[EL] Churchill on the secret ballot

[Scarberry, Mark]

We spoke by phone today with a family friend in Austria, a woman who lived through World War II. We talked about Churchill's great speeches, and afterward I read his 1946 speech in which he said that "From Stettin in the Baltic to Trieste in the Adriatic an iron curtain has descended across the Continent." I hadn't realized that in that speech he also spoke of the secret ballot as one of the "title deeds of freedom." It seems worth quoting on a list like ours:
"Now I come to the second of the two marauders, to the second danger which threatens the cottage homes, and the ordinary people -- namely, tyranny. We cannot be blind to the fact that the liberties enjoyed by individual citizens throughout the United States and throughout the British Empire are not valid in a considerable number of countries, some of which are very powerful. In these States control is enforced upon the common people by various kinds of all-embracing police governments to a degree which is overwhelming and contrary to every principle of democracy. The power of the State is exercised without restraint, either by dictators or by compact oligarchies operating through a privileged party and a political police. It is not our duty at this time when difficulties are so numerous to interfere forcibly in the internal affairs of countries which we have not conquered in war. But we must never cease to proclaim in fearless tones the great principles of freedom and the rights of man which are the joint inheritance of the English-speaking world and which through Magna Carta, the Bill of rights, the Habeas Corpus, trial by jury, and the English common law find their most famous expression in the American Declaration of Independence.
"All this means that the people of any country have the right, and should have the power by constitutional action, by free unfettered elections, with secret ballot, to choose or change the character or form of government under which they dwell; that freedom of speech and thought should reign; that courts of justice, independent of the executive, unbiased by any party, should administer laws which have received the broad assent of large majorities or are consecrated by time and custom. Here are the title deeds of freedom which should lie in every cottage home. Here is the message of the British and American peoples to mankind. Let us preach what we practice -- let us practice what we preach."
Perhaps this is particularly appropriate as some of us celebrate a victory over tyranny (perhaps the real miracle of Hanukkah); as some of us celebrate Christmas, and its hope for peace on earth; and as all of us enjoy the freedom to participate on this list and in our political processes.

Best wishes,
Mark

Mark S. Scarberry
Professor of Law
Pepperdine Univ. School of Law
Malibu, CA 90263
(310) 506-4667
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