A WORLD OF DEMOCRACIES IS A WORLD AT PEACE

Arnold Beichman writes about the one big idea that President Bush has adopted that is critical for the survival of freedom in the 21st Century.

And the one big thing that Mr. Bush knows is that in a world of democracies we would come as near to world peace as human nature and the nature of interstate relations would allow. For since the first new nation came into existence in 1789, when the U.S. Constitution was promulgated, no democracy has ever fought a war with another democracy. And by democracy I mean, to cite Seymour Martin Lipset's definition, a political system with a peaceful transfer of power and a social mechanism to enable people to influence decisions made by public officials.

Beichman refutes the common criticisms of that point of view by carefully defining when a nation became a democracy (Great Britain was not yet a democracy in 1812, for example). I would argue that even if one could cite an example of a democracy going to war against another democracy it would not negate the claim that the world would be more peaceful if more nations were democratic. Follow the link to read the whole article.