The majority who thinks they are morally right will not focus on the injustice suffered by the minority. They will focus on the crimes committed in reaction to that injustice. Look at how every militant group in the U.S. from the Black Panthers to the KKK are treated.
But that is actually an example of what I was referring to. After a decade of fighting black rights movements, the white majority eventually decided to improve the right of minorities with anti-discrimination laws, equal opportunity and affirmative action, financial support, etc.. The same happened half a century before with labor disputes, that eventually resulted in the US having a surprisingly worker-friendly labor legislation.
A voter pays no immediate direct penalty for an uninformed vote. There is not sufficient incentive to become informed. To know this, all you have to do is look at election results throughout history. Why spend hours researching the relevant policy options and politicians when the chance of the election being decided by your one vote is infinitesimal? Voting is more useful for signaling your allegiance to a group.
Even knowing that one's own vote will not decide the election, a "socially intelligent" person will take the time to vote according to his desires; because democracy has a chance of working if, and only if, everybody does that. (And that is why votes must be secret, and even the voter himself must be prevented to provide proof that he voted in a certain way: so that the election can measures the actual wishes of the citizens, without the distortions of peer pressure).
My experience is that even the poorly educated people can vote much better than the elites claim. When democracy fails, it is often because it is not given a fair chance, or not used often enough. (Here in Brazil the main Executive and Legislative posts are elected, but the Judiciary is totally self-selected and indepednent. As a result, while the first two branches barely work, and are highly corrupt, the latter does not work at all, and is totally corrupt...)
Recognition of Natural Rights is enshrined in the U.S. Declaration of Independence. This may not be the case for other countries, but here it was used as a justification by the Founding Fathers to rebel against Mother England. If Natural Rights have no legitimacy, then our government is a criminal organization with no legitimacy either. AngloSaxon law is based on two main concepts: ...
What matters in the Constitution are its articles . The reference to "self-evident rights" is only a pretense of justification for them, without any legal relevance -- because each one has his own opinion about what is "self-evident".
While there are important differences in specific areas, the legal systems of most Western countries are pretty much the same pastiche of constituional articles, laws voted by elected representatives, laws enacted by public referendums, more or less arbitrary decrees of various authorities, judiciary precedents, etc.. There is very little space for "natural laws" or 'self-evident principles" in those legal systems, except in the nooks and gaps where the written laws don't quite reach.
Democracy is BY DEFINITION the domination of the minority by the majority. Politics is merely the art of convincing enough people to agree with you so that you can FORCIBLY impose your will on those who don't.
That is true, but the alternative is, inevitably, domination of the majority by some minority. Methinks that, by and large, the latter is much worse.