Mosiah 29:25-31

²⁵ Therefore, choose you by the voice of this people, judges, that ye may be judged according to the laws which have been given you by our fathers, which are correct, and which were given them by the hand of the Lord. ²⁶ Now it is not common that the voice of the people desireth anything contrary to that which is right; but it is common for the lesser part of the people to desire that which is not right; therefore this shall ye observe and make it your law—to do your business by the voice of the people. ²⁷ And if the time comes that the voice of the people doth choose iniquity, then is the time that the judgments of God will come upon you; yea, then is the time he will visit you with great destruction even as he has hitherto visited this land.

Mosiah 29:25-27 (Emphasis mine)

These judges that are to be chosen by the “voice of this people” will use the “laws which have been given you by our fathers, which are correct and which were given them by the hand of the Lord.”  Even though the government is changing, Mosiah(2) is assuring the people that the laws will remain the same.  John Welch further explains:

“The law of Mosiah primarily made procedural changes and probably did not make radical changes in the substantive rules of the law of Moses. Mosiah instructed the new Nephite judges to judge ‘according to the laws . . . given you by our fathers’  (Mosiah 29:25; italics added [in original]), and twenty-two years later the Nephites were still ‘strict in observing the ordinances of God, according to the law of Moses’ (Alma 30:3). In its procedural and administrative enactments, the law of Mosiah can well be compared with the Israelite legal reform of King Jehoshaphat in 2 Chronicles 19:5-11.” [1] (Emphasis mine)

Mosiah(2) has faith in the voice of the people.  He tells them “it is not common that the voice of the people desireth anything contrary to that which is right.”  He believed that they would select good men to judge them. 

But what if “the time comes that the voice of the people doth choose iniquity”?  He warns them the judgments of God will come upon them.

When talking to lawyers in the land of Ammonihah, Amulek told them that “well did Mosiah say, who was our last king, when he was about to deliver up the kingdom, having no one to confer it upon, causing that this people should be governed by their own voices—yea, well did he say that if the time should come that the voice of this people should choose iniquity, that is, if the time should come that this people should fall into transgression, they would be ripe for destruction” (Alma 10:19).

The time would come when the people would choose poorly.  About sixty years later we read “[f]or as their laws and their governments were established by the voice of the people, and they who chose evil were more numerous than they who chose good, therefore they were ripening for destruction, for the laws had become corrupted” (Helaman 5:2).

John Tvedtnes writes:

 “One of Mosiah's justifications for allowing the people to elect judges was that ‘it is not common that the voice of the people desireth anything contrary to that which is right’ (Mosiah 29:26). But he noted that ‘if the time comes that the voice of the people doth choose iniquity, then is the time that the judgments of God will come upon you; yea, then is the time he will visit you with great destruction even as he has hitherto visited this land’ (29:27). Since the Nephites had not experienced such ‘great destruction’ on ‘this land,’ Mosiah must have had the destruction of the Jaredites in mind.

“What is significant about these facts is that Joseph Smith did not dictate the story of the Jaredites until long after he dictated the book of Mosiah. Consequently, the historical details of Jaredite kingship could not have been known to Joseph at this early stage of the translation. This lends evidence to the authenticity of the account of Mosiah's having translated the book of Ether and becoming acquainted with its contents.” [2] (Emphasis mine)

²⁸ And now if ye have judges, and they do not judge you according to the law which has been given, ye can cause that they may be judged of a higher judge. ²⁹ If your higher judges do not judge righteous judgments, ye shall cause that a small number of your lower judges should be gathered together, and they shall judge your higher judges, according to the voice of the people. ³⁰ And I command you to do these things in the fear of the Lord; and I command you to do these things, and that ye have no king; that if these people commit sins and iniquities they shall be answered upon their own heads. ³¹ For behold I say unto you, the sins of many people have been caused by the iniquities of their kings; therefore their iniquities are answered upon the heads of their kings.

Mosiah 29:28-31 (Emphasis mine)

Mosiah(2) realizes that people are not perfect and there had to be a check on the judges.  Higher judges can judge lower judges.  A higher judge can be judged by lower judges through the voice of the people.  This prevents any one judge from getting too powerful and ignore the will of the people.

Ryan Davis explains:

“[I]f any one actor seeks to gather powers already divided among others, the actor will face incentives to avoid relinquishing them. Consequently, the authority of government must not completely reside in any one location. As James Madison recognized, democracy is unstable unless it is carefully crafted to balance power within the government. In Mosiah's system this balance is achieved by allowing a group of lower judges to challenge the rule of a higher judge and higher judges to revise the decisions of lower judges (see Mosiah 29:28—29). The arrow of power points both directions, providing for the kind of stability found within democratic regimes.” [3] (Emphasis mine)

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[1] The Law of Mosiah, John W. Welch, Provo, Utah: Maxwell Institute, accessed February 13, 2012.

[2] King Mosiah and the Judgeship, John A. Tvedtnes, Provo, Utah: Maxwell Institute, accessed February 11, 2012.

[3] For the Peace of the People: War and Democracy in the Book of Mormon, Ryan W. Davis,
Provo, Utah: Maxwell Institute, accessed February 13, 2012.