The Tyranny Of Democracy Of The Majority

Democracy is a system, which stresses the importance of establishing “a social state in which all have equal rights” and that the rule of the majority is always the best. However, constitutions on the other hand, “are codes of rules which aspire to regulate the allocation of powers…among…government”. This conflicts with the concept of democracy as it places restrictions on what the government; elected “by the people, for the people”; can do. Surprisingly, the country that is often perceived as the closest definition to perfect democracy, America, is founded upon a long established constitution. Therefore, in this essay we will assess whether a written constitution is detrimental in a democratic system to protect rights of it’s citizens.

Democracy
However, Alexis de Tocqueville warns of the ‘Tyranny of the Majority’, this is where the opinions and views of the majority will oppress the views of the minorities; defeating the de facto aim of democracy, to eliminate oppression through tyranny of the individual. As such a democratic system is flawed with the continual possibility of tyranny, with “institutions…necessary to overcome [such] democratic instability”. Subsequently, this leads to the requirement of constitutions, as they provide clear rules of law which have to be strictly abided to by the governmental institutions to protect our rights. Without them, the tyranny of the majority would abuse the rights of the minority and as Alexis de Tocqueville has said, “to whom can he [the minority] apply for redress? If to public opinion…it constitutes the majority; if to legislature, it represents the majority…if to the executive power, it is appointed by the majority”. Therefore, it is essential that a democratic system should have a constitution in place which clearly sets outs the rights of
Finer offers the view that “constitutions are dispensable: if the power holders exercise self-restraint, the written constitution is unnecessary and if they do not then no written constitution will check them”. This is particularly true in that the constitution is simply just a document and can be abused, even ignored. For example, Article 124 of the Stalin Constitution guaranteed freedom of religious worship. However, due to the tyranny of the government, the following act was ignored, and the government acted indifferently to it’s existence. Therefore, a constitution is only as effective as the will of a few selected powerful figures allow it. From this case, it is not detrimental in protecting our rights if the government refuses to honour the document. This can be further illustrated by the American Constitution which guarantees freedom of speech, therefore, surely a legislation which prohibits hate speech is to be found ‘unconstitutional’, no matter how much support it receives from the majority. This is not the case because the will of the majority will still prevail despite the existence of the constitution. Therefore, if the will of the majority is harmful to our rights as citizens of a democratic state, the constitution can do little in protecting