Essay 32: What Are the Real Advantages That American Society Derives From the Government of Democracy (Vol. 1 Pt. 2 Ch. 6, Subchs. 3-5)

Essay Read by Constituting America Founder, Actress Janine Turner

The essays in our study reference the following edition of Democracy In America: University of Chicago Press – 1st edition translated by Harvey Mansfield and Delba Winthrop. Today’s essay references pages 227 (Start at heading, “On the Idea..”) – 235 (Stop at Chapter 7 heading) of this edition of Democracy in America.

The Real Advantages Americans Derive from Democratic Government

De Tocqueville called America the “country of democracy par excellence.” To understand why, one must recollect the real advantages American society derives from democratic government. Among those numerous advantages Americans gain from living in a democracy, De Tocqueville argued, are the idea of individual rights, the respect for the law, and the vigorous political activity that reigns in all parts of the body politic.

1. The Idea of Rights

There has never been a great and prosperous people without some notion of individual rights. One of the key advantages of democratic society is respect for the idea of rights, especially the right of property. Americans seem innately to understand that the rights that they want to claim for themselves, and that they want to be respected by others, must belong to everyone in equal measure. The result is a form of the golden rule; so that one’s own rights are not violated, one does not attack those of others.

Through this idea of equal rights, the people over time learn the habits of living free. “One cannot say it too often,” De Tocqueville said, “There is nothing more prolific in marvels than the art of being free; but there is nothing harder than the apprenticeship of freedom.” As opposed to despotism, which pretends to be a quick fix for all of society’s ills but leaves everyone worse off and miserable, “Freedom…is ordinarily born in the midst of storms, it is established painfully among civil discords, and only when it is old can one know its benefits.” Freedom, in other words, is hard work, and it takes time to realize its advantages, but there is no surer path to individual and societal happiness.

2. Respect for the Law

In addition to the idea of rights, respect for the rule of law is another real advantage that American society derives from democracy. The respect Americans share for the law derives from the personal self-interest that each has for seeing the law obeyed and upheld by everyone. “[I]n the United States,” De Tocqueville claimed, “each finds a sort of personal interest in everyone’s obeying the laws; for whoever does not make up a part of the majority today will perhaps be in its ranks tomorrow.” Each follows the law because it is in one’s own interest that everyone obeys the law, which is the product of the people themselves. Since the majority are responsible for making the law, the people view obedience not as an act of servitude but as an expression of freedom. For in following the law, they are in effect ruling themselves: “However distressing the law may be,” De Tocqueville discovered, “the inhabitant of the United States submits to it without trouble, therefore, not only as the work of the greatest number, but also as his own.” Respect for the rule of law is the single greatest expression of self-government.

De Tocqueville is not saying, and democratic peoples do not believe, that there is no such thing as a bad law. Far from it. The argument is that bad laws, while they remain in effect, ought to be obeyed by everyone until such time as the people repeal them. “[T]he people in America obey the law not only because it is their work,” according to De Tocqueville, “but also because they can change it when by chance it hurts them.” In this way, respect for the rule of law increases the overall happiness of the people.

3. Political Activity

Finally, democratic government produces the vigorous political activity that is seen in all parts of the body politic. “When one passes from a free country into another that is not,” De Tocqueville mused, “one is struck by a very extraordinary spectacle: there, all is activity and movement; here, all seems calm and immobile.” Freedom creates energy and a willingness to labor that fuels “the prodigious motion of industry.”

Perhaps reflecting on his own first impressions of America, De Tocqueville claimed, “Scarcely have you descended on the soil of America when you find yourself in the midst of a sort of tumult…Around you everything moves.” In one place, the people gather to learn if a church should be built, and in another place, they deliberate on the choice of a representative; here, the people are restless to decide on some matter of local improvements (what we might call infrastructure), and there, they attend a town meeting to discuss the planning of a school or park. The mighty engine of self-government is always on the move, spreading and deepening the habits of freedom and the happiness of the people.

All in all, De Tocqueville suggests that if “the principal object of a government” is “to procure the most well-being for each of the individuals who compose it and to have each avoid the most misery”—if the purpose of government is to increase the happiness of the most people—then the answer is to “equalize conditions and constitute the government of a democracy.”

Jason W. Stevens is Assistant Professor of Political Science at Ashland University, where he teaches political thought and history courses with fields of expertise in the American Founding, Abraham Lincoln, and political philosophy. He is also Co-Director of the Ashbrook Scholar program.

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