“You have not a [pure] democracy, but a republic accountable to people — but not immediate responsive to the people,” explains Sidney Milkis of the University of Virginia’s Miller Center of Public Affairs, who spoke to TIME as part of a presidential-history partnership between TIME History and the Miller Center. “That’s why you have a third [of the Senate] turning over, so it doesn’t get too far removed from currents of public opinion.”
Sidney Milkis
