Quote For Today

We are free today substantially, but the day will come when our Republic will be an impossibility. It will be an impossibility because wealth will be concentrated in the hands of a few. A Republic cannot stand upon bayonets, and when the day comes when the wealth of a nation will be in the hands of a few, then we must rely upon the wisdom of the best element in the country to readjust the laws of the nations to the changed conditions

-James Madison –

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Reading about people who had a profound impact on the world has been one of my favorite lifetime activities. James Madison was certainly one of them. He earned his title of “Father of the American Constitution”, but as the above quote shows, his brilliance went far beyond that. You could say that this quote from 200+ years ago speaks directly to us in 2026.

Abject poverty and extreme wealth have actually been the norm for the vast majority of the world’s existence. For thousands of years, kings had dictatorial reign over everything in their domain. They decided who would live or be killed, and there was no one to say otherwise.

Over the eons things slowly changed. Aristocracy for the most part has died, or was relegated to a social status rather than a rule of law. It kind of surprises me that as of 2026, there are still approximately 43 sovereign states in the world with a monarch as the true head of state. Most of those are in the Middle East. The extreme wealth there has been because of their vast oil reserves.

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It bothers me that the continuation of our Republic will depend, as Madison said, upon the wisdom of the best element in the country to readjust the laws of the nations to the changed conditions. I’m not sure whether those people even exist anymore. In the total scheme of things, democracies have historically been short-lived forms of government. Has its time ended here?