A response to John Piper’s recent
article.
I would like to preface this with the disclosure that I have
not nor will I vote for President Trump, I have resigned to vote for third-party
where possible until there are significant reforms to the two-party system. I
also want to make it known I hold a great deal of reverence and respect for
John Piper. It was after the reading of Desiring God that a thirst for deeper
theology and understanding based in scripture that I mark my faith journey in
adulthood. I am forever grateful for the presentation of God’s sovereignty.
The fun part: Yes, this is a criticism, it is one of many, hopefully
this can be edifying to my Christian friends and associates who are concerned about
how they ought to or not cast their vote. I think Piper’s deliberations over the choice many are likely still facing, is reflective of the broader concerns of
the two-party system, but it is a little late for us to look to the remedies
for this coming election. To this degree, H.L. Menken frames our present
situation appropriately, “Democracy is the theory that the common people know
what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard.” We have made this proverbial
bed.
Piper is concerned with the role individual personality
traits and characteristics play in leading a nation. His scriptural support is well-founded
in a biblical context, albeit not necessarily for a representative system of
government. The Books of Kings, Chronicles, and Samuel provide ample examples
of flawed leaders leading their nations to ruin or repentance. However, in all
those examples, the ruler is a King. This structural difference in the system
of governance is significant. Under a King, the people are in the direct path
of their leader, and if we are considering most of European history, that right
was through a divine authoritative claim. There was no concept of separated
powers or representative government, rather the opposite. The Peace of Westphalia
in 1648 is significantly remembered for among other things establishing the
principle of “cuius
regio, eius religio” (Whose realm, his religion), wherein the religion of
the people was dependent upon that of the sitting monarch. We are far from such
systems of government but not without other concerns. I am immensely grateful though
that the faith of my chief executive does not have any bearing on my own faith.
It is, for this reason, I think it valid to be less concerned with clear, overt
character flaws in a chief executive.
The primary argument of Piper is that we ought to weigh more
heavily on the individual character of those seeking to lead our nation. Again,
this is wholly reasonable if power is held in the hands of a single person, but
need we return to School House Rock
to remind us of the bicameral legislature as the primary body to represent the
People and the States? The bodies who draft legislation and ultimately make the
law of the land. The President does not single-handedly dictate policy. When
Presidents have done so, they have been checked. Much of President Obama’s
legacy is facing such fate, which should be the expected outcome when one leads through a “pen and phone.” I would
happily argue we cast an outsized focus on the occupant of the White House in
an unhealthy unrepresentative manner which has hurt our ability to communicate with
our neighbors about policy.
Our system of government was designed, knowing full well the
dangers of human nature. In what is one of the most important essays written by
James Madison explaining the uniqueness of the United States as a
constitutional republic, he recognizes the challenges of competing interests,
particularly when they become primarily motivated by animus against the
opposition. In Federalist
10, Madison notes, “It is in vain to say that enlightened statesmen will be
able to adjust these clashing interests, and render them all subservient to the
public good. Enlightened statesmen will not always be at the helm.” The
government of the United States of America is bigger than any single person, we
ought to remember this. A person does lead an administration, which is far more
consequential in any measurable analysis of a chief executive.
Hence, we Christians find ourselves conflicted between our
citizenship in heaven as members of the royal priesthood against our earthly
citizenship in these United States of America. How we chose to vote should not
be a simple binary option, it was not designed in this way. It should not be something
we visit only in the weeks prior to an annual election, it was not designed
for that either. If the representative government is to work, we need to be aware
and engaged throughout the year, in such a way that the government which
theoretically operates on the consent of the governed, has informed consent.
"I know no safe depositary of the ultimate powers of
the society but the people themselves; and if we think them not enlightened
enough to exercise their control with a wholesome discretion, the remedy is not
to take it from them, but to inform their discretion by education. This is the
true corrective of abuses of constitutional power." -Thomas Jefferson to
William C. Jarvis, 1820.
"If a nation expects to be ignorant and free in a state
of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be." -Thomas
Jefferson to Charles Yancey, 1816
“A popular Government, without popular information, or the
means of acquiring it, is but a Prologue to a Farce or a Tragedy; or, perhaps
both. Knowledge will forever govern ignorance: And a people who mean to be
their own Governors, must arm themselves with the power which knowledge gives.”
James Madison to W. T. Barry, 1822
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