This need not be so. America is a democratic republic. This doesn't merely mean that we get to vote; Iraqis under Saddam Hussein and the Chinese under the Communist Party rule got to do that. It also means that we get to participate in the business of governance and making a difference personally.
Participation takes many forms. It may be as direct as running for office ourselves. Michael Sessions of Hillsdale, Michigan reminded us that even if you are only eighteen years old, in high school, with only $500, running against an incumbent as a write-in candidate, a collegiate town may elect you mayor. The only thing you need to make a difference is determination.
Or it may be starting a political movement. Gregory Watson wrote a paper while he was an undergraduate at University of Texas in which he argued that a long-forgotten proposed amendment to the United States Constitution was still pending ratification and could be adopted if certain state legislatures voted to approve it. Although he received a "C" on the paper, he was undeterred and called state legislators in those states. He single handedly began a ten-year movement to change the Supreme Law of the Land, culminating in the adoption of the Twenty-Seventh Amendment in 1992--203 years after it was initially submitted to the states for ratification.
My goal on this page is far less ambitious, but no less important. I have always preached the importance of writing to our elected representatives, letting them know what we, the constituents, think. It is the most fundamental form of political participation in our democracy. I strongly believe that doing so makes a difference. Yet, I myself have never done what I've preached, not because I was cynical of the political system or because I was indifferent. It was merely because I found other ways to participate.
That changes today.
On this page I publish the letters I have written to my Congressman, Scott Garrett of New Jersey's Fifth District, on random topics, covering political and legal issues, major and minor, prominent and dormant.
I publish the letters for three reasons.
1. I have wanted to write a column ever since I left college, when I wrote a business column, and this seemed like a great way to get back into it.
2. I would like people to know and understand my brand of conservatism.
3. I would like to inspire others to similarly write their representatives.
The column is titled "Letters to a Congressman," named after "Letters from a federal farmer," which New York newspapers published during the constitutional ratification debates in 1788 to oppose the adoption of the constitution. I thought no other event better exemplified true democracy than the people themselves actively debating the constitution.