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  3. The classic difficulty felt with democracy arises from the fact that democracy can never express the will of the whole people be

The classic difficulty felt with democracy arises from the fact that democracy can never express the will of the whole people be

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问题     The classic difficulty felt with democracy arises from the fact that democracy can never express the will of the whole people because there never exists any such unchanging will(at least in any society that call itself democratic). The concept of government of the whole people by the whole people must be looked on as being in the poetry rather than in the prose of democracy; the fact of prose is that real democracy means government by some kind of dominant majority.
    And the ever-present danger, repeatedly realized in fact, is that this dominant majority may behave toward those who are not of the majority in such a manner as to undermine the moral basis of the right of people, because they are people, to have some important say in the setting of their own course and in the use of their own faculties.
    Other forms of government may similarly fail to respect human independence. But there is at least no contradiction in that; the underlying assumption of every kind of government by wisers and betters is that people on the whole are not fit to manage their own affairs, but must have someone else do it for them, and there is no paradox when such a government treats its subjects without respect, or deals with them on the basis of their having no rights that the government must take into account.
    But democracy affirms that people are fit to control themselves, and it cannot live in the same air with the theory that there is no limit to the extent to which public power — even the power of a majority — can interfere with the lives of people.
    Rational limitation on power is therefore not a contradiction to democracy, but is of the very essence of democracy as such. Other sorts of government may impose such limitations on themselves as an act of grace. Democracy is under the moral duty of limiting itself because such limitation is essential to the survival of that respect for humankind which is in the foundations of democracy. Respect for the freedom of all people cannot, of course, be the only guide, for there would then be no government. Delicate ongoing compromise is what must be looked for. But democracy, unless it is to deny its own moral basis, must accept the necessity for making this compromise and for giving real weight to the claims of those without the presently effective political power to make their claims prevail in elections.
The failure of nondemocratic governments to respect human independence_____.
选项 A、is in conformity with their basic assumptions
B、interferes with the rights of the minority
C、hinders the achievement of their objectives
D、leads to consequences beyond their anticipation
答案A
解析 这是一道细节题。题干中的信号词为respect human independence，出自第二段第二句话中。文章第二段指出：其他形式的政府形式可能不尊重人们的独立性；由更睿智、更优秀的人组成的任何政府都可能认为，总体而言，人们不适合管理他们自己的事务，应该让其他人来为他们管理这些事务，因此，在这样的政府，不尊重其国民，或者基于这些人没有得到被政府本应该重视的人权时，就没有什么不合情理了。这说明，不尊重人的独立性符合这些政府的设想。A说“与其基本设想一致”，这与文章的意思符合。B是其设想造成的结果，与题目的要求不符；C与文章的意思相反；文中没有提到D。
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