Education, 2005 Mansbridge, Jane. "The Amendment Process". 1986 Marshall, Thurgood. "Reflections on the Bicentennial of the United States Constitution". 101 Harv.L 1987 Dahl, Robert. "Who Governs?". Schattscheider, E.E. "The Semisovereign People"

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