Are we truly equal?

The answer to that is clearly that we are not. We are at once smarter and less smart than our fellow citizens, more and less successful, lucky, innovative, skilled, supported and/or capable. We all have different wants, needs and desires.

There are only two times we are equal while we are on the planet – when we all require the same minimums of food, clothing and shelter to survive and when we vote.

If that is true, then why do we live under a governmental system that bases electoral success on such false equality – the “one person, one vote” ideal?

Other than voting, the government we elect does reciprocate by treating us as equals, choosing instead to tax some more than others (some not at all), to provide different levels of aid and to apply laws and regulations differently. Government has metastasized from the protector of an environment where equal opportunity exists to the arbiter of “equality.” It is legally sanctioned inequality in pursuit of equality.

Theoretically, the reason we have a representative republic is to mitigate this condition but due to the corrupting influence of political motives, our current system seems not to be effective.

It would be ridiculous to allow ignorant be able to limit how smart you are, the weak to place shackles on your arms to limit your strength, the short to legally force you to stoop or the unattractive to require the attractive to wear hoods over their faces. We would dismiss this out of hand as absurdity and yet we allow those who pay no taxes to vote, as well as those who have little understanding of political issues, foreign policy issues or financial issues.

There are few viable solutions to the trap of people voting themselves benefits at the expense of others, to, as Frederic Bastiat said, live “the great fiction through which everybody endeavors to live at the expense of everybody else.”

One wonders if a state level lottery to randomly select perhaps 50% of the population of each state to vote might be a solution. If the winners of this lottery was selected purely by random chance and only notified 30 days before the national election, perhaps it would force all citizens to be more prepared while also discouraging the effect of factions. Since the voting pool would be random, it would also prevent the politicians from targeting special interest groups for favors in expectation of votes.

Should everyone be allowed to vote? I’m not sure that they should. Each should have the opportunity to do so and a state level lottery combined with the Electoral College system would seem to be the most equal way to achieve both fairness and impartiality of the result.

It is just a suggestion and as with all suggestions, it comes with both upside and downside aspects.