The Sovereignty of the People

THE SOVEREIGNTY OF THE PEOPLE

Is it right that, if two leaders are at odds with each other, thousands of young people on both sides have to go and die in a war, which broke out due to the hardness or incapacity or thirst for power or the psychic problems of some leaders? People don’t want to send their children or husbands or brothers to die.

Is it right that, if a leader makes unjust or unpopular laws, citizens have to suffer and submit without being able to decide anything? Is it permissible for leaders to exercise their offices as if the state were their property or do they use them for their own interests, and not as public offices in the service of the people, while citizens can do little or nothing to change their situation? Citizens want to be a decisive part in the realization of the general well-being and social justice.

Is it legitimate that in the long run many parties are infiltrated by representatives of large economic and/or financial groups (multinationals), who often operate for more or less deviant lobbies, or who blackmail the rulers, so whoever you vote for is almost the same? And even if the leaders are of a party “allied” or “close” to the people, they are the ones who decide for the people, even if they don’t always get it right: and over time they become a strong center of power, a pole of attraction for careerists, speculators and, at times, dictators.

We know that in ancient times the leaders, i.e. the sovereigns, proclaimed themselves Gods, and, later, “sovereigns by the will of God”. Now I make clear some facts that are not known, because nobody wants to talk about them.
When Jesus came he declared: “The leaders of the nations, you know, decide over them and the potentates exercise their dominion over them; these must not be among you”. “Truly I tell you, everything that the community together approves on earth is also approved in heaven, and everything it rejects on earth is also rejected in heaven”. That is, for Jesus, God’s will is expressed by the decision of the whole community, not by the leaders. But this is democracy! It is the sovereignty of the people, which Saint Paul calls the “royal dignity” of each one.
Everyone can vote, from the last slave to the most important person, on equal terms: “the last are first” (note that slaves, plebs, women and the lower social classes were excluded from voting in ancient Greek democracy).

The apostle Saint Peter confirms: “We must not obey individuals, but only God”, that is, Love, our Father (our Dad), for which we are all brothers, on equal terms. St. Peter ratified the decisions of the community, he did not command the community.
For these reasons St. Paul can affirm: “We do not command you, but we are collaborators of your joy”. And in the end he adds: “When all structures of power and forms of domination are annihilated… we have the fullness of time”.
Since the whole community can decide on the distribution of wealth, there are no longer poor among them. The evangelist St. Luke writes: “The multitude of believers are of one heart and one soul and among them there are no needy”. A lot of people believe them, seeing how they love one another like brothers, and Christians are multiplying more and more every day by the witness they offer and by their admirable social structure.

It’s a social revolution! The democratic achievements of original Christianity, and the high number of followers, arouse enormous fear in the ultra-powerful Roman emperors (Diocletian declares that they undermine the very structures of the empire). These therefore order continuous persecutions up to the 4th century AD, when the emperor Constantine operates the total shelving of the direct democracy of the early Christians, in exchange for a recognition of freedom of cult (formal) to the Christians themselves, also giving rise to the creed in a theology of life, but of an afterlife (above the clouds). Since then and for over a thousand years it is no longer possible to speak of the D.D., under penalty of stake.
Incidentally we recall that still in 1907 AD the supreme pontiff Pius X unfortunately condemns democracy both in secular states and in ecclesiastical organization: it will mean paving the way for fascist-type dictatorships.
We wish the hierarchy to rediscover the beauty of original Christianity and that all, Italian and non-Italian citizens, rediscover it.

Democracy is not only the possibility and the right to express one’s opinion, it is, above all, the possibility for everyone to directly have a concrete part in decisions, through truly suitable voting tools and with executive value (without limitations or quorum, otherwise would be a reduced democracy).
It should be born in mind that the social evil is due not to the insensitivity or ineptitude of the people, but to the lack of the constitutional right for the people to express their will on common needs, with immediate and binding effect.
The pushers of sufferings instead want local wars or the unconditional exploitation of territories and the submission of peoples for the interests of some economic/financial multinationals: where will we go if this continues?

We want the direct democracy of the citizens, which does not want war or the exploitation of citizens and their resources, but allows for the general well-being of all, a highly livable environment and lasting peace.
We want the direct democracy of the citizens, which does not want the “divide and rule” of the powerful and disinformation, but tolerance, progress and unity in the harmony of the people.
We want the direct democracy of the citizens, which does not allow to crushing for emerging over other people, which does not allow to steal for possessing, but it is the system that creates a healthy economy, the equitable distribution of wealth among all, decent and guaranteed wages for workers, maximum employment, low public debt, lower taxes, highly efficient services and social justice.
We want the direct democracy of the citizens, which does not make us resign ourselves to the wearing structures of power, but realizes citizens’ full democratic freedom and their civil, social and political maturity.
We want direct democracy, which is the greatest of civil rights, which is the factor of progress for humanity, which identifies itself with the will of all citizens, which is totally close to the soul of the people, which makes citizens sovereign.

Loving the people doesn’t mean doing what we think is good for the people, but it is doing what the people want all together. This makes the people sovereign!
Scientific progress in the future will allow humanity to live without the classic diseases that afflict it today. Direct democracy, to be instituted in our Constitution, accomplishes an even greater task: it will make it possible to free humanity from the socio-economic evils that are wearing it down today. Come on citizens! With direct democracy established, you and you and you and each of us all together win the world.

DIRECT DEMOCRACY

Full direct democracy is the system that allows the sovereignty of the people to be exercised. When all the people can decide together on the needs of the community everything works properly. Typical is the example of neighboring Switzerland (which conquered the DD in the nineteenth century), where for anything that the rulers do not do properly, the people – having collected a pre-established number of signatures – can vote by constitutional law, through referendum or popular initiative without limitations or quorum, and the result of the vote is compulsorily immediately enforceable. That’s why everything works properly there.

In Italy today there is much talk of the minimum wage that the most conservative rulers do not want to grant. In Switzerland, with direct democracy, citizens have won salaries that are among the highest in the world. It sounds like a contradiction in terms, because if wages are too high, businesses won’t be able to sustain themselves, but it isn’t. All workers, Swiss and migrant, are given very valid professional training and high salaries; this means that millions of citizens can spend and buy millions more products and, in this way, companies sell and earn much more, therefore they have to increase the production of goods and take on more people: in Switzerland – these are facts – unemployment is therefore the lowest in the world.

Also with regard to the environment, citizens do not want to live in degradation, therefore being able to decide directly for themselves, in Switzerland they have created the best ecological environment on the planet: visiting it is believing.
In the Swiss federation internal conflicts are almost absent, yet three different ethnic groups, four different languages, five religious confessions coexist there: but very rarely there is a need for struggles, clashes, demonstrations, strikes. For every need, the people vote and choose the best and most shared solution, in unity.

In Italy, without a decent and guaranteed minimum wage and without the “obligation” of high professional training, many companies earn money by paying workers less: it is the opposite of what has been described above! But by doing so, only a few companies make money, while many workers, Italians and migrants, have no future, poverty (and malfeasance) is spreading, births are falling, also due to the scarcity of crèches, (with serious risk for future pensions) and a significant number of Italians, in the end, he is forced to leave Italy.
Let’s look at the facts: the guaranteed minimum wage was also one of Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s cornerstones: through these he resolved the very serious US economic/financial crisis of 1929. He almost doubles the low salaries of workers and the minimum pensions, intervenes in support of farmers and agricultural prices, issues laws to give citizens more trade union and social rights (among other things, he introduces unemployment and old-age benefits), imposes very tight state controls on the banking/financial system, begins several new public works to foster employment, paying these formerly unemployed workers instead of giving them non-productive welfare benefits, strongly promotes research and techno-scientific innovation.

Jean-Jacques Rousseau is the “father” of Swiss direct democracy. He asserts the supremacy of the will of all the people: sovereignty cannot be represented, for the same reason that it cannot be alienated. Sovereignty consists essentially in the general will, and the will is not represented: either it is the same or it is another; there is no middle course.

Loving the people doesn’t mean doing what we think is good for the people, but it is doing what the people want all together.
This requires a total change of mentality. It is true social renewal, it is the best organization for humanity. It’s what makes us strong! Citizens are the architects of their well-being.
Enough with the governability of a few over a mass of politically handicapped people!
We want to achieve the direct democracy of citizens. The struggle will be tough, it will cost hardships and sacrifices, but in the end the victory will be ours, of all citizens, forever.
Long live the sovereignty of the people!

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PS- The topics covered here are more extensively developed in the various categories of this text web site.
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