The Strange World of Ivan Ivanov by G. Warren Nutter

Author:G. Warren Nutter
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: American Institute for Economic Research
Published: 2020-01-06T00:00:00+00:00

VI

An Informed Citizenry

A democratic society rests on an informed citizenry, mindful of important issues and facts and ever critical in its searching for the truth. Diverse sources of information must be available and subject to constant examination and evaluation in the public forum. The electorate must be sufficiently well-educated to engage in this deliberative process and for governing itself effectively and wisely.

In the United States, we have developed an environment of traditions and institutions favoring these ends. While providing a basic education for all, we cultivate a spirit of free inquiry and expression and safeguard their practice. Free speech and a free press serve as the vehicles of open discussion, in which competing and conflicting ideas and facts are subjected to the test of critical analysis.

In no other nation of the world at any time has the government been put to so much work in gathering, processing, and disseminating information for the benefit of the public. It was fortunate that our Constitution called from the beginning for a census of the population every ten years so that our House of Representatives could be reapportioned periodically on the basis of an accurate count of the people it serves. Over the years the scope of the census has been vastly expanded, and a great many other fact-gathering activities have been undertaken at all levels of government. This enormous fund of information, far from perfect but more complete than that available to any other people, serves us all: our representatives in their tasks of running the government, the various social and economic groups in the pursuit of their interests, the common man in the ordinary business of life, and the scholar in his studies.

But we recognize that it would be fatal to grant government anything approaching a monopoly over the supply of information. No group in power, even though motivated by the best of intentions, can be expected to resist the temptation to mobilize facts for its own purposes. The line between information and propaganda becomes thin to the vanishing point when there are no checks on the pronouncements of government.

One such check is built into our political system in the forming of federalism, representative government, separate and counterbalancing powers, and the two-party system. Those who are in power today may be out tomorrow, and they must keep this in mind. No sanctity attaches to official data of the past or present, for they are subject to constant challenge by both ins and outs and are constantly subjected to it. Since the ins will be partisan in their use of facts, it is fortunate that the outs will also be. In this way the general public has an opportunity to weigh the pros and cons in seeking the truth, and it may be aided in doing so by various disinterested scholars.

Even more important checks are provided by the diversity of private sources of information supplemented by an inquisitive and critical press. Many private organizations collect and disseminate information. True enough, many have axes

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