While this form has plenty of drawbacks, it has so many benefits over traditional aristocracies and military power structures.

“Democracy is the worst form of government there is — except for all of the others!” Dr. Mary Albright said in a memorable episode of the TV show 3rd Rock from the Sun in 1996.

Now she really meant representative republic, since our framework is not a true democracy — and I’m very glad it isn’t. I have neither the time nor the inclination to understand every single issue to the extent required to truly be able to vote intelligently — and neither do the vast majority of of the population.

So instead of having all the people make all the decisions or a few people entrenched in control, we just pick the best representatives we can and trust them to handle the tough decisions.

We as Americans acknowledge from the outset that they aren’t going to be perfect and that they will probably make a lot of decisions differently than we would. We have means to try to encourage them to do what we think is correct, whether through logical conversations or financial contributions or even by gathering others who have similar beliefs and publicly demonstrating to bring attention to our causes.

But — with some exceptions — we entrust both the making of laws and the execution of those laws to these individuals (the evaluation of the validity of laws is entrusted to judges who, in Utah, aren’t elected and I hope it stays that way).

Does it work?

Well, in my opinion, the answer is yes and no.

I think overall the system has plenty of strengths, not the least of which is the ability to change course. Our governments at all levels can try doing things different ways and — when smart enough — focus on the things that work well.

I think it has drawbacks, including the fact that it often draws the most popular and egotistical individuals and they often aren’t the best administrators and compromisers. That leads to a lot of grandstanding and not enough working together to find the best solutions.

I’ve been thinking about all of these things as we get into the meat of the upcoming midterm election cycle, starting with caucus meetings next week.

The irony to me is that on paper, these caucus meetings are supposed to be about representative organization: Members of a political party gather in their precincts and elect representatives to go to county and state conventions, who then select candidates for office.

But the problem arises when you look more closely at the process.

The average turnout at a Republican caucus meeting in Utah is probably less than 10% of the registered Republicans in the precinct. Therefore, in the convention system, you have a tiny sliver of the constituency who make the decisions — and the evidence clearly shows that they often don’t represent the will of all Republicans.

To me, the only fair way to do it would be to have only allow delegates from precincts that have a majority (more than 50%) of registered Republicans at the caucus meeting — and only allow the county and state conventions to select candidates if more than half the precincts are represented. Then the process would truly exemplify representative government, not the pale shadow it is now.

Will that ever happen?

It’s extremely doubtful, since it would give the convention system power back to the people instead of keeping it in the hands of the relative few who have it now.

But however our candidates end up being selected, I think there are three important points with regards to representative government that need to be kept in mind that all too often seem to be forgotten these days:

1. Your representative represents you, whether you voted for them or not.

There are many individuals on the city, county, state and national levels who won elections without me being one of the citizens to vote for them. That’s how the process works. But I should still recognize that they represent me and that I can use various methods to help them understand my perspective.

2. If you are elected, you don’t just represent those who voted for you.

Too often it seems like representatives focus only on those of their political party, even to the point of demeaning those who have different views. You don’t need to agree with everyone, but as an elected official part of your job is to respect everyone you represent. Failure to do so should make all of us seriously question the qualifications of any such elected official.

3. Each elected official has the duty to use their judgment.

Edmund Burke, a member of the British Parliament, told the Electors of Bristol in a speech in 1774 that, “Your representative owes you, not his industry only, but his judgement; and he betrays you instead of serving you if he sacrifices it to your opinion.”

It’s important to admit that our elected officials should (and almost always do) have access to more complete information about issues than the public does. That doesn’t make them right and self-interest will frequently get in the way, but they need to base their decisions based on their own logic and understanding, which often differs from ours.

And if we don’t like how they do that, we have every right to work to elect someone else we think will do better.

Because that is what representative government is all about.

Jared Lloyd is the managing editor of the Standard-Examiner and can be reached at jlloyd@standard.net.