BACKSTORY 56.2 The Fight Against Local Democracy
Written by SP Editor
This is not another screed about Trump, although he is a case study of anti-democratic practice. This is about something that seems to be a global trend. I’m talking about the autocratic impulse to impose control from above and eliminate local voices, votes, and vetoes. The blunt, brazenness of power is increasingly expressed with impunity and no regard for local wishes or input.
Indeed, Trump often expresses his theory of change which is essentially, “because I could.” This was always common, but often more likely imposed with some guile, some semblance or pretense of accountability.
Recently, in New Orleans where I live, I watched the Republican Governor, a Trump wannabe, like so many these days, react to the resounding election of a civil court clerk, who had been jailed in error for many years, by going to the Republican majority legislature and eliminating the position by merging the civil and criminal court positions. The New Orleans City Council and mayor sought to call a special election to fill this newly imposed position over their protest. They, like the voters, were ignored. I recognize this pales next to the elimination of Congressional and legislative seats held by elected Black representatives, both in Louisiana and throughout the southern states. Tennessee stripped out the Memphis-based seat. Louisiana left only one seat despite a Black population of one-third. Mississippi debated getting rid of its one seat in the delta with more than one-third population. The Supreme Court’s twisted conclusions don’t disguise the obvious, and they said as much: this is about power, not the people.
In Turkey, still claiming to be a European democracy, the elected mayor of Istanbul, seen as a threat to the president, is jailed on specious charges and his party banned. How is this different from Putin’s reign in Russia, other than as a matter of degree? In India, still claiming to be the world’s largest democracy, how does one justify the charges against non-BJP candidates and the restriction of citizenship and voting rights for Muslims in BJP led states throughout the country.
Where are their clean hands in modern politics? Not among our nice Canadian neighbors in the north. Ontario premier Doug Ford came into office by eliminating a significant number of seats of opponents in the Toronto city council, where he had served previously as mayor and found them to be contentious. Now there’s a proposal that would allow the provincial government to review and reject any proposal approved by any of the regional governments in Ontario.
I realize much of this is not new. For the last thirty years in the United States the ability of cities with home rule charters allowing local control and governance has been under constant attack. The ability of citizens, locally and at the state level, to initiate binding referenda on issues in their interest has been eviscerated in many areas, Florida being about the best example, but in many other states this path has also been strewn with barriers. I would be remiss not to mention Trump’s effort to try to take over the control of voting from the states in order to restrict access, eliminate people from the voting list, and impose minority will.
All of these iron fisted exercises of power are meant to curtail popular voice and votes in order to allow untrammeled exercise of governing authority, while often mumbling lip service to democracy. As we’re now seeing with the development of data centers, pipelines and other economic infrastructure, there is not even that pretense in many states when it comes to creating megaprojects and barring protest, citizen input, and transparency.
The fight continues, but the odds have worsened as the playing field is tilted against the bottom to favor the will and whims at the top. The abuses of “I can” will continue, until we have the organization and strength to once again say, “you can’t!”