Throughout American history our constitution and government has undergone many changes that have affected American citizens politically, socially, and economically. Many people such as Dr. Michael Parenti and Michael Moore believe the constitution and the system of government that was established and is still in use today was created primarily for the purpose of securing the interests of the wealthy class of the late 18th century and that our government is still being used to protect the wealthy class from the middle and lower classes who make up the majority of America. In chapter two of The Struggle for Democracy, Edward S. Greenberg and Benjamin I. Page, explain that there were economic forces that motivated the creation of a strong central government. While our government has many of its roots in the wealthy landowners of the late 18th century, our government also has its roots in the human desire for freedom and control over one’s own destiny. Our government does support the wealthy; however ordinary citizens without wealth in the past and even still today have been able to manipulate the system to achieve the goals of the middle and lower classes and to even bring some of the wealth into their hands.
In The Struggle for Democracy, Greenburg and Page explain that the Constitution was written by delegates from each of the thirteen colonial states and “the delegates were not common folk” and “most delegates were wealthy men,” and were not “common laborers, skilled craftspeople, small farmers, women, or racial minorities.” (33 The Struggle for Democracy) These wealthy delegates could not have been expected to write a constitution that did not reflect their own financial interests as well as their associate’s interests. The greatest evidence of the influence of the wealthy class was the condoning of “involuntary servitude” by the Constitution. Dr. Parenti says the wealthy class “reluctantly made democratic concessions under the threat of popular rebellion.”...