The 250th anniversary of the birth of the United States was supposed to be a joyful celebration, exalting particularly the crux of US political theory and practice – that the adult citizens in general, and not any particular subset of them, are able to govern the affairs of the union, from the local level all the way to the federal level:

‘Democracy in my sense, where the whole power of the government in the people, whether exercised by themselves or by representatives, chosen by them either mediately or immediately and legally accountable to them…Consequence, the proposed government a representative democracy…Constitution revocable and alterable by the people. This representative democracy as far as is consistent with its genius has all the features of good government’ (Alexander Hamilton, ‘Founding Fathers Quotes on Government, Democracy, and Placing Power in the People,’ ammo.com).

Recent elections in Louisiana seem to pour significant doubt on the future of this cornerstone of the entire US political system. For two consecutive years now, all amendments have been soundly rejected by Louisiana’s voters. One of the main reasons given for this is that the amendments are too complicated, and the plain-folk voters simply don’t have the wherewithal to sit down and sort them all out:

‘Deslatte says voters do not have the time to research these issues to make informed decisions.

‘“It is a heavy lift to expect voters to be able to sift through some of these proposals, because they are complex. They take a lot of education. People have other things going on in life,” Deslatte said’ (Joe Gallinaro, ‘Louisianians vote “NO” on all five proposed constitutional amendments,’ louisianaradionetwork.com).

And as our own publisher Scott McKay (MacAoidh, for the purposes of complete accuracy) noted on Monday…

‘ . . . slotting constitutional amendments written in legal jargon people struggle greatly to make sense of into election cycles where the public isn’t generally paying a lot of attention just smacks of trying to put one over on the voters. Given that the default vote on constitutional amendments is always “No,” you can’t make up the ground you need to make up during a spring election.

‘And second, never – EVER – put five amendments at a time in front of the voters. That’s a recipe for failure. There should never be more than two amendments in front of the public at a time, because people can’t process that much complex policy and more importantly, they don’t want to. There’s a natural irritation with politicians who are elected to make policy then turning around and asking the voters multiple times a year for direction on things nobody has time to study, and that irritation is going to manifest itself in massive amounts of “No” votes’ (Scott McKay, ‘Winners And Losers From Saturday’s Elections In Louisiana,’ thehayride.com).

The people of Louisiana are at a significant crossroads: On the one hand, most are quick to proclaim that the citizens are paramount in the political order, that they must be the final arbiters in political matters; on the other hand, they are refusing to accept the responsibilities that such power demands of them.

Future elections and other developments will give us certainty, but it seems we are heading for a major political restructuring in Louisiana, where citizen involvement and decision-making will recede. What will come into being to replace the current bottom-up, citizen-oriented political system? That does not require much imagination. The trajectory of all of society is currently in the direction of more and more digital automation. We suspect the political system will follow the same trend, with AI especially being favored as a neutral arbiter that can make sense of and resolve the complexities of modern political problems.

We have already seen how people cheered over Musk’s/DOGE’s use of AI to root out waste and inefficiencies in the federal government. And AI is often touted as a way to outsource the drudgery of unwanted tasks so people can focus on higher, more rewarding work. It would not at all surprise us to see the adoption of AI (hallucinations and all) in some way in an effort to simplify politics for Louisianans, to make their political duties easier to bear.

That is only one possibility. Others could come to fruition: God’s Providence and human free will are deeply mysterious. Whatever the outcome, folks in the States had better enjoy the festive atmosphere of 2026 while it lasts, for it appears that the denouement of the union as we have known it will be arriving sooner, not later. Deep Blue States and cities are introducing rigid, centralized government systems that trample the customs and institutions that give rise to ordered freedom; Red States like Louisiana are quailing before the hard work that self-government demands. Such is not the stuff of renewal.