ROUSSEAU, RIVERBOATS AND RUSSET LEAVES

Whenever an important proposition to be voted upon that will affect my life in some way, either indirectly, obliquely or tangentially, I like to re-read some of the writings of Rousseau, especially his "The Social Contract." The will of the majority of the people should determine how we live, socially, was one of his main themes, if not the only one, in this particular work. We come to live together in a community with the understanding that we will abide by what the most of the people want as shown by their votes.

This sounds good if only all people were eligible to vote and would vote. Many in our community are now discussing the upcoming riverboat gambling pro and con. Many are being influenced by what they read and hear and by the motives and caliber of the writers and speakers. Sometimes the amount of advertising makes a difference.

One tiny crack in Rousseau's blueprint is the malleability of man's mind, his propensity to let others influence his better judgment, or, indeed, let others do his thinking for him.

Rousseau wrote at a time when there were no PACS, probably no mass-printed advertising, fear in speaking one's mind publicly. He assumed that, in a free world, each person would not be swayed, but would vote (our times) or take action (Rousseau's times) for the proposition that would have the most beneficial effect on his own life. "The people," Rousseau said, "have given the monarch the right to rule, not God, and the people could take back that right if the monarch ruled badly." Most of you know what followed Rousseau's and other writers' publications--the French Revolution.

That phrase, "take back," is being used quite frequently in our national conversation now. If things have, in the opinion of the majority, gone wrong, the majority has the right to take back what they felt was right in the first place, but let it slip away because of inaction.

So we have our own present little revolution of a part of our way of life looming in our city. How will it go? Who knows?

You're sniggering? Saying, `Where does she get off talking so he-falutin' about Rousseau the French Revolution, The Social Contract'? I'm sniggering, too, at myself, but surely that part about the will of the majority of the people, if they vote, is relevant.

The sun will rise, as usual, on the 3rd. The moon will be big and almost round and in its proper place. Some will make adjustments, however the vote goes, and move on like the Mississippi does on its way to the sea. No riots on Broadway, no burning of Main Street. Isn't Cape Girardeau a wonderful place to live?

Like the narrator in Stevenson's poem, "The Lamplighter, I feel very lucky to have a lamp--er--voting precinct almost beside my door. I can walk the few hundred steps it takes. Along the way I'll note the russet color beginning to creep into the pin oaks, right on time, the yellow-red of the sweet gums and the scarlet of the Virginia Creeper, right on time.

On the way back from voting, my civic duty done, I'll pause at the wild rose bushes in the hedgerow and gather a few rose hips to add to my back porch autumn basket where the birds and squirrels come to sample the contents, completely unmindful of how man conducts his affairs.

Thus it seems that I live in two different worlds, one where I live with trees, shrubs, seeds, soil, flowers and wildlife where Rousseau's Social Contract does not apply and one where it does. I am happy and at utter peace with the first. I am accepting of the second, having faith that it will work out for the good most of the time, and totally at the end of time.

REJOICE!