re: #37 EmmmieGIt’s something we should learn in 5th grade civics.

To have a democracy, you have to have the citizens actually making and voting on every law. We would all have to be in DC, voting on every bill. Not practical. Athens had a democracy because only they restricted who was a citizen, and they were geographically small enough to pull it off.

In a republic, we elect representatives to make the laws. Our votes are on the representatives, not the laws. Far more practical in a hurking big nation with hundreds of millions of people.

Hmmm. That seems to me more like ‘pure democracy’ vs. ‘representative democracy.’ By your explanation Canada and Britain are republics which they are not.

Shrugs. Not important, really. What’s really important is whether the citizens are involved in the process or not. Ours is, unfortunately, increasingly, not.