The Iranian regime is offering a $10 million bounty for the death of Barron Trump, according to a three-minute segment that aired this weekend on Iranian state television. The explicit threat is also a tacit admission. Apparently, the President of the United States is too secure a target for Iranian assassins. So, how about his college-enrolled son?

The monstrous offer shows in stark contrast the difference between Iran’s Islamist regime and the United States of America. In America, government officials only provide large monetary rewards for information leading to the capture of heinous criminals — terrorists, traffickers, serial killers, and the like. Iran, meanwhile, is offering a monetary reward for an innocent college student whose only imaginable offense is being related to his father. Oh, and the reward is not for his capture, but for his death. What monstrous barbarism!

But the Trump family are not the only ones who must worry about Iranian assassins. On Monday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu shared in a radio interview that “Iran tried to murder one of my sons.”

Why is Iran so fixated with the children of its enemies? Perhaps it knows that men like Trump deeply care about their families and will go to great lengths to protect them. By striking at Barron, Iran believes it can create another point of leverage to manipulate President Trump’s decisions.

More likely, however, Iran is simply treating the leaders of other nations as it treats its own. Technically speaking, the U.S., Israel, and Iran are all republics or democracies of one brand or another, not hereditary monarchies. But, when Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei was killed at the outset of fighting on February 28, Iran’s remaining leaders selected his son, Mojtaba Khamenei to replace him.

Mojtaba was a strange pick to lead the battered regime through war, as he was already underqualified for the position and gravely wounded to boot. Thus, his appointment can only be described as a bit of dynastic loyalty bleeding through, even though the Islamic Republic of Iran technically has no dynasty.

Thus, by striking at the sons of President Trump and Prime Minister Netanyahu, the Iranian regime was simply treating the families of those leaders as it treated its own — as an elected dynasty of sorts.

Such elected dynasties were never the intention of America’s Founders. The authors of the Federalist Papers defended the Constitution’s sparse qualifications for federal elected office on the grounds that it would result in candidates being selected for their merit. Thus, the office of representative was “open to merit of every description, whether native or adoptive, whether young or old, and without regard to poverty or wealth, or to any particular profession of religious faith” (Federalist 52). Those would become senators “whose merits and talents may claim a share in the public confidence” (Federalist 62). And the office of president “will never fall to the lot of any man who is not in an eminent degree endowed with the requisite qualifications” (Federalist 68). Alas, even the Founders could guess wrong sometimes.

At first, the fledgling nation inched along the prescribed path. In his prize-winning biography, historian Ron Chernow suggests of George Washington that the general’s path to the presidency was helped by the fact that he had no biological children. In an age of kings, Washington could never become a king, at least not a hereditary kingdom. Thus, power was considered safe in his hands.

That changed quickly. The nation’s second president was John Adams; his son, John Quincy Adams, became the sixth president. Adams once wrote to his wife, “I must study Politics and War that my sons may have liberty to study Mathematics and Philosophy.” As it turned out, at least one son studied politics, too. Politics quickly turned into a family business.

Since then, America has seen other family “dynasties,” as it were, who remain politically powerful across generations. President Benjamin Harrison was the grandson of President William H. Harrison. Presidents Theodore and Franklin Roosevelt were cousins. Just in the past half-century, two generations of Bushes sat in the oval office (and another tried), Hillary Clinton nearly succeeded her husband Bill (16 years later), and people named “Kennedy” somehow keep popping up in positions of power.

The last two presidents were surrounded by a constellation of people named “Biden” or “Trump” who had murky official status but nevertheless sometimes played a role in policymaking (most significantly, Jared Kushner, husband of Ivanka Trump, negotiated the Abraham Accords).

That such family coincidences are merely the result of merit is too preposterous to believe. It turns out that politics, especially in a party system, is more about connections and popularity than merit. In fact, when individuals of true talent do rise to the top, it almost seems to be by accident.

So then, how should we understand this phenomenon? Is it merely a subconscious reversion to monarchy? Some zealous defenders of liberty might say so, but that seems too uncharitable. It overlooks the natural human instincts to make provision for one’s children, and to raise children in the footsteps of their parents. A business owner might hope that his son will one day take over the family business; when the “family business” is politics, it becomes a “dynasty” of sorts.

In a system of popular government like America, such passing of the governmental baton between relatives also requires cooperation from the voters. This week, South Carolina Republicans elected Darline Graham, younger sister of the late Senator Lindsey Graham to be their candidate in November’s election. Does Ms. Graham have the same foreign policy bona fides that characterized Lindsey’s tenure? In the senatorial debate, she admitted that she does not. But voters gave her the chance to succeed her brother anyways because they believe she wants to carry on her brother’s legacy.

It also seems to be the case that some voters simply like to keep the same name in office. South Carolinians replaced Graham with Graham. When Luke Letlow (R-La.) suddenly died after winning election to Congress, his wife Julia ran for the empty seat and won. Kentuckians have now been governed by two generations of Beshears. Alaska Democrats tried to sow confusion by recruiting a man named Dan Sullivan to run for the seat held by Senator Dan Sullivan.

Yet, although America has seen many well-connected families, it has not seen total family dominance. In a recent primary in New York City, voters rejected Jack Schlossberg, a grandson of President John F. Kennedy, because there weren’t really any reasons to vote for him, besides his family legacy.

Although cases of nepotism arise from time to time, America remains fundamentally a republic, not a hereditary system. Voters can choose candidates based on their name association with a beloved candidate. But they can also choose candidates for their merits and reject candidates who have none, despite a famous name. For now, America seems to be riding something of a wave of family connections in politics. But that will likely fade as the old guard must hand over the standard to a new generation. As always, in America, the people decide.