Essay 45: De Tocqueville– “A Few Remarks On The Present Day State And The Probable Future Of The Three Races Which Live In The Territory Of The United States” (Vol. 1 Pt. 2 Ch. 10, Subch. 2)

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 326 – 348 (almost the entire page down to the next heading) of this edition of Democracy in America.

De Tocqueville’s View On Race Relations In The United States

Alexis de Tocqueville uses his keen insights and talents for observation to focus on the question of slavery and blacks in the newly created United States of America.

Near the end of his essay on this topic he once again demonstrates the prescience and perception that he has revealed throughout the book “Democracy in America”. In this essay, he predicts slavery’s demise.

He explains at the end of the essay, “… whatever the efforts of Americans of the south to preserve slavery, they will not succeed at it forever….in the midst of the democratic freedom and enlightenment of our age [slavery] is not an institution that can endure.”

Indeed, slavery ended in the US. It proved incompatible with the remarkable ideas of our founders including the foundational principle that “All Men are Created Equal.” The end came about as the result of the most consequential war that this nation had ever experienced. Greater and more deadly for Americans than World War I and World War II. Certainly, greater than the losses of the Revolutionary War. The Civil War cost more American lives than any war the US has ever been involved in.

Ultimately, freedom and abolition came at a very high price. 160 years later we’d all be well served to remember that cost. After WWI and WWII America made peace with her enemies. Particularly after the evils committed by Japan, Germany and Italy our nation’s reconciliation abilities are quite pronounced. Today Japan is a leading trading partner. Germany and Italy are too. In fact, many Americans proudly proclaim their desire for German and Italian automobiles as a sign of their financial success in life.

After armed conflict in Afghanistan and Iraq, America poured 100s of billions of dollars to help rebuild.

But ironically, today there is a growing movement to foment discord over a military conflict that occurred more than a century and a half ago – the Civil War. This wrongheaded approach isn’t just antithetical to who we are as Americans, but it hinders our efforts to progress as a nation.

Reconciliation is who we are. It is part of the American identity. And in fact, the American identity is the focus of De Tocqueville’s Democracy in America.

Notably, De Tocqueville doesn’t take on the persona of an abolitionist in this essay. He attempts to do what he had done in the other essays. Observe and report.

When he wrote this essay, De Tocqueville sought to explain the curious phenomenon of the existence of a “free” North and a “slave” South. One of De Tocqueville’s most trenchant observations is that the race of slaves in the 18th and 19th century created one of the biggest challenges to ending it.

He explains that as a concept slavery imposed on any and all races would be easier to abolish precisely because it so directly attacks the notion of the humanity of man – all of them. A slave could be your brother or sister. But having slavery focused on blacks however, while it still denigrates the notion of the equality of man, it doesn’t do so in the same broad manner. He further observes that as a consequence of singling out the slave by race the notion that there is something unique about whites being free and blacks being slaves is easier to maintain. He says by only using blacks for slaves in America, “they made a wound in humanity less large, but infinitely more difficult to heal.” De Tocqueville adds, “the remembrance of slavery dishonors the race and race perpetuates the remembrance of slavery.”

But to De Tocqueville the harm of slavery in America was obvious to even the casual observer. He argued that it explains the culture of industry in the north and the culture of indolence in the South.

Showing just how remarkable the differences in lifestyles are for the North and the South, De Tocqueville describes the dissimilarity of life on both sides of the Ohio river. He explains that the Ohio River – named by native Americans – translates to “Beautiful.”

And indeed, it was.

The climate on both sides of the river he reports was “temperate” and the soil on each side offered “inexhaustible treasures” and yet on one side was Kentucky a “slave” state and the other Ohio a “free” state.

The two sides of the river reveal to De Tocqueville a significant difference in economic and productive activity. Ohio was more prosperous and active. Kentucky was less populated, less developed and more causal about economic activity. This difference provided a practical reason to oppose slavery.

For De Tocqueville, this prosperity and productivity difference is endemic to the existence or lack thereof of slavery. He even suggests that the scope of government activity can be explained by the presence of slavery. For instance, in Ohio, he notes that the state government established a canal between Lake Erie and the Ohio River allowing commerce all the way from Europe to New Orleans.

By contrast, he explains that residents of Kentucky have “neither zeal nor enlightenment” and consequently state activity reflects a more lackadaisical response.

Thus, in De Tocqueville’s theorizing, the existence of slavery is the primary reason why those who lived in the South languished in economic stagnation and those who lived in the North prospered.

On the Ohio state side of the river free men had to exercise agility and use willpower to provide for themselves and their family. And since they could keep the benefits of their efforts, they were more inclined to do so. On the Kentucky side it was the responsibility of slaves to provide for their owners and the owners family. The slaves worked but not with the zeal that comes from personally benefiting from their labors.

He concludes that separate and apart from the morality and dignity of all humans being free, his practical observation was that free men would be more prosperous overall and society would be better served by that prosperity.

But mere practical benefits De Tocqueville feared would not be sufficient to cause the South to end its reliance on slave labor. Cultural mores might be too hard to overcome. He feared that the physical appearance of blacks would mean that integration into the broader society would be a real challenge even if the South considered ending slavery.

In the end, America did live up to its founding principles and ended slavery. This wouldn’t be a shock to De Tocqueville.

De Tocqueville often spoke of America being a melting pot – a place where intermarriage and nonsegregated living became commonplace – but he was apprehensive as to whether that could work to resolve the issue of race relations caused by the existence of race-based slavery.

Indeed, there are those today who are “racialists” who use the physical appearance of people to divide Americans – some for financial gain and others for political gain.

Notwithstanding these efforts, here in the 21st century De Tocqueville might be quite impressed with the ability of Americans of all races to live together in harmony.

Today in a country by size the 3rd largest on the planet, nearly 20% of all US marriages are interracial. The US is among the more diverse nations on the planet. According to the US Census Bureau, Asians were the fastest growing ethnic group last year. And as of 2017 some 15% of all children born were mixed-race. On the whole America has demonstrated quite the ability to thrive together despite the existence of large ethnic groups.

In conclusion, De Tocqueville recognized the ills of slavery and how it contradicted the values of our founders. He saw both practical and philosophical rationales for it to end. He takes care to note that his traveling companion Gustave de Beaumont (Goose-tav DE Boo-mon) was preparing a book on the status of blacks in the US which De Tocqueville heartily recommended.

America was created by the adoption of an amazing concept – the equality of all men and self-government by its citizens. So fascinated was De Tocqueville he traveled to America to study it. Even while seeing the evils of slavery, De Tocqueville could see so much of the wonder of this magnificent plan of a republic governed not by rulers but by citizens. His hopefulness ultimately has been borne out.

We have a remarkable and enduring republic. But, as Benjamin Franklin warns – only if we keep it.

Horace Cooper is a senior fellow at the National Center for Public Policy Research and chairman of Project 21 – the black leadership network

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