[Congressional Record Volume 155, Number 140 (Thursday, October 1, 2009)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E2412-E2413]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




STATEMENT COMMEMORATING THE INCEPTION OF REPRESENTATIONAL GOVERNMENT IN 
                                 LYCIA

                                 ______
                                 

                        HON. MICHAEL E. McMAHON

                              of new york

                    in the house of representatives

                     Wednesday, September 30, 2009

  Mr. McMAHON. Madam Speaker, many of us in this Chamber are familiar 
with the Roman and Greek fundamentals of our nation and our democracy. 
In addition to these two great nations and traditions a third 
cornerstone of democracy also existed in the Mediterranean of which our 
Founding Fathers also drew inspiration from.
  There is a renewed effort by scholars to emphasize the link between 
our democracy and that of Patara, which was the capital of Lycia, an 
ancient civilization of democratic principles. The Lycian government, 
known as the Lycian League existed along Turkey's Mediterranean coast 
from roughly 167 BC until 400 AD, and served as an inspiration to the 
framers of the U.S. Constitution.
  The Lycian League was the first democratic union in history to 
utilize proportional representation as a model for political 
organization.
  At least twenty-three city-states were united under the League that 
presided over federal institutions. Depending on its size, each of the 
League's 23 city-states was eligible to send up to three 
representatives to the parliament

[[Page E2413]]

(Bouleuterion) located in Patara. Medium-sized towns sent two, whereas 
smaller towns could unite together to send one representative to the 
capital on their behalf. The number of representatives from each city-
state determined taxes and other financial obligations. The general 
assembly was responsible for electing federal officers controlling 
communal land and determining trade and civil rights, as well.
  The ``Lyciarch,'' was the Parliament's president, which at various 
times served as the League's religious, military, and political leader. 
Many historians believe that women have served in Patara as the 
Lyciarch.
  One of the thinkers who impacted the debate over our own constitution 
was Montesquieu. In Book IX of his Spirit of the Laws, he argues the 
utility of confederacy, stating: ``It is unlikely that states that 
associate will be of the same size and have equal power. . . . If one 
had to propose a model of a fine federal republic, I would choose the 
republic of Lycia.''
  Alexander Hamilton and James Madison picked up on this concept, and 
cited the Lycian League as a model for our own system of government.
  Both Alexander Hamilton and James Madison used the Lycian form of 
government in the Federalist Papers. The semicircular rows of the 
Lycian parliament building was a model to the seating arrangements in 
the U.S. Congress today.
  In the Federalist Papers No. 16, Alexander Hamilton wrote, ``I shall 
content myself with barely observing here, that of all the 
confederacies of antiquity, which history has handed down to us, the 
Lycian and Achaean leagues, as far as there remain vestiges of them, 
appear to have been most free from the fetters of that mistaken 
principle, and were accordingly those which have best deserved, and 
have most liberally received, the applauding suffrages of political 
writers.''
  This is how an ancient civilization thousands of miles away and over 
two thousand years ago made a major impact on our system as a 
representative democracy, preventing the possibility of tyranny, as 
feared by Alexander Hamilton and James Madison.

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