As the U.S. presidential election day approaches on Tuesday, November 3, there is the idea the (f)act of voting is a tool, but we need to ask for what? Voting presents us—or is presented to us—as a quintessential right, safeguarded by the blood of fallen troops and shrouded in mythos of liberty and justice for all… whom matter. Whether we accept or reject this presentation, we must admit voting as a performative act or a tool through which to direct action needs to be framed in history. “The great force of history,” James Baldwin reminds us, “comes from the fact that we carry it within us,” and that “history is literally present in all that we do.” But what has been carried into the present under the guise of voting and, through voting, what do we keep ever-present? We start where history nudges us to look—ancient Rome. The socio-political and economic structures regulating U.S. society, and around a globe molested by western European violence, are plagiarized forms of Roman law and institutions. Their story is a mirror to us.

Whether we cry for or critique the idea of democracy, know that it failed in Rome as it did in Athens, Greece, its alleged homeland. Commoners were represented by delegates to a General Assembly (GA) elected by wards within the city, through oral votes that were then counted via roll call. The Senate made up of old and wealthy men came to dominate this assembly. The GA is your House of Representatives, which has 435 members, and the Senate, well, is the Senate, with 100 members. The U.S. Senate still has more (relative) power than the House. Ordinary Roman citizens seeking membership in the Senate usually identified with the interests of the upper class rather than the commoners. In the first U.S. presidential election the voters were virtually landowning and chattel holding white men. White males are the only demographic with unencumbered universal suffrage. Aristotle’s politics supported the view that women were inferior to and should be ruled by men, and enslaved families often were divided and sold to work on Roman plantations. Sounds eerily familiar. The Roman class system was based on property, which included women, and the rape of women was not an offense punishable by law. It is nearly impossible to find one legal case where white men have been punished by law for the rape of women of African ancestry in the United States.

In the age of U.S. empire, it is important to remember Rome’s expansion and the imposition of its ideas, institutions, and language were facilitated by networks of soft and lethal power. Rome’s imperial rule and increased territorial expansion led, however, to civil wars, constant social upheaval, and the eventual collapse of the republic. At the heart of these were struggles between conservatives who questioned expansion (or globalization) and the imperialists who desired expansion and wealth. The latter won, but hedging that way accelerated the failure of the republic. Julius Caesar tried to establish a monarchy—not dissimilar from Trump’s total authority claims—through the military and nationalist politics, but neighboring and external (Germanic) groups halted his efforts, and successors failed on account of civil upheavals and coups. Imperial rule slowly but steeply declined.

As the Roman empire deteriorated, tyrannical leaders and chaos plunged Rome into the obvious: that neither reforms—in our case, anti-racist workshops, police bias training—nor the spread of a new theology—the religion of whiteness, in our case—would save it. If the United States is our Rome, do we use the tool of voting to save it? I’m unconvinced by the Dave Chappelle’s nod that “we should do it” because “this is your country, too. It is incumbent upon us… to save our country.” Voting is not power, but the act of voting flirts with the illusion of participating in power—power that enshrines the belief that its system of governance works. Said differently, all systems—be they economic, social or political—are built around belief. They are as real to the extent to which we belief in them. This is precisely why citizens and residents must be constantly assured there are flaws, but the system works; the elections were hacked and reframed by foreign actors, but the elections were fair because the system, yet again, works. What works is belief. Voting, regardless of what or who one votes for, is an act of belief. And though some may quibble about the absence of a viable and contending third party, even if there was one, voting and the belief it authenticates would remain entrenched. Voting narrows our political vision to the scripted options on the menu, foreclosing the possibility of creating our own menu or another restaurant.

For those who don’t want to believe, there is, however, another choice besides voting Democrat or Republican. The choice is voting by not casting a ballot. On the one hand, we may have to bite the bullet and use an intentional non-vote, which is to say we’re opting out of the belief in things unseen and unrealized—the “more perfect union.” Plus, there is no “right” to vote etched in the U.S. Constitution. This leaves us all with no greater or lesser, right or wrong choice. On the other hand, an intentional no-vote has practical implications. Enough of these can lead to a tie or neither party candidates reaching an absolute majority of electoral votes (270); in that case, a two-thirds majority of the House must decide for president and the Senate the same for a vice-president, according to the 12th amendment. But if the House is unable to do so by March 4, the vice-president became president and the Senate chooses from a shortlist the vice-president. What happens if neither body are able nor willing to muster a two-thirds for any candidate? We don’t know. The country has yet to go there. We know the tie between Thomas Jefferson and Aaron Burr in election of 1800 caused a crisis, resolved by the creation of the 12th amendment. But perhaps such crisis anew is what’s needed to unhinge the belief and the system it props up through voting.

Sources

David Waldstreicher, Slavery's Constitution: From Revolution to Ratification (New York: Hill and Wang, 2009)

Roman Law and Its Influence in America (https://scholarship.law.nd.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=4429&context=ndlr)

Franz Wieacker, “The Importance of Roman Law for Western Civilization and Western Legal Thought,” B.C. Int'l & Comp. L. Rev. 4, no. 2 (1981): 257-81 (http://lawdigitalcommons.bc.edu/iclr/vol4/iss2/2)

The right to vote is not in the Constitution (https://theconversation.com/the-right-to-vote-is-not-in-the-constitution-144531)