The Noble Business of Incumbentocracy: A Reply to ‘The Sordid Business of Democracy’

Note: This essay is a response to Daniel Tokaji, The Sordid Business of Democracy, 34 Ohio Northern University Law Review 341 (2008). The term incumbantocracy appears to have been coined by Jamin B. Raskin in The Supreme Court\u27s Double Standard, where he argued that voters don\u27t really pick public officials on Election Day because public officials pick voters on redistricting day. THE NATION, Feb. 6, 1995, at I 67-68. If democracy is a sordid business—a base, dirty, and ignoble business—then perhaps it is not too much of a stretch to say that there is something simple, clean, and noble about the business of incumbantocracy. This should ring a discordant note. lncumbantocracy, and not democracy, is the problem which calls for the courts to intervene. lncumbantocracy involves the sordid business of gerrymandering districts and fixing elections so that those in power stay in power, regardless of what the voters might wish or how they vote. Incumbantocracy is dirty politics, and trying to eliminate this practice is, no doubt, a dirty and difficult job; but one should not confuse the problem with the solution. If democracy is, in fact, a sordid business, the alternatives are much worse. As Abraham Lincoln once said, democracy consists of a government of the people, by the people, for the people. Democracy is supposed to include the continuing responsiveness of the government to the preferences of its citizens, considered as political equals. The present state of incumbantocracy in the U.S. all but ensures that representatives do not, in fact, represent the people. They are not accountable or responsive because there is little to no political pressure to keep them accountable