- Could this election disintegrate US democracy?
AT PENPOINT
The performance of President Donald Trump in the first debate against Democrat rival Joe Biden was typical, and his crassness, rudeness and bullying sprang no surprises. It was typical of his entire life before he had run for President in 2016. He had been unusual then in being the first person ever not to have held any office before, which meant that he had never undergone any of the public scrutiny that is customary for those who contest elections to office less than the Presidency, nor even of those who have to undergo legislative confirmation after nomination to office. The record of his long life till then (he was 67 when he ran) was examined, and it was duly noted where the gaps lay. For example, there was his refusal to make public his tax records, something he was not obliged to do, but candidates for office (and not just the Presidency) routinely did. Only after he won the Presidency, and only very recently, when he was running for re-election, have press reports appeared. They have been denied by him, but there has been none of the only really effective rebuttal there is, of making public the correct tax returns.
However, during the debate, he revealed one facet of his personality that, while previously known, throws a garish light on his readiness to endanger the very basis of democracy, which is the prior agreement to accept election results. A refusal to accept them is more associated with the Third World or emerging democracies. One of the latest examples comes from Belarus, which is an ex-Soviet republic. However, as is more usual, there it is the opposition which is protesting rigging by the incumbent. Here the incumbent is making the allegations.
The USA has been an example followed by developing countries. Even such countries as Pakistan who have Westminster-style constitution look to the USA. If democracy is to disintegrate there, it will be a major disaster, not just for the USA, but for all countries that look up to it. Trump might not realize that more rides on him than four more years
The US election process seems almost chaotically diffused. There is no single election authority. Indeed, there are no statewide authorities, but 3,000 counties with each conducting elections. From the point of view of the late 18th century, when the system was put in place, it made sense, that even though there was to be an election for one post, there should not be a single national constituency. That would have been virtually impossible to administer. Also, at that time, there was no popular vote. The state legislatures elected the presidential electors.
When the electors were elected, the franchise was narrow. But it was counted by the counties, which then sent their result to the state’s Secretary of State, who then declared elected as electors those who had committed to vote for a particular person. The election of the President is not by popular vote, but by the Electoral College vote. That means that if one candidate loses by huge majorities in some states, but wins narrowly in some, he could win in the Electoral College despite having lost the popular vote. As a matter of fact, in 2000, that is what happened, as well as in 2016. Trump’s only hope of winning re-election hinges on such a victory again.
It is not that the states do not count, or even the Union. The overall, methodology of electing a President is enshrined in federal legislation, while state-wide legislation also exists. One such state-wide decision is at the heart of Trump’s strategy to dispute the election. The mail-in ballot, who can cast one, until when can they be tendered, and other rules governing them, are determined on a state-wide basis. Trump is alleging, without any evidence, that there will be fraud through them. That seems to be where he will make his stand.
The death of Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg helped. He has the help of the Republican Senators who will confirm a replacement in time to have a full Supreme Court hear any election-related disputes. It might be remembered that, because George W. Bush actually lost on the popular vote in 2000, the result in Florida was going to determine the winner in the Electoral College. That result depended on a recount of ballots. The decision to stop the recount was taken by the Supreme Court, and the younger Bush was declared the winner.
And that time, it was noted that one of the judges, Mr Justice Clarence Thomas, had been appointed by the older President Bush despite the harassment allegations made by a former colleague, while the son of Mr Justice Antonin Scalia was on the younger Bush’s legal team.
Trump sounded another note during the debate, which indicated how he could refuse to accept the poll results: when he told the Proud Boys to “stand by”. The Proud Boys are a white supremacist group, and Trump’s remarks have been interpreted not as the condemnation he was asked to make, but a warning to prepare. For what? A stolen election?
Pakistanis have experience of stolen elections. They involve getting control of the election commission. They are usually not ascribed to oppositions. They are usually made by a party that is losing, to explain to its followers why they lost. They could be used when there was a gap between national and provincial polls, to rally support for a defeated party.
White supremacist groups and militias are mobilizing behind Trump, it seems, ready to run riot if he is declared the loser. Who will so declare him? TV stations, which he has been careful to deride as purveyors of ‘fake news’, normally do, but Trump supporters will not trust them.
The only way out of a nasty post-election scenario, would be for Biden to win so convincingly that legal challenges, even if accepted, would not overturn the result. There is a difference between losing a state by 5,000 votes and 500,000. And then there is the difference between having to overturn one result in the Electoral College to turn a narrow defeat into a narrow win. As opposed to needing to reverse 20 results to turn a heavy defeat into that narrow win. If the defeat is big enough, the candidate and his supporters lose steam.
One analogy is with the Roman Republic. Trump will probably not destroy American democracy, but he may be playing the part in the USA played by Gaius Marius in Rome. Marius broke the Roman term limit, which allowed one one-year term as consul (of which there were two). He was Consul no less than seven times. Roman democracy did not break down at once, but the party he founded was inherited by his nephew-by-marriage Julius Caesar, whose great-nephew Augustus thereupon became the first Emperor.
Another parallel is with France, and the decline it suffered from being the leading power in Europe under Louis XIV, who died in 1715, to the deposing of Louis XVI by the French Revolution in 1789. US decline has become visible under Trump, just as it achieved the success of outlasting the USSR in the Cold War.
The USA has been an example followed by developing countries. Even such countries as Pakistan who have Westminster-style constitution look to the USA. If democracy is to disintegrate there, it will be a major disaster, not just for the USA, but for all countries that look up to it. Trump might not realize that more rides on him than four more years.
