The “Will of the People”
Elon Musk seems to have no comprehension of the basics of American governance and history.
Somehow the most talked about man in American politics today is not the sitting president, the attention-hog Donald Trump, but his nebulously-titled “senior advisor,” billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk. Although he has “no actual or formal authority to make government decisions himself,” Musk has been the subject of near-constant media attention – and for good reason. He has made confident pronouncements about government spending and policy both in impromptu interviews and via his rampant posting on the social network he owns, Twitter. (I refuse to call it X because that’s a stupid name.) His style is deliberately incendiary, he repeatedly and significantly exaggerates his claims, and he lashes out at critics, reserving his most unsparing attacks for when he is most in the wrong. In a way, he’s not much different from the man who actually sits behind the Resolute Desk.
But this piece isn’t going to be about Musk’s DOGE ‘reforms’ or spending cuts, nor will it be about his confidently idiotic foreign policy ideas. It won’t even be about the fact that he chronically misreads government accounting documents – a hobbyhorse for this former auditor. Instead, it will be about a phrase that Musk continually returns to in his pronouncements about the purported legitimacy of the actions of government or the courts: the will of the people. He has used this phrase over and over again, in TV interviews and online. For instance, he has argued for the impeachment of judges who “are grossly undermining the will of the people and destroying America,” also known as ruling against various Trump schemes, some reasonable and others less so. In a joint interview with the president, he served up the following word salad (Kamala would be proud!):
“If the will of the president is not implemented and the president is representative of the people that means the will of the people is not being implemented and that means we don’t live in a democracy, we live in a bureaucracy. Does that make sense?”
No, Elon. That does not make sense. Not only are these statements patently incorrect, they betray a deep unfamiliarity with – or even a hostility to – the basic norms and forms of American governance throughout our history.
Let’s first tackle the phrase itself – the will of the people. There are myriad problems with the concept as described here, both in general and in the specific American context. Who are “the people?” Are all citizens included? If so, can anyone come up with even a single issue on which all American adults agree? How can such a broad and heterogeneous group possibly have a single “will?” If you only consider some of the people as “the people,” how are you making that selection and who are you leaving out? How small a group can represent “the people?” 75%? 60% A bare majority? A mere plurality? And how do you gauge what those smaller groups agree on? Even if people widely agree on a particular issue when framed as a yes/no poll question, do they agree on how to deal with it? What happens when the opinion of “the people” is contradictory? For example, most Americans agree that inflation is bad. But most Americans also dislike the harsh measures needed to tamp down said inflation. What then? Most Americans really hate Congress, but they also like their particular representative. How do you square that circle?
Americans are a highly variegated bunch with a whole lot of individual freedom to live lives and express ideas as they see fit. And that’s exactly what makes us special – one might say exceptional. There is no “will of the people,” because we don’t agree on everything, even the basics. Any diminution of the idea of “the people” so as to actually find something that a smaller group can agree on necessarily negates the concept itself. That just means it’s a shared opinion of a majority, not some mystical popular will that drives the decisions of man. And America has been based on tamping down the momentary opinion of a temporary majority for as long as we’ve existed as a polity. We are not a direct democracy, where the populace is consulted on every minor decision and bare majorities rule with an iron fist. We are a constitutional republic, with separation of powers, a federalist structure, elected representatives, a Bill of Rights, and several constitutional safeguards to ensure the promotion of individual liberty, regardless of the whims of ephemeral majorities.
Our Founders knew that the fleeting “will of the people” couldn’t be trusted, which is why they made it so difficult to enact massive changes with a small majority that was not geographically diverse. They made the constitutional amendment process challenging so that broad buy-in was required to alter the form of American government or the legal protections of the citizenry. They balanced the federal legislature between the states and the people and the national compact between the states and federal government. They diffused power in ways that were not only novel, but genius and long-lasting. They knew that such a structure would ensure that significant legal changes to American life or governance would only be made if a durable supermajority across the whole of the country agreed to it. In a nation that has always been diverse – intellectually, regionally, professionally, culturally, economically – this was the glue that held the Union together.
We do not live in a parliamentary system, where the party that wins a small majority, or even a plurality, in a single election can completely revise the social compact or the works of government. Our elections are local first, then state, then federal. The results of a single election – except in cases of absolutely staggering landslides, as in 1820 (Monroe ran unopposed!), 1936, 1964, and 1984 – do not provide a “mandate” for drastic change, as there is no single agenda, party, or person being trusted with absolute power. The president can be of a different party from the Congress, the Senate and House can be split, there can be more governors and state legislators of one party than the other – totally unmoored from the federal balance of power. And even within a party, ideas can vary wildly. Democrats argue over foreign policy, radical proposals like court packing, and even the value of capitalism and the police. Republicans argue about immigration policy, national security, and taxes. One party includes both John Fetterman and Rashida Tlaib, while the other counts both Tom Cotton and Thomas Massie among its members. American politics is in constant tension and flux, exactly how it was meant to be.
At the same time, pretending that our elected officials are supposed to act simply as vessels for the loudest voices in the public square – which is all the “will of the people” is to folks like Elon Musk – runs counter to the most basic tenets of conservatism and of the political ideas of the Founders. As a republic, we elect people to use their judgment to represent our interests in the government. These elected officials are not meant to be mere weathervanes for the whims of the public, but advocates for the national interest more broadly. They are supposed to have a more universal view as compared to the parochial mindsets of their constituents, who do not have the time or ability to dedicate their lives to following the minutiae of politics. If the representative’s constituents are unhappy with his judgment or performance, they can vote him out. That is the check on our elected officials, not the current attempts to cajole politicians to follow the mob wherever it leads.
The ur-conservative thinker and great inspiration to the Founders, Edmund Burke, explained how this system of representation was meant to function, and it is worth quoting at length:
“Certainly, gentlemen, it ought to be the happiness and glory of a representative to live in the strictest union, the closest correspondence, and the most unreserved communication with his constituents. Their wishes ought to have great weight with him; their opinion, high respect; their business, unremitted attention. It is his duty to sacrifice his repose, his pleasures, his satisfactions, to theirs; and above all, ever, and in all cases, to prefer their interest to his own. But his unbiassed opinion, his mature judgment, his enlightened conscience, he ought not to sacrifice to you, to any man, or to any set of men living. These he does not derive from your pleasure; no, nor from the law and the constitution. They are a trust from Providence, for the abuse of which he is deeply answerable. Your representative owes you, not his industry only, but his judgment; and he betrays, instead of serving you, if he sacrifices it to your opinion.
My worthy colleague says, his will ought to be subservient to yours. If that be all, the thing is innocent. If government were a matter of will upon any side, yours, without question, ought to be superior. But government and legislation are matters of reason and judgment, and not of inclination; and what sort of reason is that, in which the determination precedes the discussion; in which one set of men deliberate, and another decide; and where those who form the conclusion are perhaps three hundred miles distant from those who hear the arguments?
To deliver an opinion, is the right of all men; that of constituents is a weighty and respectable opinion, which a representative ought always to rejoice to hear; and which he ought always most seriously to consider. But authoritative instructions; mandates issued, which the member is bound blindly and implicitly to obey, to vote, and to argue for, though contrary to the clearest conviction of his judgment and conscience,–these are things utterly unknown to the laws of this land, and which arise from a fundamental mistake of the whole order and tenor of our constitution.”
This Burkean conception of representation was shared by the men who framed our Constitution. They also shared his abhorrence for direct democracy, influenced by thinkers all the way back to Aristotle, who rightly argued that mob rule was simply another form of tyranny. This is not only foundational to American conservatism, but to America itself. Our polity is complex and nuanced, with deep roots in history and law, and constrained by the Constitution; the exact opposite of the mercurial whims of constantly shifting majorities that may well desire things that future generations would come to regret and that our ancestors wisely sought to preclude. The “will of the people,” if it even exists, was never meant to be the cornerstone of American governance. Elon Musk should take note.