Talk:Popular sovereignty

Worldwide coverage

Hello everyone. This article focuses too heavily on the American context. I'll add some international coverage when I get the chance (and please consider doing so yourself) but, in the meantime, the section on the United States also needs to be shortened. It might be a good idea to create a new article titled "Popular sovereignty (United States)", and move most of the section's current content to there. – SJL 01:08, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

An example of what you propose was done with the article Secession which led to the creation of Secession in the United States. In the case of popular sovereignty in the United States, there is a general political and philosophical use of the term, and I believe that should stay in this article, combining it with other views on the subject from philosophers, political scientists etc. from other nations.

What should be spun off would be a separate article on Popular Sovereignty, as a political issue in the United States from roughly 1846 to 1860. Unless someone objects, I will go ahead and create the new article and transfer the relevant material, which would be the last six paragraphs of the section "History and use of the term". Tom (North Shoreman) (talk) 14:36, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

Sounds good to me. I have some concerns about the content of that section – it reads, especially in the footnotes, like a term paper – but I'll take that up with the person who made the contribution. – SJL 16:56, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

NO 74.87.124.2 (talk) 16:34, 6 February 2023 (UTC)

Developing a broader article and spinning-off some of the U.S. coverage, as suggested here, would be a vast improvement. At the time I revised this article in the Spring, it seemed a potpourri of unverified notes on the development or use of the idea of popular sovereignty. My concern at the time was that its coverage of the American context seemed to shift between 1) the content of the American doctrine, 2) the efforts to implement a scheme of popular sovereignty and 3) the political rhetoric of popular sovereignty. The revision was designed to address the confusion about the various uses of the doctrine in the American context.

The gap in the international coverage was one that pre-existed the U.S. revisions. In the process of making those revisions, the few international references (excepting those in the introductory paragraph) were finally deleted as not verified or a simple statement of a point of view. The intro paragraph, which was similar to what is the current introduction, seemed fine as far as it went. It really did not take the reader far except to link them to other articles on some of the thinkers who addressed the idea. The article provided little on the content or context of the development of the idea of popular sovereignty. Of course the problem is finding someone with the background and interest to address generally accepted interpretations of the development and use of the doctrine of popular sovereignty in a world-wide context. I hope JSL is not having second thoughts about taking that project on.

Creating a separate article on "Popular sovereignty (United States)" as proposed by Tom (North Shoreman) is a promising idea. It seems he proposes that this section would focus on the use of popular sovereignty as political rhetoric in the U.S. I look forward to reading what he develops. It seems a solid solution to resolving confusing references to popular sovereignty as a doctrine versus its application or misapplication as a political tool.

As for where the article stands at present, I offer several observations:

• First, in the second paragraph there are statements by Americans describing ideas of popular sovereignty. Should this paragraph be moved so that it appears under the United States section? These American expressions of the idea are not equivalent to those set forth in the first paragraph. The cited American expressions are taken from efforts to apply the doctrine of popular sovereignty to a specific political problem in the U.S. Unless there is an objection, I would propose moving them under American sub-section, unless some other editor finds that American politicians James Wilson or John Jay are within the ranks of Hobbes, Locke or Rousseau in the development of the idea of popular sovereignty.
• Second, until Tom (North Shoreman) or another editor spins off some of the American material into a separate article, would it be useful in the section designated by JSL as "United States" to restore the sub-headings? I think this will be easier on the reader, until such time as the changes are made to the article as a whole. At that time we could address the sub-headings in terms of how the article has been re-organized.
• Third, JSL notes some concerns about the notes to the 1846-60 section on the United States. Should this be addressed now or should we wait until the separate entry on "Popular sovereignty (United States)" is created (and to the extent those concerns still exist at that time)?

Rushlite (talk) 19:26, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

Update

I have made some changes:

• I changed the name of the section on the United States to 'Popular sovereignty in the United States', and moved most of the information that was provided there to a new article by the same name.
• I removed the second paragraph from the lead and pasted in on the talk page of the new article so that it can be incorporated into the main text there.

I will expand the general base of this article when I get a chance, but I have some other projects on Wikipedia that I am giving priority. If someone else is able to get started now, though, please do! By the way, it's SJL, not "JSL". ;) – SJL 04:59, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

==== UPDATE BY CYNICAL PATRIOT (USA)

I came here to participate in the discussion of merging "Consent of the Governed" with "Popular Sovereignty" My opinion is no. Next, There seems to be some movement to rewrite US and world history here on Wikiedia and elsewhere. And finally, there seems to be some effort to minimalize the contribution of the USA to the body of political and government theory.

On the first point: The American Founding Fathers created a constitution and government that became known as "The Great American Experiment" for a reason. It was a constitutional republic that prevented the "democratic" majority from removing from individuals certain inalienable rights. George Washington was offered the opportunity to be king and rejected. The Founding fathers feared corruption and the eventual return to a rule of tyranny. To avoid this they gave individual citizens the title Sovereign Citizen and called elected officials public servants. They gave sovereignty to the individual rather than collectively to the entire Citizenry to establish that democratic majority could not take away from the individual the god given, natural irrevocable rights.

On the second point: The Political and Government theory embodied in the US Constitution led to the existance of the most vibrant and powerful Country in the world for the past 200 years. The US Constitutional Republic inspired the French during the French Revolution. It charted a model for throwing off colonialism and implementing new governments to replace colonialism.

On on the third point: Incorporating the arguments of the 2nd point, it is absolutely unfathomable that the US Theory and models of politics and government would be minimalized. I don't know where the proponent of minimalizing the USA Founding Fathers contribution to political and governmental theory lives, but I wonder if they would even be free to express this sentiment if the USA had not entered WWI and prevailed in liberating Europe from Tyranny. And then liberating the world from tyranny in WWII. Only the US form of government allowed the vibrance and productivity to alter what otherwise would have been the course of world history. And you want to dismiss it as a foot note or a subsection of some larger "World Document" I think not. You keep your world history and we will keep our US history. The US version of events is more consistent with reality.(CynicalPatriot (talk) 21:13, 1 August 2009 (UTC))

= End Cynical Patriot discussion =

This article certainly muddies up the concepts of consentof the governed and popular sovereignty. Even more unbelievably, Locke is mentioned, who never wrote of Popular Sovereignty, yet Abraham Lincoln, who wrote\spoke extensively on the subject, is omitted. I find it highly unlikely that this oversight is accidental. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.15.167.185 (talk) 02:47, 3 July 2011 (UTC)

--Brad Anderson-- — Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.43.84.200 (talk) 16:24, 15 November 2011 (UTC)

I also made one change: the original article read, "popular sovereignty or the sovereignty of the people is the political principle that the legitimacy of the state is created by the will or consent of its people,"

To this, I added the term "created and sustained," since otherwise this term "created," implies a SURRENDER of popular sovereignty to the state, once this "legitimate state" is thus "created." Naturally, this destroys popular sovereignty-- but unfortunately, it is the current state of affairs in America, where the People have no such "right of negative veto" over federal legislation or other national policy. So if the majority was dead-against a particular act by the federal government, they have no sovereign authority to stop it other than the limited choice of elections. This is not popular sovereignty, but only elective oligarchy, since the legitimacy of the state is no longer sustained by the consent of the People. This is an "elephant in the room" which is the undoing of popular sovereignty, but which no one wants to talk about. R

Neutrality

I added the NPOV tag because of this sentence: "Popular sovereignty expresses a concept and does not necessarily reflect or describe a political reality."

There was a reference cited, but the sentence is an opinion, and a reference does not help to legitimize it, since it is not a fact. For the person who added that sentence or any person who wishes to defend it, *in what way* does it not reflect or describe a political reality? That seems nonsensical to me. Please explain. It won't make sense to most people, and it doesn't seem coherent enough to be included in the opening paragraph of the article. 66.69.194.16 (talk) 22:39, 27 November 2008 (UTC)

Yes it does. That is EXACTLY how citations work. Now maybe it wasn't a good citation because you're right it should expand on why the writer holds that opinion and the source should be reliable and hopefully the writer notable in st least this topic. But "opinion" is not the problem here 47.44.49.171 (talk) 05:36, 26 February 2024 (UTC)

Seems like some countries which are decidedly NOT democratic are using the concept to legitimize the rule. A notable example is China, where a prominent member of the central committee of the Chinese Communist Party has written a book titled Democracy which argues that since the chinese people had and continue to consent to be ruled by the Communist Party, therefore China has a true democracy. Ridiculous but true. So I think some such disclaimer about the use of this concept is warranted. Kotika98 (talk) 09:11, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

Proposed merge from consent of the governed

I don't agree with the merge from consent of the governed. Consent of the governed, if unanimity is required, can refer to individual sovereignty. The U.S. Declaration of Independence was somewhat ambiguous on that point. Tisane (talk) 00:58, 24 February 2010 (UTC)

history and social contract

I`ve made a few changes on that section, but I think other changes are needed. First, there`s no sense in calling the section "history" if the subsequent sections are also about history. I would propose changing the title to "Origins". Secondly, i don`t think the mention of Robert the Bruce is relevant at all. The power of noblemen over a king is not exceptional during the middle ages. The holy roman emperors and the polish-lithuanian commonwealth come to mind, but this is all really just derivatives from the traditional germanic relation between a war leader/king and his war officials/noblemen. Popular sovereignty is not about aristocracy vs. monarchy disputes. In fact, the magna carta would be a better introduction to the transition between nobles` rights and peoples` rights. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Marco.natalino (talk • contribs) 08:58, 6 May 2012 (UTC)

Yup, I took down the part about Scotland. If anyone disagrees, please read, for example, the last paragraph on page 10 of the article cited instead of going just with the first paragraph!

just a small part:

The account of Scottish origins in the Declaration of Arbroath, as the pedigree of Scottish self-determination, was not a statement of biological descent or ethnic affiliation. It was the pedigree of an allegiance, a pattern of obedience intended to demonstrate the kingdom’s credentials as a thoroughbred institution with generations of history behind it. Marco.natalino (talk) 23:05, 19 May 2012 (UTC)

English Commonwealth

Currently the article states "The American Revolution marked a departure in the concept of popular sovereignty as it had been discussed and employed in the European historical context".

However it is called the American Revolution because it was thought to be a revolution (in the old English sense as used before the French revolution), and little is new under the sun. The English Commonwealth vested its sovereignty in the people and then proceeded to ignore them! (see s:Act declaring England to be a Commonwealth May 19, 1649)

So perhaps the sentence in this article needs to be rewritten as it is misleading to ignore the Interregnum. -- PBS (talk) 15:40, 9 August 2013 (UTC)

"and then proceeded to ignore them!" --yes, that is exactly what did NOT happen in the USA. all the American states held regular popular elections. Rjensen (talk) 05:15, 10 August 2013 (UTC)

Parental fundamental liberties

Fundamental Liberties Interests 2604:2D80:D10B:BD00:1964:7201:D8A9:B8FC (talk) 01:52, 8 August 2023 (UTC)