I am not a leftist. Far from it. Not only have I become a conservative in my old age, but I find myself growing more conservative every month. Nonetheless, I think those on the left are correct about one...

I am not a leftist. Far from it. Not only have I become a conservative in my old age, but I find myself growing more conservative every month. Nonetheless, I think those on the left are correct about one thing, at least. They are right when they warn us that the United States, where the top 1 percent of people own about 40 percent of the nation�s wealth, has a dangerous imbalance of wealth.

Please don�t misunderstand. I am far from agreeing with the leftist notion that the ideal society would be one in which wealth is equally distributed. This is absurd. Nonetheless, this great inequality of wealth is dangerous for America. For it is making the United States less and less a democracy (a form of government in which the people rule) and more and more an oligarchy (a form of government in which a small number of very rich people rule).

Theoretically it is possible for a society to remain democratic even with a small class of super-rich persons. Theoretically, yes. But practically speaking, no. Human nature being what it is, super-rich people will not abstain indefinitely from getting political power and using it to promote their agendas. Only rarely (e.g., Mayor Bloomberg of New York) will they do this by running for and holding elective office themselves. More usually, they�ll get and use political power by controlling � or influencing, if you prefer that word � those who hold elective office. In other words, the super-rich will get and use political power by �buying� politicians, at least politicians at the highest levels: mayors of our biggest cities, governors, members of the U.S. House and Senate and, above all, the president of the United States.

There was a time when money, though important, wasn�t nearly as big or nearly as important in politics as it has been for the last half-century or so; and it grows bigger and more important every year.

In the old days, local political parties (called �machines� by their critics) were tremendously important. Those running for high office had to depend on machines to maintain party loyalty, distribute electoral propaganda, and get out the vote on Election Day.

But those were the days before television advertising. And as everybody knows, ads on TV are terribly expensive � an expense local political machines cannot afford. But these ads can be afforded by candidates who receive lots and lots of money from rich supporters. As campaigns became more costly, candidates for high office worried less and less about keeping local political machines happy and more and more about keeping their rich friends happy. Today the machines have virtually disappeared, while the rich and super-rich dominate American political campaigns for high office.

Some good-hearted but na�ve people think that we can limit the influence of the rich by having taxpayer financing of political campaigns. But this is silly. These rich people didn�t get rich by being stupid � or by hiring stupid lawyers. No matter what laws are passed, the rich will find legal ways of evading the laws; besides, they already �own� the legislators who will write these laws.

Now oligarchy isn�t an intrinsically bad thing. But in the United States we have a special problem. For we are and always have been philosophically democratic. We believe that government is legitimate to the degree � and only to the degree � that it is chosen by the people. When we conclude that in reality our government is controlled by the rich and super-rich, not the people, we will experience a great legitimacy crisis; our government will no longer feel legitimate to us, and thus it will not receive the deference that legitimate authority is entitled to. Lawlessness and disorder will follow.

We have two options if we wish to maintain legitimacy. Either (a) halt the rush toward oligarchy, or (b) abandon our democratic philosophy. But since we are unlikely to do either, we are probably going to have an unpleasant century ahead of us.

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David Carlin, a former majority leader of the Rhode Island Senate, is a professor of philosophy and sociology at Community College of Rhode Island.