In theory this has advantages over a 'pure/direct’ Democracy- for example even if 51% of the people voted to ignore the bill of rights, that wouldn’t be legal. You would have to amend the constitution to achieve that- which is a lot harder to do than simply getting 51% of the popular vote. In a Direct democracy it would be easier for a majority group to disenfranchise a minority group.
If the US. was ran they way it’s supposed to be, we would be a democracy because the government exists to enact the will of the people.
The problem is that our representatives no longer represent us (if they ever really did), so that makes it decidedly less than democratic. That’s why I said we were ‘supposedly’ a Representative Democracy. We are in name only.
The U.S Government is a Democratic Republic, which is a type of Representative Democracy, which is a type of democracy.
In theory this has advantages over a 'pure/direct’ Democracy- for example even if 51% of the people voted to ignore the bill of rights, that wouldn’t be legal. You would have to amend the constitution to achieve that- which is a lot harder to do than simply getting 51% of the popular vote. In a Direct democracy it would be easier for a majority group to disenfranchise a minority group.
If the US. was ran they way it’s supposed to be, we would be a democracy because the government exists to enact the will of the people.
The problem is that our representatives no longer represent us (if they ever really did), so that makes it decidedly less than democratic. That’s why I said we were ‘supposedly’ a Representative Democracy. We are in name only.