VOICES OF DEMOCRACY

By Martha McGovern
July 13, 2008


Voice 1:      We the people “hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are
        created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain
        unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of
        Happiness.”

ALL:        WE THE PEOPLE

Voice 2:    Democracy – a term from the Greek language that means “rule by the
        simple people.”

Voice 3:    Democracy – Abraham Lincoln:  a “government of the people, by the
        people, for the people.”

Voice 4:    By far the most challenging form of government.  Molly Ivins:  “The thing
        about democracy, beloveds, is that it is not neat, orderly, or quiet.  It
        requires a certain relish for confusion.”

ALL:        WE THE PEOPLE

Voice 1:    George Washington:  “As Mankind becomes more liberal, they will be
        more apt to allow that all those who conduct themselves as worthy
        members of the community are equally entitled to the protections of civil
        government.  I hope ever to see America among the foremost nations of
        justice and liberality.”


Voice 3:    Langston Hughes:
“Democracy”

Democracy will not come
Today, this year
Nor ever
Through compromise and fear.

I have as much right
As the other fellow has
To stand
On my two feet
And own the land.

I tire so of hearing people say,
Let things take their course.
Tomorrow is another day.
I do not need my freedom when I’m dead.
I cannot live on tomorrow’s bread.

Freedom
Is a strong seed
Planted
In a great need.

I live here, too.
I want freedom
Just as you.

Voice 2:    Anna Howard Shaw, a Suffragette, June 21, 1915:
“When I came into your hall tonight, I thought of the last time I was in your city.  Twenty-one years ago I came here with Susan B. Anthony, and we came for exactly the same purpose as that for which we are here tonight.  Boys have been born since that time and have become voters, and the women are still trying to persuade American men to believe in the fundamental principles of democracy.  
    And God said in the beginning, ‘It is not good for man to stand alone.’  That is why we are here tonight, and that is all that woman’s suffrage means; just to repeat again and again that first declaration of the Divine, ‘It is not good for man to stand alone,’ and so the women of this state are asking that the word ‘male’ shall be stricken out of the Constitution altogether. . . .  
If the voice of the people is the voice of God, how are we ever going to know what God’s voice is when we are content to listen to a bass solo?  Now if it is true that the voice of the people is the voice of God, we will never know what the Deity’s voice in government is until the bass and soprano are mingled together, the result of which will be the divine harmony.  
Take any of the magnificent appeals for freedom . . . and rob them of their
universal application and you take the very life and soul out of them.”

Voice 4:    Moliseng Mashlope, Soweto Uprising, South Africa:  
“I stand with you on this street.  This, it’s my street.  My corner.  My country.  This, it’s my place.  I am in my place!  I am part of this earth, but I will not lie down like mud to disappear.  I am the mountain that rises up to spit in your face.  I am Moliseng!  I will not walk down the road of my mother, bow my shoulders, hide my head in shame!  I will stand up.  I stand up!  Your bullet cannot kill me.  You will see me forever in your dream, running in the fire of freedom!  You will not sleep.  You will hear my heart beating, beating, beating, speaking in my own tongue!  Amandla!  Amandla!  (Freedom!  Freedom!)  
[Moliseng is a character in The Syringa Tree by Pamela Gien.]

Voice 3:    Howard Winters:  “Civilization is the process in which one gradually
        increases the number of people included in the term ‘we’ or ‘us’ and at the
        same time decreases those labeled ‘you’ or ‘them’ until that category has
        no one left in it.”

ALL:        WE THE PEOPLE

Voice 1:    Winston Churchill:  “The best argument against democracy is a five-
        minute conversation with the average voter.”

Voice 2:    Thomas Jefferson:  “I know of no safe repository of the ultimate power of
        society but people.  And if we think them not enlightened enough, the
        remedy is not to take the power from them, but to inform them by
        education.”

Voice 3:    Paulo Freire:  “Education either functions as an instrument which is used
        to facilitate integration of the younger generation into the logic of the
        present system and bring about conformity, or it becomes a practice of
        freedom, the means by which men and women deal critically and
        creatively with reality and discover how to participate in the
        transformation of their world.”

Voice 4:    John F. Kennedy:  “We are not afraid to entrust the American people with
        unpleasant facts, foreign ideas, alien philosophies, and competitive values.  
        For a nation that is afraid to let its people judge the truth and falsehood in
        an open market is a nation that is afraid of its people.”

ALL:        WE THE PEOPLE

Voice 1:    Edward  Dowling:  “The two greatest obstacles to democracy in the
        United States are, first, the widespread delusion among the poor that we
        have a democracy, and second, the chronic terror among the rich, lest we
        get it.”

Voice 3:    Arthur Jensen:  “There is no democracy.  There is only IBM and ITT and
        AT&T and DuPont, Dow, Union Carbide, and Exxon.  Those are the
        nations of the world today.
        We no longer live in a world of nations and ideologies.  The world is a
        college of corporations, inexorably determined by the immutable bylaws
        of business.  The world is a business.”
                [Arthur Jensen is a character in the movie “Network.”]

Voice 2:    Center for the Study of Democratic Societies:  
“It seems there have always and everywhere been two major thrusts of progressive political activity.  . . . These two thrusts are the ubiquitous demand for more and more meaningful democracy and the equally ubiquitous search for a more sustainable and just socioeconomic system that resolves . . . costly societal problems.  [The combination of these two thrusts] has come to be called Socioeconomic Democracy.”

ALL:    WE THE PEOPLE

Voice 4:    Franklin D. Roosevelt:  
“In the future days . . . we look forward to a world founded upon four essential human freedoms.  The first is freedom of speech and expression – everywhere in the world.  The second is freedom of every person to worship God in his own way – everywhere in the world.  The third is freedom from want, which translated into world terms, means economic understandings which will secure to every nation a healthy peacetime life for its inhabitants – everywhere in the world.  The fourth is freedom from fear, which, translated into world terms, means a world-wide reduction of armaments [so] that no nation will be in a position to commit an act of physical aggression against any neighbor – anywhere in the world.
    This nation has placed its destiny in the hands and heads and hearts of its millions of free men and women, and its faith in freedom under the guidance of God.  Freedom means the supremacy of human rights everywhere.  Our support goes to those who struggle to gain those rights and keep them.  Our strength is our unity of purpose.”

ALL:        WE THE PEOPLE

Voice 2:    Mohandas K. Gandhi:  “When I despair, I remember that all through
        history the way of truth and love has always won.  There have been tyrants
        and murderers and for a time they seem invincible, but in the end, they
        always fall – think of it, ALWAYS.”

Voice 3:    E.B. White:  “Democracy is itself, a religious faith.  For some it comes
        close to being the only formal religion they have.”

Voice 4:    Al Gore:  “We have a purpose.  We are many.  For this purpose we will
        rise, and we will act.”

ALL:        WE THE PEOPLE . . .