Bruno Leoni points out that elections are seriously flawed because majority rule is incompatible with individual freedom of choice (1961)
About this Quotation:
As another presidential and congressional election is upon us, we turn to one of the great legal and political analyses of the electoral process by the Italian jurist Bruno Leoni. In this quote from his 1961 lectures Leoni observes that fundamentally elections are a result of group decisions which produce decisions which are not compatible with individual freedom of choice. Furthermore, he suggest that coercion is frequently involved in the “machinery of voting”. The much touted benefits of “majority rule” in fact produce outcomes which are desired by only a “majority of the majority”, which in reality are that of a minority of the people.
Other quotes from this week:
- 2009: Macaulay argues that politicians are less interested in the economic value of public works to the citizens than they are in their own reputation, embezzlement and “jobs for the boys” (1830)
- 2008: James Madison on the dangers of elections resulting in overbearing majorities who respect neither justice nor individual rights, Federalist 10 (1788)
- 2007: Thomas Gordon on standing armies as a power which is inconsistent with liberty (1722)
- 2006: J.S. Mill in The Subjection of Women argued that every form of oppression seems perfectly natural to those who live under it (1869)
- 2006: Bruno Leoni notes the strong connection between economic freedom and decentralized legal decision-making (1961)
- 2005: Cicero urges the Senate to apply the laws equally in order to protect the reputation of Rome and to provide justice for the victims of a corrupt magistrate (1stC BC)
- 2004: James Bryce believed that the Founders intended that the American President would be “a reduced and improved copy of the English king” (1885)
- 2004: Ludwig von Mises laments the passing of the Age of Limited Warfare and the coming of Mass Destruction in the Age of Statism and Conquest (1949)
Other quotes about Parties & Elections:
- 2009: Captain John Clarke asserts the right of all men to vote in the formation of a new constitution by right of the property they have in themselves (1647)
- 2009: Gustave de Molinari argues that political parties are like “actual armies” who are trained to seize power and reward their supporters with jobs and special privileges (1904)
- 2008: James Madison on the dangers of elections resulting in overbearing majorities who respect neither justice nor individual rights, Federalist 10 (1788)
- 2008: Bruno Leoni argues that expressing one’s economic choice as a consumer in a free market is quite different from making a political choice by means of voting (1961)
- 2007: Herbert Spencer takes “philosophical politicians” to task for claiming that government promotes the “public good” when in fact they are seeking “party aggrandisement” (1843)
- 2006: Lance Banning argues that within a decade of the creation of the US Constitution the nation was engaged in a bitter battle over the soul of the American Republic (2004)
- 2005: James Bryce tries to explain to a European audience why “great men” are no longer elected to America’s highest public office (1888)
- 2005: Auberon Herbert discusses the “essence of government” when the veneer of elections are stripped away (1894)
3 November, 2008
 | Bruno Leoni points out that elections are seriously flawed because majority rule is incompatible with individual freedom of choice (1961) |
Bruno Leoni, in Freedom and the Law (1961), noted two serious problems with political voting, namely that it often volated individual freedom and resulted in rule by a minority:
But voting itself seems to increase the difficulties relating both to the meaning of “representation” and to the “freedom” of the individuals in making their choice. … Election is the result of a group decision where all the electors are to be considered as the members of a group, for instance, of their constituencies or of the electorate as a whole. We have seen that group decisions imply procedures like majority rule which are not compatible with individual freedom of choice of the type that any individual buyer or seller in the market enjoys as well as in any other choice he makes in his private life. The effects of coercion in the machinery of voting have been repeatedly pointed out by politicians, by sociologists, by political scientists (such as J.S. Mill who observed that) political issues are decided “by a majority of the majority who may be, and often are, but a minority of the whole.”
The full passage from which this quotation was taken can be be viewed below (front page quote in bold):
But voting itself seems to increase the difficulties relating both to the meaning of “representation” and to the “freedom” of the individuals in making their choice. All the difficulties relating to decision groups and group decisions remain when we consider the process of voting in present-day political systems. Election is the result of a group decision where all the electors are to be considered as the members of a group, for instance, of their constituencies or of the electorate as a whole. We have seen that group decisions imply procedures like majority rule which are not compatible with individual freedom of choice of the type that any individual buyer or seller in the market enjoys as well as in any other choice he makes in his private life. The effects of coercion in the machinery of voting have been repeatedly pointed out by politicians, by sociologists, by political scientists, and especially by mathematicians. Certain paradoxical aspects of this coercion have been especially emphasized by the critics of such classical methods of representation as the so-called single-member system which still is in effect in the English-speaking countries. I wish to draw your attention to the fact that these criticisms are chiefly based on the alleged fact that the system is not in accordance with the principle of “representation,” namely, when, as John Stuart Mill said, political issues are decided “by a majority of the majority who may be, and often are, but a minority of the whole.” Let me quote the passage of Mill’s essay on this subject:
Suppose then that, in a country governed by equal and universal suffrage, there is a contested election in every constituency, and every election is carried by a small majority. The parliament thus brought together represents little more than a bare majority of the people. This parliament proceeds to legislate and adopts important measures by a bare majority of itself. What guarantee is there that these measures accord with the wishes of a majority of the people” Nearly half the electors, having been outvoted at the hustings, have had no influence at all in the decision, and the whole of these may be—a majority of them probably are—hostile to the measures; having voted against those by whom they have been carried. Of the remaining electors nearly half have chosen representatives who, by supposition, have voted against the measures. It is possible, therefore, and not at all improbable, that the opinion which has prevailed was agreeable only to a minority of the nation.