Qualifications for U.S. President

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The difference is that they believed in a common goal and worked with each other to make things better. Today our politicians are narrowminded and think only of themselves. Any that have a desire to actually represent ther people typically get bulldozed over. We are then left with politicians that simply tow the party line.

 

Which only reinforces my point.

The duel between Hamilton and Burr suggests otherwise, as do the events leading up to, and including, the Civil War.

 

Well, about the time I posted this topic look what my state legislators were up to:

The whole article in the Knoxville News-Sentinel may be found here.

I had to laugh, a little, having forgotten that I don't have a high school diploma myself, because I left high school to go to college early. Of course, I have a college degree and a graduate degree. But technically I'm a high school dropout.

OTOH I live in a town where we had a mayor for years who couldn't read. I would hope our elected officials could read - but the electorate here, at least at that time, didn't agree.

 

No, sorry - It refutes it. Rather than being "not very bright," as you commented, it demostrates their collective genius. Lookie here - There are two foundings to the American system: The Declaration of Independence crafted 1776, and the Constitutional Convention of 1787. The DoI is a revolutionalry statement of principle; essentially it states what we collectively believe to be important as a nation (liberty, pursuit of happiness, equality, etc).

On the other side, the Constitution is, as American historian Joe Ellis has tagged it, "the accommondation of liberty to power." The Anti-federalists had always claimed that the creation of a powerful federal government is a betrayal of the principles of '76 - Jefferson's DoI.

You were right to bring up the Civil War, and it was wise of Lincoln to go back to the principles of 1776 to make his opening statement in the Gettysburg Address: "Four score and seven years ago..." was 1776 counting from that year, and pointed to the notion that "our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal." And as Madison always pointed out in his later years, the Constitution gave no power to the federal government to limit slavery within the states. So which was correct? A war had to be fought to settle the difference. But not because the Founders got it wrong. It was because the states that withdrew rejected what really made the whole thing work: Who was sovereign? was it the states? or the federal government? The answer, of course, is neither. It is the People who are sovereign, and that is exactly what the Founders intended in both the founding documents.

The Southern states that withdrew from the nation rejected the very principle that was important to the Founder's system of government - popular soveignity, and it was always Madison's worst fear that a "minorty of states" would reject the principle of popular sovereignty and thereby rejecting the very foundation on which American government rested.

In order for the system to work there always has to be an accomondation between the "Two Foundings," so to speak. But that accomondation is the People's decision. It is not nearly so simple as to say that there are two documents, so two policital parties; it's not really THAT simple. Nevertheless, there are historians who believe that the two parties, once broken down, are still engaged in the same argument which Jefferson and Hamilton were fighting during the Founding, with a few issues crossed over to and adopted by one side or the other. The Founders crafted a brilliant framework in which that argument could continue without "blowing the whole thing to pieces" so to speak. Because of men like Lincoln, who understood what the Founders intended, the nation even survived the Civil War.

 

My point was that the people warning about factionalism were busy engaging in factionalism themselves. Nothing you've written, erudite though it be, addresses that.

 

AM - Ah, I see your point. In the Founder's defense I will say that the two-party system was nothing back then like it is today. Even though Jefferson and Burr belonged to the same "party" notice how they, as candidates, had to fight each other tooth-and-nail in the election of 1800 for president. That situation could never happen today because the two parties are more clearly defined; also the electionn is now general.

But the Founders did enivsion the rise of party "factions" and it is the competeing interests of the parties which Madison (as the unofficial father of the Constitution), believed would keep the majority from ever gaining too much power. Madison was in many ways vindicated by the recent 2006 elections, where Americans had had their fill of the "one-party" majority of the Republicans. What most of the Founders feared, was the rise of "sectionalism," which proved far worse than the rise of political factions.

 

Mmm. I was unaware. Alas.

Thanks for the info, though.

 

Getting a little bit back to topic: Required is the ability and will to make the cabinet work together constructively.

Darth Cheney, though a heavyweight, isn't the puppet master behind Bush. In my view George Bush has this style 'evil' and ultimately weak CEOs have, that he lets his minions duke it out among themselves, only to intervene on occasion as 'the decider' to keep the system in 'constructive ambiguity' to put it charitable. That way he preserves the last word with minimum effort. IMO that is a destructive leadership style that serves the interests of the CEO to keep ambitious underlings at bay, but does not benefit the firm.