To which capital-R Republic are you referring? Since you're saying "ourselves" I assume it's not Rome or Athens, so maybe the USA? What was so special about l

To which capital-R Republic are you referring? Since you're saying "ourselves" I assume it's not Rome or Athens, so maybe the USA? What was so special about landowners that only they merited full citizenship? There is ample evidence it had more to do with their ancestry, religion, gender, and wealthiness than some sort of appeal to "reason." In fact, assigning merit based on race, wealth, etc. qualifies as an assault on reason in my book.