I&#x27;d say that the tautology of what the system agrees is legitimate is what is legitimate (no less useful than gravity pulls things together because it pulls things together). Laws promoting racism were broken in the US, and the law-breakers were quickly recognized as legitimate. Perhaps some types of tax dodgers might be considered legitimate. The beauty of a democracy is that if you can convince enough people that something should be legitimate&#x2F;illegitimate, they can make it so.<p>And yes &quot;inherently legitimate&quot; was a poor phrase to choose.<p>And I believe many founders leaned heavily on Rousseau&#x27;s work. Hamilton and Madison particularly in the Federalist Papers.