• nednobbins@lemm.ee
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    13
    ·
    3 months ago

    That seems unlikely, since the constitution doesn’t really include safeguards against someone like Trump.

    The founding fathers were afraid of a King (at least some of them were). They put all kinds of limits on the power of the executive but they assumed people would follow those rules. They never really considered the possibility of a private citizens gaining so much power that they can ignore government.

    • orbitz@lemmy.ca
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      6
      ·
      3 months ago

      Wasn’t the electoral college and impeachment bits supposed to be safeguard from people like Trump? I’m actually curious because I’m not American but so many things I’ve read said those were supposed to help that sort of thing. Not that it’s helped.

      I thought another big thing they didn’t count on was so many members of Congress following that sort person.

      Also yes I agree they didn’t think of the possibility of someone being able to ignore laws because that’d be absurd not to put someone on trial speedily regardless of the position they held.

      • nednobbins@lemm.ee
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        2
        ·
        edit-2
        2 months ago

        There’s quite a lot of disagreements between historians on why there’s an electoral college https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/k5hv2m/what_was_the_founders_purpose_in_creating_the/

        We have a lot of laws that protect people from government. The complement to such a policy is that we reduce the amount of protection government has from people.

        If you assume that your government is bad or that it will inevitably become bad then this is a great policy to reduce bad government. The flip side is that if we expect government to protect us from individual bad citizens who have gained a lot of power it’s harder.

        edit: grammar

      • Wogi@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        1
        ·
        3 months ago

        Yes and no

        The system was always supposed to protect those in power from those without. The system is designed so that the masses have extremely limited power to remove people like trump if the people with money want him there.