“[I]n a liberal democracy, sovereignty lies in the people at large; and our governing structures exist to implement that will.”

— Allen C. Guelzo

2010s, Interview with Sara Gabbard (2018)

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Allen C. Guelzo 82

American historian 1953

Charles A. Reich (1928–2019) American lawyer

The Liberals' Mistake (1987)
Context: Liberals placed an unreasonable amount of faith in large institutions: unions, foundations, big government, large corporations, and universities. These institutions are based on principles that are antithetical to democracy. They are not democratic, they are hierarchical: Someone is at the top and everybody else is at the bottom. Their policies are not made democratically, they are made at the top. These institutions are also not egalitarian. They operate by administrative discretion and authority, not the rule of law: There is no legislature, no group lawmaking body.
The individual in the large organization does not have the kind of constitutional rights that an individual in the society at large has. There are no protections of autonomy and free speech. Employees can be fired for many reasons. We need to constitutionalize large organizations to protect the people within them, to ensure that they can be politically outspoken.

“I am not a liberator. Liberators do not exist. It exists when people liberate themselves.”

Ernesto Che Guevara (1928–1967) Argentine Marxist revolutionary

Statement in Mexico (1958); as quoted in Kaplan AP World History 2005 (2004) edited by the Kaplan staff, p. 240

“There is a difference between constitutional government and judicial dictatorship. And I think it's time we remembered that our Constitution was not put together in order to establish the sovereignty of the judges, it was framed in order to guarantee the sovereignty of the people.”

Alan Keyes (1950) American politician

CPAC 2004, January 24, 2004. http://renewamerica.us/archives/speeches/04_01_24cpac.htm.
2009

“The nation and the government in Germany are one thing. The will of the people is the will of the government and vice versa. The modern structure of the German State is a higher form of democracy [ennobled democracy] in which, by virtue of the people’s mandate, the government is exercised authoritatively while there is no possibility for parliamentary interference to obliterate and render ineffective the execution of the nation’s will.”

Joseph Goebbels (1897–1945) Nazi politician and Propaganda Minister

“On National-Socialist Germany And Her Contribution Towards Peace.” Speech to the representatives of the international press at Geneva on September 28. 1933. German League of Nations Union News Service, PRO, FO 371/16728. Included within Völkerbund: Journal for International Politics, Ausgaben 1-103, 1933, p.16
1930s

“Conservative, n. A statesman enamored of existing evils, as opposed to a Liberal, who wants to replace them with others.”

Ambrose Bierce book The Devil's Dictionary

The Devil's Dictionary (1911)

“Every age that has historical status is governed by aristocracies.
Aristocracy with the meaning - the best are ruling.
Peoples do never govern themselves. That lunacy was concocted by liberalism. Behind its "people's sovereignty" the slyest cheaters are hiding, who don't want to be recognized.”

Joseph Goebbels (1897–1945) Nazi politician and Propaganda Minister

Jedes Zeitalter wird, wenn es historischen Rang hat, von Aristokratien gestaltet.
Aristokratie = die Besten herrschen.
Niemals regieren Völker sich selbst. Diesen Wahnsinn hat der Liberalismus erfunden. Hinter seiner Volkssouveränität verstecken sich nur die gerissensten Schelme, die nicht erkannt sein wollen.
Michael: a German fate in diary notes (1926)