A Hundred Thousand Darlingtons: Self‐Respect, Moral Judgement, and the Right to an Equal Democratic Say

ABSTRACT I defend the non‐instrumentalist thesis that every adult member of a political society has a pro tanto fundamental moral right to an equal democratic say in determining the content of the laws to which she is subject. I begin by giving an account of an important kind of servility that has received only glancing notice in philosophical discussion. This servility consists in the willingness to subordinate one's capacity for moral judgement (as distinct from one's interests, desires, or will) to another's. I argue that, barring special circumstances, an adult person who willingly acquiesces to a lesser political liberty displays this type of servility. An adult cannot normally self‐respectfully acquiesce to a less than equal democratic say. But, I argue, a condition for a political society to be just is that its members can self‐respectfully acquiesce to the status it accords them. Thus, it is a pro tanto intrinsic requirement of justice that all adult members of a political society be granted an equal democratic say. There is a pro tanto fundamental moral right to an equal democratic say.