Did you know ancient Athens had the first democracy? Every year, 500 citizens (only men were citizens) were selected to decide on laws. Then the remaining citizens whose names were not drawn voted on the laws. The majority won. Athenians felt this was the only fair way for all citizens to have a voice.
However, the Athenian democracy didn’t last. After the Peloponnesian War where Sparta won, Athens was once again ruled by a small number of people. Even though the democracy in Athens only lasted 100 years, it was a fair government that inspired America’s democracy. We are very thankful that the Athenians came up with the idea!
You may be wondering why we do not have the same government as Athens. There are two types of democracy. A direct democracy and a representative democracy. A direct democracy is where people vote for their own laws. A representative democracy is where people vote on representatives to make and vote on the laws for all citizens.
As you can see, the United States and many other countries have Athenians to thank for democracy. Even though the Athenian democracy only lasted 100 years, their government inspired equal representation for all citizens.
Recently, I’ve become more interested in government because it seems more important now that I’m older. That’s why I chose to find out more about the origin of democracy. All of this information came from Ancient Greece for Kids.