The systems were set up such that a landowning and lawyer class would be the policymakers indefinitely. The “burden” of “democracy” was self-imposed by that class over the colonial period where they’d have town halls and shit to heir grievances to each other and the mayor or governor would tell them to fuck off or find some way to meet their needs.

Only those with means would have the time to do any of these things. It was a new gentry system, but one that depended more on wealth itself over heritage or a title from a monarch. Poor people, i.e. the vast majority of people, were too busy working or taking care of themselves or simply having no capacity to engage because they could not read or write or pay for education.

The system is still fundamentally the same, just with a few tweaks here and there. More people can vote but the policymaking power is still in the hands of the economic ruling class and still this is the people with the time to spend on this shit or to hire lobbyists and lawyers to do it for them. Poor people still can’t engage even though they can read and write because they have even less “free time” and must contend with a massive propaganda machine to try and figure out what is going on and what to do about it.