Democracy: Its Origin and Purpose

by Bernard P. Hagan
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Democracy: The Origin of Democracy

The question remains, why are so many nations becoming democratic? Why is it that a movement that began in America over two hundred years ago is spreading to every country? Is it because democracy is a better way to live and people naturally flock to it for that reason? Yes, of course, that's one of the main reasons for the spread of democracy.

But there is something else. If it was God's idea to create us with equal rights, which it was, and since equal rights for all is the foundational principle of the democratic system, then democracy was God's idea from the outset.

If we give John Locke credit for authoring the theory of natural laws, and Rousseau credit for authoring the theory of the social contract, and Montesquieu for authoring the theory of separation of powers, and so on, then we also have to give God credit for authoring and originating the theory and principle that established democracy.

Did God originate democracy with a view that it would never come to predominance on the stage of world affairs? From His point of view, was democracy to be just one more social system, rising and falling continually in a sea of competing social systems? That apparently is not His intention. So that while the great majority of humans have a preference for democracy and wish to see it prevail everywhere, so does God.

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