No Kings—and No Oligarchs

Two opposing views from America’s Founding Fathers are particularly relevant to the upcoming No Kings rallies:

• “Of more worth is one honest man to society and in the sight of God, than all the crowned ruffians that ever lived.”—Thomas Paine
• “There never was, nor ever will be a civilized Society without an Aristocracy.”—Gouverneur Morris

I once played the historic figure of Gouverneur Morris in Paul Foster’s stage play, Tom Paine, about the life of Thomas Paine who, in 1776, wrote a pamphlet called “Common Sense,” which guided and gave form to the American Revolution. Much has been written about how that work has direct relevance to today’s No Kings rallies, making a compelling case for the preservation of a republic and representative democracy over authoritarianism. However, thinking back to Foster’s play, I’m reminded that it’s important to also remember Morris because, as a bitter critic of Paine, he represents a viewpoint diametrically opposed to Paine’s egalitarianism, as represented in the role of oligarchs in society, or the “gentry,” as he called them. Their loyalty and support underpins the power of a king. And 250 years later, this is just as true for today’s oligarchs and their would-be king, Donald J. Trump.

Simply have a look at any image of the 2025 presidential inauguration. The platform behind Trump is crowded with the richest people in the country, among them, Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos, Tim Cook, Sam Altman, Sundar Pichai, and Rupert Murdoch.

Attending the No Kings rallies to express loudly and clearly the views of the 99% is a step in the right direction.

These people are enablers of Donald Trump, but at the same time, as Paine points out, the relationship between oligarchs and an authoritarian ruler is an uneasy one: “The rich are in general slaves to fear, and submit to courtly power with the trembling duplicity of a spaniel.” How else to describe the obsequious fawning over Donald Trump by those same people on the platform?

A wealthy landholder and capitalist, Gouverneur Morris was a member the “1%” of his day. And when resentment against King George III was brewing in the colonies in the 1770s, he and his fellow landowners worried that any change to the status quo could threaten their power and privilege. Suppressing discontent, however, he realized, would not be easy. Referring to popular leaders in the colonies, in a 1774 letter to John Penn, Morris wrote: “These sheep, simple as they are, cannot be gulled as heretofore. In short, there is no ruling them; and now, to leave the metaphor, the heads of the mobility [mob] grow dangerous to the gentry, and how to keep them down is the question.”

Today’s oligarchs have a simple answer: Spend a billion dollars to elect right-wing candidates in this year’s midterm elections. The degree to which that will work any better than Morris’ efforts in the 1770s remains to be seen.

After armed conflict broke out between colonists and British troops in Lexington and Concord in April 1775, most wealthy landholders did not openly side with the king. However, many argued for negotiations to end the hostilities and reconciliation with the Crown. Thomas Paine thought this was madness. Once blood has been shed, he said, reconciliation was impossible: “As well can the lover forgive the ravisher of his mistress, as the continent forgive the murders of Britain." Indeed, in the end, a peaceful settlement between king and colonists was not to be.

Today, with two years of increasing violence, both rhetorical and physical, on the part of the second Trump administration, that same line has undeniably been crossed.

If in the elections on November 3, Democrats win control of Congress, there will no doubt be calls for toning down the rhetoric, more cooperation across the aisle, and a working relationship between Trump and a Democratic Congress. But, as with Paine’s argument, that may very well not be possible.

At the end of the War of Independence, when the new country’s constitution was being considered, America’s wealthy managed to guarantee their continued privileged position in society. Paine had argued: “The true and only true basis of representative government is equality of rights. Every man has a right to one vote… The rich have no more right to exclude the poor from the right of voting, or of electing and being elected, than the poor have to exclude the rich.” However, at the Constitutional Convention of 1787, Morris made the case that only those who owned property should have the right to vote. “Children do not vote,” he said, “Why? Because they want prudence; because they have no will of their own. The ignorant and the dependent can be as little trusted with the public interest.” James Madison, Alexander Hamilton, and John Adams agreed, and although the Constitution left the right to vote in the hands of the individual states, in most cases that meant that only white male voters with property could vote.

Although they will still seek to benefit from their proximity to power in the wake of a Democratic victory in the midterms, like Morris and his fellow gentry, Trump’s ultra-rich supporters will continue to find ways to protect their privileged status in society. With virtually unlimited resources, both financial and technical (including advanced AI models), along with increasing control of the media, the oligarchs will do their best to influence policy, legislation, regulation, and public opinion. This will make them difficult to keep in check. But attending the No Kings rallies to express loudly and clearly the views of the 99% is a step in the right direction.

Before the war, judges in the colonies were appointed and paid by the Crown. This made them natural allies of the king and the wealthy in society. Morris believed that “the principle purpose of the state was protecting private property” and a strong executive and the courts were the instruments to ensure that. In today’s America, this alliance is again in force on the Supreme Court. Trump has nominated 3 of its 9 judges, and 3 others were nominated by Republican presidents, giving the conservatives a supermajority. For this reason, the court has ruled in Trump’s favor in many cases, notably rolling back voting rights and loosening campaign financing laws, both of which entrench the power of the wealthy over the poor. But the court has also afforded Trump king-like immunity from prosecution for all “official acts.”

Thomas Paine had a response to that: “When it is laid down as a maxim, that a King can do no wrong, it places him in a state of similar security with that of idiots and persons insane, and responsibility is out of the question with respect to himself.” I leave it to you to decide if that description applies to our would-be king.