wellspring/01-principles/01-04-republicanism-apologia.md

Wellspring: Principles apologia: In defense of republicanism:

This section is speaking of the form of government known as a "Republic" and not about the political party in the USA known as the "Republican Party". Unless we explicitly state that we are talking about something else, we mean by the terms "republic/republican/republicanism" nothing more than the form of government which uses the separation of powers to pit competing interests into a gridlock and thereby to curtail the ability for one interest group to dominate and rule -- this gridlock serves to ensure that the polity is ruled by the constitutional document -- that is, that the polity is ruled by a publicly published constitutional law, and not by the whim of any interest group.

Republicanism is the rule of law -- as opposed to every other form of government which is rule by whim. This document speaks in defense of Republics over other forms of government - especially in contrast to Democracies:

On the need for transformative or major constitutional and legislative change:

What sorts of changes are required to enable a polity to adapt to new phenomena and technologies?

A constitution founded on the principles of private property sovereignty for all residents should not need to undergo dramatic transformations in order to serve the private property protection requirements of any generation, irrespective of how far into the future we should look.

Most of the transformative changes to the constitution of the forerunning republic were required because private property sovereignty (ownership of the oneself and one's produce, both cognitive and physical) was intentionally denied to various classes of people. If the forerunning republic had not made the mistake of denying private property protection to various groups (African Americans, Native Americans, etc), and if their property rights were enforced from day one, none of the later fallout, tension and indeed, the violent conflicts, would have been necessary.

The Wellspring constitution seeks to ensure that we will absolutely not repeat this mistake which was made by the forerunner republic. Wellspring explicitly and conscientiously seeks from day one, to ensure that all individuals' private property sovereignty is enforced.

If indeed, the implementations of WS follow through on this intent, then legislation will almost always consist of nothing more than a simple clarification of how private property reasoning applies to new phenomena and technologies, irrespective of how far off into the future we peer.

In the forerunner republic, changes were needed -- wouldn't Wellspring be the same?

The laws of Democracies and some other forms of government change quickly and impulsively with the whim of the governing class. In a republic, changes to law may sometimes come rapidly where the values of an overwhelming majority demand those changes; but most of the time they come only after level headed consideration. Republics intentionally resist impulsive and oppressive change. Republics do not resist transformative change if it is justified, well reasoned and well legislated. Republics are not against major, or even transformative change intrinsically -- they are against impulsive and/or oppressive changes.

In response to the chorus of historical examples (mainly from the USA's constitutional history) purporting to show that the intentionally inflexible nature of Republics ends up denying justified changes, (such as changes to extend individual sovereignty to groups to whom it was denied), we would like to set up arguments in response to the most pertinent attacks:

[Note: This section requires expertise beyond my own and should be written by someone more knowledgeable, who can express these three sets of arguments succinctly, yet back them up with hard-punching references to facts.]

• Slavery :
  • Slavery was an area where property rights needed to be extended to afro-americans, and then subsequently, diligently enforced. The solution to slavery was to extend and enforce property rights -- not to abolish private property altogether.
  • When the polity truly desires changes, they will demand them of their politicians even using force if necessary -- and this is what happened in the Civil War, the outcome of which was the 13th, 14th and 15th amendments. If you argue that "Well, they had to use guns and fight a war just to get those changes", we reply by pointing out that the ability to take up arms against the government and the politicians and to demand change was built into the constitution intentionally for precisely this purpose.
  • The civil war is a story which depicts not the depravity and resistance of Americans to abolition, but the general tendency toward respect for the sovereignty of the individual: it's not often pointed out, but the north had, by some sources, 10 times the economic and productive power, and a much larger army, than the south. The majority of the force of the civil war was on the side of abolition and the south was vastly outnumbered, outgunned and under-resourced. This points to the idea that the majority of Americans were at least sufficiently pro-abolition, that when forced to make the choice, they preferred abolition over the continuance of slavery.
• LGBT+ rights :
  • I don't know enough about the development and buildup to LGBT+ rights, and would appreciate assistance in drafting this point.
• Womens' rights :
  • The womens' political rights movement happened pretty rapidly and actually was a good example of how quickly change can happen in a republic when it is justified and desired by the overwhelming majority.

...And here are some arguments we will pre-empt by showing that we have also considered the rights of groups of entities which do not yet even exist, but may exist in the future:

• Artificial Intelligences : We have anticipated the advent of full AGI, and have written this constitution in such a manner as to ensure that they will have full private property sovereignty when they are introduced into everyday life.
• Extra-terrestrials : We've also gone ahead and anticipated the (almost absurd) potential for future tourists, residents and immigrants from outside of Earth and ensured that the language of WS will ensure that their private property sovereignty is protected as fully as any AGI or human.

We've tried very hard to essentially ensure that any fully conscious entity of at least human intelligence which comes into the jurisdiction of a WS polity will not need to struggle and fight for its right to life -- aka, its right to private property sovereignty. We've endeavoured to ensure the peaceful coexistence of all conscious agents within the borders of a WS polity.