Essay 46: 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. 3)

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Guest Essayist: Christopher Burkett

Our Commissioners | Office of the Texas Governor | Greg Abbott
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 348 (heading and 2 lines) – 379 (top paragraph) of this edition of Democracy in America.

American Union Will Last? What Dangers Threaten It?

Near the end of Volume One of Democracy in America, De Tocqueville discusses the possible dangers that might, in the future, lead to the dissolution of the American federal Union. If the amount of time De Tocqueville takes to discuss this topic is an indication of its importance, he must have taken this issue very seriously, as it is one of the longest chapters in the book. In fact, it had been an issue of utmost concern to President George Washington in his “Farewell Address” (1796), and of a young Abraham Lincoln in his 1838 address titled “The Perpetuation of Our Political Institutions,” delivered shortly after the first volume of Democracy in America was published.

De Tocqueville begins by observing that, in the long run, the survival of the Union depends heavily on how long the delicate federal balance of powers and responsibilities between nation and states can be maintained. If that balance tips too far toward the national government, the states might become irrelevant; if it tips too far toward favoring state sovereignty over the national authority, the states might disassociate and thus break up the Union. This problem seems unavoidable because of the very nature of the federal Union, which sought to combine thirteen mostly sovereign and independent states into one nation under a national government.

The framers of the Constitution, De Tocqueville notes, “had not been charged with constituting the government of a unitary people, but with regulating the association of several peoples.” In other words, the founders faced the challenge of creating a single nation comprised not of a unitary people but of confederated peoples distinguished by several distinct characteristics. The problem is this: “Unitary peoples are therefore naturally brought toward centralization” (or strengthening the importance of the nation), and confederations toward dismemberment.” Or, to put it differently, a unitary people feels a kind of “patriotism” toward the nation, whereas confederated peoples tend to feel more “patriotism” toward their particular state, region, or section of the Union.

What makes the peoples in the American Union so different and, therefore, inclined to identify more as members of their state or section, rather than as Americans in the larger sense? Tocqueville points out many of the same differences that were emphasized by the Antifederalist Brutus in his essays opposing ratification of the Constitution in 1787-88. De Tocqueville notes the number of diverse commercial interests among the states and sections of the Union, especially between the Northern and Southern states, but also between the original Eastern states and the newer states of the West. De Tocqueville, however, seems to place more stress on different ideas, opinions, and passions among the states and sections – especially those that shape the mores, in fact the very character of the peoples inhabiting those sections.

To illustrate this potentially disruptive difference of character, De Tocqueville writes on how the institution of slavery “has modified the character of the inhabitants of the South and given them different habits.” Raised to be both self-reliant but needing the voluntary cooperation of his fellow citizens, the “American of the North” is more “patient, reflective, tolerant, slow to act, and persevering in his designs.” He is “more active, more reasonable, more enlightened, and more skillful.” The American of the South, having been raised with the benefit of slaves serving his material needs, “loves greatness, luxury, glory, noise, pleasures, above all idleness,” and is “more spontaneous, more spiritual, more open, more generous, more intellectual, and more brilliant.” The man of the North has the characteristics of the middle class, whereas the man of the South “has the tastes, prejudices, weaknesses, and greatness of all aristocracies.” De Tocqueville’s point is that these powerful differences in character tend to divide rather than unite citizens as one American people. “Slavery therefore,” De Tocqueville writes, “does not attack the American confederation directly by its interests, but indirectly by its mores.”

The localization of slavery in the South does, however, potentially threaten the survival of the Union in a political sense. With westward expansion, the centers of influence shift from the original states of the East (both North and South) to the new states of the West. With the addition of new states – and therefore new representatives in Congress – the delicate balance of political power between free and slave states is jeopardized. The people of the South especially see how this affects the institution of slavery in their states in the future. The South, De Tocqueville observes, “knows that federal power is escaping it, that each year sees the number of its representatives in Congress diminish and those of the North and West grow – the South, populated by ardent and irascible men, is irritated and restive.” In this De Tocqueville sees the tendency of the Southern states to tend more and more toward asserting the importance of states’ rights or sovereignty, as evidenced by the nullification crisis in South Carolina in 1832. Thus De Tocqueville predicts that if the Union is dissolved, it will likely be by one of two means: either by the abrupt secession of states from the Union, or by a gradual reversal over time toward complete state independence.

Christopher Burkett is Associate Professor of Political Science at Ashland University and Academic Director of the Ashbrook Scholar Program and Academies. He is editor of Ashbrook’s 50 Core American Documents, and has written on the American Founding, Progressivism, and American Foreign Policy. He holds a B.A. from Ashland University, and received his M.A. and Ph.D. from the University of Dallas.

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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)

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Guest Essayist: Horace Cooper

Our Commissioners | Office of the Texas Governor | Greg Abbott
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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Essay 44: 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. 1)

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Guest Essayist: Robert Pence

Our Commissioners | Office of the Texas Governor | Greg Abbott
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 302 (bottom half) – 325 of this edition of Democracy in America.

Democracy in America recounts Alexis de Tocqueville’s reflections on his extensive travels in America. In the chapter under discussion (Volume 1, Part Two, Chapter 10), he considers the present and probable futures of the three races [the white man, the Negro and the Indian] that inhabit the territory of the United States. De Tocqueville found the three races to be naturally distinct and inimical to each other. Fortune had gathered them together and mixed them without the ability to intermingle, to the end that each pursued its own destiny. My focus is De Tocqueville’s answer to the question, vis a vis the Indian, “What is to be the future of the Indians?” He saw it as bleak. Very bleak. To the point of extinction.

Before the arrival of the white man in North America, the Indians lived tranquilly in the woods. “The Europeans, after having dispersed the Indian tribes far into the wilderness, condemned them to a wandering and vagabond life full of inexpressible miseries” (305). The author laments that many of the Indian tribes that formerly inhabited New England no longer exist. As Indian nations were forced further into the interior of the continent, large populations of colonists grew in their place. Such dispersal obscured their traditions, interrupted their memories, changed their habits, and increased their needs beyond measure. They became “more disordered and less civilized than they already were” (305). When the Indians lived alone in the woods, they hunted or made what they needed. Such self-sufficiency could not last: hunting alone could no longer satisfy their needs. The more remote tribes living beyond the Mississippi could still hunt the buffalo herds whose migrations could be followed. Famine forced migration. Before them is war. Misery is everywhere.

In 1831, De Tocqueville found himself on the Mississippi River. He saw a large number of Choctaws arrive; they had left their country and sought to cross the Mississippi where they thought they would find the refuge that the American government promised them. Alas, the government very rarely kept them. Half-convinced and half-compelled, the Indians had to move again, and again, to inhabit new wildernesses, where the whites would hardly leave them in peace for ten years (312). Thus, North American Indians had only two options for salvation: war or civilization (312-3). In the South, the “Cherokees and the Creeks, have found themselves almost surrounded by Europeans who, disembarking on the shores of the ocean, descending the Ohio, and traversing the Mississippi, arrived all around them at the same time. They were not chased from place to place, as were the Northern tribes, but, little by little, they were pressed together within narrowing limits” (315). When the Indians succeeded at farming, their white neighbors offered them prices that seemed high to them, but they took the money and moved on.

“President Washington had said…We are more enlightened and more powerful than the Indian nations; it is to our honor to treat them with goodness and even with generosity.’ This noble and virtuous policy has not been followed. “The tyranny of the government is ordinarily added to the greed of the colonists” (320). For sure, many states failed to recognize Indian tribes as independent peoples. [A series of Supreme Court cases in the 1830’s confirms such conduct.]

Unable to protect the Indians, the Federal government transported them to other places and maintained them there; in territory that had already been guaranteed to them. Today [i.e., the 1830’s], the American government does not take their lands away from them, but it allows them to be invaded. In a few years, doubtless, the expanding white population will again be on their heels; then they will again meet the same ills without the same remedies. Thus, the states, by their tyranny, force the savages to flee; the Union, by its promises and with the aid of its resources, makes flight easy. These are different measures tending to the same end.

De Tocqueville opined that the Indians’ right to their lands was never ceded, nor forfeited. The author questions whether the tribes’ troubles began when they were hostile to the United States, and sided with Great Britain during the struggle for independence. [My note: in the Declaration of Independence, the last charge made against the English King recounts “the long train of abuses and usurpations” against the colonists. “He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavored to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes, and conditions.”]

Pushed westward by the white man’s quest for more land and his increasingly frequent breaches of treaty after treaty, the Indians lost their culture, language, and security, their very way of life. De Tocqueville foresaw the inevitable: “the Indian race of North America is condemned to perish” (312).

 

Robert Pence - WikipediaRobert Pence is a Washington D.C. native who attended Maryland University as an undergrad, American University for J.D. and two M.A. degrees, and Yale University from which he received a M.Phil. degree in Italian Language and Literature. President Donald Trump appointed Bob to serve as the American ambassador to Finland; he served in Helsinki from May, 2018 until January, 2021. He served for years on various educational, artistic and philanthropic boards including The Kennedy Center, the Wolftrap Foundation, the World Affairs Council and American University. The is currently a member of boards of George Mason University (VA) and The Gary Sinise Foundation.

He is particularly proud to serve on Gary Sinise’s board where he joins with other equally committed citizens in support of the men and women of the Armed Forces of the United States, police, and first responders.

Mr. Pence’s wife Suzy serves on the National Advisory Board of Constituting America.  The  Pences are generous contributors to Constituting America, and their support has helped make our Online De Tocqueville Study possible. We thank you, Mr. Pence! 

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Essay: 43 The Main Causes Which Tend To Maintain A Democratic Republic In The United States (Vol. 1 Pt. 2 Ch. 9, Subch. 10)

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Guest Essayist: Will Morrisey

Our Commissioners | Office of the Texas Governor | Greg Abbott
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 298 (bottom half of page) – 302 (top half of page) of this edition of Democracy in America.

 

WHAT AMERICAN DEMOCRACY MEANS FOR EUROPE

Founding a democratic republican regime is one thing. The American founders had done that. Maintaining it is another, as Benjamin Franklin famously remarked upon emerging from the final session of the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia, and as a sober young American attorney named Abraham Lincoln saw and considered in his “Address to the Young Men’s Lyceum” in Springfield, Illinois in 1838, some two generations later.

Writing a couple of years before Lincoln, Alexis de Tocqueville understood that his fellow Europeans hesitated to found democratic republics because they did not see how such regimes could sustain themselves in Europe, where geopolitical, constitutional, and civil-social circumstances differed substantially from those prevailing in North America. By then, Americans faced no formidable enemies, needed to fight no major wars, and consequently afforded no opportunities for a native Napoleon to hunger for military glory and move against republicanism. The American capital was no Paris, no Rome; a centralized government can fall prey to mobs, with ‘the democracy’ threatening the government, whether monarchic, as in 1789 and again in 1848, or republican, as the Romans had seen in the military coup of Julius Caesar. And North America is much bigger than Europe; on a large continent, “nature itself works for the people,” giving them an outlet for their restless ambitions. Dissatisfied with your lot in life? If you’re an American, go West, young man; set yourself up as a farmer, not as a revolutionary.

Europeans enjoyed none of these advantages. Politically, they enabled the American Founders to constitute their national government as a federation, not a centralized state. Their strong township institutions, established long before the founding, had taught the people “the art of being free,” habits of mind and heart consistent with self-government. Americans had anchored their civil and criminal courts in the counties, close to the people, who could be confident that they would be judged by their peers.

Most importantly, American hearts were animated by the principles of a “democratic and republican” religion. As De Tocqueville had earlier maintained, the first movement toward equality of condition was in Christianity itself, its teaching of human equality before God. At the same time, American minds were enlightened by an education that was eminently practical, with the ‘Three Rs’ enabling citizens to read their Bibles for moral guidance, to read their newspapers for political information and for expressing their own opinions, and to calculate sums correctly in business.

In all, “American legislators had come, not without success, to oppose the idea of rights to sentiments of envy; to the continuous movements of the political world, the immobility of religious morality; the experience of the people, to its political ignorance, and its habit of business, to the enthusiasm of its desires.” It was true that Americans confronted one potentially ruinous dilemma absent from Europe: race-based slavery, the theme of the final section of De Tocqueville’s first volume—one distinct from the problem of the overall civil-social equality, the democracy, in America. Europeans, however, faced the reverse problem: no slavery, but no obvious solution to the questions raised by democracy.

On that front, Europeans enjoyed none of the advantages Americans enjoyed. Democracy was advancing in their societies with the weakening of the aristocracies. But democracy, social and civic equality, need not issue in republicanism, in the protection of natural and civil rights. Napoleon had demonstrated this, only a quarter-century before De Tocqueville ventured to the United States. “The organization and establishment of democracy among Christians is the great political problem of our time.” Indeed, “the question I have raised interests not only the United States, but the entire world; not one nation, but all men.”

Why? Under the civil-social condition of modernity, democracy, with no aristocrats standing between the people and the centralized state, one could not only see a monarchy along the lines of France under Louis XIV, but a new absolutism, a new despotism “with features unknown to our fathers.” The old absolutist monarchies retained a still-formidable aristocratic class. Firstborn sons inherited the estate, ruling but also protecting the peasants who worked their land, as their ancestors had done for centuries. Second-bord sons entered the clerical aristocracy, the Roman Catholic Church exerting influence on peasants, monarchs, and their fellow aristocrats alike Under the old regime, wealthy merchants in cities and townships also commanded their own sources of revenue and manpower independent of monarchs and aristocrats. Even under the rule of the Bourbons, then, there was “a love of freedom in souls” among honor-loving aristocrats and aristocrats and commerce-loving merchant. The peasants and urban workers ruled by these elites nonetheless understood that they, too, could one day see the face of God, that they too partook of the dignity of human being.

But in the European civil-social democracy of De Tocqueville’s century, the Enlightenment philosophes and their intellectual heirs had undermined faith in God; “nothing any longer sustains man above himself.” And democratic men find themselves in a leveled society in which all classes mix together, and “the individual disappears more and more into the crowd,” readily “lost in the midst of the common obscurity,” and therefore no longer held responsible for his actions.

 “When each citizen, being equally powerless, equally poor, equally isolated, can only oppose his individual weakness to the organized force of the government,” a regime of despotism would take on the harshness of late Roman imperialism, “those frightful centuries of Roman tyranny, when mores were corrupt, memories effaced, habits destroyed, opinions wavering, and freedom, chased out of the laws, no longer knew where to take refuge to find an asylum; when nothing any longer stood guarantee for citizens and citizens no longer stood guarantee for themselves,” where “one would see men make sport of human nature.”

In the event, many Europeans would come under tyrannies even worse than De Tocqueville foresaw, regimes in which making sport of human nature meant hunting it down in death camps and world wars, resulting in tens of millions dead, regimes where the modern state, armed with technologies permitting surveillance of its subjects, ended civil and political liberty for those who survived the onslaught, spurring the invention of a new word, ‘totalitarianism.’

“Is this not worth thinking about? If men had to arrive, in effect, at the point where it would be necessary to make them all free or all slaves, all equal in rights or all deprived of rights; if those who governed societies were reduced to this alternative of gradually raising the crowd up to themselves or of letting all citizens fall below the level of humanity, would this not be enough to overcome many doubts, to reassure consciences well, and to prepare each to make great sacrifice readily?” For “if one does not in time succeed in founding the peaceful empire of the greatest number among us,” democratic republics instead of democratic despotisms, “we shall arrive sooner or later at the unlimited power of one alone.”

Against atheist ideologies, therefore, De Tocqueville called upon Europeans to renew their respect for Christianity. Against overweening military and political ambition, he commended a spirit of peaceful commerce, of the ‘bourgeois’ life detested by aristocrats and socialists alike. Against the “sentiments of envy” he opposed the idea of individual and civil rights. Against governmental centralization, federalism and the practical experience local self-government provides to citizens. Against the threat of foreign wars, a strong executive, a constitutional monarch empowered to defend the realm. And against the alienation of his fellow aristocrats, De Tocqueville urged a policy not futile dreaming of reinstituting command but of guiding democracy, moderating its passions by teaching it how better to govern—as De Tocqueville himself did, in writing Democracy in America.

 

Will Morrisey is the author of ten books, including studies of the political thought of the American founders, the American Progressives, Herman Melville’s Moby-Dick, and Shakespeare’s comedies. He has been an editor of Interpretation: A Journal of Political Philosophy for 45 years. He retired from the Politics Department at Hillsdale College in 2015. His articles and reviews may be found on “Will Morrisey Reviews.”

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Essay 42: The Main Causes Which Tend To Maintain A Democratic Republic In The United States (Vol. 1 Pt. 2 Ch. 9, Subch. 9)

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Guest Essayist: Danny de Gracia

Our Commissioners | Office of the Texas Governor | Greg Abbott
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 296-298 (Stop at “Importance of what Precedes”) of this edition of Democracy in America.

The Way We Were (And Could Be Again)

“The Americans have no neighbors and consequently no great wars, financial crisis, ravages, or conquest to fear; they need neither large taxes, nor a numerous army, nor great generals; they have almost nothing to dread from a scourge more terrible for republics than all those things put together – military glory.”
-Alexis de Tocqueville

The late Ronald Reagan after losing his party’s nomination for president in 1976, spoke of a time capsule that he had the opportunity to write a letter for that would be later opened for the American Tricentennial 100 years later in 2076.

“And suddenly it dawned on me, those who would read this letter a hundred years from now … will know whether we met our challenge,” Reagan explained. “Whether they will have the freedom that we have known up until now will depend on what we do here.”

Reagan then went on to say:

“Will they look back with appreciation, and say, ‘Thank God for those people in 1976 who headed off that loss of freedom? Who kept us now a hundred years later, free? Who kept our world from nuclear destruction? And if we fail, they probably won’t get to read the letter at all, because it spoke of individual freedom and they won’t be allowed to talk of that or read of it. This is our challenge and this is why we were here in this hall tonight. Better than we’ve ever done before, we’ve got to quit talking to each other and about each other and go out and communicate to the world that we may be fewer in numbers than we’ve ever been but we carry the message they’re waiting for. We must go forth from here united, determined, and what a great general said a few years ago is true: There is no substitute for victory, Mr. President.”

History both repeats and rhymes, and the challenge and battle that Reagan had spoke of for the soul and future of America is the same struggle that every American has been fighting since The Shot Heard Round The World on April 19, 1775 and maybe even earlier.

In the early decades of the United States of America, this country was a marvel to philosophers, historians, and political observers the world over, one of them being Alexis de Tocqueville. The Old World had its share of political revolutions and political experiments, and the search for a system of government that balanced the individual’s pursuit of happiness against society’s need for cohesion and order had been tried and failed numerous times over.

More often than not, the rulers of the Old World brought about political reform through palace intrigue, bloody revolutions, and military takeovers, often offering platitudes of liberty and freedom and justice to distressed citizens but ultimately never granting a system that allowed people the space to be human inside a government restrained enough to not be oppressive but still maintain the basic functions of a sovereign state without becoming a failed state. “Meet the new boss, same as the old boss” was the way that rulers and systems of government had come and gone for millennia up to the founding of the United States of America. Certainly, the Ancient Greeks had their experiment in democracy, but that was a system that was at best superficial and did not empower people to pursue and enjoy individual freedom in the way we today think of the revolutionary American statement that “all men are created equal.”

In fact, the lessons of the Peace of Westphalia treaty were still very much on the minds of European leaders at the time of the American Revolution. That treaty established the understanding that the lowest common denominator in the world system is not the individual, but the state itself, and that rulers have the right to be sovereign inside their national borders – a concept which, interestingly, lives on in the text of today’s United Nations charter.

This idea that the king is the state and the state is the king and everything and everyone under the king belongs to the king who is, like the ancient Pharaoh of Egypt, the morning and the evening star was upheld by the Peace of Westphalia. Many of the ancients, though they resented it, likely felt and understood this was a necessary evil.

The Bible gives us the story of Moses spending time collecting the Ten Commandments on a mountaintop, while his brother Aaron is left behind with the presumably millions of Israelites who had been rescued from Egypt’s bondage by divine deliverance. The people organized the equivalent of a democracy in the absence of Moses, pressured Aaron to build a golden calf as their national icon, and began to revel and cast off all restraint – that is, until Moses came back with the power of God to put them in their place.

This idea that if people are allowed to have their way, they’ll use it to do evil and wreak chaos on a national and even international scale has persisted throughout human history. The purpose of the king, who is either there because a “god” chose him or because he is the bloodiest, wisest, or richest person able to assemble and control the resources needed to maintain a state, is essentially under this line of thought to keep the citizens in line and to keep the neighboring countries in line as well.

When we read De Tocqueville’s “Democracy in America,” we can therefore see the European alarm and fascination that America, at least at the time, was a political unicorn. Here De Tocqueville finds Americans govern themselves, and don’t require a police state to keep them in line. Here the heads of state, local leaders, and public servants are anodyne, mostly agreeable individuals, who dare not step out of line, lest they face the wrath of the public. In short: Americans have a functioning democracy because they can handle it.

“To submit the provinces to the capital is therefore to put the destiny of the whole empire not only in the hands of a portion of the people, which is unjust, but also in the hands of the people acting by itself, which is very dangerous,” De Tocqueville wrote. “I already said before that I saw in the origin of the Americans, in what I called their point of departure, the first and the most efficacious of all the causes to which the current prosperity of the United States can be attributed. Americans had the chance of their birth working for them: their fathers had long since brought equality of conditions and of intelligence onto the soil they inhabited, from which the democratic republic would one day issue as from its natural source. This is still not all; with a republican social state, they willed to their descendants the most appropriate habits, ideas, and mores to make a republic flourish.”

One will likely read De Tocqueville in 2024 and, seeing the condition of the United States, easily say, “Ouch, he missed it, we missed it, and what a height we’ve fallen from.” The very things that allowed America to be a successful democracy at the time of Tocqueville’s writing of “Democracy in America” are the very things that are absent in today’s country.

Increasing urbanization by design means that people today are packed together in tight, uncomfortable, competitive built environments. This is the opposite of the pastoral, agrarian, mostly relaxed America that De Tocqueville wrote of with agreeable citizens and family structures that were personal, instructive, and a form of self-government.

Want to feel democracy has failed? Work in Downtown Honolulu, Hawaii and just try to leave your office for a 45-minute lunch break. Trust me, if you don’t get a traffic ticket for a simple mistake, get run over by a distracted driver, collide with a pedestrian disobeying the crosswalk signal, or get stuck in a traffic jam due to some wild accident for two hours, then you must have the very blessing of God Himself operating in your life. This is a daily experience which embitters citizens and makes individuals reliant on big government to fix, regulate, or control the increasingly out of control world around them. Here in Hawaii, we have no shortage of public “planners” yet the local chaos here is out of control.

Does democracy as a system of government work? Technically yes, technically no. It “works” if a majority of those voting are enlightened, altruistic, and at peace with themselves and others. It doesn’t work when they’re not. And that is why America, in 2024, is the exact opposite of what De Tocqueville described in “Democracy in America.”

Today? We’re fighting world wars no one wants to admit are world wars. Our young people are tearing apart college campuses and have a political divide that is night and day from their parents view of the world. Our government is bigger than it’s ever been before, but it can’t maintain order. We’re taxing people way beyond what drove the Founders to rebel, but every politician and bureaucrat says they need more money and can’t even cut the grass or keep the roads paved because there’s “no money for that.” And depending on which of the two major parties one subscribes or aligns with, one may see two totally different directions and purposes for the future of America.

Oh, if only we could go back to De Tocqueville’s time, when times were simpler. We can, in fact. Despite all of the disruption, decline, and major changes in history, America’s experiment is still at its core a system of inputs and outputs that when operated properly will work the way it was intended, for limited government, and maximum individual freedom.

De Tocqueville’s America at the time of his observation emphasized a connection to one’s family and to one’s community. When we are able to know each other and keep each other accountable, we can solve things by cooperation or by negotiation amongst ourselves. That is the beginnings of self-governance.

I often ask myself how many people would be out protesting in the streets or being vicious and disagreeable over abstract political ideas if they had someone back home who loved them and helped them and kept them grounded with supportive words and kind loyalty.

De Tocqueville also encountered an America that did not see or rely on national government as the source of their solutions. Today, we want a quote from the president and the speaker of the house and the senate majority leader on every little thing that happens in the world and what their plan is. When Americans took initiative and took action on the things they had within their personal sphere of reach, politicians were largely obsolete. Today, we take minimal responsibility for things and seek to be as un-accountable for our actions and others as possible. De Tocqueville’s America was proactive and ready to take charge. They had peace because they had initiative.

And most importantly, De Tocqueville saw an America that had traditions that clearly established lines between moral rights and wrongs. “In the United States, religion not only regulates mores, but extends its empire over intelligence,” he observed. Today, we have been encouraged to be narcissistic, avoidant, and mercenary in our actions. The concept of “your truth,” “your vibes,” or “your tribe” that has been promoted in recent years suggests a man or a woman can be an island who does whatever is right in their own eyes at any given time with no accountability to anything or anyone except their own gratification.

Multiplied to a population level, this kind of thinking is disastrous and results in exactly the kind of society we have that is at war with itself. There is a war against moral clarity in America today that brings out the worst, rather than the best, that democracy can offer.

“It is likely,” Benjamin Franklin said at the 1787 constitutional convention, “to be well-administered for a course of years, and can only end in despotism, as other forms have done before it, when the people shall become so corrupted as to need despotic government.”

Take that not as a prophecy that cannot be avoided, but as a warning that must be heeded.

America is at a dangerous precipice in 2024. We are headed away from the enlightenment that De Tocqueville and others marveled at, and are going backwards in time to the traditions of upheaval, reactionary despotism, and ultimately, total decline. But we can turn back. It will take changing our communities, changing our cities, and most importantly, changing ourselves.

Danny de Gracia is a political scientist and internationally published author who lives in Hawaii. He is currently working on his second master’s degree in health policy at the University of Hawaii at Manoa.

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Essay 41: The Main Causes Which Tend To Maintain A Democratic Republic In The United States (Vol. 1 Pt. 2 Ch. 9, Subch. 8)

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Guest Essayist: Richard Epstein

Our Commissioners | Office of the Texas Governor | Greg Abbott
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 292 (Stop at “That the Laws”) – 295 of this edition of Democracy in America.

Causes Tending to Undermine a Democratic Republic

Commentary on de Tocqueville:
Vol. One, Part Two, Chapter Nine

It is widely acknowledged that Democracy in America, written in 1835 and 1840, is the greatest book on that topic—a period of America long gone and never to return. De Tocqueville offers an optimistic chapter describing the forces working to preserve a democratic republic. Conjoining those two words obscures the traditional philosophical opposition between republics and democracies. In so doing, De Tocqueville offers several explanations that, while accurate for his time, are as dead as a dodo bird in ours.

His first explanation is that “The Americans have no neighbors and consequently no great wars,” except, of course, with themselves (the Civil War of 1861-1865 was at the time the bloodiest and most sophisticated war fought anywhere in the world). We still have quiet borders with our northern and southern neighbors (putting aside the problem of illegal immigration). But today, new technologies that span oceans call for military interactions with countless nations, both friend and foe—China, Germany, Iran, Iraq, Israel, Japan, North Korea, Russia, Spain, Taiwan, Ukraine, the United Kingdom, and many others. Our current military budget, foreign policy, defense capabilities, intelligence sources, and foreign aid programs never crossed De Tocqueville’s mind. But to read him as a blind isolationist would draw exactly the wrong inference. Today, he would know that the question is not only whether to interact with these formidable world powers but also how to do so. Do we sign bilateral or multilateral treaties? Can we continue to follow a constitutional system that requires, except in emergencies, the Congress to declare war before the President as commander-in-chief can intervene in Kosovo or Libya? These all present tough issues. And if De Tocqueville was right to attack General Andrew Jackson when he ascended to the presidency, should we say the same about Dwight Eisenhower? Don’t blame De Tocqueville for not seeing the future. Don’t rely on him as if he did.

Second, De Tocqueville spoke of the advantages of having a small national capital, which prevents a disproportionate concentration of power at the center that would regrettably displace the “great assemblies” in small towns and reduce the key role of citizen participation in direct democracy. He even notes with evident uneasiness that cities like Philadelphia (then populated by 161,000 inhabitants) and New York (then 202,000) could be the source not only of disagreement but potentially of race riots.

Those days are gone forever. When De Tocqueville wrote, the population in the United States was under 15 million people, just before the new waves of immigration reached our shores. Today, the population of the United States is over 336 million people. New York City is close to 8 million, and Philadelphia has about 1.5 million. Those long-term population increases do not allow traditional institutions to scale up without some fundamental changes in their character. The town model cannot work, so some variation on the square/cube law takes over—any viable state must cube the size of its infrastructure in order to double the size of its operations. Town meetings are for school boards, not climate control or interstate transportation.

Yet more than size is at stake. For the first, roughly speaking, 125-150 years under the 1787 Constitution, the philosophy of government at the federal level changed radically. The classical liberal model that speaks of the control of force, fraud and monopoly was no longer at the fore. Now, a much broader conception of government power uses administrative expertise to implement complex regulatory schemes that are supposed to reflect informed democratic preferences. Woodrow Wilson’s administration ushered in the federal income tax, the Federal Reserve Board and the Federal Trade Commission, the expansion of antitrust laws, the direct election of Senators, and women’s suffrage. Together, these composed the first stage of expanding state power, followed by Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal and Lyndon Johnson’s Great Society. These activities undercut the restrictions on state power imposed by the principles of separation of powers and checks and balances. The New Deal saw the rise of the alphabet agencies—the Agricultural Adjustment Administration, the National Labor Relations Board, the Civil Aeronautics Authority, the Interstate Commerce Commission, and many more. The Great Society added civil rights, health care, and environmental protection, bringing more power to Washington, which today may be somewhat curbed by the Roberts Court’s controversial attack on judicial deference to the expansive actions of the administrative state.

De Tocqueville may not have approved of all these changes had he foreseen them. But, if alive today, he would recognize that there is no turning back to the simpler world of 1835. And as the final irony, like De Tocqueville, we have no open spaces in which to move and hide. So our challenge in this brave new world is to maintain levels of freedom and prosperity that De Tocqueville could not have imagined—or understood.

Richard A. Epstein is the inaugural Laurence A. Tisch Professor of Law at NYU School of Law, where he serves as a Director of the Classical Liberal Institute, which he helped found in 2013. He has served as the Peter and Kirstin Bedford Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution since 2000. Epstein is also the James Parker Hall Distinguished Service Professor of Law Emeritus and a senior lecturer at the University of Chicago.

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Essay 40: The Main Causes Which Tend To Maintain A Democratic Republic In The United States (Vol. 1 Pt. 2 Ch. 9, Subch. 7)

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Guest Essayist: Tony Williams

Our Commissioners | Office of the Texas Governor | Greg Abbott
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 288 (Start at “How the Enlightenment”) – 292 (Stop at “That the Laws”) of this edition of Democracy in America.

De Tocqueville on American Education and Self-Government

In 1838, a young Abraham Lincoln addressed a young men’s lyceum debating society in Springfield, Illinois, on the topic of “The Perpetuation of Our Political Institutions.” Lincoln stated that mob rule and demagoguery were great threats to American self-government. He asserted that the way to preserve American political institutions was to restore reason and reverence for the laws as a “political religion” over the shifting and dangerous passions of human nature.

Publishing his masterpiece, Democracy in America, at the same time Lincoln spoke, De Tocqueville offered his own reflections on “the influence exerted by the enlightenment and the habits of the Americans on the maintenance of their political institutions.” In both cases—education and political habits—were formed primarily through experience rather than theory. The American people, he observed, were eminently a very practical people.

De Tocqueville thought that American education did not produce great literature or scientific inventions. Instead, Americans adapted the technology, “marvelously to the needs of the country.” They also sought education to learn “the doctrines and the proofs of [their] religion.” Finally, they gained familiarity with “the principal features of the constitution that governs” their country.

The main measure of American education might be found, in De Tocqueville’s view, in the thousand newspapers he says crisscrosses the republic. Americans demonstrated a commitment to the “utility of Enlightenment” rather than a desire to reproduce the Encyclopedie project of the French Enlightenment to classify all the world’s knowledge, for example.

Americans bring this practical education and knowledge even in the vast stretches of the western frontier. De Tocqueville stated that the American plunges “into the wilderness of the New World with his Bible, a hatchet, and newspapers.” Thus, they bring their version of enlightenment with them as they civilize what they considered a wilderness.

But, more than that, education cultivates the habits and mores of a self-governing people. De Tocqueville writes, “the instruction of the people serves powerfully to maintain a democratic republic.” Those virtues of citizenship, however, are acquired not through reading great political tracts but by the constant practice of self-governance.

De Tocqueville is astounded that Americans have an extremely strong sense of their rights. The American knows “what his rights are and what means he will use to exercise them.” The same could hardly have been said of peasants farming in Italy or serfs in imperial Russia.

Americans also acquire an understanding of the laws from reading newspapers and participating in the work of self-government. With a written Constitution and published laws, Americans were in a unique position of knowing the laws they lived under. De Tocqueville writes, “He has made himself familiar with the mechanisms of the laws.”

Lastly, and perhaps most importantly, Americans engaged in self-governance. Universal male suffrage meant that all white men could vote, which was truly exceptional in the first half of the nineteenth century. They voted in free elections, served on juries, held political office, served in local government jobs in their communities, and attended democratic town meetings.

“It is from participating in legislation that the American learns to know the laws, from governing that he instructs himself in the forms of government. The great work of society is accomplished daily before his eyes and so to speak in his hands.”

De Tocqueville noted that Americans carried “the habits of public life into private life.” That was perhaps one of the keys to the health of American democracy. They had democratic habits and virtues that animated a robust civil society of self-governing citizens who could manage their own affairs without the intrusive hand of government. And, self-government was rooted upon education forming the character of the American people.

Today, Americans generally have a strong instinctual sense of their constitutional rights. While they may not always get the exact particulars correct, they cherish the right to speak their minds because they have free speech under the First Amendment. They also have a strong reaction against a police officer searching the trunks of their cars without probable cause or entering their homes without a warrant. They would want to speak with a lawyer if arrested and held at a police station. In this way at least, the American spirit of liberty and self-government is alive and well.

De Tocqueville noted this phenomenon almost two centuries ago in Democracy in America. He wrote an American “will teach you what his rights are and what means he will use to exercise them.”

Tony Williams is Senior Teaching Fellow at the Bill of Rights Institute; a Constituting America Fellow; author of Washington and Hamilton: The Alliance that Forged America, and Hamilton: An American Biography.

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Essay 39: The Main Causes Which Tend To Maintain A Democratic Republic In The United States (Vol. 1 Pt. 2 Ch. 9, Subch. 6)

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Guest Essayist: Ben Peterson

Our Commissioners | Office of the Texas Governor | Greg Abbott
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 282 (Start at “On the Principal Causes”) – 288 (Stop at “How the Enlightenment”) of this edition of Democracy in America.

De Tocqueville on Religion in Society

For De Tocqueville, habits and mores, determined especially by religion, are the primary contributors to the Americans’ successful maintenance of their democratic republic. Against champions of liberty who opposed Christianity and reactionaries who opposed liberty and defended religion, De Tocqueville described and favored an American republicanism that had combined “the spirit of religion and the spirit of freedom.” The dominance of Christian morality—a salutary tyranny of the majority—promotes domestic tranquility and furnishes limits on political power. De Tocqueville makes an arresting claim: “Religion, which, among Americans, never mixes directly the government of society, should therefore be considered as the first of their political institutions; for if it does not give them the taste for freedom, it singularly facilitates their use of it.”

While noting that religion “never mixes” with government, De Tocqueville nevertheless notes that it holds widespread influence in society, hinting at the larger force of his argument. De Tocqueville’s claim is twofold: first, Christianity exercises an enormous degree of political influence in America, despite formal separation of church and state, through its hold over the mores. Second, the degree of influence Christianity wields actually depends on disestablishment, assigning religion to its proper sphere of dominion over hearts and minds.

In De Tocqueville’s analysis, mortal man is irrepressibly homo religiosus, irrepressibly yearning for immortality. Religion thus possesses a natural advantage in the sphere of the mind and mores, pertaining to the permanent interests of human beings in the next world:

As long as religion finds its force in the sentiments, instincts, and passions that one sees reproduced in the same manner in all periods of history, it defies the effort of time, or at least it can only be destroyed by another religion. But when religion wishes to be supported by the interests of this world, it becomes almost as fragile as all the powers on earth.”

All civil powers, in contrast, are ephemeral. Direct alliance with civil political power jeopardizes religion’s natural advantage. The enemies of an allied regime become enemies of the religion: “So by uniting with different political powers, religion can only contract an onerous alliance. It does not need their help to live, and by serving them it can die.”  This makes religion especially vulnerable in democratic ages because configurations of political power change rapidly and constantly.

The reason Christianity—which De Tocqueville will argue in Volume II is especially suited to liberty—maintains a somewhat thinned, but widespread and unchallenged influence in American society is because it confines itself to the realm of general moral guidance and the government of the heart and mind, the natural, universal realm of religion: “In America, religion is perhaps less powerful than it has been in certain times and among certain peoples, but its influence is more lasting. It is reduced to its own strength, which no one can take away from it; it acts in one sphere only, but it covers the whole of it and dominates it without effort.”

De Tocqueville presents religion with a tradeoff: it can have universal dominion over minds and mores, or conventional political power over a particular group, but not both. De Tocqueville’s claim and analysis, supported with the example of the French Revolutionaries’ antagonism to religion and the American case, suggest two intriguing possibilities relevant to the question of the Christian witness: first, political influence need not rest on direct governmental prerogative or public recognition. Second, entanglement with conventional political power could present a danger to the influence of religion, undermining the influence over minds and mores.

The tradeoff has a bit more bite. De Tocqueville claims that Christianity has complete dominance over minds and mores, but that dominance comes up against other mental and moral features of the democratic age. For example, Christianity must not challenge too pointedly the “love of well-being” that equality engenders but be content with constraining the pursuit of well-being to honest means. In democratic ages, religion cannot afford to buck against common opinion too much:

“As men become more alike and equal, it is more important that religions, while carefully putting themselves out of the way of the daily movement of affairs, not collide unnecessarily with the generally accepted ideas and permanent interests that reign among the masses; for common opinion appears more and more as the first and most irresistible of powers; there is no support outside of it strong enough to permit long resistance to its blows.”

Religion retains its dominant—but limited—hold over minds and mores only by staying tightly within narrow bounds. The spirit of religion and the spirit of liberty mix, but uneasily in the context of democracy.

Ben Peterson is an assistant professor in the Department of Government and Criminal Justice at Abilene Christian University. He writes on a range of public policy issues, drawing from resources in Christian social and political theory, the broader Western tradition of political thought, and contemporary social science. You can find links to his other writings and information about his scholarship on his website.

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Essay 38: The Main Causes Which Tend To Maintain A Democratic Republic In The United States (Vol. 1 Pt. 2 Ch. 9, Subchs. 4-5)

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Guest Essayist: Paul McNulty

Our Commissioners | Office of the Texas Governor | Greg Abbott
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 275 (Start at “On Religion”) – 282 (Stop at “On the Principal Causes”) of this edition of Democracy in America.

Religion and Democracy in America:
An Essay on the Observations of Alexis de Tocqueville

America’s Founding Fathers believed there was an inseparable link between faith and freedom. They were convinced that if one flourishes the other will as well and that liberty particularly would be at risk if religion and virtue diminished. The evidence of these shared convictions is unmistakable, as revealed in the quotations below. In addition, decades after it factored into the Framers’ crafting of the U.S. Constitution, De Tocqueville emphasized the foundational significance of religion in preserving American freedom. But why is this so?

In a free society, self-government is a prerequisite for social order. If citizens exercise self-restraint in relation to others and take responsibility for their well-being and that of their dependents, then freedom and limited government can be maintained. In the absence of self-government, freedom will diminish as various forms of coercive government power necessarily fill the void. Self-government requires the exercise of moral virtue, often referred to as public virtue. And moral virtue is generally and historically the fruit of sincere faith. This is why the Founders saw the great utility of religious belief.

John Adams, our second President, wrote, “Our constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.” The father of our Constitution, James Madison, offered a similar insight when he observed that our form of government necessitated “sufficient virtue among men for self-government.” And perhaps the strongest statement on this point was offered by President Washington in his “Farewell Address” to the people of the United States in 1796. He wrote,

Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable supports…. And let us with caution indulge the supposition that morality can be maintained without religion. Whatever may be conceded to the influence of refined education on minds of peculiar structure, reason and experience both forbid us to expect that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle.

The relationship between freedom, religion, and virtue has been insightfully described by some observers as the “golden triangle of freedom.” Freedom begets the exercise of religious belief, religious belief begets virtue, and virtue strengthens freedom. This was universally understood by America’s founding generation.

It should come as no surprise, therefore, that the essential interconnection between faith and freedom was among De Tocqueville’s key observations about our young nation. In his Democracy in America subchapter entitled “Of Religion Considered as a Political Institution, How It Serves Powerfully to Maintain the Democratic Republic among the Americans,” De Tocqueville notes, “Who could deny the fortunate influence of religion on mores and the influence of mores on the government of society [?]” Here the word “mores” is essentially the same as public virtue, a set of generally accepted moral norms within a community. De Tocqueville saw such mores as a powerful influence, both directly and indirectly, on the American political order and critical for sustaining freedom. He writes, “From the onset, politics and religion found themselves in accord, and they have not ceased to be so since.”

In his following subchapter entitled “Indirect Influence Exercised by Religious Beliefs on Political Society in the United States,” De Tocqueville affirms a non-sectarian value of religious belief. “There is an innumerable multitude of sects in the United States. All differ in the worship that must be given to the Creator, but all agreed on the duties of men toward one another. Each sect therefore adores God in its manner, but all sects preach the same morality in the name of God.” Moreover, De Tocqueville observes that some Americans may not be convinced of the truth of religion, but he is sure that they are convinced of its utility.

For De Tocqueville, religion typically entails various characteristics that are especially valuable for a free society. These characteristics include: a special appreciation for the equality of people and their inherent value; a commitment to strong family life; a love for order that “carries into the affairs of the State:” and, perhaps most importantly, a requirement of moral self-restraint that preserves liberty and influences public service.
De Tocqueville concludes subchapter 5 on a cautionary note, one that is strikingly relevant to our current political and moral climate. “How could society fail to parish if, while the political bond relaxed, the moral bond were not tightened?” In other words, the increasing polarization in our politics poses a serious threat to the preservation of our Constitutional order if public virtue continues down the current path. At the same time, the growth of secularism has weakened the religious foundations of our shared morality.

Many in today’s debates would strenuously resist making a connection. At the very least, the burden on those professing faith to demonstrate virtuous character has never been greater. Such faith-based morality is what the Founders were counting on, and what De Tocqueville saw as the greatest hope for America.

Paul McNulty is the president of Grove City College. Prior to assuming this position in 2014, he served more than thirty years in Washington, DC as an attorney in public service and private practice. In 2005 he was appointed to the position of Deputy Attorney General by President George W. Bush after serving for more than four years as the United States Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia where he was a leader in the nation’s response to the terrorist attacks of 9-11. He served for more than ten years in the U.S. House of Representatives including as Chief Counsel for the House Majority Leader, Chief Counsel for the Subcommittee on Crime, and Counsel to the Committee on Standards of Official Conduct. Mr. McNulty also led the corporate compliance and investigations practices at the global law firm Baker McKenzie.

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Essay 37: The Main Causes Which Tend To Maintain A Democratic Republic In The United States (Vol. 1 Pt. 2 Ch. 9, Subchs. 2-3)

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Guest Essayist: Stephen Tootle

Our Commissioners | Office of the Texas Governor | Greg Abbott
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 274 (start at “On the Influence of the Laws…”) – 275 (On Religion) of this edition of Democracy in America.

Even the shortest sections of De Tocqueville’s writings often contained keen insights into the requirements of liberty. When describing the laws and mores required to maintain a democratic republic, De Tocqueville summarized what he had described in previous chapters. His summary gave us a remarkable insight into how American ideals and institutions had been working since the founding.

He understood that the very structure of our government encouraged and enabled a free people to keep their liberties. One key element of this structure was the interaction between the national government and local government. The national government had the power to protect the American people. Local governments gave Americans the ability to enact legislation meaningful to their everyday lives. But towns and the democratic institutions closest to the people had a special role to play.

Towns tended to enact and enforce laws that limited the evils of unchecked majorities. As these people and institutions did their work, every American learned the value of freedom. Courts could not stop majorities from enacting their desires forever. But the emotions of majorities could be slowed and directed. De Tocqueville saw that what the founders had intended did work in practice.

A metaphor can help to understand his point. Imagine an athlete competing in a sport over time. That athlete would come to understand the value of having the rules of the sport applied fairly. When the athlete won, it would be an earned victory. The people who watched the sport would become more invested in the sport because of the integrity of the contest. Thus, even when one failed to win, the athletes and spectators would come back for the next contest. Rules, when fair and followed, create a culture that leads to the best results over time. Further, even though a fan of a particular team or athlete might want to win one contest, over time a fan would learn the importance of protecting the integrity of the sport through effective officiating and rulemaking.

De Tocqueville understood how cultures and government systems interact with one another. Individuals have, “habits of the heart.” Those habits interact with others in society to form, “habits of mind.” Those collective habits form a culture. A government system on its own could never create a free culture for a free people, but governments could help maintain, encourage, or destroy a free culture. Over time, systems of government could allow a culture of a free people to continue and thrive. These lessons might seem simple or obvious, but their implications are as profound as the continued existence of a free government tending toward the prosperity of all people.

As each individual human being is infinitely complex, every single person contains untold conflicting and overlapping desires and values. The federal system, local governments, the practices of towns and judges, and the free culture of a free people did something very special to the complex, conflicting, and overlapping desires of individuals. The system enabled what Hamilton called for in Federalist 1: a political culture based on “reflection and choice” rather than “accident and force.” De Tocqueville’s record of how Americans lived in the early decades of the 19th century demonstrated that Hamilton was right.

Human nature has not changed since the days of De Tocqueville. What was true for them still holds for us. Culture is the sum of the values of individuals. Government institutions cannot force us to live good lives. But good government and good institutions can make it possible for people to live peaceful, prosperous lives of their own choosing.

Stephen Tootle is Professor of History at the College of Sequoias in Visalia California and Honored Visiting Graduate Faculty at Ashland University. His reviews, articles, and essays have appeared in National Review, the Claremont Review of Books, Presidential Studies Quarterly, the Journal of the Gilded Age and Progressive Era, and his hometown newspaper. He hosts a weekly podcast/webcast called “Tootle Talk.”

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Essay 36: The Main Causes Which Tend To Maintain A Democratic Republic In The United States (Vol. 1 Pt. 2 Ch. 9, Subch. 1)

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Guest Essayist: Val Crofts

Our Commissioners | Office of the Texas Governor | Greg Abbott
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 264 (start at chapter 9 heading) – 274 (stop at heading “On the Influence of the Laws…”) of this edition of Democracy in America.

The Main Causes Which Tend To Maintain a Democratic Republic in the United States

The United States exists today as a federal democratic republic, which was part of the Founders’ plan to create the unique and effective system of government that we have lived under for 237 years. Our democratic republic has two elements to it. First, in our form of democracy, we let the citizens rule under majority rule in certain elections, as well as adhering to the concept of popular sovereignty: government that is based on the supremacy of the people. Second, in our republic, we give power to our representatives, who govern for their constituents. We have elements of both a democracy and a republic, balanced within our system of government, which was the Founders’ intent.

In the first part of Chapter 9, De Tocqueville examines the main reasons and causes of the democratic republic existing within the United States in 1831-32. Throughout his book, De Tocqueville states that his primary goal was to explain these reasons and causes. He believed that the main causes for them could be narrowed down to three main causes.

1. The situation that God (Providence) placed Americans
2. Our laws
3. Our habits and norms

This section looks at the main factors in maintaining our democratic republic. De Tocqueville narrows down the list of “a thousand circumstances” for the unique situation of the United States democratic republic to the main ones. He felt that as we had no neighbors around us who served as a military threat, we did not need to fear war or the possibility of conquest from neighboring nations. He believed that military glory and the need for conquest were fatal to past republics, but were not a concern to ours in the 1830s.

When De Tocqueville visited, the United States had a small capitol city that was not dominant over the entire nation’s politics yet. It was not controlling the lives of the citizens and making itself felt everywhere. U.S. citizens ruled themselves in small assemblies and participated within direct democracies to determine most of their day to day lives and issues. The people were allowed to be stewards of themselves. De Tocqueville felt it would be a breach of the representative system if the national capital ever tried to usurp the local control.

De Tocqueville speaks throughout his book of the “point of departure” of our nation from others, when the Puritans combined religious and personal liberty, bringing “equality of conditions and of intelligence” to our shores that would become the natural fabric from which our democratic republic would emerge. God also graced us with a natural place to foster this type of government.

He next speaks of Americans having a general “well-being” that exists here, due to the incredible riches that exist on the North American continent, which was described as a blank canvas waiting for emigrants to discover and farm upon. It creates a peaceful and content mindset, which runs contrary to societies that are angry and discontent and those feelings often come out as resistance and overthrow of governments. In the United States of 1831, De Tocqueville felt we did not have to worry about such things because we were so content.

God gave us this land in a pristine state, De Tocqueville notes, which was just sitting there waiting to be cultivated by future successful farmers.

He then discusses that most of the emigrants in the American West do not come directly from Europe there. Most European immigrants, in De Tocqueville’s observations, stayed along the Atlantic coast until they were able to be successful enough to move on to greener pastures of the West. This trend continued as settlers moved into the Ohio Territory. Many in Ohio and the former Northwest Territory also waited to accumulate personal wealth before moving West.

These emigration patterns led to a new type of primogeniture in the United States—one that did not exist by name, but because of condition. As families become more prosperous, the eldest will generally take the land in the East and the younger siblings go West to seek their fortune. This helps to keep large estates in the family and not parceled up among the family. De Tocqueville notes that this does not offend anyone and goes on without complaint. He cites enormous numbers that leave homes in the East and move West.

These situations God provided, along with a series of laws and habits that Americans naturally had during his visit in 1831-32 allowed for our nation to exist to be a perfect land for a democratic republic, according to De Tocqueville.

Val Crofts began his teaching career in 2001 at Westosha Central High School in Paddock Lake, Wisconsin, and is currently employed as the Chief Education and Programs Officer at the American Village in Montevallo, Alabama. He previously taught at Milton High School in Milton, Wisconsin, for 17 years and worked as a teaching consultant for the Wisconsin Virtual School for nine years.
He shared his passion for learning by teaching AP Government and Politics, AP Human Geography, AP Comparative Government, AP U.S. History, U.S. History, and U.S. Military History. In his current role at the American Village, he works to create an engaging curriculum to help assist teachers and students of all ages to learn about American history, America’s Founders, and the legacy that they left for future generations.
In 2008, Crofts founded the Discovering Democracy program at Milton High School. Discovering Democracy immersed hundreds of students into government through public policy research and culminated with a weeklong field study in Washington D.C. His students were privileged to meet with top policy experts and national leaders such as then-Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Justice Antonin Scalia, Justice Sonia Sotomayor, and former Speaker of the House, Paul Ryan.
Crofts was recognized for his teaching efforts in 2013 when he received the Crystal Apple Award for Teaching Excellence. He was also selected as the Wisconsin DAR Outstanding Teacher of U.S. History in 2020.

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Essay 35: What Moderates The Tyranny Of The Majority In The United States (Vol. 1 Pt. 2 Ch. 8)

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Guest Essayist: Tom Hand

Our Commissioners | Office of the Texas Governor | Greg Abbott
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 250 – 264 (stop at chapter 9 heading) of this edition of Democracy in America.

Democracy in America: Moderating the Majority

In Democracy in America, De Tocqueville warns of the inherent danger to a democracy from “the omnipotence of the majority” and the tyranny that is naturally imposed on the minority. De Tocqueville offers some consolation to lovers of American democracy that certain factors in the United States work to hold in check some of that power.

Among these impediments, at least in the 1830s, to potential abuses were lawyers who collectively constituted an independent, non-partisan judiciary system and the authority vested in American juries. De Tocqueville believes that lawyers are naturally elitists and aristocrats and often think contrary to the general run of mankind, thus creating an obstacle the masses must overcome to impose their will on the minority. He also states that the American jury system, in which the people have the final say regarding which laws are just and if they have been equitably applied, is a significant check on the absolute power of the majority whose representatives create the laws.

But De Tocqueville argues the greatest check on the despotic tendencies of the majority is the simple fact that the central government has limited interest in directing the daily lives of its citizenry. De Tocqueville states that during his 41-month tour of the United States in 1831 he observed a central government that was concerned with very few aspects of American life, being almost solely interested in foreign affairs.

Based on his world of the 1830s and the federal government found in America at the time, De Tocqueville’s reasoning was sound. But things have changed since those early days of the republic and his words meant to give comfort to Americans now must give us pause in light of the current state of affairs.

In the America of De Tocqueville’s day there was no federal administrative state, and even President Jackson’s own cabinet only consisted of six departments. There was no Federal Bureau of Investigation to observe every move of a free citizenry, no Environmental Protection Agency to decide if people can use gas stoves in their own homes, no National Health Institute to determine that Americans need to wear masks and stand six feet from their fellow citizens, and no Transportation Security Administration to decide that two ounces of liquid is okay but never three.

The sheer lack of size and apparent lack of interest in the federal government in overseeing day-to-day life in America was, in De Tocqueville’s mind, a blessing to democracy. He mentions how fortunate Americans are that the federal government “has not undertaken to regulate secondary things in society” but provides a warning as well if that condition should ever change.

De Tocqueville writes, “…if having established the general principles of the government, it (the federal government) entered into the details of their application, and having regulated the great interests of the country, it could descend to the limit of individual interests, freedom would soon be banished from the New World.”

One wonders what De Tocqueville would say if he were to view the America of 2024 with its overarching federal government that touches every aspect of American life and is administered by those unelected by the people. It is easy to imagine that De Tocqueville would lament for the loss of true freedom in America, that ability to decide for ourselves how we would live, and he would probably predict a darkened future if somehow this cancer is not removed.

Tom Hand is the visionary behind Americana Corner, an organization dedicated to sharing compelling narratives of significant events, influential leaders, and foundational documents that have shaped the United States. Since 2020, Tom has written and produced over 200 articles and videos, aiming to rekindle Americans’ patriotic spirit and remind them of the nation’s remarkable legacy. Beyond his creative work, Tom established the Preserving America Grant and Partners programs, donating millions to support history organizations nationwide. All proceeds from his book, “An American Triumph: America’s Founding Era through the Lives of Ben Franklin, George Washington, and John Adams,” support these programs. His unwavering dedication to promoting patriotism and preserving America’s heritage makes him an invaluable advocate for the Great American Story.

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Essay 34: The Majority In The United States Is All-Powerful And The Consequences Of That (Vol. 1 Pt. 2 Ch. 7, Subchs. 4-6)

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Guest Essayist: Tom Hand

Our Commissioners | Office of the Texas Governor | Greg Abbott
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 243 (start at “On the Power that the Majority..” heading) – 249 of this edition of Democracy in America.

Democracy in America: The All-Powerful Majority

In De Tocqueville’s masterpiece, Democracy in America, De Tocqueville discusses at length what he terms the “omnipotence of the majority” found in democracies and how that all-powerful force is one of the greatest threats to liberty and freedom, the twin pillars of a democratic form of government.

It seems a contradiction that the greatest blessing of a democracy, the rule of the majority instead of the one or the few, should also hold in it the most likely place wherein lies the seeds for the possible destruction of democracy. But, as De Tocqueville points out, that is very much the case.

As De Tocqueville asks, “What is a majority, in its collective capacity, if not an individual with opinions, and usually with interests, contrary to those of another individual, called the minority? Now, if you admit that a man vested with omnipotence can abuse it against his adversaries, why not admit the same concerning a majority?”

De Tocqueville goes on to argue that this omnipotence can easily, and perhaps naturally, lead to abuse, one he terms the “tyranny of the majority.” Because they are the many against the few, the majority assumes a type of moral authority over society and woe be to him that questions this power. Where can he who confronts the majority turn for help? The executive is elected by the majority, and the legislature is as well. The police are, in De Tocqueville’s term, simply “the majority under arms.”

This all-powerful influence extends beyond the laws and the customs of a country; it even has a telling effect on the thoughts of its citizens. De Tocqueville argues that once the majority has determined what is “right,” all who oppose that opinion become outcasts of society.

In an example, De Tocqueville pictures an official telling someone out of step with the majority that “You are free not to think as I do; your life, your goods, everything remains to you; but from this day on you are a stranger to us…When you approach those like you, they shall flee you as being impure; and those who believe in your innocence, even they shall abandon you, for one would flee them in their turn. Go in peace. I leave you your life, but I leave it to you worse than death.”

Because the majority is insulated from the criticism, it lives in a state of “perpetual adoration of itself,” failing to ever conceive that they may be wrong. This develops into arrogance within the majority who begin to see their fellow citizens not as equals with a different outlook but rather as deplorable beings incapable of redemption.

The omnipotence of the majority also has a profound effect on our national character by encouraging the “spirit of the court,” that demeaning characteristic in which men crawl before others in positions of power to curry their favor. While that dehumanizing trait is typically the hallmark of a small cadre of nobility within an absolute monarchy, De Tocqueville argues that the courtier spirit is even more prevalent within a democracy where the many are within reach of the pinnacle of power, therefore making demeaning servility much more common place.

De Tocqueville concludes this discussion by stating that the greatest danger for American republics comes from the omnipotence of the majority. He writes, “If ever freedom is lost in America, one will have to blame the omnipotence of the majority.”

In laymen’s terms, De Tocqueville is cautioning that the minority in this country will only take so much before it pushes back, and that push back will be most unpleasant. This closing warning is ominous and one that today’s “thought-police” in America would be wise to recognize.

Tom Hand is the visionary behind Americana Corner, an organization dedicated to sharing compelling narratives of significant events, influential leaders, and foundational documents that have shaped the United States. Since 2020, Tom has written and produced over 200 articles and videos, aiming to rekindle Americans’ patriotic spirit and remind them of the nation’s remarkable legacy. Beyond his creative work, Tom established the Preserving America Grant and Partners programs, donating millions to support history organizations nationwide. All proceeds from his book, “An American Triumph: America’s Founding Era through the Lives of Ben Franklin, George Washington, and John Adams,” support these programs. His unwavering dedication to promoting patriotism and preserving America’s heritage makes him an invaluable advocate for the Great American Story.

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Click here for the essay schedule with today’s essay and previously published essays hyperlinked.

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Essay 33: The Majority In The United States Is All-Powerful And The Consequences Of That (Vol. 1 Pt. 2 Ch. 7, Subchs. 1-3)

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Guest Essayist: Jeff Broadwater

Our Commissioners | Office of the Texas Governor | Greg Abbott
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 235 (start at chapter 7 heading) – 243 (stop at “On the Power that the Majority in America…) of this edition of Democracy in America.

On the Omnipotence of the Majority in the United States and Its Effects

For De Tocqueville, unchecked majority rule within the states presented problems. The national government, he observed, was more independent of public opinion and largely limited itself to foreign affairs, leaving state governments to dominate American society.

De Tocqueville argued that state constitutions dangerously inflated the power of the majority. State legislators served short terms and were elected directly by the people, and so reflected “the daily passions of their constituents.” Bicameral legislatures failed to check the majority because both houses represented the same social class and both were popularly elected. The executive and judicial branches could not serve as effective checks. State governors, who were often selected by the legislatures for short terms of office, lacked the necessary independence. In several states, even judges were elected, and legislators controlled their salaries. Making matters worse was a growing tendency on the part of voters to limit lawmakers’ discretion with binding instructions.

Popular attitudes tended to enhance the authority of the masses. “The moral empire of the majority,” De Tocqueville wrote, “is founded in part on the idea that there is more enlightenment and wisdom in many men united than in one alone.” Americans also believed “that the interests of the greatest number ought to be preferred to those of the few.” They could accept what De Tocqueville called “the tyranny of the majority” because Americans were not divided by “irreconcilable interests;” minority parties could always hope to form a majority in the future. Unfortunately, he added, the will of the majority was so overbearing that it could not be delayed long enough “to hear the complaints of those it crushes,” a tendency that he warned could have dangerous consequences in the future.

The Omnipotence of the Majority and Legislative and Administrative Instability

Whatever dangers America’s freewheeling democracy posed to the nation’s future, De Tocqueville saw immediate problems in its legal system and in public administration. State constitutions aggravated the instability inherent in democracy—he assumed public opinion could change quickly and dramatically—by consolidating power in state legislators and then providing for their annual election. As evidence of instability, De Tocqueville pointed to the state constitutions themselves: almost all of them had been amended within the last thirty years. Ordinary statutes meanwhile proliferated. He considered Massachusetts to be the best governed of the states, but new bills passed by the Massachusetts assembly since 1780 had already filled three large volumes, and that was after an 1823 revision in which a number of obsolete laws were repealed.

Democratic instability also frustrated attempts to implement policy. De Tocqueville cited prison reform in Pennsylvania as an example. In the 1780s, reformers in the Keystone State–he apparently had the Quakers in mind—had pushed for the construction of new prisons built with rehabilitation in mind. But because the entire system could not be reconstructed at once, the older, more punitive prisons, which De Tocqueville described as “dungeons,” persisted, and once public interest in prison reform waned, grew even more brutal.

The Tyranny of the Majority

In addressing the tyranny of the majority, De Tocqueville confessed a personal dilemma: he deplored the idea that the majority had the right to do whatever it pleased, and yet he conceded that all legitimate political power was derived from “the will of the majority.”

De Tocqueville attempted to resolve his dilemma by appealing to universal principles of justice which transcended the laws of a single jurisdiction. When he refused to obey an unjust law, he wrote, he was appealing “from the sovereignty of the people to the sovereignty of the human race.” If one nation might abuse another, and if one individual might abuse a neighbor, why would we deny the capacity of a majority faction to violate the rights of a minority? He rejected “mixed government,” in which competing interests were combined to check and balance one another, as a solution. England, often cited as a model of mixed government, was, De Tocqueville argued, actually an aristocracy. Some superior “social power” would always exist, but justice required it be subject to a moderating influence.

Majority tyranny was rare in America, but when it erupted the law could not contain it. At the start of the War of 1812, pro-war mobs in Baltimore repeatedly attacked the offices of an anti-war newspaper and killed one of the editor’s defenders. In Pennsylvania, free blacks enjoyed a legal right to vote, but fearing white reprisals, feared to exercise it. The states, De Tocqueville concluded, needed executives and judges with greater independence and legislators who would represent the majority without being “the slave of its passions.”

Majority Power and the Arbitrariness of Officials

Majority support, De Tocqueville observed briefly, often permitted American officials to exceed their authority and act arbitrarily, a habit he feared might “one day become fatal” to freedom.

Jeff Broadwater’s publications include Jeffferson, Madison, and the Making of the Constitution (2019); James Madison: A Son of Virginia and a Founder of the Nation (2012); and George Mason, Forgotten Founder (2006). He also co-edited, with Troy Kickler, North Carolina’s Revolutionary Founders (2019). He currently serves as the book review editor for the Journal of the North Carolina Association of Historians.

 

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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)

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Guest Essayist: Jason Stevens

Our Commissioners | Office of the Texas Governor | Greg Abbott
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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Essay 31: What Are the Real Advantages That American Society Derives From the Government of Democracy (Vol. 1 Pt. 2 Ch. 6, Subchs. 1-2)

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Guest Essayist: Brenda Hafera

Our Commissioners | Office of the Texas Governor | Greg Abbott
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 220 (start at Chapter 6 heading) – 227 (Stop at heading, “On The Idea Of Rights…”) of this edition of Democracy in America.

How to Re-ignite Patriotism in America

Has patriotism become unfashionable? Last year, a Wall Street Journal poll reported that just 38% of Americans view patriotism as very important. That’s down from the 70% who said the same in 1998. The question is, why?

De Tocqueville, the famous French author who loved America, offers some insights. In his essay, “On Public Spirit in the United States,” he describes two kinds of patriotism, warns of the moments when patriotism fades, and offers a solution for patriotic renewal.

The first kind of patriotism is instinctive. People love their home, and that “love intermingles with the taste for old customs, with respect for ancestors and memory of the past.” This patriotism, more monarchical in character, rests on old orders and traditions. It ebbs and flows, reigniting and then subsiding in times of war and peace.

In contrast, republican patriotism is steady, and the citizen “interests himself in the prosperity of his country at first as a thing that is useful to him, and afterwards as his own work.” He connects his character and destiny with that of his country. Republican patriotism is based in reflection, practice, and self-interest. It “is born of enlightenment; it develops with the aid of laws, it grows with the exercise of rights, and in the end it intermingles in a way with personal interest.”

De Tocqueville was astonished and admired that such patriotism reigned in America, despite its citizens not having resided long on the land. He even quipped that a traveler could not criticize anything about America to an American, except perhaps the climate and the soil, “and still, one finds Americans ready to defend both as if they had helped to form them.”

But “sometimes a moment arrives in the lives of peoples when old customs are changed, mores destroyed, beliefs shaken, the prestige of memories faded away.” The land “become a lifeless land in their eyes,” and they are dismissive and disparaging of their ancestors and legislators. Neither form of patriotism appeals any longer to the hearts and minds of the people.

It is difficult to read De Tocqueville’s description of such a moment without thinking of our current time. Civic education is in a sorry state. We tear down statues and with them our memories, good or bad. Four out of 10 Zoomers believe the Founders can be more accurately described as villains, rather than heroes, according to psychologist Jean Twenge’s Generations. It is perhaps no surprise that patriotism matters less for the technological generations who have retreated to the online world and avoid in-person conflicts, or even everyday niceties.

De Tocqueville’s prescription for patriotic renewal is for men and women to participate in government and society. As he famously observed, Americans formed civic associations for even seemingly mundane tasks. Such involvement allows citizens to come together for the purpose of repairing a community center or conducting a fundraiser without care for partisan political disagreements. Engaged citizens begin to see each other as neighbors first, not political adversaries, and view differences through the lens of good will rather than suspicion.

More fundamentally, America’s political system being animated by consent of the governed affords citizens a sense of ownership of their country. It is the principle “all men are created equal” which demands public opinion be treated as sovereign, making that principle the ultimate source of American patriotism. To understand this more fully, we might turn to one of De Tocqueville’s most noteworthy American contemporaries, Abraham Lincoln.

When commemorating the 4th of July, Lincoln observed that many Americans were no longer direct descendants of those who fought the Revolution. As time went on, would the unity and patriotism of America erode? He responded that, as Americans look to the Declaration, they will find that they:

have a right to claim it as though they were blood of the blood, and flesh of the flesh of the men who wrote that Declaration, and so they are. That is the electric cord in that Declaration that links the hearts of patriotic and liberty-loving men together, that will link those patriotic hearts as long as the love of freedom exists in the minds of men throughout the world.

It is the Declaration that defines and unites Americans. It gives us a principle to strive towards, an ideal that we are asked to further and fulfill, inviting us to love America because it is good in its mission, even if imperfect. Perhaps the most significant source of the current decline of patriotism is that we no longer understand, and maybe even do not believe, the truth of this great principle.

Our call today is to take it seriously, to wrestle with it. We may find that it not only makes us patriotic, but ennobles us, both as individuals, and as a people.

Brenda Hafera is the Assistant Director and Senior Policy Analyst at The Heritage Foundation’s Simon Center for American Studies.

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Essay 30: Government By Democracy In America (Vol. 1 Pt. 2 Ch. 5, Subch. 15) of Democracy in America by Alexis De Tocqueville

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Guest Essayist: Joseph A. Ledford


Our Commissioners | Office of the Texas Governor | Greg Abbott
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 217 – 220 (to heading “What are the Real Advantages…”) of this edition of Democracy in America.

The Manner In Which American Democracy Conducts Foreign Affairs.

Governing the external affairs of a state involves a particular set of skills. Foreign policy requires the combined use of patience, prudence, secrecy, and long-term strategic thinking. It entails grave risks and difficult trade-offs. Decision-makers, who should be free of the passions that grip the people, must make cold-blooded calculations in the national interest. Such is the view of De Tocqueville. In contrast to the “good sense” of democracy guiding domestic affairs, De Tocqueville observes that foreign affairs demand these aristocratic attributes. Certain qualities of democracy stop at the water’s edge.

As De Tocqueville explains, American elites of the Early Republic possessed the leadership qualities necessary to ensure that democracy flourished at home while America advanced its interests abroad. Although seemingly a contradictory stance, De Tocqueville’s advocacy for their role in directing foreign affairs was not incompatible with his republican predilection. Rather, as he contends, aristocrats and commoners alike had a shared interest in the prosperity and security of the United States.

And it was none other than George Washington and Thomas Jefferson whom De Tocqueville saw as the Founding Fathers of American diplomacy. They charted the course for America’s engagement with the world.

Washington, the American Cincinnatus, impressed De Tocqueville above all with his “inflexible character.” De Tocqueville, who abhorred the French Revolution, admired how Washington’s adroit statecraft prevented a Franco-American alliance during the French Revolutionary Wars. In doing so, Washington had incurred the steep cost of bitter partisan politics over his stance of neutrality. Washington braved this domestic upheaval through the Genêt affair and especially during the implementation of the Jay Treaty with Great Britain. Despite these immediate repercussions, however, Washington’s approach to foreign affairs permitted the establishment of the nation in the long run. America eventually secured itself from the meddling of European powers, although it was hard-won through the Quasi-War and the War of 1812.

On September 19, 1796, George Washington’s Farewell Address appeared in Claypoole’s American Daily Advertiser, an eloquent political testament that resonated with De Tocqueville nearly four decades later. First drafted by James Madison in 1792, and then shaped by Alexander Hamilton in 1796, Washington’s Farewell Address makes the classic case for unity, neutrality, and reciprocity, all of which were needed to transform America into a great power.
In Democracy in America, De Tocqueville elects to include an extract from Washington’s Farewell Address. It highlights the first president’s timeless principles for conducting foreign policy. In the passage, Washington prevails upon Americans to seek free trade, abide by treaties, and avoid permanent alliances to keep Americans from involving themselves in European wars.

Washington aimed for peace and union, not war and disunion. This wisdom transcended political divides. Avoiding messy entanglements with European powers proved to be a bipartisan effort among American statesmen. Despite Jefferson’s fierce disagreements with Hamilton, De Tocqueville identifies Jefferson as a kindred spirit of Washington. Once an ardent political foe, the Democratic-Republican shared the Federalist’s vision for American foreign policy when he ascended to the presidency.

To demonstrate the continuity, De Tocqueville cites a maxim from Jefferson. It reflects the third president’s general position on how America should manage its relationship with other countries. “That Americans ought never to demand privileges from foreign nations in order not to be obliged to accord them themselves,” De Tocqueville quotes from Jefferson. In a footnote, De Tocqueville acknowledges that he cannot provide a source for Jefferson’s words. Nevertheless, this sage line captures the sentiment of Jefferson’s precept from his first inaugural address, in which he famously declared “peace, commerce and honest friendship with all nations, entangling alliances with none.”

“We are all Republicans, we are all Federalists,” Jefferson also proclaimed at his first inauguration. Indeed, De Tocqueville understood the conduct of American foreign affairs this way.

For De Tocqueville, as well as Washington and Jefferson, America was geopolitically exceptional. Given that the United States was located in the New World, the struggles of the Old World did not concern Americans. Without being mired in European power struggles, Americans could continue to grow their nation, develop their democracy, and thrive. One day, though, America would become powerful enough to pursue more ambitious external affairs.

 

Joseph A. Ledford is a Hoover Fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University.

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Essay 29: Government By Democracy In America (Vol. 1 Pt. 2 Ch. 5, Subchs. 12-14)

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Guest Essayist: Paul Carrese

Our Commissioners | Office of the Texas Governor | Greg Abbott

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 120 (starting at the heading “On The Election of the President”) through 130 (stopping at the heading “On The Federal Courts”) of this edition of Democracy in America.

These sub-chapters on America’s “Government by Democracy” address a crucial theme of the work: constitutional republic versus democracy. De Tocqueville befriends the new phenomenon of mass, egalitarian democracy, especially its success in America (so far). Yet as a genuine friend, he notes both weaknesses and strengths. His tough-love message: beware too much of a good thing. Too much democracy, and its ideal of equality, undermines America’s other great principles. These include: liberty and self-government; the rule of law; moral principles mostly stemming from Christianity yet sustained by religious liberty; and, striving for happiness (per the Declaration) in ways that ennoble life, not cheapen it. The tough-love messages in these sub-chapters address: public morality, particularly corrupt officials; can our democratic spirit sustain hard struggles (e.g. extended wars); can the people heed the wiser policy judgments of “statesmen;” and, can we exercise the self-control and far-sighted thinking necessary to survive and prosper in a dangerous world.

A crucial passage in the “Efforts” sub-chapter reiterates De Tocqueville’s praise of the United States as a federal republic with a complex Constitution (see e.g. Vol. I, Part 1, ch. 8 – praising the Constitution’s offices for statesmen in the Presidency and Senate, and elevated federal judges, balancing the democratic House). The Constitution keeps America a democratic republic, making the best of our democratic-egalitarian spirit. “Efforts” also notes that “a great democratic-republic has never been seen” ( 212). America is the first powerful, successful such republic in human history. However, here and in the sequel – on “the Power” of self-control American democracy shows – De Tocqueville wonders whether our “democracy,” the dominance in American politics of popular will, allows the necessary self-control and far-sighted thinking. In “Efforts” he concludes that democracy “will in the long term augment the real strength of society,” but aristocracies, monarchies, and despotisms still can gather more focused power (in the mid-19th century). Nonetheless, there is a path America could take, offering hope:

If a democratic country remained subject to a republican government for a century . . . it would be wealthier, more populous, and more prosperous than neighboring despotic [authoritarian] states; but . . . it would have run the risk several times of being conquered by them. (214)

Thus, another theme here: can Americans sustain the civic virtues – including “public morality” – to abide by our republican, constitutional forms of government; thereby sustaining a more honorable politics; and, finding policies to promote greatness and security. Today we don’t think of politics in terms of virtues, vices, or the character of the people and of our leaders; thus, we don’t use “statesman” regularly. Yet: looking across the 190 years since De Tocqueville published these sub-chapters, don’t they capture enduring issues of American self-government, along with predicting our survival – indeed, power and greatness – in a still-dangerous world?

Further ideas to consider:

Corruption and Vices of Those Who Govern in Democracy; Effects on Public Morality
Difficulty maintaining “public morality” in democracy; strong temptations to “vulgar” wealth-seeking by officials – and, to popular suspicions against officials – versus the dignity, honorableness, and “public conscience” a democratic-republic should seek.

Of What Efforts Democracy Is Capable

Phony, authoritarian democracy versus genuine.

De Tocqueville considers only the Revolutionary War an existential crisis for America; he never mentions the War of 1812. Yet, a few chapters ahead, he discusses the prospect of a civil war – over slavery. Can Americans sustain the taxes, and military service either voluntary or conscripted, needed in a war of survival? What wars has America fought to substantial victory since 1830? What wars in the past 60 years have we abandoned? How is America’s military faring after 50 years of the all-voluntary military policy? Democracies prefer peace; can make “a sudden and vigorous effort” in a crisis; but may not be capable of “braving great storms . . . for a long time” (p. 214).

Democracies lack a “clear perception of the future,” of the long-term value gained via difficulties, because “the people feel much more than they reason;” lacking the “enlightenment and experience” that authoritarian governments have regarding war, international challenges (p. 214).

The Power American Democracy Generally Exercises Over Itself

The wisdom of “statesmen” versus “the difficulty that democracy finds in defeating the passions and silencing the needs of the moment in view of the future;” that “the people are surrounded by flatterers,” and we often fall for the easy path offered.

De Tocqueville’s harsh criticism of Indians (the typical term in the 19th century), and the Spanish and indigenous peoples of South America, reflects a time when democratic republics were new and fragile; he emphasizes the basic reality that no people and politics is successful unless prosperous, ordered, and powerful enough to defend itself. Later in this Part he severely criticizes America for betraying the principles of the Declaration in its treatment of African slaves and indigenous peoples; but also predicts America will someday be one of the world’s two dominant states – standing for liberty – while Russia stands for authoritarianism. He praises America, even if flawed, for being ordered enough to achieve greatness – by securing the power to defy authoritarianism; yet this realistic lens also produces his harsh judgments about other peoples.

Paul Carrese is a Professor in the School of Civic & Economic Thought and Leadership at Arizona State University, and its founding Director, 2016-2023. Formerly he was a professor at the U.S. Air Force Academy and co-founded its honors program blending liberal arts education and leadership education. He teaches and publishes on the American founding, American constitutional and political thought, civic education, and American grand strategy. He has held fellowships at Oxford University (Rhodes Scholar); Harvard University; the University of Delhi (Fulbright fellow); and James Madison Program, Princeton University; and currently is a Senior Fellow of the Jack Miller Center for Teaching America’s Founding Principles and History.

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Essay 28: Government By Democracy In America (Vol. 1 Pt. 2 Ch. 5, Subchs. 4-5)

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Guest Essayist: Samuel Gregg

Our Commissioners | Office of the Texas Governor | Greg Abbott

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  199 (start at at heading “On Public Costs Under The Empire of American Democracy” – 210 (stop at heading “The Corruption and Vices Of Those Who Govern In Democracy…”)

Government By Democracy In America Vol. 1 Pt. 2 Ch. 5, Subchapters. 8-11 – Public Expenses Under The Rule Of American Democracy, Instincts Of American Democracy In The Fixing Of The Salaries Of Civil Servants, Difficulty Of Discerning The Reasons Which Persuade The American Government Toward Economy, Can The Public Expenditure Of The United States Be Compared With That Of France?

Though well-known for his political and social commentary, De Tocqueville devoted considerable attention throughout his life to issues of political economy. He was well-versed in the economic writings of thinkers like Jacques Turgot, Adam Smith, and John Stuart Mill. De Tocqueville also explored some of the pressing economic topics of his time in texts such as his Memoir on Pauperism (1835).

Educated Europeans of De Tocqueville’s era were well-aware of the burgeoning economic power of the American republic that he visited for 10 months between 1831 and 1832. In Democracy in America, however, De Tocqueville’s thoughts on economic topics revolved around questions concerning the effects of democracy upon government expenditures.

Public expenditures in Western countries in the nineteenth century as a proportion of national Gross Domestic Product (GDP) were much less than those of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. But the advent of democratic government, according to De Tocqueville, was likely to increase pressures for ever-growing state spending.

In Democracy in America, De Tocqueville argues that citizens in democratic societies were expected to think more about the proper responsibilities of government. The more they do so, De Tocqueville states, the more that “a host of needs arises that they had not felt at first and which one can only satisfy by having recourse to the resources of the State.”

At the same time, De Tocqueville observes, democracies were more prone to sudden changes of policies. That meant many publicly funded government activities go unfinished or take on a haphazard character. This resulted in democratic governments making numerous “unproductive expenditures.” Such inefficiencies were compounded by the fact that “continuous surveillance” of public officials in charge of implementing budgets was lacking in America.

Working against these propensities to expand public spending, De Tocqueville notes, were the equalizing tendencies of American democracy. These generated skepticism about the worth of expending large sums on the “principal agents” of government.

Americans were willing to pay good salaries to “officials of secondary rank.” Yet their democratic instincts led them to spend less on “the great officers of the State.” The reason, De Tocqueville argued, was that Americans looked at such office holders through the lens of their own social and economic circumstances. This means, he wrote, that democratic society “give those who govern it hardly enough to live honestly”

That parsimonious mindset affected Americans’ willingness to engage in public expenditures on government buildings and public events. On one level, this reflected Americans’ habit of viewing this spending from the standpoint of their own often modest personal circumstances. But another element that disinclined Americans to support government spending on such things was the fact that Americans were as much “a commercial people” as they were “a democratic nation.” Habits like thrift, saving, and deferred gratification that dominated Americans’ business and economic activities discouraged them from attaching much worth to public displays of ornamentation.

De Tocqueville closes his commentary on public expenditures in America by comparing it to the situation in his native France. He stresses the difficulties of making such comparisons in light of limited information about this topic in both countries.

In France, De Tocqueville notes, the central government’s expenses were known, as were those of the eighty-six departments into which France was administratively divided. Expenditures at the town level, however, were unknown. A similar pattern, De Tocqueville observes, manifested itself in America. The Federal government published “the total of departmental expenditures.” One could also easily obtain “the particular budgets of the twenty-four states of which [the Union] is composed.” Yet at the level of county and town, De Tocqueville wrote, such information was near-impossible to find.

De Tocqueville nevertheless maintained that taxation and government expenditures in France were much higher than in America. For one thing, he noted, France had a much larger army and a navy that dwarfed America’s. France’s national debt was also larger than America’s because France had been subject to two invasions in De Tocqueville’s lifetime. America’s physical isolation from Europe, however, meant that it did not face this prospect.

That said, De Tocqueville thought that it was “mistaken” for the “partisans of democracy” to claim that democratic government “is genuinely economical.” Democracy, he argued, did not mean “cheap government.” There was nothing in democracy’s design, De Tocqueville believed, which would prevent it from raising taxes “as high among them as in most of the aristocracies or monarchies of Europe.” The moment that “great troubles came . . . to assail the peoples of the United States,” he fully expected America to increase taxes and its public expenditures.

In this, as in so many other matters, De Tocqueville proved to be correct.

 

Samuel Gregg is the Friedrich Hayek Chair in Economics and Economic History at the American Institute for Economic Research. In 2024, he was awarded the Bradley Prize.

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Essay 27: Government By Democracy In America (Vol. 1 Pt. 2 Ch. 5, Subchs. 6-7) 196-199

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Guest Essayist: Roberta (Bobbi) Herzberg

Our Commissioners | Office of the Texas Governor | Greg Abbott
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 196-199 (stop at heading “On Public Costs Under The Empire of American Democracy”) of this edition of Democracy in America.

An Analysis of Democracy In America (Vol. 1 Pt. 2 Ch. 5, Subchs. 6-7) – The Arbitrary Power Of Magistrates Under The Sway Of American Democracy, Administrative Instability In The United States.

Today, many citizens worry that bureaucrats are unaccountable and unresponsive to the interests of majorities, while other citizens worry that the bureaucracies are too politicized and too open to manipulation. As we can see from these selections of De Tocqueville, this is a long-standing concern for democratic governance. In these chapters, De Tocqueville suggests that democratic systems can be as arbitrary and unstable as despotic states because democratic majorities, just as a despot, can press the administrators to follow their desires. As a result, he argues that democratic majorities do not worry about the power of administrators because they believe that those administrators work on their behalf. If interests of a democratic majority change, they can simply change the actions of the administrators or the administrators themselves. As De Tocqueville states:

In democracies, the majority being able to take power each year out of the hands in which it had entrusted it, also does not fear that it may be abused against itself. A master at making its will known at each instant to those who govern, it would rather abandon them to their own efforts than chain them to an invariable rule that by limiting them would in a way limit itself (196).

As a result, majorities and the administrators they directed could act at will to pursue the majority interests. De Tocqueville worried that this created an instability in society that permitted some potentially dangerous actions by bureaucrats. As he argues:

Nowhere has the law left a greater part to arbitrariness than in democratic republics, because in them, what is arbitrary does not appear fearful. One can even say that the magistrate becomes freer as the right of electing descends further and as the time of the magistracy is more limited (197)
He argued that responsiveness to the majority took precedence over consistent decisions that could form a meaningful rule-of-law.

As an alternative to this arbitrary rule, De Tocqueville suggests that democratic states divide power, as exists in a limited monarchy, which provides both the stability and the energy needed to create the proper balance between effective government and individual liberties. Under this divided plan, both the monarch and democratic majorities will prefer the adoption of regular rules for administrators to follow over the constant tug of war between these divided interests:

The same cause that brings the prince and the people to render the official independent brings them to seek guarantees against the abuse of his independence, so that he does not turn against the authority of the one or the freedom of the other. Both therefore agree on the necessity of tracing out a line of conduct in advance for the official, and see their interest in imposing rules on him from which it is impossible for him to deviate. (198)

The result is the beginning of the arguments in favor of a professionalized administrative state over one that is directly responsible to democratic preferences. Today, the professionalization of the bureaucracy under civil service rules, first established with the Pendleton Act of 1883 and updated by the Civil Service Reform Act of 1978, significantly reduces this link to democratic change that De Tocqueville feared. But, instead, it introduces the risk of severing the bond to democratic interests that made Americans not fear the magistrate. It may no longer be the case that the government is us in the way that De Tocqueville reflects in this selection.

For De Tocqueville, good administration required a balance of democratic input and knowledge of administrative science that only develops and matures with experience across generations: “the art of administering is surely a science; and all sciences, in order to make progress, need to bind together the discoveries of different generations as they succeed each other.” (198) He argues that the instability in a pure democratic system prevents such learning and growth and that this limited the effectiveness of American governance:

It is very difficult for American administrators to learn anything from one another. Thus, they bring to the conducting of society the enlightenment that they find widespread within it, and not knowledge that is proper to them. Therefore, democracy, pushed to its final limits, harms progress in the art of governing (199)

For De Tocqueville, the success of democracy depends heavily on the education and development of the citizenry. It is not surprising, therefore, that he focused so heavily in Democracy in America on the role of civil society as a training ground essential to the successful self-governance of a democratic republic. The skill sets built in those interactions act as a cross-pressure to the desire for constant and immediate change he associates with pure democracy. Without the voluntary art of association which he observed in his travels through America, such an unstable and arbitrary system would be untenable. These cautions come out clearly in Volume Two of Democracy in America, published just 5 years after these selections from Volume One, and are at the heart of his critique and analysis of The French Revolution in The Old Regime and The Revolution. De Tocqueville was a prescient analyst of the strengths and the challenges of building a properly functioning democratic system. We can learn much by continuing to keep his insights and cautions in mind.

Roberta (Bobbi) Herzberg is a Distinguished Senior Fellow for the F. A. Hayek Program for Advanced Study in Philosophy, Politics, and Economics and a Senior Research Fellow at the Mercatus Center at George Mason University and Emerita Associate Professor in political science at Utah State University (USU), where she served as department head and administrative director of The Institute of Political Economy. Dr. Herzberg currently serves as president of the Society for Development of Austrian Economics and was president of the Public Choice Society from 2014-2016. Dr. Herzberg received her Ph.D. in political economy from Washington University in St. Louis. She writes and speaks regularly on public policy, public choice, institutional analysis, civil society, and the Bloomington School.

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Essay 26: Government By Democracy In America: Influence that American Democracy Exerts on Electoral Laws

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Guest Essayist: James Clinger


Our Commissioners | Office of the Texas Governor | Greg Abbott

 

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 192 (start at heading Influence that American Democracy Exerts on Electoral Laws) – 195.

In a span of a few pages in the first volume of Democracy in America, Alexis De Tocqueville discusses the implications of the frequency of American elections and the significance of the un-exalted position of civil servants in the United States. In each case, De Tocqueville’s arguments hinge on the importance of time horizons in understanding the behavior of public officials in the nation.

De Tocqueville visited the United States in 1831, along with his friend and collaborator, Gustave de Beaumont, officially to do research on penal conditions in the United States. This did result in a report that was presented to the French government, but of more significance was De Tocqueville’s book, Democracy in America. This was an analysis of more than government and politics, but also social conditions and a civic society that De Tocqueville believed gave rise to a form of governance that was unknown in Europe. De Tocqueville based his conclusions on observations carried out over several months. De Tocqueville visited seventeen of the twenty-four states then making up the union. He also briefly traveled through a bit of Canada. He only spent a few weeks in Washington, DC, so the bulk of what he learned about the country came from witnessing happenings outside the capitol. His observations also took place in a year in which no presidential or congressional elections were held. Much of what he learned came from witnessing politics and society at the local level.

Influence Which American Democracy Has Exercises On Electoral Laws

In remarking on the relative frequency of American elections, De Tocqueville claimed that “When election comes only at long intervals, the state runs a risk of being overturned in each election.” The parties involved perceive that there is much at stake in the election, and the winning side will “seize for themselves a fortune that comes so rarely within their reach.” If elections occur more frequently, the defeated candidates are more “patient.” In short, their time horizons adapt to the prospect of a change in their prospects in a soon to be held election. Frequent elections cause a good bit of “unrest for the state,” largely by the enactment of policies that are unstable since they are often reversed. Yet De Tocqueville believes that most Americans seem to have chosen the dangers of some instability over the threat of calamitous and tumultuous changes when elections are few and far between. Some of the founders, such as Alexander Hamilton and Thomas Jefferson, decried this instability in laws, but their concerns were not persuasive enough to sway most state lawmakers, who crafted the election laws. De Tocqueville’s conclusions were probably based on his observations of state and local elections, and their aftermath. There were no federal elections at the time of his travels to America.

Modern social science research has explored the implications of election frequency. Much of that research examines effects on voter turnout, rather than the behavior of candidates and parties. A phenomenon sometimes called “voter fatigue” or “ballot fatigue” has been found when elections occur frequently or if the ballots are too long. Under these circumstances, voter turnout declines as the number of elections increases over a fixed period of time. Because in America voters have opportunities to vote in federal, state, and local elections, often held on different days of the calendar, elections of some sort were and are held quite frequently. Party primary elections also add to the number of times that voters go to the polls, but primaries did not exist in De Tocqueville’s day. Some research does address the effect of the electoral cycle on the behavior of elected officials. In cases on elected officials with longer terms, such as U.S. senators, voting behavior in their chamber is relatively independent of their constituencies’ preferences but becomes more representative of constituency desires later in their terms as the next election approaches.

“Public Officials Under the Empire of American Democracy”

De Tocqueville also had much to say about the impact that the “empire” of American democracy had on public officials, particularly civil servants. One of the notable aspects of the way that public officials behave appears to be related to that they “remain intermingled with the crowd of citizens: they have neither palaces, nor guards, nor ceremonial uniforms” generally working without uniforms, badges, or distinctive ornaments of office that set them apart from the general population. In a democracy, De Tocqueville argued, “government is not a good; it is a necessary evil.” Public officials are “accorded a certain power” but beyond that any “external appearance of power” would “needlessly offend the public’s sight.”

This disdain for external and pretentious ornaments of office is also related to the issue of time horizons. Privileges (and power) of office “are passing; they depend on the place and not the man.” The administrative positions in office are temporary. They are paid positions, otherwise, the government would be staffed by wealthy amateurs who can afford to serve without official remuneration. This would create a “class of wealthy and independent officials, to form the core of an aristocracy.” In democratic states “all citizens can obtain posts” but “all are not tempted to solicit them.” In a sense, both formally elected and administrative positions are filled by the “principle of election.” The common voters select the elected officials, and the elected officials “elect” those holding administrative positions. In each instance, the appointments are temporary. They are not long-term, and they cannot be handed down from father to son. For that reason, “there is no public career, properly speaking” and officials have “no assurance in being kept in them [office].” Without the prospect of a long-term career, the pool of people who are both willing and able to work in government is restricted.

It is important to remember that De Tocqueville’s observations took place in a time in which both political and bureaucratic terms in office were much different than they are now. In those days, political careers were more time-limited and incumbent office holders had less advantage in elections than they do now. Furthermore, in De Tocqueville’s day there was no civil service system at any level of government. With the Pendleton Act in 1883, the federal government adopted a civil service system, which provided some job protection for government employees, and state and local governments adopted civil service in some cases before but often after the Pendleton Act. Whether this careerism that can be found in America over the last century or so has made the country less “democratic” is an issue that must be considered at another time.

 

James C. Clinger is an emeritus professor in the Department of Political Science and Sociology at Murray State. For many years, he was the director of the Master of Public Administration Program at Murray State. He now serves as an on-line adjunct instructor for any university willing to hire him and as a substitute teacher for the Henry County (Tennessee) School System.

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Essay 25: Government By Democracy In America

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Guest Essayist: Dr. Colleen Shogan

Our Commissioners | Office of the Texas Governor | Greg Abbott

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 187-192 (stop at heading Influence that American Democracy Exerts on Electoral Laws).

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De Tocqueville’s Democracy in America is known for its conversational writing about culture, government, and politics. But like all thinkers who blend theory and observations, De Tocqueville can be tricky. It is important to read De Tocqueville slowly and carefully so that we understand the full implications of his arguments.

At the beginning of the chapter, De Tocqueville gives us a hint about what is to come. He wrote, “I know here I am walking on ground that is afire. Each word of this chapter must offend on some points the different parties that divide my country. I shall not speak less than all my thought” (187).

What a remarkable introduction. He tells his readers that he knows his arguments are controversial, so much so that the topics he is about to discuss are on fire! While his opinions will offend almost everyone, he promises honesty in his analysis. These eye-opening sentences place the reader on high alert. We must proceed with caution.

What are De Tocqueville’s shocking revelations? First, he asserts that “in the United States, the most remarkable men are rarely called to public offices” (188). Why is this? Tocqueville argues that although many citizens in a democracy are well-meaning, they don’t know how to achieve the goals they desire (188). Also, democracy encourages envy in its citizens due to the powerful sentiment of equality (189). De Tocqueville comments that Americans “do not fear great talents, but they have little taste for them” (189). Democracy encourages talented citizens to shun a political career, since the vast majority of the electorate does not want them and oftentimes, they have better things to do, such as pursue private wealth.

This seems like a very dismal conclusion from De Tocqueville. If this is the case, then perhaps we should stop reading Democracy in America. The United States is a representative democracy. If democracy does not encourage good people to enter public service as representatives, then it seems as though democracy has no chance of succeeding.

However, it’s important to keep reading. Remember the beginning of the chapter. De Tocqueville likes to make brash statements which catch the attention of a reader. His style is similar to a top-selling thriller writer, who ends each chapter with a scary cliffhanger.

The first sentence of the next section indicates De Tocqueville is about to shift gears. He begins with this pronouncement: “When great perils threaten the state, one often sees the people fortunately choose the most appropriate citizens to save it” (190).

Wait one second! Didn’t De Tocqueville just argue that a problem of democracy is that its citizens don’t choose “remarkable men” for office? This is why De Tocqueville can be puzzling at times. He likes to make bold observations, and then provide counter arguments.

De Tocqueville has at least three caveats to offer, which challenge his pronouncement that representative democracy is endangered. First, when difficult circumstances present themselves, De Tocqueville argues that citizens in a democracy tend to select the best people to lead. This is a big qualification to his earlier argument. After all, the most critical time for a democracy to select the best people is during a crisis. If democracies succeed in picking qualified leaders at these moments, then much of the earlier concerns noted by De Tocqueville may not be valid.

Second, the “mores” (or culture) of a location affect the quality of government (191). De Tocqueville viewed the New England states as the best prepared in this regard, largely because they are the oldest functioning democracies in the United States (191). They’ve had more years to practice democracy, and as it turns out, they’ve gotten better at it over time. This seems a temporary problem, which should resolve as democracies age.

Lastly, De Tocqueville argues that America’s constitutional design is also helpful. While the House of Representatives attracts less distinguished individuals, the Senate is elevated in its membership and rejects “small passions” that can frustrate the public good (192). The bicameral legislative structure seems to mitigate some of the bigger worries De Tocqueville had about representative democracy.

So, which argument is correct? Is it the first notion that democracy frustrates or inhibits the selection of qualified citizens for public office, thus dooming it to failure? Or can we find hope in the second argument, which offers a much more positive assessment about democracy’s future?

Of course, that is why De Tocqueville is such a complicated thinker about democracy. He doesn’t provide all the answers. It’s up to you, the careful reader, to decide. De Tocqueville wants you to keep reading, and to apply your knowledge of history to evaluate his observations.

Remember, De Tocqueville wrote the first volume of Democracy in America in 1835. He could only study and observe about fifty years of American history to frame his opinions. Now, the United States has been a democracy for five times longer than that. This makes studying De Tocqueville today more relevant and compelling than ever.

 

Dr. Colleen Shogan, 11th Archivist of the United States

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Essay 24: On Political Association in the United States (Vol. 1 Pt. 2 Ch.4) of Democracy in America by Alexis De Tocqueville

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Guest Essayist: Michael C. Maibach


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Essay Read by Constituting America Founder, Actress Janine Turner


Alexis de Tocqueville On Political Association in the United States:

By Michael C. Maibach

In Democracy in America, De Tocqueville dedicates a chapter to “Political Association in the United States.” “The right of association is an English import, and has existed in America since the beginning… Of all the countries in the world, America has taken greatest advantage of association and has applied this powerful means of action to the greatest variety of objectives…

[The American] learns from birth that he must rely on himself to struggle against the evils and obstacles of life.” De Tocqueville has come from the Age of Aristocracy to visit the new Age of Equality. Here he found gone the safeguards of royal order, social standing, and the family name. In this classless society “In the United States, they associate for the goals of public security, commerce and industry, morality, and religion.” De Tocqueville coins the word “individualism” when writing of America. That word alone explains the deep desire of Americans to form voluntary leagues of all manner and size – what Burke called “little platoons.”

“After the press, association is the great means that parties use to get into public affairs to gain the majority. In America, the freedom of association for political ends is unlimited… An association consists of public support by individuals to a doctrine and the promise… of making those doctrines prevail.” Free speech engenders free association, which engenders the freedom of assembly. “There, men see each other; the means of action combine; opinions are expressed with the force and heat that written thought can never attain.” From assembly, parties may be formed – like a nation inside a nation. And it is parties who elect to office those who will make the changes around which all this gathering has inspired.

In America, he writes, political assemblies “do not have… the right to make laws; but they have the power to attack the one that exists and to formulate in advance the one that should exist.” American assemblies exist to lead opinions to change, not to force change through the violence of the mob. “In America, there are factious persons, but no conspirators.” His example is the 1831 Philadelphia convention convened around the Nullification Crisis. While Americans did not turn to violence then, it was ironically a forerunner to the Civil War of 1860 when political assemblies so sharply divided did come to blows.

De Tocqueville writes, “In America associations can never pretend to represent the majority; they only aim to convince it. They do not want to act, but to persuade; in that they are different from the political associations of Europe.” Why? “Of all the causes that cooperate in the United States to moderate the violence of political association, perhaps the most powerful is universal suffrage.” Because male citizens could cast a vote, those elected to office had a deep legitimacy under the designs of the Constitution. “In countries where universal suffrage is accepted, the majority is never doubtful.” The loyal opposition can write, debate, associate and assemble – but using force is never justified given the basic fairness of universal suffrage. “In America, the purpose of associations is to convince and not to compel.”

In sharp contrast, De Tocqueville writes that “In Europe, there are almost no associations that do not claim that they represent the will of the majority… Most Europeans still see in association a weapon of war… the thought of acting next preoccupies all minds. An association does not want to convince, but to fight… In Europe, associations consider themselves in a way as the legislative and executive council of the nation, which itself cannot raise its voice; starting from this idea, they act and command. In America, where in the eyes of all they represent only a minority of the nation, they speak and petition,” not act.

In summary, De Tocqueville’s thesis is that America’s universal suffrage – the idea of free and fair elections – has the great benefit of creating “the loyal opposition” we see in our political assemblies. They talk, assemble, petition, and campaign… they do not tear down the house. They do not turn to violence or law breaking.

But all of this could be at risk today. Americans’ faith in universal suffrage, in “election integrity” has become a significant issue for our Nation. Until a few years ago US election practices did not include ‘early voting,’ ‘ballot harvesting,’ ‘drop boxes’… and the repeal of voter ID requirements. In Virginia we have gone from Election Day to 145 days of early voting! Party poll watchers can monitor voting on Election Day. It is simply impossible for any party to monitor the polls for 145 days.

De Tocqueville closes by writing – “There are no countries where associations are more necessary to prevent the despotism of parties or the arbitrariness of the prince than those in which the social state is democratic. In aristocratic nations, secondary bodies form natural associations that halt abuses of power. In countries where such associations do not exist…a great people can be oppressed with impunity by a handful of factious persons or by one man.” Considering this, America cannot afford to have the mainstay of our faith in self-government undermined by radical, non-transparent election reforms combined with open borders. At some point public trust in our political system will be lost.

 

Michael C. Maibach is a Trustee and Managing Director of the James Wilson Institute and a Distinguished Fellow On American Federalism at Save Our States.

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Essay 23: Freedom of the Press in the United States (Vol. 1 Pt. 2 Ch. 3) of Democracy in America by Alexis De Tocqueville

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Guest Essayist: George Landrith

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Essay Read by Constituting America Founder, Actress Janine Turner

 

Freedom of the Press in the United States
By George Landrith, President, Frontiers of Freedom Institute

Our Founding Fathers saw freedom of the press as a foundational element of being a free and sovereign people. They had seen Redcoats arrest writers and destroy printing presses used to publish papers that were critical of Parliament and the Crown. So they made sure that our First Amendment specifically prohibited the government from abridging the freedom of the press and of speech.

De Tocqueville, a Frenchmen, came to study and analyze democracy in America and what made it work. His seminal work was the book – Democracy in America which he published in 1835. Not surprisingly, it includes an extensive discussion of freedom of the press.

De Tocqueville acknowledged that freedom of the press might be abused at times, but he also understood that freedom of the press, even with its imperfections, prevents great evils of abusive government power used to control and manipulate the people. He grasped that a choice between government censorship and a free press was actually a choice between servitude and independence. And like our Founders, De Tocqueville came down on the side of independence and individual liberty.

One of De Tocqueville’s observations was that in France, the newspapers were highly centralized whereas in America newspapers were dispersed, numerous and local. In America, nearly anyone could start their own newspaper or publication and could argue for the proposals or solutions that he or she thought best. Because of this freedom of the press, political information was widely available throughout the entire nation and covered many different perspectives. Thus, the American public was able to debate and evaluate the various political issues and in many cases come to a national consensus after a robust national debate. The wide array of newspapers and publications that enjoyed the freedom of the press played an important part in this national debate.

Among a free and sovereign people, determining what is true is our job. And we need a full spectrum of information and a robust debate to help us determine what is truth versus what is misinformation. The First Amendment’s free speech and free press protections are the best way to be sure we can decipher fact from fiction and truth from lies. Censorship has proven over hundreds of years to be a poor method for arriving at truth. Our founder’s believed this and interestingly, De Tocqueville came to a similar conclusion.

A brief review or comparison of societies across the globe throughout history reveals a great deal. Every totalitarian dictator in modern history has used censorship to empower themselves and to control and subjugate the masses. No dictator in modern history has protected the right of his political adversaries to express their views. Instead, the expression of dissent is seen as an act of treason and merely disagreeing with those in power can result in punishment.

As an inspired break from this trend of using censorship to control the masses, our Founders guaranteed that we could express our dissent and we could even peaceably assemble with the express purpose of stating our disagreement with the government’s actions.

Both our Founders and De Tocqueville wisely understood that we cannot hope to be a free and prosperous people if freedom of speech and the press is only allowed if the content is approved of by those in positions of government power. And we should never base our approval on the concept of a free press on whether we agree with the content.

I am confronted regularly with ideas and content that I believe to be wrong-headed, but its value is that it facilitates a robust public debate and that debate is an important foundational element of our nation’s freedom and strength. Even if I strongly disagree with the writer’s perspective, the answer is to honestly and fairly critique their argument and explain its errors and provide a better option. But it isn’t helpful to seek to silence them simply because we believe them to be wrong.

Another Frenchman, Voltaire, was quoted by his biographer, Evelyn Beatrice Hall, as having said, “I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.” This is very much inline with the views of our Founders and De Tocqueville.

If we believe in freedom of the press only for those with whom we agree, then we don’t really believe in freedom of the press. Freedom of the press plays a fundamental role in a self-governing society where the people enjoy freedom. If we allow freedom of speech or the press to be eroded, the foundations of our liberty will also be eroded. So being pro-freedom of the press is simply being for American foundations of liberty and against government with totalitarian instincts. We can thank De Tocqueville for his keen powers of observation and analysis in Democracy in America.

George Landrith is the President of Frontiers of Freedom Institute – a public policy think tank devoted to promoting freedom, the Constitution, the rule of law, a strong national defense, free markets, and individual liberty. Mr. Landrith is a graduate of the University of Virginia School of Law, where he was the Business Editor of the Virginia Journal of Law and Politics. He is admitted to the bar in Virginia and California and is also a member of the United States Supreme Court bar. As an adjunct professor at the George Mason School of Law, he taught constitutional law and appellate advocacy.

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Essay 22: Parties In The United States (Vol. 1 Pt. 2 Ch. 2) of Democracy in America by Alexis De Tocqueville

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Guest Essayist: Horace Cooper

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Essay Read by Constituting America Founder, Actress Janine Turner

 

On Parties in the United States

De Tocqueville offers trenchant analysis of the political parties in the US at the dawn of the 19th Century.

At the time of his writing there was one large party that was dominant – the Republican Democratic party which ultimately came to be called the Democratic party. This party had managed to outmaneuver and outlive the Federalist Party and the Whigs.

In fact, today the so-called Democratic party is the oldest continuously existing party in American history. Founded in 1828, it is also the oldest political party in the world.

According to De Tocqueville, the longevity of this party isn’t a sign of its greatness, but, counter intuitively, a sign of its smallness.

To appreciate this insight, one has to understand De Tocqueville’s understanding of political parties.

He divided them into two categories – great and small. He wasn’t referring to size, instead he was talking about philosophy and impact.

Great parties are motivated by principles rather than by specific conflicts or disagreements. Great parties promote the interests of the whole nation rather than appealing to subset groups within.

In his view the then dead Federalist Party was in fact great. It was populated by some of the most prominent members of society and importantly of the Revolutionary War. Men like John Adams, Alexander Hamilton and John Jay.

These individuals and others like them had served in key roles during the War of Independence against Great Britain as well as within the first government set up by our Constitution.

In fact, many of these individuals were instrumental in the creation of the government in both drafting, and selling it to the American people.

Even after its collapse the Federalist party has had a lasting impact on the American system by laying the foundations for having a national economy, promoting the acceptance of a national judicial system and formulating principles of foreign policy.

In contrast, the Democratic party was viewed by De Tocqueville as a “small” party. Its issues agitate rather than support the broader society. Small parties he argues lack a political faith – that is remain constant on a principle regardless of circumstance. A small party is “stamped with a selfishness that shows openly in each of their acts.” De Tocqueville uses the National Bank as an example of the distinction between “great” and “Small” parties. He argues that the “enlightened classes” are generally in favor of the National Bank and the population at large are not.

Rather than focus on the benefits and costs of the National Bank – which was created by the Federalist party with that in mind – the Democrats used its unpopularity with the public as a wedge to have it eliminated.

This choice by a small party may help it succeed in the short run, but in the long run may not be great for society.

Remember, the National Bank was set up as a means of dealing with the war debt and to help fund the government’s other debts. It was empowered to issue currency as well.

Ironically, though the Democrats were successful in ending the charter of the National Bank in 1811, by 1816 a new national bank had to be created for many of the same reasons as before – this time the War of 1812.

However, even that Bank was ultimately killed by the Democrats. Nearly 100 years would pass before the Federal Reserve was created in 1912. Ironically another Democrat would sign the law creating the Federal Reserve (a national banking system) after the concept had been killed by a Democrat – Andrew Jackson in 1836.

If nothing else, the same political party could ultimately be on opposite sides of the national banking issue, demonstrating De Tocqueville’s point.

De Tocqueville claims that “great” parties try to unite the interests of the country while “small” ones carelessly divide them. In this case he uses the divide between the wealthy and the rest of the population as an example.

Whereas the Federalists supported laws that sought to protect the interests of all the citizens of the US as a “great” party would do, the Democrats sought to pit the broader American society against the wealthy.

In fact, this willingness to look at the broader impact of national policy led to the Federalist party not being nationally popular, according to De Tocqueville.

Only because the national government was so limited in its authority did this phenomenon not create great havoc in the first 100 years of America’s existence. But by the start of the 20th as the federal government expanded its authority, this wedge proved quite powerful in allowing for the creation of greater taxation and business regulation – the super regulatory state that exists today.

Whether political parties are “small” or “great” they still serve a useful purpose. De Tocqueville says that political parties are an “inherent evil” as they provide a constructive way for “factions” to compete with one another. In contrast, without parties there is the inherent risk that “rival nations” form within a given country and when those rivals are unable to resolve their differences then a civil war becomes likely.

While De Tocqueville made his observations nearly 3 decades before the US Civil War, his insights were quite profound. Many of the conflicts that the Federalists recognized – the importance of America being a thriving commercial republic vs an agrarian one, the broader goal of citizen equality (including blacks), and the benefits of limited government – were ultimately unable to be permanently resolved without military conflict.

Even though he had hoped that the competition among parties would allay conflict, his observations have largely held true.

Though today political parties may not be “great” their existence creates a way for Americans to work through their differences without physical force. Like them or not, for De Tocqueville that is a ringing endorsement for their existence.


Horace Cooper is a writer and legal commentator. He has appeared on CNN, MSNBC and Fox as well as in a variety of print publications. He is also a Research Fellow with the National Center for Public Policy Research, a Senior Fellow with the Heartland Institute and the Director of Law and Regulation at the Institute for Liberty.

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Essay 21: Why It Can Be Firmly Stated That In The United States It Is The People Who Govern

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Guest Essayist: Peter Roff

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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 page 165 of this edition of Democracy in America.

It is important to remember that De Tocqueville’s masterwork was published early in the 19th century. It is a collection of observations about an America vastly different from the one in which we now live.

While some of De Tocqueville’s observations are truisms, holding true then, now, and always, it is only by approaching others while acknowledging the emergence of the modern liberal welfare state that we can see how far the nation has moved from its “small d” democratic roots.

Chief among these enduring notions is the concept of America as a self-governing people. De Tocqueville’s words in Chapter 1, Part 2 of Volume 1 of Democracy in America still resonate. The people are sovereign, wielding the ultimate authority over the state. They elect representatives to voice their concerns at the federal, state, and local levels in the executive, legislative, and sometimes even in the judicial capacity, a living testament to the enduring relevance of De Tocqueville’s observations.

With a few caveats, the system studied by De Tocqueville has weathered well most of the storms of the last two and a half centuries. The franchise has been expanded to the point that every law-abiding American citizen is eligible to participate in the electoral process, serve on juries, and be part of national, regional, and local governance. This evolution is a testament to the dynamic nature of our governance system.

That is not to say, however, that the Constitution upon which it is based is, as many like to argue, “a living breathing document that must keep up with the times.” It is foundational to the American system, “saying what it means and meaning what it says” as more than one pundit has said. The system changed because the people arguably wanted those changes and voted for them.
Consider the popular movement that brought about the direct election of senators. It was proposed and adopted through a constitutional amendment as an anti-corruption measure without much consideration being given to how it would abolish the institutional tensions purposely established between the states and the federal government.

It would be wrong to fault De Tocqueville for failing to anticipate changes that allowed the government to grow in size, authority, and power. The system we have now, which began to take shape under Woodrow Wilson and grew exponentially under FDR’s New Deal, LBJ’s Great Society, and the administration of the current president, takes it upon itself to fulfill many of the valuable and volunteer functions cited by Democracy In America as essential to American character and different from what could be found at the time in Europe.
What the voters, through their representatives, put in, they should be able to remove, again through their representatives. That this has not happened, even with the best efforts of presidents like Calvin Coolidge, Ronald Reagan, and Donald Trump, is a testament to the growth in the power of political parties and special interests, as De Tocqueville discusses later in Part 2 of Volume 1.

Nonetheless, the people still govern. They still have the ultimate authority because they still have the franchise. The agents of the administrative state often attempt to overlook that fact, as do members of the judiciary who frequently substitute their own interpretation, not just of the laws passed by Congress and the regulations issued by the Executive Branch and the plethora of independent agencies that populate the nation’s capital, but of the U.S. Constitution itself.

All that can be undone by the people should they choose to be serious once again about their liberty. It will be a costly enterprise, difficult to achieve unless common ground can be found among the badly polarized factions of the American populace that the vision of the nation as recorded by De Tocqueville is superior to what we now have. Without unity on that point, factionalism will expand, partisanship will increase, and the divide of people living side by side will grow.

 

Peter Roff is a contributing editor at Newsweek and a Senior Fellow at several Washington-based public policy organizations.

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Essay 20: Tocqueville on the Distinctiveness of American Federalism – Volume 1 Part 1 Chapter 8

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Guest Essayist: Joseph M. Knippenberg


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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 154 (starting at heading What Keeps The Federal System From Being Within Reach of All Peoples) – 161 of this edition of Democracy in America.

Tocqueville on the Distinctiveness of American Federalism (Democracy in America, Book I, ch. 8)

De Tocqueville’s discussion of “What Keeps the Federal System from Being within Reach of All Peoples” is a penetrating and challenging meditation on a certain kind of American exceptionalism. It is at once a tribute to the genius of the American Founders and to the enlightenment of the people for whom they legislated, and a profound appreciation of the serendipitous contribution of geography—America’s great distance from the European powers—to the success of their undertaking.

De Tocqueville identifies two vices inherent in every federal system—“the complication of the means it employs” and the “relative weakness” of the central (i.e., national, or as we say, federal) government. The first, he says, is “most visible,” while the second is “most fatal.”

The complexity has to do with the distribution of sovereignty between two levels of government, each operating directly on the people and each supreme within its limited sphere. This, De Tocqueville emphatically avers, is “conventional and artificial,” that is, not natural. What’s natural is for people to be governed by one source of power, to look to one capital as both the center of authority and the center of loyalty and affection. To undertake the careful discrimination between which government has authority to do what, to discern the limits of both state and federal government in their respective spheres, requires “a people long habituated to directing its affairs by itself, and in which political science has descended to the last ranks of society.”

Are we still capable of this? Our tendency to expect or seek national uniformity in legislation and policy, our impatience with the political and cultural diversity of the states, and our complaints about the “undemocratic” character of both the Senate and the Electoral College, certainly suggest that many of us have lost sight of the genius and subtlety of the original design.

De Tocqueville’s account of the weakness of the central government follows from what he believes about the naturalness of unitary government. Our national government is, he says, “a work of art,” the product of our constitutional design. For most of us, most of the time, it is a remote abstraction. On the other hand, “the sovereignty of the states in a way envelops each citizen… It takes charge of guaranteeing his property, his freedom, his life; at every moment it influences his well-being or his misery.” Indeed, he continues, this sovereignty depends on “all the things that render the instinct for one’s native country so powerful in the heart of man.”

To be sure, especially in times of international crisis, we need a strong central government, capable of defending us from adversaries. Our states by themselves are too small and too weak to meet the exigencies of such a moment. De Tocqueville describes an almost fateful choice between a weak government that leads to defeat and domination and a strong government that prevails only by becoming despotic.

It was America’s great fortune, he wrote in 1835, to have the Atlantic Ocean between it and the European powers, a natural defensive barrier that remedied the defects of a relatively weak central government and obviated the need for a strong one.

Now, we haven’t enjoyed this luxury since the end of World War II and the beginning of the Nuclear Age. Despite America’s status as a superpower, it remains vulnerable to other nuclear powers and to asymmetric threats (such as terrorism) from rogue states and non-governmental actors like al Qaeda and ISIS.

According to De Tocqueville’s prescient analysis, such a situation would seem to call for a strong central government, with its concurrent temptations to abuse and oppression, i.e., to despotism. We might then, in a sense, be forgiven for our own almost natural inclination to abandon federalism, paying attention to the federal government, rather than to the states.

But De Tocqueville’s argument suggests that we do so at our peril. As he argues elsewhere in Democracy in America (see, for example, Vol. I, ch. 5, on townships and on administrative decentralization), the scope of local and state politics matches both our imaginations and our concrete interests. The more distant and abstract those interests are (as in national policy matters), the less efficacious and engaged we tend to be, and the more abstract and ideological our positions tend to be. It would not surprise De Tocqueville at all for a largely national political scene to be dominated by hyper-ideological elites, which seems like an apt description of our current situation.

As I suggested at the outset, his remedy for this situation is to see to it that “political science [descends] to the last ranks of society,” so that we understand the vital role played by the states in our federal system. This is not just a matter of fidelity to a Constitution that has been in place for almost 240 years, but of informed allegiance to a political arrangement that engages our interest, protects our rights, and provides the basis for the kinds of political interactions where fellow citizens on opposite sides of an issue can work together to find a common ground.

Joseph M. Knippenberg is Professor of Politics at Oglethorpe University in Brookhaven, GA, where he has taught since 1985.

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Essay 19: Federalism and Democracy – Volume 1 Part 1 Chapter 8 Sub Chapters 22

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Guest Essayist: Will Morrisey

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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 149 (starting at On the Advantages of the Federal system Generally and its special Utility for America) – 154 (stopping at heading What Keeps The Federal System From Being Within Reach of All Peoples) of this edition of Democracy in America.

In order to construct modern, centralized states on the model advocated by Machiavelli, European monarchs weakened the aristocratic class, which had ruled the feudal states, characterized by weak monarchs and powerful landlords. Weak aristocracies meant increasingly egalitarian civil societies beneath the modern states, whether their regimes were monarchic or republican. For De Tocqueville, ‘democracy’ is not itself a regime, and equality is neither a natural or legal right; democracy is a social condition, one that must be understood clearly if it does not descend into despotism. As the most thoroughly democratized society in the world in the 1830s (this, despite slavery), America fascinated the young French aristocrat, living in the aftermath of the debacle of the French republicanism in the 1790s and of French monarchy in the 1780s and again in the Napoleonic Wars.

Differing from feudal states in their degree of centralization, modern states also differed from ancient city-states in size, being far larger in both territory and population. In small states, De Tocqueville remarks, “the eye of society penetrates everywhere” (as the song advises, “don’t try that in a small town”), ambitions modest (no Napoleon has arisen from Slovenia). In small states, “internal well-being” is prized more than “the vain smoke of glory.” Manners and morals are “simple and peaceful,” inequality of wealth less pronounced. Political freedom is the “natural condition” of small states; in all times, antiquity (Athens) and modernity (Switzerland), “small nations have been cradles of political freedom.”

They lose that freedom on those rare occasions when they do muster the power to expand. “The history of the world does not furnish an example of a great nation that has long remained a republic,” whether the nation is ancient Rome or modern France. That is because “all the passions fatal to republics grow with the extent of territory, whereas the virtues that serve as their support do not increase in the same measure.” The gulf between rich and poor widens; great cities arise, with their “depravity of morals”; individuals become less patriotic, more selfish. This is worse for republican regimes than for monarchies, as republics depend upon popular virtue while monarchy “makes use of the people and does not depend on them.” In sum, “nothing is so contrary to the well-being and freedom of men as great empires.”

This notwithstanding, “great states” enjoy some substantial advantages. Their cities are “like vast intellectual centers,” where “ideas circulate more freely” than in the more censorious atmosphere of small communities. The people are safer from invasion, since the borders are remote from much of the population. Above all, great states wield greater force than small states, which is “one of the first conditions of happiness and even existence for nations.” De Tocqueville “[does] not know of a condition more deplorable than that of a people that cannot defend itself or be self-sufficient.”

What, then, shall republican legislators do? The American Founders took the recommendation of Montesquieu: federalism, which (as Publius argues in the tenth Federalist), permits Americans to live in an “extended” republic, one that can preserve the virtues needed for republicanism while enjoying the advantages of a large modern state. While the Congress “regulates the principal actions of social existence,” it leaves administrative details to the “provincial legislatures.” [1] In a democratic republic, the people are sovereign; in the United States, the people have divided their sovereignty between the federal government and the “provinces” or states. The federal government attends to the general welfare of the nation, but can only act through specific, enumerated powers set down in the Constitution. It can reach into the states and rule their citizens directly, but not in all, and indeed not in most, things.

This is what allows democracy or civil-social equality to ‘work’ in the United States. Because the federal government organizes American foreign policy, the states need not take on the expense or the effort to defend themselves and so can concentrate their energies on internal improvements, just as small political communities are inclined to do. This spirit of economic enterprise is enhanced by the Constitutional prohibition of tariffs among the states, which makes America into a vast free-trade zone. The spirit of economic enterprise itself redirects ambitions toward peaceful commerce and away from military glory, the passion of aristocrats. Americans thereby unite “the zeal of citizens” with their self-interest. With no arms to purchase and no wars to sustain, among state politicians “ambition for power makes way for love of well-being, a more vulgar but less dangerous passion” than the love of glory, the passion of aristocrats. “Vulgar” means not-noble, not aristocratic but democratic. Federalism thus reinforces the democratic republican regime, unlike in the South American republics of the time, where republicanism extended over large territories but under centralized governments. In the federal republic of the United States, “the public spirit of the Union itself is in a way only a summation of provincial patriotism.” Combining civic participation with the spirit of commercial enterprise, Americans unite “the zeal of citizens” with economic self-interest, each passion moderating the other.

Thanks to the wisdom of the Framers of the United States Constitution, “the Union is a great republic in extent; but one could in a way liken it to a small republic because the objects with which its government is occupied are few.” The federal government exercises substantial power but in a manner “not dangerous to freedom” because, unlike a fully centralized government, it does not “excite those immoderate desires for power and attention that are so fatal to great republics,” whether in ancient Rome, modern France, or modern Brazil. Such desires that do arise “break against the individual interests and passions of the states,” jealous defenders of their own share of the popular sovereignty.

In the civil society of American democracy within a federal system, “the Union is free and happy like a small nation, glorious and strong like a great one.”


Note:
De Tocqueville uses the term “provincial” rather than “state” because his European readers associate statehood with sovereignty, which American states have only in part.



Will Morrisey holds the William and Patricia LaMothe Chair in the United States Constitution at Hillsdale College, Hillsdale, Michigan, where he has taught since 2000.

 

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Essay 18: On The Federal Constitution – Volume 1 Part 1 Chapter 8 Sub Chapter 21

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Guest Essayist: Marc A. Clauson

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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 146 (starting at heading “What Distinguishes the Constitution of the United States of America from all other Federal Constitutions – 149 (stopping at On the Advantages of the Federal system Generally and its special Utility for America) of this edition of Democracy in America.

The French writer De Tocqueville traveled in and wrote about the culture and politics of the new American Republic between 1835 and 1840. His work has become a classic of political thought and is considered one of the most insightful analyses of the early Republic and its institutions. Democracy in America is De Tocqueville’s most important work, particularly for our consideration of the Constitution.

The question in subchapter 21 is a crucial one, even in current discourse on the Constitution. De Tocqueville asks what makes the American Constitution different from other constitutions. In his day, the American version was certainly not the only constitution in effect (even less so today). In addition, several elements set the American compact apart from other similar documents, such as Poland and France. De Tocqueville focuses on one aspect—a very important one. As he explains it, the most unique innovation of the American Constitution is that, unlike the previous Articles of Confederation, whose provisions only allowed the national government to operate on state governments as a whole, the new compact’s provisions operated directly on citizens of each state. Before, the state governments could, and sometimes did, simply refuse to follow laws enacted by Congress based on its powers. As De Tocqueville writes, “In America, the Union has, not states, but plain citizens, for those governed.” The new Constitution bypasses the states in the exercise of its enumerated powers.

This innovation might at first seem somewhat insignificant. But if one remembers the previous regime, it was the very problem of the inability of the Congress to enforce its powers that threatened the survival of the new republic. This flaw (at least in large part) drove the Constitutional Convention to take drastic action in devising a wholly new social compact. Even assuming common interests existed among the entire population and across all or most states, the possibility that each time Congress attempted to enforce its agreed-upon powers could lead to defiance on the part of even one state, and could inevitably incentivize more states to ignore the national government. The entire confederation might disintegrate.

Vincent Ostrom has elaborated on the political theory underlying the American Founders’ innovation, beginning with the foundational idea that “people as individual persons are the fundamental units to be considered in organizing any political association…The individual person is the doer of acts. The way each individual as a person relates himself to others is the basis of all social organization.” The fundamental reason for the existence of government is to establish order among individuals. Collectivities as a whole cannot make such decisions apart from the individuals constituting them. Moreover, individuals as individuals are the recipients of political order, as a given law or policy does not fall on an abstract entity called a state, but on natural humans, notwithstanding the occasional legal attribution of some corporate entities as legal persons. Even a decision affecting a corporation in the first instance eventually affects the individuals related to that corporation, not the “thing” called a corporation—for example, employees and consumers.

In addition, De Tocqueville and the American Founders recognized that laws needed to be enforced to be effective. But under the previous Articles of Confederation, sanctions amounted only to advice or suggestions. To be effective, laws had to be enforceable as against individuals, the actual actors. Without the design of the Founders, the very idea of a government and its goal would be thwarted, to the detriment of the citizens. Once again, one can see the uniqueness of the American Constitution. It would not be an overstatement to assert that the American constitutional system would not work, in fact, might collapse, without this innovation added by the Founders.

Marc A. Clauson is Professor of History, Law and Political Economy and Professor in Honors at Cedarville University. Marc holds a PhD from the University of the Orange Free State, SA, Intellectual History and Polity); JD (West Virginia University College of Law, Jurisprudence); MA, ThM (Liberty University, New Testament Studies and Church History); MA (Marshall University, Political Science); BS (Marshall University, Physics); and PhD work (West Virginia University, Economic Theory).

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Essay 17: On The Federal Constitution – Volume 1 Part 1 Chapter 8 Sub Chapter 20

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Guest Essayist: Adam Carrington

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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 143 – 146 (stop at heading What Distinguishes the Constitution of the United States of America from all other Federal Constitutions) of this edition of Democracy in America.

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In this section of Democracy in America, De Tocqueville claims that the national constitution is superior to those found in the states. In making this case, he points to a broader purpose of his project.

As he stated early in the work, De Tocqueville thinks that a general movement toward democratic forms of government are inevitable, part of a Providential movement in history. Yet he believes humans possess the ability to make their democracies better or worse. Here, he notes two problems democracies tend to face. Both he claims the national constitution combats better than its state counterparts.

First, De Tocqueville writes that one danger for democracies is the possibility of “[t]he complete enslavement of the legislative power to the will of the electoral body.” One might think this point is a good thing, a feature, not a bug. Should not the lawmakers in a popular government follow the will of the people, who by definition are the sovereign in such regimes?

De Tocqueville does not deny the ultimate sovereignty of the people. But he wants the people to exercise their rule in the most thoughtful, moderate, and just way possible. The people do so best through representatives who themselves possess some ability to lead and thus to mold popular opinion rather than merely follow it. This balance, wherein the representatives truly represent but do so with some room to persuade, depends in large part on the terms of office lawmakers hold.

In the states, the lawmakers tend to hold one to two year terms, De Tocqueville notes. This made the representatives constantly dependent on the immediate, short-term views of the people. In that mode, the people could be prejudiced, passionate, and irrational, as all persons can be at certain points in life. The national constitution established longer terms—two years for the House and six for the Senate—with the idea that, “lengthened the time of the electoral mandate to allow to the deputy a greater use of his free will.” With some space between elections, lawmakers had some time to persuade voters, to appeal to their more settled, rational, and longer-term interests. That space would increase the chances of justice being served, not the mighty feeding on the weak.

Second, the French thinker states that democracies tend to result in “[t]he concentration, in the legislative power, of all the other powers of government.” The Americans had learned from another Frenchman, Montesquieu, that political power was by nature legislative, executive, or judicial and that free governments divided these tasks among distinct institutions. To combine them descended into tyranny, even if it was the people themselves combining the power.

But state constitutions had proven woefully inadequate in realizing the truth about separation of powers. Though having such a distinction on paper, the legislative power tended to dominate in practice; executives and judges became the puppets of the lawmakers. The national constitution reacted to these problems with a better structure.

The president as national executive would have a four year term, thus giving him the independence that came with length of office. Moreover, the legislature could not coerce him to act in certain ways by diminishing or eliminating his salary. Finally, De Tocqueville points to the veto, whereby the president could stop legislative attempts to minimize or eliminate his inherent constitutional powers.

Other guards existed for the judiciary. They, too, would have salary protections. But instead of a four-year term, the judges, once appointed, held their positions for life absent willing resignation or the difficult process of impeachment and removal. These judges need not succumb to legislative control but instead could exercise their own powers in ways that furthered their purpose and checked overreaches from other branches.

Taken together, De Tocqueville says the clear result was that, “the affairs of the Union are infinitely better conducted than the particular affairs of any state.” By this claim he meant the national government operated in a more moderate, wise, intelligent, stable, and firm manner. Doing so was about much more than simple efficiency. De Tocqueville saw in the national constitution mechanisms that preserved the people’s liberty against its many foes. The national constitution channeled decision-making the exercise of power in ways more likely to result in justice.

We would be wise to listen to De Tocqueville’s wise observations. It not only will make us better students of our own country. It might make us better citizens of it here and now.

Adam M. Carrington is Associate Professor of Political Science at Ashland University, teaching courses on U.S. political institutions and the intersection of faith and political thought. Previously, he taught in The Van Andel Graduate School of Statesmanship at Hillsdale College, focusing on the U.S. Constitution, Constitutional Law, The American Presidency, and Politics & Literature. His writing has appeared in such popular forums as The Wall Street Journal, The Hill, National Review, and Washington Examiner. His book on the jurisprudence of Justice Stephen Field was published in 2017 by Lexington. Carrington received his B.A. from Ashland University and his M.A. and Ph.D. from Baylor University. He lives in Hillsdale with his wife and their two daughters.

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Essay 16: On The Federal Constitution – Volume 1 Part 1 Chapter 8 Sub Chapters 15-19

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Guest Essayist: Eric Wise

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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 130 – 143 of this edition of Democracy in America.

Please leave a comment in the blog below and automatically be entered in our weekly drawing for a free copy of the book!

 

On The Federal Constitution – Volume 1 Part 1 Chapter 8 Sub Chapters 15-19

“In the hands of seven federal judges rest ceaselessly the peace, the prosperity, the very existence of the Union. Without them, the Constitution is a dead letter…”

– Alexis De Tocqueville

 

The great observer of the American regime is Alexis De Tocqueville. An observer is most often distinct from a participant. De Tocqueville sees America from the outside.

But to say he sees America from the outside is insufficient. We are invited to ask from what vantage point of the outside does De Tocqueville observe.

It would be easy to conclude he observes from another great young democracy, France. After all, his subject, democracy in America, suggests that democracy is going on somewhere else.

Democracy in America was first published in 1835. This is the period of the July Monarchy in France, which began with the overthrow of one Bourbon monarch, Charles X, to replace him with another Bourbon monarch, Louis Phillipe. De Tocqueville could have accurately titled his book Democracy Today, given that democracy in America was at that time the only democracy game in town.

Why digress so? Because in reading De Tocqueville it helps to understand that, as astute an observer as he is, he is in fact an alien to the system in America. De Tocqueville truly knows only monarchy.

In this spirit he writes, “a federal government ought more than any other to desire to obtain the support of justice, because in its nature it is weaker, and one can more easily organize resistance against it.” Is this observation made because for an observer looking down from a monarchical perch, that is how the American system appears?

“In America, they have put this theory into practice. The Supreme Court of the United States is the sole, unique tribunal of the nation,” writes De Tocqueville. “Sole” reminds us of the root “mono”, which is one half the root of “monarchy”, which means rule of one. This idea foreshadows a potential corruption of the institutions of the United States, which we will get to later.

Let’s look at De Tocqueville’s perspective and then at the possible corruption.

De Tocqueville appreciates how the United States’ federal government and the United States’ state governments are both ground up institutions. That is, each part of the federal system represents delegations of sovereign authority from people to the government. The people of each state lend certain aspects of their sovereignty to the state governments, and the people of the United States lend their sovereignty collectively to the United States.

As De Tocqueville wrote, “The first question which awaited the Americans … was so to divide the authority of the different States…, whilst the entire nation, represented by the Union, should continue to form a compact body, and to provide for the general exigencies of the people.”

This sense of the sovereignty of individuals, which is the basis of consent in America, is bred in the bone. Perhaps the first instance of this practice occurs in Connecticut through the adoption of the Fundamental Orders of Connecticut without any reference to royal authority. As Thomas Hooker, a leading Puritan minister in New England, had said in 1638, well before Hobbes and Locke wrote any jot or tittle on the subject, “The foundation of authority is laid firstly in the free consent of the people.”

That ethos as reflected in the United States Constitution leads to dual sovereignties that are derivative of the sovereignty and consent of the people. With that dual sovereignty comes dual judicial systems, one state and one federal. And while De Tocqueville makes no mention of Puritans such as Hooker, he appears to understand this.

Thus De Tocqueville observes with interest that “It may easily be proved that the Union could not adapt the judicial power of the States….to enforce the laws of the Union by means of the tribunals of the States would be to allow not only foreign but partial judges to preside over the nation.”

But I venture an American of De Tocqueville’s time would have seen this procedurally requirement slightly differently, as they would not have admitted the possibility of a sole power precisely because there cannot be two sole powers, of course. If the sole power of the American regime is the consent of the people, then there is no room for judicial supremacy. De Tocqueville, one dares say, may have mistaken, ever so slightly, or as a modern man might say, subconsciously, the power of the Supreme Court with the power of a king.

This brings us to corruption. At the time De Tocqueville was writing the United States was experiencing a drought of new amendments to the Constitution, new affirmative and formal acts of consent, that began in 1804 and would not end until after the Civil War with the 13th Amendment. To fill the gap, the Supreme Court, after De Tocqueville, handed down the Dred Scott decision to settle once and for all a regime question that could only be resolved through the consent process. Justice Taney, the author of Dred Scott, assured a credulous President James Buchanan that the regime question of popular sovereignty set forth in his Dred Scott opinion, would put to rest the political instability over slavery that troubled the regime. Taney could scarcely have been more wrong.

Today we suffer from a similar drought of amendments, the last fully consummated and unified process for the 26th Amendment having been completed in 1971 (the 27th Amendment having been a drawn-out event that began as the Congressional Compensation Act of 1789). De Tocqueville might see the change as an example of the power of the Supreme Court analogous to a monarch. But from the perspective of an American participant it is hard to unsee it as the ebb of the true sole power in America, the people, which ought to be restored through a process like a convention of states, where the people of the United States might take on regime questions after the manner of the Founders, and in the manner the Founders intended, as reflected in Article V.

 

   J. Eric Wise is a partner in the law firm of Alston & Bird.

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Essay 15: On The Federal Constitution – Volume 1 Part 1 Chapter 8 Sub Chapters 11-14

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Guest Essayist: Tara Ross

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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 120 (starting at the heading “On The Election of the President”) through 130 (stopping at the heading “On The Federal Courts”) of this edition of Democracy in America.

American presidential elections have grown increasingly contentious in recent years—to say the least! Too many mistakenly blame the Electoral College, but Alexis de Tocqueville’s classic work, Democracy in America, offers a different perspective.

Indeed, his observations about American society in the early 1800s also included warnings that Americans should have heeded—but didn’t. No wonder presidential elections have become so acrimonious.

De Tocqueville, of course, lived at a time when countries around the world were (at least trying to) shake off monarchies, replacing them with elected leaders. Perhaps it’s unsurprising, then, that Democracy in America alludes to the change. A monarchy, with its relatively infrequent change in leadership, at least provides stability. Can a nation elect new leaders once every few years without too much disruption?

In general, De Tocqueville believes that elective systems undermine a nation’s stability, but he notes that this danger has been mitigated in America because presidential power is limited. To the contrary, “the preponderant power resides in the national representation as a whole,” De Tocqueville observes.

The modern American presidency, of course, looks nothing like the one that De Tocqueville studied in the 1830s.

A powerful President, De Tocqueville writes, makes for dangerous election seasons. One human being clawing for power is surrounded by others, also clawing for a piece of that power. “It is clear that the more prerogatives the executive power has,” De Tocqueville explains, “the greater the lure is; the more the ambition of the pretenders is excited, the more also it finds support in a crowd of [those with] secondary ambitions who hope to share in power after their candidate has triumphed.”

America during De Tocqueville’s lifetime didn’t have that problem. To the contrary, he marveled, “[n]o one has yet been encountered who cares to risk his honor and life to become president of the United States, because the president has only a temporary, limited, and dependent power.” The same applies to those who might otherwise want to help a candidate achieve the presidency. “The reason for this is simple,” De Tocqueville concludes, “having come to the head of the government, he can distribute to his friends neither much power nor much wealth nor much glory, and his influence in the state is too feeble for the factions to see their success or their ruin in his elevation to power.”

A too-powerful President can create other dangers, too, because the workings and direction of government become too dependent on a single individual. “The vaster the place that executive power occupies in the direction of affairs, the greater and more necessary its habitual action is,” De Tocqueville concludes, “and the more dangerous such a state of things is. Among a people that has contracted the habit of being governed by the executive power and, even more so, of being administered by it, election could not fail to produce a profound disturbance.”

An election is inherently “a period of national crisis,” De Tocqueville thinks, because everyone becomes overly focused on the approaching election. The interests of the country fall by the wayside. Nevertheless, things are even worse when a President runs for re-election.

He recognizes the dilemma facing the delegates to the Constitutional Convention: If a President is doing a good job, then Americans should have the option to re-elect him. On the other hand, De Tocqueville wonders if the dangers don’t outweigh the benefits.

“Intrigue and corruption are vices natural to elective governments,” he concludes. “But when the head of state can be reelected, the vices spread indefinitely . . . . [the incumbent] borrows the force of the government for his own use. . . . the care of the government becomes a secondary interest to him; his principal interest is his election.”

In an interesting twist, De Tocqueville remains impressed by the “mode of election” for American Presidents, recognizing that the Electoral College “express[es] the real will of the people.” He notes the difficulty in getting a majority to support any candidate “at the first stroke,” especially given the size and nature of the country. Electing a special body (the Electoral College) to make this decision struck De Tocqueville as an efficient process for reaching agreement on a candidate. It would also better reflect the will of the people than legislative selection.

America’s presidential election system, he concludes, “[is] a happy combination that reconciles the respect that is owed to the will of the people with the rapidity of execution and the guarantees of order that the interest of the state requires.”

In short, Democracy in America focuses on two factors that have historically made American presidential elections work: The limited nature of executive power and the structure of the Electoral College. The first of these has been severely undermined, and the second is under attack.

De Tocqueville would surely be unsurprised to learn that elections have turned ugly in recent decades.


Tara Ross is a retired lawyer and the author of several books about the Electoral College, including Why We Need the Electoral College (Regnery Gateway).

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Essay 14: On the Federal Constitution – Volume 1 Part 1 Chapter 8 Sub Chapters 7-10 of Democracy in America by Alexis De Tocqueville

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Guest Essayist: Dr. Robert Brescia


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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 113 (starting at the heading “On the Executive Power”) through 120 (stopping at the heading “On the Election of the President”) of this edition of Democracy in America.

 

Executive Power; a Summary of Alexis de Tocqueville’s Comparison of the U.S. Presidency and the French Monarchy

 

“The executive power in France extends to everything, like the sovereignty – the king is one of the authors of the law. The president is only the executor of the law.”

“The president is hindered in the sphere of the executive power – the king is free in it.”

“The president possesses great prerogatives that he has no occasion to make use of – in what he does have occasion to execute, he is weak.”


Alexis Charles Henri Clérel, Comte de Tocqueville

It’s helpful to set the stage with the reminder that De Tocqueville was one the 19th century “big thinkers” – A French noble who analyzed political and sociological movements. He had an avid interest in the young United States, particularly its form of government. De Tocqueville was a classical liberal who espoused the governmental form of parliamentary government, wary, though, of the tyranny of the majority when in power. It is difficult, however, to assign a political ideology to De Tocqueville because he straddles the ideals of much of the political spectrum. The time of his visit to America was during the French monarchy (Louis XVIII and Charles X); “between the republics” period – between the First Republic (1792–1804) and Second Republic (1848–1852).

De Tocqueville’s thoughts about the American presidency and the French monarchy

Following are the main points of difference between the U.S. Presidency and the French monarchy that De Tocqueville points out in Democracy in America, starting with what he refers to as the most important difference:

1. Sovereignty in the United States is divided between the Union and the states, whereas among us (in France), it is one and compact. In the United States, the executive power is limited and exceptional, like the very sovereignty in whose name it acts; in France it extends to everything, just like the sovereignty.

2. The king in France really constitutes a part of the sovereign, since laws do not exist if he refuses to sanction them; he is, in addition, the executor of the laws. 3. The king of France participates in the formation of the legislature by naming the member of one house and putting an end to the duration of the mandate of the other at his will. The president of the United States does not concur at all in the composition of the legislative body and cannot dissolve it.

4. The king is represented within the houses by agents who set forth his views, support his opinions, and make his will prevail. The president has no entry into Congress; it is only in an indirect manner that he can influence the legislative process.

5. The power of the king of France has the advantage of longevity over that of the president – this makes the king feared because he wields power for a much longer time. The president is a magistrate who is elected every four years with one exception so far (Grover Cleveland, 1885-89 and 1893-97), while the king of France is a hereditary head – divine right to assume absolute power says it all. Whereas the U.S. president is indirectly elected by the people, the French king is appointed – usually succeeded by an immediate family member.
6. The king of France is the absolute master in the sphere of executive power. The president of the United States is responsible for his actions. French law says that the person of the king is inviolable. Like the Roman Catholic Pope, he is infallible when speaking “ex cathedra” (from the chair). The difference is that while the Pope has only spoken once ex cathedra, the French kings put out many edicts during their reigns. There can be no opposition to his rule.

7. De Tocqueville points out that in France, there must be an accord between the king and the chambers; that anything else invariably leads to an irresolvable struggle. That is not the case in the U.S. but if the U.S. president is of a different political party than the majority in one or two houses of Congress, there certainly is a struggle to get things done.

The framers of our Constitution had placed the utmost importance on the legislative branch and envisioned the executive branch as an action-oriented, puttin-laws-into-force branch of government. They realized that it is one thing to write a law and another to apply it and see that it is obeyed. Basically, the U.S. president is supposed to be a “doer” – an executor. Article II of the Constitution says that the president “must take care that the laws be faithfully executed” and that he must take an oath or affirmation to faithfully execute the Office of President. In our times, there has evolved a notion of the “imperial presidency” which deals with the enlargement of the powers of the office but that flies in the face of the Constitution and is reinforced by the mystique factor of the presidency, especially in recent years. De Tocqueville recognizes that there are “accidental causes that can increase the influence of the executive power – generally that is war because the president acts as the chief of the armed forces.

Summary

Alexis de Tocqueville’s service to our heightened understanding of the U.S. presidency is quite commendable. For example:
“Just now Washington contains the most important men of the whole Union. We no longer seek instructions from them on subjects of which we are ignorant; instead, we reexamine, in conversation with them, everything which we already know, more or less. We settle the doubtful points…”
His service is very valuable because it promotes a prominent level of questioning and “doubt settling” we should be undertaking currently. The nature of our political experiment can be considered as an early form of a complex adaptive system – constantly changing with the identity and the impact of independent variables weighing heavily upon it. That is something that historians do not focus on and something that political scientists should. The U.S. presidency has built up capabilities never imagined in 1832 because our society has become infinitely more complex to manage. Still, many Americans repel the notion of a monarchy as much as they did when King George III was the King of England.

 

Dr. Robert Brescia is a National Board Certified Teacher (NBCT), serving as Social Studies Department Chair at Permian High School in Odessa, TX. The Governor of Texas re-appointed him to the State Board for Educator Certification (SBEC) for a six-year term. Bob has a doctoral degree with distinction in Executive Leadership from The George Washington University. He also teaches ethics to university students and leadership to organizations.

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Essay 13: On The Federal Constitution – Volume 1 Part 1 Chapter 8 Sub Chapters 5-6

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Guest Essayist: Christopher C. Burkett


Our Commissioners | Office of the Texas Governor | Greg Abbott

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 110 (starting at the “Legislative Powers heading”) – 113 (stopping at the “On the Executive Power Heading”) of this edition of Democracy in America.

Alexis De Tocqueville: On The Federal Constitution

“In this state of things, what happened was what almost always happens when interests are opposed to reasonings: they bent the rules of logic.” (Alexis De Tocqueville, Democracy in America).

As De Tocqueville notes, the Constitution of the United States is federal in nature. This makes it quite unusual – in fact, unique – among all historical constitutions in Europe. This is so, in part, because Americans have discovered a new understanding of what “federal” means, which in turn requires De Tocqueville to carefully point out to his European readers some subtle characteristics of the Constitution.

De Tocqueville begins to explain the federal nature of the Constitution of the United States by describing what he calls “Legislative Powers.” By this, De Tocqueville means to show how the bicameral Congress is composed of two legislative bodies – a House of Representatives and a Senate – and, though the concurrence of both is needed to pass laws, each has some unique characteristics, responsibilities, and powers. This difference between the two houses of Congress arises from the compound nature of the American political union: it is intended, by the Federal Constitution, to be a union of the whole American people under a national government with national laws, while each of the member states simultaneously retains its own government, laws, and powers.

This compound or “federal” nature of the American Union and Constitution is an important factor in shaping American democracy, but was established legally in the new Constitution as a way to reconcile the natural tension that would exist between a national government and a state government. De Tocqueville reveals how this new kind of federalism came into being, beginning with the first attempts at establishing a government for the Union during the American Revolution. In the years when the Articles of Confederation were legally in effect (1781-1787), disagreements rose to the surface in the Confederation Congress over whether the Union of the American states comprised a real nation or a mere treaty-based agreement between sovereign and independent nation-states. As De Tocqueville writes:

“[T]wo opposed interests were presented to each other. Those two interests had given birth to two opinions. Some wanted to make the Union a league of independent states, a kind of congress, where the representatives of distinct peoples would come to discuss certain points of common interest. Others wanted to unite all the inhabitants of the former colonies into one and the same people.”

These were the prevailing opinions when the Confederation Congress authorized a Federal Convention to meet in Philadelphia in 1787 to discuss amendments to the Articles of Confederation. Delegates such as David Brearly and Robert Paterson of New Jersey, for example, strongly defended the former point of view that, in order to protect the various interests of the states, the Union should be more like a treaty-based league with a very limited general congress. Others, such as James Madison of Virginia, argued for the creation of a national union under a strengthened national government with real legislative powers. From the beginning of the debates at the Convention, when delegates agreed to create a bicameral legislature it became clear that this question would be resolved primarily through the composition of the two bodies of Congress (the House of Representatives and the Senate). Brearly and Paterson, among others, insisted that each state be equally represented in both houses, and that members of each house be selected by the state legislatures, ensuring that the interests of the states would be sufficiently expressed, supported, and protected in Congress. Madison and his supporters, on the other hand, insisted on creating a national government in which each state would be represented proportionally (based, for example, on population) in both houses, and in which state legislatures would select members in either house of Congress.

Ultimately delegates agreed to compromise on these questions (as proposed in part by Roger Sherman and Oliver Ellsworth of Connecticut): the states would be proportionally represented in the House of Representatives by members elected directly by the people; and the states would be represented equally in the Senate by members chosen by the state legislatures. By this compromise the framers established a Constitution that was “partly national, partly federal.” De Tocqueville writes:

“In this state of things, what happened was what almost always happens when interests are opposed to reasonings: they bent the rules of logic. The legislators adopted a middle term that reconciled by force two theoretically irreconcilable systems. The principle of the independence of the states triumphed in the formation of the Senate; the dogma of national sovereignty, in the composition of the House of Representatives.”

With careful insight, De Tocqueville reveals the uniquely complex nature of the Constitution of the United States in the composition of Congress, as an important factor of American democracy.

Christopher C. Burkett is Associate Professor of History and Political Science, and Director of the Ashbrook Scholar Program at Ashland University.

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Essay 12: On the Federal Constitution– Volume 1 Part 1 Chapter 8 Sub Chapters 1-4 of Democracy in America by Alexis De Tocqueville

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Guest Essayist: Robert Lowry Clinton


Our Commissioners | Office of the Texas Governor | Greg Abbott

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 105 – 110 (stopping at the heading “Legislative Powers”) of this edition of Democracy in America.

“…what is new in the history of societies is to see a great people, warned by its legislators that the wheels of government are stopping, turn its regard upon itself without haste and without fear, sound the depth of the ill, contain itself for two entire years in order to discover the remedy at leisure, and when the remedy is pointed out, submit voluntarily to it without its costing humanity one tear or drop of blood.” (Alexis De Tocqueville, Democracy in America).

Alexis De Tocqueville: On the Federal Constitution

After a brilliant introduction expounding the rise of democratic inclinations in Europe during the centuries leading up to the colonization of America, followed by seven chapters exploring socio-economic, geographical, cultural and political conditions on this side of the Atlantic, De Tocqueville turns to a peremptory discussion of the Federal Constitution in chapter 8. Beginning with the history of the Constitution’s emergence out of the earlier Articles of Confederation, De Tocqueville emphasizes the colonists’ strong connections to England before the War of Independence, noting the sharing of religion, language, mores and laws among the Americans and the English. This sharing, however, was not enough to prevent the War of Independence.

During the War and its immediate aftermath, the Americans were governed by the Articles (written in 1778 and adopted in 1781), which repudiated a complete union in favor of a confederation of individual states. De Tocqueville explains that once the War commenced, the principle of union prevailed anyway in the face of a common enemy. However, when the public danger subsided, states resumed their original and entire sovereignty.

The states disunited proved disastrous, exposing the states to dangers both foreign and domestic. Before long, Congress recognized its’ impotence and called for a convention to address the problems and revise the Articles. The “revision” thus produced by the Convention of 1787 turned out to be a complete replacement of the Articles, resulting in our present written Constitution.

De Tocqueville extols the greatness of the American founders in heeding the warning of the dangers of disunity, acting with resolve yet patience in devising a remedy, and accepting the remedy—though controversial—without bloodshed:

“…. what is new in the history of societies is to see a great people, warned by its legislators that the wheels of government are stopping, turn its regard upon itself without haste and without fear, sound the depth of the ill, contain itself for two entire years in order to discover the remedy at leisure, and when the remedy is pointed out, submit voluntarily to it without its costing humanity one tear or drop of blood.”

After a brief comparison of the American and French Revolutions, attending to the most obvious differences between the two wars, De Tocqueville proceeds to a summary of the Federal Constitution, stressing the crucial distinction between the character of the powers granted to the nation and those left to the states. Since the goal of the nation is to respond to “a few great general needs,” its powers are “simple and easy enough to define”. Since the goals of the state are “multiple and complicated,” thus retaining “the common rule,” their prerogatives cannot be so easily defined. De Tocqueville perceives the inevitability of conflict between state and national governments, and suggests that the Supreme Court was created, in part, to avoid having such disputes left to individual state courts.

Relying heavily on The Federalist, De Tocqueville examines more closely some of the intricacies presented by this constitutional system. For example, some national powers are made exclusive, others not. Where national power is not exclusive, states can govern freely, subject to the intervention of courts if they abuse their freedom and “compromise the security of the entire Union.” Thus the Federal Constitution establishes both a republic and a confederation, both federal and confederal.

De Tocqueville closes his section on federal prerogatives by giving some examples suggesting that on some points (e.g., having a single national court to interpret the law and a single legislature to impose taxes on everyone and commercial regulations on the states), the American Union is more centralized in some ways than some European monarchies! Though this seems a bit of a stretch, maybe not. Perhaps De Tocqueville was echoing the earlier fears of the Anti-federalist “Brutus” when he suggests in the one-sentence section that follows (entitled “Federal Powers”) that it might be difficult to confine the national government to the exercise of its delegated powers?

In sum, De Tocqueville’s preliminary remarks on the Constitution are generally sound and most helpful in drawing attention to the most important feature (and problem) of the constitutional order it established: the dual sovereignty embodied in the federal system. And in the last analysis, his cautionary suggestion about the difficulty of preventing future concentration of power in the national government would prove fully justified.

Robert Lowry Clinton is Professor Emeritus at Southern Illinois University Carbondale. He is the author of Marbury v. Madison and Judicial Review, God and Man in the Law: The Foundations of Anglo-American Constitutionalism, and numerous articles in academic and popular publications.

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Essay 11: On Political Judgment in the United States Volume 1 Part 1 Chapter 7 of Democracy in America by Alexis De Tocqueville

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Guest Essayist: Andrea Criswell


Our Commissioners | Office of the Texas Governor | Greg Abbott

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 100 – 104 of this edition of Democracy in America.

Alexis De Tocqueville: On Political Judgment in the United States

“[Political jurisdiction is] to withdraw power from someone who makes a bad use of it and to prevent this same citizen from being vested with it in the future.” (Alexis De Tocqueville, Democracy in America).

“Take one for the team”! Maybe Washington, maybe Hamilton, patented this unheard of paradigm shift, but the idea set in motion a constitutional republic that would require more from the elected than any other time in history. Adding a unique feature, in regard to public officials, the Founders took it a step further, one that would keep democracy on the up and up. Alexis De Tocqueville recognized this feature, he caught the nuance in regard to political jurisdiction saying it is, “to withdraw power from someone who makes a bad use of it and to prevent this same citizen from being vested with it in the future.” It allowed public servants to be judged among their elected peers, without criminalizing them. In America’s version of political jurisdiction it could not be used as a partisan weapon, it required deep trust of the elected, and it tethered leaders to a higher accountability. These three distinctions will be considered here.

Be slow to impeach. The temptation to override is currently strong in the political atmosphere. Take what you want politically by force. The Founders feared this, and set in motion a unique take on political jurisdiction which would require a respect for the law no matter who was elected. If the people, by free and fair elections, selected a person to govern, then that person should be protected from impeachment being used as a partisan weapon. It is this very reason that only the public official called forward by the House of Representatives can be labeled an offender. Protecting against false accusations, the Senate judges the offense. What surprised De Tocqueville was that this only included removal from office, not justice through the penal code. The House could call for impeachment, and the Senate could enact impeachment, but neither could take away the personal liberties of the offender. That was out of their jurisdiction. Radically different from the structures in both England and France, the Founder’s plan limited impeachment for the purpose of protecting the choice of the governed.

Trust the law. In times of uncertainty, the governed must trust the checks and balances of the law and not take matters into their own hands. Obedience to authority is a wonderful fail safe when the elected is your chosen candidate, but when your candidate is not chosen, it requires great maturity to work under the leadership of someone you do not agree with. Order is a protective measure against chaos. It blesses all who sit in its shade. The shade as seen in political jurisdiction in the United States is that the leaders are tethered to something greater than themselves, the law, which supersedes agenda. Usurpation is only acceptable when the elected dishonor the law. However, in modern America trust in elected leadership has been broken and most of the governed do not understand the law. This is a concerning combo that the Founders feared.

To hold office. A little phrase with great power. When seen through a lens of selfish ambition this power brings an elected person self-promotion. Seen through the lens of service, it garners benefit for the governed. Political jurisdiction is intended to protect the elected while establishing office void of selfish ambition. What a difference a lens can make. This is where free and fair elections apart from gerrymandering are so important. The balance between recognizing the possibility of human failure and the tension between freedom of choice and the law is real. The elected person is imperfect, but the law holds their imperfection in check. Accordingly, political jurisdiction is, in De Tocqueville’s words, “despite its mildness and perhaps because of its mildness, a very powerful arm in the hands of the majority.”

This is not “your father’s” democracy. Liberty requires more. The republic is a standard of law for all people, to be honored and upheld equally by both the elected and the governed. It was understood that the elected would place their own natural tendencies aside out of respect for the law, and that the governed would place their natural tendencies aside out of respect for the elected. This mutual agreement of giving and receiving would allow them to accomplish something the world had never seen. De Tocqueville reminds us today that America’s system of political jurisdiction sets American democracy apart. If it breaks down, she will become just like other democracies. Without this unique balance, America will not embody liberty in its truest form.

Andrea Criswell is a wife, mother, and homeschool teacher in the northwest Houston area. Graduating from both Texas Tech University and Asbury Theological Seminary, she teaches Christian Worldview classes. Her passion is helping high school students become responsible young adults who critically think and learn how to solve problems.

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Essay 10: On Judicial Power in the United States and Its Action on Political Society – Volume 1 Part 1 Chapter 6 of Democracy in America by Alexis De Tocqueville

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Guest Essayist: Kevin Gutzman

Our Commissioners | Office of the Texas Governor | Greg Abbott

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 93 (starting at chapter 6) through 99 of this edition of Democracy in America.

Alexis De Tocqueville entitles Volume One, Part One, Chapter 6 of Democracy in America “On Judicial Power in the United States and Its Action on Political Society.” He attempts to describe American judicial institutions as if they were all of one model, along the way comparing them to the French courts more familiar to him and to his intended readers. Particularly notable to De Tocqueville as a foreign observer was the political role of American courts that we Americans have come to take for granted. “ The judicial power[‘s] … political power is so great,” he explains, “that it appeared to me that to speak of it in passing would diminish it in the eyes of readers.”

Federal, republican, and elective governments are not peculiar to America, this Frenchman notes, but the American judiciary is unique. Its weight is felt in every political discussion. In regard to particular cases, it exercises its power as other countries’ judiciaries do — “as an arbiter” between parties, “on particular cases and not on general principles” (that is, not on an advisory or legislative basis), and “only when it is appealed to” (that is, when a case is properly brought before it).

Yet, American judges, De Tocqueville insists, have political power of a remarkable kind: “Americans have recognized in judges the right to found their rulings on the Constitution rather than on the laws.” What he has in mind is that American judges exercise the power of judicial review, which he classifies as political, not legal. To an American, this distinction is jarring. We have all been indoctrinated in the idea, captured in Article VI of the United States Constitution and forcefully said to have been the bedrock of judicial review by Chief Justice John Marshall in Marbury v. Madison, that judicial review is precisely a legal function, that what is happening when a judge says a statute is to be inoperative (“struck down”) on the basis of unconstitutionality is that inferior law is being made to yield to superior law. As Marshall put it, “It is emphatically the duty of the Judicial Department to say what the law is. Those who apply the rule to particular cases must, of necessity, expound and interpret the rule. If two laws conflict with each other, the Court must decide on the operation of each. If courts are to regard the Constitution, and the Constitution is superior to any ordinary act of the legislature, the Constitution, and not such ordinary act, must govern the case to which they both apply.”
It was by political acts that the sovereign states, following the Article VII ratification process, put the U.S. Constitution into effect, yes, but determining whether a law is constitutional in a case brought before it by one of the parties is for an American court a legal task, not a political one. De Tocqueville essentially concedes this point without making it when he notes that in America the people can, when they so desire, change a constitution (state or federal).

After comparing the relationships between law and constitution in the American system to the relationships between law and constitution in France and in Britain, De Tocqueville asserts that there is little to fear from judicial decisions holding laws unconstitutional, as they will only affect the particular cases the judges are deciding. Whether a statute will be repealed because unconstitutional is a question that will only be decided after several related cases have been adjudicated. Here our author is simply mistaken: decisions holding statutes unconstitutional have commonly had immediate and general effect since American courts first exercised the power of judicial review.

De Tocqueville next asserts that judges exercise the power of judicial review only despite themselves. They have no impulse to do so, he says. We are familiar with numerous instances in which Americans certainly were, or at least seem to have been, anxious to exercise the power of judicial review. At least one of them, the Supreme Court case of McCulloch v. Maryland (1819), ought to have been known to De Tocqueville. There had already been numerous cases of judicial review in federal courts by the 1830s, when De Tocqueville wrote his book, and they have come to be quite numerous now.

De Tocqueville closes this chapter with consideration of Article 75 of the French Constitution of year VIII (1799), which made Napoléon Bonaparte first consul. Under that constitution, he says, a government official could only be tried after the Council of State had decided he could. American courts have no need of such permission, he notes.

Kevin R. C. Gutzman, J.D., Ph.D. is Professor and former Chairman in the Department of History, Philosophy & World Perspectives at Western Connecticut State University. He is the author of six books in the history of the American Revolution and Early Republic, one of which was a New York Times bestseller, two of which were book club main selections, and one of which was named one of the ten outstanding conservative books of 2007. His latest is The Jeffersonians: The Visionary Presidencies of Jefferson, Madison, and Monroe.

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Essay 9: Necessity of Studying What Takes Place in the Particular States before Speaking of the Government of the Union – Volume 1 Part 1 Chapter 5 Subchapter 12 of Democracy in America by Alexis De Tocqueville

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Guest Essayist: Jay McConville

Our Commissioners | Office of the Texas Governor | Greg Abbott

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 82 (starting at the heading “Administrative Decentralization”) – 93 (stop at chapter 6) of this edition of Democracy in America.

Alexis De Tocqueville: Administrative Decentralization and the Character of the United States.

“What I admire most in America are not the administrative effects of decentralization, but its political effects” (Alexis De Tocqueville, Democracy in America).

Alexis De Tocqueville’s Democracy in America is an insightful examination of American society and its political institutions. In “The Necessity Of Examining What Happened In Individual States Before Considering The Union As A Whole – Political Effects Of Administrative Decentralization In The United States,” De Tocqueville emphasizes the importance of understanding the political structures at the state level before attempting to grasp the nature of the American Union. His admiration for the political effects of the American decentralized system highlights the importance of democratic participation and local governance over mere administrative efficiency.

In times of increasing political polarization, complexity of governance, and rising public debt, it is natural to look for ways to reduce redundancies and centralize operations. That has led many to question the effectiveness of the federalist system, especially given modern communications technologies. It is no longer difficult to communicate, as it was at our founding for example, between federal authorities and local communities. De Tocqueville was one of the first to observe that the division of powers among national, state, and local authorities in America could lead to inefficiencies in governance. After detailing some examples of this division, he readily admits that “the villages and counties of the United States would be more usefully administered by a central authority…” Yet De Tocqueville knew such efficiencies were not the most important aspect of government, but that instead, “individual forces [are] joined to the action of social forces,” and that when joined, “they often succeed in doing what the most concentrated and most energetic administration would be in no condition to execute.”

Laboratories of Democracy

Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis popularized the phrase “laboratories of democracy” in the 1932 Supreme Court case New State Ice Co. v. Liebmann. His emphasis, like many of today’s writers, was on effectiveness and efficiency. “It is one of the happy incidents of the federal system that a single courageous State may, if its citizens choose, serve as a laboratory; and try novel social and economic experiments without risk to the rest of the country,” wrote Brandeis. This has often been cited as a reason to maintain what is otherwise an inefficient diffuse administrative state, as well as for leaving as much power locally as possible. Brandeis wrote, “[m]erely to acquire the knowledge essential as a basis for the exercise of this multitude of judgments would be a formidable task…Man is weak, and his judgment is, at best, fallible.” Brandeis’ opinion echoes much from De Tocqueville who wrote, similarly, that “[a] central power, however enlightened, however learned one imagine it, cannot gather to itself alone all the details of the life of great people. It cannot do it because such a work exceeds human strength. When it wants by its care alone to create so many diverse springs and make them function, it contents itself with a very incomplete result or exhausts itself in useless efforts…” Thus, an over-centralized state “excels, in a word, at preventing, not at doing.”

Reading Democracy in America, it becomes clear that while De Tocqueville and Brandeis might agree on the benefits of decentralization, De Tocqueville emphasized its role in fostering democratic participation as the primary benefit.

The Character of the Nation

De Tocqueville’s analysis of administrative decentralization compared the distinctive nature of American governance to European nations, where administrative power was often concentrated in the hands of a few. American decentralization, to De Tocqueville, was not just a matter of convenience but a deliberate strategy to promote democratic participation. European citizens, controlled by a centralized authority, often viewed their condition as akin to being a “colonist, indifferent to the destiny of the place that he inhabits.” The citizen’s connection to the nation was therefore suspect, reliant more on tradition than a genuine belief that his nation was his own. Longevity for the nation was therefore tenuous, as its governance “[does] not concern him in any fashion,” and “belong[s] to a powerful foreigner called the government.” As a result, European citizens found themselves “swinging constantly between servitude and license.”

De Tocqueville was more bullish on the American nation, even as tradition might fade, because, unlike Europeans, the American “applies himself to each of the interests of his country as to his very own… He has for his native country a sentiment analogous to the one that he feels for his family, and it is still by a sort of selfishness that he takes and interest in his state.” Americans believe, in the words of Abraham Lincoln, that this is a nation “of the people, by the people, [and] for the people.”

Out of Many, One.

True, federalism ensures a check on national authority and guards against tyranny. Additionally, decentralization promotes a more responsive and accountable government.

Most importantly, however, decentralization fosters a political culture of what we would today call buy-in – that deeply held belief that this is our nation, that we are not subjects, but full participants in its success now and into the future. It fosters civic responsibility and engagement, and develops a habit of self-governance, responsibility, and accountability. De Tocqueville saw this buy-in as essential for the sustainment of democracy and knew, like many today, that such self-reliance should never be sacrificed on the altar of efficiency.

Jay McConville is a former soldier, political activist, and business executive who writes on Substack at Goose & Gander (jaymcconville.substack.com). He is also a fitness trainer and a doctoral candidate at the L. Douglas Wilder School of Government and Public Affairs, Virginia Commonwealth University. Jay has served for more than seven years on Constituting America’s Governing Board of Directors.

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Essay 8: Necessity of Studying What Takes Place in the Particular States before Speaking of the Government of the Union – Volume 1 Part 1 Chapter 5 Subchapters 9 to 11 of Democracy in America by Alexis de Tocqueville

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Guest Essayist: Scot Faulkner


Our Commissioners | Office of the Texas Governor | Greg Abbott
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 79 (starting at the heading “On The State”) through 82 (stop at the heading “Administrative Decentralization”) of this edition of Democracy in America.

The core of America’s federal system of government is viable state governments. America is called “the United States” to institutionalize the importance of distributed and diverse state governance as a balance to centralized power.

De Tocqueville fully understood this unique America concept by declaring “The Necessity of Examining What Happened in Individual States Before Considering the Union as a Whole”.

State legislatures, except Nebraska, mirror the two legislative chambers at the national level. In 1934, Nebraskans voted to merge their two legislative houses determining unicameralism would be more efficient and cheaper.

The concept of two legislative chambers, at both the national and state levels, began with the Royal Charter that established Jamestown in Virginia. It evolved from the Charter holders into governance by the King’s Representative (Royal Governor) and his Advisory Council. This evolved into the Senate at both the national and state level.

As De Tocqueville explains:

“The Senate is usually a legislative body; but sometimes it becomes an administrative and judicial body.”

A state’s House of Representatives, called the House of Delegates in some states, also has its roots in Jamestown. When the settlers demanded their own voice, the Virginia House of Burgesses, in 1619, became the first democratically elected legislative body in America.

De Tocqueville explains the difference:

“The other branch of the legislature, ordinally called the House of Representatives, participates in no administrative power and takes part in judicial power only by accusing public officials before the Senate.”

The House of Burgesses became a proving ground for what would become the “lower house” at the national and state levels.  “Upper” and “Lower” house designations were derived from their location within Jamestown’s legislative building. The House of Burgesses was located on the ground floor while the Governor’s Advisory Council met on the second floor.

Drawing from British tradition, the members of the House held their positions for shorter periods of time to be held closely accountable by those they represented.

De Tocqueville explains:

“By granting to the senators the privilege of being chosen for several years, and being renewed seriatim, the law takes care to preserve in the legislative body a nucleus of men already accustomed to public business, and capable of exercising a salutary influence upon the junior members.”

James Madison and Alexander Hamilton, writing under the pseudonym “PUBLIUS”, outlined this binding of the House of Representatives more closely to those they served in Federalist No. 52:

“Frequent elections are unquestionably the only policy by which this dependence and sympathy can be effectually secured…. It is a received and well-founded maxim, that where no other circumstances affect the case, the greater the power is, the shorter ought to be its duration.”

This unique legislative environment of having different terms and therefore different mandates/perspectives was considered a strength by de Tocqueville:

“To divide legislative strength, thus to slow the movement of political assemblies, and to create a court of appeal for the revision of laws – such are the sole advantages that result from the current constitutions of the two houses in the United States.”

De Tocqueville embraced the universal wisdom of how America’s state legislatures governed:

“This theory, nearly ignored in ancient republics, introduced into the world almost haphazardly like most great truths, unknown to several modern peoples, has at length passed into the political science of our day as an axiom.”

De Tocqueville then turns his attention to state governors.

He outlines the governor’s role as a “moderator and counsel”. This is very different from the powerful Royal Governors they replaced.  Governors serve as a counterbalance to the legislature as each chamber balances each other. This institutionalized series of “checks and balances” creates a web of accountability at both the state and national level. The lessons learned from royal overreach were embedded to prevent future tyranny.

Governors also have the power to “stop or at least to slow movement” of legislation.  This check on legislative power arises from the lessons learned from the English Revolution (1640-1660) when Charles I’s royal tyranny was replaced with Oliver Cromwell’s legislative dictatorship.

A governor, in their role as moderator, do set “out the needs of the country to the legislative body and makes it known what means he judges useful to employ in order to provide for them.” The legislature’s role is to approve or reject the governor’s agenda, serving as a balance to executive power.

De Tocqueville, who had previously outlined the importance of local government in America, explains that “the governor does not enter into the administration of townships and counties”.

Each level of government in America has its own role, power, and independence. From the national level on down to local communities, America’s strength is a structure that prevents centralized tyranny.

Scot Faulkner was the Chief Administrative Officer of the U.S. House of Representatives. Earlier, he served on the White House staff. He is Vice President of the George Washington Institute of Living Ethics at Shepherd University and the President of Friends of Harpers Ferry National Historical Park.

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Essay 6: Necessity of Studying What Takes Place in the Particular States before Speaking of the Government of the Union – Volume 1 Part 1 Chapter 5 Subchapters 1 to 5 of Democracy in America by Alexis de Tocqueville

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Guest Essayist: Raúl Rodríguez

Our Commissioners | Office of the Texas Governor | Greg Abbott

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 56 – 65 of this edition of Democracy in America, and stops at the heading “On The County In New England.”

De Tocqueville’s study of townships in America is justly famous. He allows Americans to have pride in where they come from and in their history. He champions the idea of local civic participation and shows how it is a core element of American prosperity. The town, he tells us, is the key to understanding what true freedom is and fostering it in a democracy. This is a bold claim. Let us see what de Tocqueville has to teach us.

De Tocqueville states that one must look at the individual states prior to looking at the national government to understand America. De Tocqueville recognizes that the United States has a unique constitution that grants political power to states and the national government. The federal character of the US Constitution is one of the strengths of America. This virtue of America is better understood by examining not only the states, but also the towns and counties that make up the state. The local character of America, we will learn, gives America vitality and fosters freedom.

De Tocqueville memorably states that townships are “the sole association that is so much in nature that everywhere men are gathered, a township forms by itself.” Because towns are so natural, they exist in all societies. The town, he even declares, “appears to issue directly from the hands of God.” Despite the natural, or providential, character of towns, “the freedom of a township is a rare and fragile thing.” Town liberty requires citizens to come together and to fix their own problems. The difficulty with this is that towns often make mistakes. A large and sophisticated country “tolerates only with difficulty the trials of freedom in a township.” The authority overseeing a town often thinks that it can govern in a faster and more efficient way. As a result, town liberty is vulnerable to “the invasions of power”” (57). Town liberty, in other words, does not last long. What is amazing is that in America, town liberty still existed when de Tocqueville visited and he had reason to believe that it could possibly be maintained, albeit with considerable effort.

Rather than disparage the dysfunctional and provincial character of local towns, de Tocqueville praises them. De Tocqueville agrees that a centralized nation can sometimes get things done faster, but such a nation loses the spirit of liberty. There is something about liberty that requires small, local action by citizens. He memorably tells the reader that towns prepare citizens to be truly free:

“The institutions of a township are to freedom what primary schools are to science; they put it within reach of the people; they make them taste its peaceful employ and habituate them to making use of it. Without the institutions of a township a nation can give itself a free government, but it does not have the spirit of freedom” (57-58).

Freedom is not easy—it requires apprenticeship. Towns provide citizens with an opportunity to practice being free. Localism is a key ingredient to freedom.

The New England Township is elevated as a paragon of liberty. Numbering between two and three thousand inhabitants, New England is the epitome of local political action. De Tocqueville says that “the law of representation is not accepted” in the New England township. Citizens are their own masters and they unite to rule over themselves. This pure form of local freedom is unheard of in Europe and most of the world, de Tocqueville tells us. Ordinarily, citizens see problems, but have no power to fix them. In the township, citizens see a problem, come together to discuss the problem and to vote on how to fix it immediately. This fact of the township teaches citizens how to be powerful and independent. To be free means to have the power and independence to take action.

In the cosmopolitan world that we now live in, it can be hard to see the virtue of local towns. De Tocqueville helps us have a new perspective. He challenges us to reexamine, to rethink, what it means to be free. For de Tocqueville, freedom is not simply the right to do whatever you want, but the ability to take action with our fellow citizens to accomplish something good. By vindicating town life, de Tocqueville provides us with a practical means by which to learn and practice civic freedom. He also gives us a warning—local liberty is hard to keep. If citizens allow local decisions to be taken out of their hands, they may never get it back. Actively participating in town governance can be annoying and tiresome, but we should be wary of giving it up for the sake of convenience. Freedom requires vigilance, and even mistakes. Our small towns provide us with a space to practice the art of being free. De Tocqueville admonishes us: Return to your local communities—you will find freedom there!

Raúl Rodríguez is an Assistant Professor in the School of Civic Leadership at the University of Texas at Austin. He received his Ph.D. at the University of Notre Dame and his B.A. at Furman University. Dr. Rodríguez’s research and teaching focus on the classic texts of political philosophy and constitutional studies. His current book project is titled Redeeming Democracy: Tocqueville’s New Liberalism.

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Essay 7: Necessity of Studying What Takes Place in the Particular States before Speaking of the Government of the Union – Volume 1 Part 1 Chapter 5 Subchapters 6 to 8 of Democracy in America by Alexis de Tocqueville

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Guest Essayist: Charles Hurt

Our Commissioners | Office of the Texas Governor | Greg Abbott

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 page 65 (starting at the heading “On The County In New England”) through page 79 (stop at heading “On The State”) of this edition of Democracy in America.

Anyone who has worked as a reporter for newspapers — from small town weeklies to big city dailies — can tell you that few things are more boring than the civic affairs of a tiny New England township. It’s existence, one might say, is “obscure and tranquil.” Yet, curiously, it is also the object of “lively affections” from the citizens who inhabit the township. We are reminded of this intense pride over a township’s mundane civic obligations every four years when the dutiful people of Dixville Notch, New Hampshire, trundle out into the deep snows near the remote Canadian border at midnight on a Tuesday to cast and count the first half dozen or so ballots in the nation’s presidential primary. It’s an affair bursting with so much pride among the townspeople as to seem like a Taylor Swift concert — even compared to that always show-boating Punxsutawney Phil predicting the end of spring down near Young Township closer to the end of winter in balmy Pennsylvania. To the outside cynic, the voters of Dixville Notch very often get it wrong and never has a primary come down to those first six or 11 votes cast by those hardy citizens. Yet the townspeople of Dixville Notch are undaunted and persevere every four years as if the life of the Republic depended upon it.

Because it does.

The “obscure and tranquil” nature of the New England township — and the “lively affections” inspired among its citizens — caught the jealous attention of French aristocrat Alexis de Tocqueville when he traveled to America in 1831 to study this budding new Republic. He was in awe of such curious behavior as if he were an explorer on a safari observing strange, new wild animals in their native habitat.

“The township is the hearth around which the interests and affections of men come to gather,” he observed.

Coming from a continent of aristocratic bloodlines, 1000-year religious wars, feudal fiefdoms and kingly realms with bejeweled crowns and walled cities, de Tocqueville considered this New England township in America a truly strange creature. What was the source of cohesion among its citizens? From where did such intense pride spring? How did they know what to do? Where was the castle? It is worth noting that many of these townships predated the republic to a time when they were remote, unwalled outposts in a vast kingdom loosely governed by a king whose palace was an ocean away. Even then, they were kind of on their own. While they were taxed by the king and had fealty to him, they were entirely on their own when it came to finding practical solutions to the very real problems they faced in daily civic life. It was this very whiff of practical independence that would become the wind that fueled the wildfire of freedom on the American continent.

“The revolution in the United States was produced by a mature and reflective taste for freedom, and not by a vague and indefinite instinct of independence,” de Tocqueville observed. “It was not supported by passions of disorder; but, on the contrary, it advanced with a love of order and legality.”

In the plain New England township, titles were loathed. Instead of Lords and Dukes, the officers of the township are called “justice of the peace” and “selectman.” Degrees in received wisdom were viewed with special suspicion.

“The justice of the peace is an enlightened citizen, but who is not necessarily versed in knowledge of the law,” de Tocqueville noted. “So they charge him only with keeping the order of society, a thing that demands more good sense and rectitude than science.”

The justice of the peace and the selectman is stripped of all “aristocratic character,” he writes.

In particular, de Tocqueville was struck by the “primitive” nature of the township and the “practical” matters so dutifully taken up by regular townspeople. If a road or a bridge washed out, who would fix it? Certainly not a king in some faraway land of fairy tales. The road had to be fixed and fixed fast so that the farmer could get his grain to the miller’s grist mill on the far side of the stream so that bread could be made so that the people of the township could eat. It was that simple. Practical self-interest was the social compact. Certainly, high ideals such as independence, life and liberty were sacred in the new Republic. But those principles alone would ultimately perish if all the townspeople starved to death. In the old country, governments and kings were forever justifying their existence and brutally confirming their authority. In this strange new country fueled by human nature and reigned by self-determination, government was a lowly affair entirely justified by its ability to ensure basic freedoms while solving practical problems that would clear the path to prosperity for the townspeople.

“In the bosom of the profound peace and material prosperity that reign in America, the storms of municipal life are few,” de Tocqueville wrote.

Obscure and tranquil? Yes. Even boring? Perhaps. But free.

Charles Hurt

Charles Hurt is the Opinion Editor and a columnist for The Washington Times. Often seen as a Fox News contributor on the cable network’s signature evening news roundtable, Mr. Hurt in his 20-year career has worked his way up from a beat reporter for the Detroit News and Washington correspondent for the Charlotte Observer before joining The Washington Times in 2003. He later served as D.C. bureau chief and White House correspondent for the New York Post and editor at the Drudge Report.

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Essay 5: On The Principle Of The Sovereignty Of The People In America – Volume 1 Part 1 Chapter 4 of Democracy in America by Alexis de Tocqueville

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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 start at the chapter four heading on page 53 and goes through page 55 of this edition of Democracy in America.

Alexis de Tocqueville’s seminal work, Democracy in America, offers a profound examination of the American political system, with particular emphasis on the principle of the sovereignty of the people. In Volume 1, Part 1, Chapter 4, de Tocqueville explores how this principle functions in the United States, attributing much of its success to the decentralized nature of American government, particularly through the institution of townships.

De Tocqueville identifies townships as the foundational units of American democracy, embodying the principle of the sovereignty of the people. He describes them as independent entities endowed with significant local autonomy, handling functions such as tax collection, school management, and road maintenance. This level of local governance contrasts sharply with the centralized administration prevalent in France, where the state manages most functions.

The autonomy of American townships, according to de Tocqueville, fosters widespread civic participation. He notes that almost every citizen is involved in some aspect of local governance, which serves as an essential educational tool. Through active participation in township affairs, citizens practice self-governance, develop a deeper understanding of their rights, and cultivate a sense of public spirit. This civic engagement strengthens democratic institutions from the ground up, reinforcing the principle of popular sovereignty.

Thomas Jefferson, one of the foremost advocates for states’ rights and local governance, argued for the devolution of power to states and localities within America’s federal system. Jefferson believed that the best government is one that is closest to the people, where citizens have the most direct control over their affairs. He saw local governance as a means to educate and engage citizens in the political process, thereby fostering a more vibrant and resilient democracy.

Jefferson’s vision aligns with de Tocqueville’s observations on the role of townships. By decentralizing power and granting autonomy to local governments, the American system ensures that citizens are not merely subjects of distant authorities but active participants in their governance. This decentralization, or dual sovereignty, creates a balance between national and local interests, promoting liberty and preventing the concentration of power.

The principle of federalism, which underpins the American political system, involves the distribution of power between the national government and the states. This diffusion of power is crucial in securing individual liberties. The 1992 Supreme Court case, New York vs United States, Justice Sandra Day O’Connor highlighted this aspect of federalism, stating that “Federalism secures to individuals the liberties that derive from the diffusion of sovereign power.” This case underscored the importance of maintaining a balance between centralized authority and local autonomy to protect individual freedoms.

In de Tocqueville’s analysis, the sovereignty of the people is most evident in the functioning of townships. These local units of government embody the principle of subsidiarity, where decisions are made at the most immediate level possible, thus promoting individual freedom and responsibility. The townships’ ability to manage their own affairs without excessive interference from higher levels of government exemplifies this diffusion of power.

De Tocqueville emphasizes the educational role of townships in American democracy. By engaging in local governance, citizens learn the practicalities of democratic participation. They develop skills in deliberation, negotiation, and decision-making, which are essential for the functioning of a healthy democracy. This hands-on experience in governance is invaluable in cultivating informed and active citizens.

Moreover, de Tocqueville observes that the local independence of townships nurtures a strong sense of community and public spirit. Unlike the centralized bureaucratic systems in Europe, where citizens often feel detached from their government, American townships foster a direct connection between the people and their representatives. This connection enhances accountability and responsiveness, further reinforcing the principle of popular sovereignty.

De Tocqueville contrasts the decentralized township system with the highly centralized administration in France, highlighting the benefits of the American approach. In France, the central government’s extensive control over local affairs stifles civic participation and inhibits the development of local leadership. In contrast, the American township system encourages local initiative and responsibility, creating a dynamic and participatory political culture.

This decentralization serves as a counterweight to potential abuses of power by the central government. By distributing authority across multiple levels of government, the American system prevents the concentration of power in a single entity, thus safeguarding individual liberties. This balance is essential for the maintenance of a free and democratic society.

The principle of the sovereignty of the people in America is intricately linked to the role of townships in the nation’s federal system. De Tocqueville’s observations highlight the significance of local autonomy and civic participation in fostering a vibrant democracy. Through the devolution of power, as advocated by Thomas Jefferson, and the diffusion of sovereign power emphasized in the New York vs United States case, the American system of federalism secures individual liberties and promotes active citizenship.

Townships, as the foundational units of American democracy, provide a practical and effective means for citizens to engage in self-governance. This decentralized approach not only enhances local governance but also serves as a critical educational tool, preparing citizens for broader political participation. Ultimately, the success and stability of American democracy rest on this delicate balance between local autonomy and centralized authority, ensuring that the sovereignty of the people remains at the heart of the nation’s political system.

Andrew Langer is a long-time contributor to Constituting America’s annual studies on the Constitution.  Currently, he serves as Director of the Center for Regulatory Freedom at the CPAC Foundation, as well as the host of several podcasts, including the Federal Newswire’s “Lunch Hour” podcast and “Andrew and Jerry Save the World.”. For nearly a decade, he was the host on WBAL Newsradio 1090 in Baltimore, and still fills-in regularly for radio shows across the country.  A graduate of William & Mary with a degree in international relations, he has taught regulatory policy at the university level.

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Essay 4: Social State Of The Anglo-Americans – Volume 1 Part 1 Chapter 3 of Democracy in America by Alexis De Tocqueville

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Guest Essayist: Joerg Knipprath

Our Commissioners | Office of the Texas Governor | Greg Abbott

 

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 45 (start at chapter 3 heading) – 53 (stop at chapter 4 heading) – of this edition of Democracy in America.

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De Tocqueville long has had the deserved reputation of an insightful early observer of the United States and its people. His discussion of the social condition of Americans and its influence on their personal and political character is a case in point. De Tocqueville uses this chapter as an introduction to a further and more detailed analysis later in the book. Although De Tocqueville’s account is informative and illuminating, one must be conscious of its author’s limitations. In various particulars, his remarks are outdated due to no fault of his, having been overtaken by significant social and technological events. Some are likely incorrect, and yet others reach conclusions more comprehensively explained by other developments. Moreover, as the typical current discussion of historical events sadly demonstrates, it is difficult to rise above one’s own cultural background, biases, and attitudes, for us no less than for De Tocqueville.

De Tocqueville’s main theme in this chapter is the mutually reinforcing relationship of American social conditions, the character trait of seeking equality, and the political tendency in favor of democratic government. To develop that theme, he attributes considerable importance to changes in the law of inheritance at the time of the American Revolution. Indeed, as he describes, American states generally abandoned feudal English practices of entail and primogeniture.

Although this is not an essay on English land law, a very brief and, admittedly, superficial foray into the subject is useful. Entail allowed “dead-hand control” in that a landowner would convey his property (in practice it usually—but  not always—was a male landowner) to someone with the proviso that the recipient could transfer the land only to his kin (usually his issue). That kin could only transfer to their own kin, and so on, within the structure of primogeniture. The entail could keep landed estates within the family and preserve the family’s land based status.

Primogeniture required that, in general, the entire landed estate went to the eldest son. If there was no son, a more curtailed estate would go to any daughters. Those daughters’ interests then would go to their eldest sons. This system helped to prevent estates from being broken up into undesirably smaller parcels over time. However, as De Tocqueville points out, it also fostered economic inequality among family members and social inequality between the great landed nobility and the rest of society, including the emerging commercial bourgeoisie. At the same time, primogeniture had the—probably unintended—consequence of pushing the younger sons of the nobility into the military, the legal profession, or the church. Much of England’s imperial success was engineered by those who were deprived by primogeniture of inherited landed wealth.

Complex interrelated changes in European society gradually produced an economically powerful and politically restive commercial elite. Money and trade became the focus of enterprise and wealth. With the decline of feudalism, land became more commodified. Entail and primogeniture survived in some relic form in England into the 20th century. However, they already had lost their vitality long before De Tocqueville wrote, due to changed social conditions and through the creativity of English lawyers.

Attempts to plant the English law of land tenures in American colonies occurred but fell on inhospitable soil. Not all colonies were initiated by English noblemen. Even within the proprietary colonies, the authority of the lords proprietor was challenged almost from the beginning by the settlers who, whether farmers, merchants, artisans, or mechanics, represented a broad middle class and who did  not shy from using their numbers and their taxes for political leverage. Moreover, the English families mostly remained in the old country, several thousand miles  across the ocean. There arose some economically and politically powerful American families of Dutch descent in New York and English descent in Virginia  and other Southern and Border states. But, as De Tocqueville acknowledges, “So, therefore, in our day in America the aristocratic element, always weak since its birth, is, if not destroyed, at least weakened, so that it is difficult to assign it any influence whatsoever in the course of affairs.”

Finally, the North American colonies had an abundance of something that England lacked by comparison, land. As long as people could move freely across the next ridge of mountains, neither entail nor primogeniture was a barrier to land acquisition and to wealth and status. In short, while De Tocqueville’s thesis about the intimate connection and critical causal relationship between the abolition of such land law doctrines and the development of American democratic character is interesting, there may be less to it than he claims. It might be more accurate to state  that the republican nature of American post-Revolutionary War politics and the resulting constitutional realignment made it easier for state legislatures to sweep away anachronistic legal doctrines.

With those disclaimers, many of his observations and conclusions are worth contemplating, both for their general validity and their continued specific relevance to current American social conditions and political structure. “In order to know the legislation and mores a people, one must therefore begin by studying its social state.” So much has been a common staple of anthropology and political philosophy for millennia. Plato’s exploration of the relationship between the nature or soul of the individual and that of the community comes to mind. Aristotle’s  argument in favor of the social conditions provided within the Greek polis as best conducing to human flourishing is another example. Baron de Montesquieu added climate and ecology to the factors determining the character of a people and their  customs and laws, while his premise of the importance of a people’s social condition to their political system matched that of his countryman.

Ordinary law, including legislation, is most effective when it arises organically from the habits of the people and responds to the community’s felt  needs of the times. Law imposed from the top and used instrumentally to achieve a “good” community envisioned by a self-proclaimed enlightened elite and their clerisy is less likely to account for the full range and nuance of the community’s social condition. At the level of a political constitution, the study of a people’s social condition must take into account historical influences and cultural predispositions beyond what might be needed for ordinary civil or criminal law.

De Tocqueville generally views the American emphasis on equality as a commendable trait. Equality is at the heart of an eminently democratic American  political structure, as he describes it. There is relative economic equality, not due  to a lack of wealthy individuals, reticence about the love of money, or commitment to the permanent equality of property. Rather, there is economic mobility. “In  America most of the rich have begun by being poor,” and “fortune turns there with  incredible rapidity and experience teaches that it is rare to see two generations  collect its favors.”

This is an important factor for republican government. A broad middle class,  constituted of farmers, merchants, artisans, and mechanics, was the focus of  republican theory from ancient Greece to the American founding. Through its  stabilizing influence on the inherent contentiousness of factional political  competition, a broad property-owning middle class as an engine for general  prosperity and maintenance of so-called bourgeois values and morals is a critical  factor for success and longevity of a republic. The current unease about wealth  inequality reflects in part a concern about its effect on the essence of our political  system, self-government. However, wealth inequality is natural in an advanced  technological society based on knowledge. We are not a nomadic hunter-gatherer  society. It is not wealth inequality as such that is the problem, it is whether or not  there is sufficient economic mobility to avoid multi-generational economic and,  ultimately, political stratification.

This cultural devotion to the principle of equality is generally beneficial. It provides the incentive to be economically productive and successful. In education, few are illiterate. “Men show themselves to be more equal in their fortunes and their intelligence … than in any country in the world and than they have been in any century of which history keeps a memory.” On the political side, equality promotes democratic sentiment and political fluidity. “This passion tends to elevate the small to the rank of the great ….”

De Tocqueville acknowledges that there is also a dark side to equality and the democratic principle. He appears to have taken to heart Plato’s lessons in The Republic about the dangers of the democratic man. “[O]ne also encounters a depraved taste for equality in the human heart that brings the weak to want to draw the strong to their level and that reduces men to preferring equality in servitude to inequality in freedom.” This tendency, rooted in envy, is certainly not unknown today.

As to the political danger, “when citizens are all nearly equal, it becomes difficult for them to defend their independence against the aggressions of power…. People can therefore draw two great political consequences from the same social state [maintaining popular sovereignty or succumbing to absolute power of one ruler];…” He concludes, “The first to be submitted to the formidable alternative  that I have just described, the Anglo-Americans have been happy enough to escape  absolute power.” But the danger is always present, and, if Plato is to be believed, the same social and political characteristics that lead to increased equality and  democracy have inherent flaws which ultimately lead to tyrannical government.

De Tocqueville avers that the cause for Americans’ success up to that point was their circumstances (presumably overall prosperity and wide-spread property ownership), origin (presumably deeply ingrained cultural influences), enlightenment (comparatively wide-spread literacy), “and above all mores ….” If  De Tocqueville was correct in at least the core of his analysis of the social condition of the dominant Anglo-American population of the United States in the  mid-19th century, one must now confront two difficult questions. To what extent do the social and economic conditions he saw as critical pre-requisites for self government and popular sovereignty within a republican system still exist? If they have become eroded and resulted in (or are the result of) more systemic economic stratification, less connection to cultural influences that previously defined American republicanism, and collapse of traditional morals, can these deficiencies be mitigated and the alternative tendency to tyranny be avoided?

 

An expert on constitutional law, and member of the Southwestern Law School faculty, Professor Joerg W. Knipprath has been interviewed by print and broadcast media on a number of related topics ranging from recent U.S. Supreme Court decisions to presidential succession. He has written opinion pieces and articles on business and securities law as well as constitutional issues, and has focused his more recent research on the effect of judicial review  on the evolution of constitutional law. He has also spoken on business law and contemporary constitutional issues before  professional and community forums, and serves as a Constituting America Fellow.

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Essay 3: On The Point of Departure and Its Importance for the Future of the Anglo- Americans – Volume 1, Part 1, Chapter 2 of Democracy in America by Alexis de Tocqueville

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Guest Essayist: Tony Williams

Our Commissioners | Office of the Texas Governor | Greg Abbott

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  27 (start at chapter 2 heading) – 45 (stop at chapter 3 heading) – of this edition of Democracy in America.

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Alexis De Tocqueville was a French traveler who produced one of the most discerning observations about American democracy ever written. His discussion of the Puritan origins of American democracy is ample proof of his keen understanding. In De Tocqueville’s view, the Puritans made profound contributions to civil and religious liberty in what he terms, “the first age of the American republics.”

De Tocqueville acknowledges that the English tradition of rights in the Magna  Carta was important to the colonists’ attachment to rights, freedoms, and the rule of law that were a ““fertile seed of free institutions.” But, whatever their country of origin, they experienced common hardships settling North America that promoted equality instead of European feudal aristocracy. While De Tocqueville briefly discusses the South and argues that slavery bred a character of haughtiness and extremes of luxury and poverty:

Slavery as we shall explain later, dishonors work; it introduces idleness into society, and with it, ignorance and haughtiness, poverty and luxury. It enervates the forces of the intellect and puts human activity to sleep. The influence of slavery, combined with the English character, explains the mores and social state of the South.

He focuses on the Puritan democracy that shaped the American character and self rule.

De Tocqueville sees several defining characteristics of Puritan democracy that supported religious and civil liberty. The Pilgrims, he notes, sought to escape persecution and enjoy religious freedom to worship God as they pleased. Importantly, they settled as middle-class families who were the backbone of a society that valued family, order, and morality.

In addition, one of the first things the Pilgrims did in the New World was to agree to a political covenant establishing the rule of law. The Mayflower Compact created a civil body politic to create “just and equal laws” in support of the common good. The towns of New England formed democracies in which the people were sovereign and “name their magistrates…[and] give themselves laws.”

In their democratic town meetings, the sovereign people voted and participated in public affairs, enjoyed individual freedom, and consented to taxes. They served in local public offices that served the needs of the community. The citizens formed strong attachments to their community and were habituated in their rights, duties, and morals.

One of the main pillars of strong, democratic New England towns was the great emphasis upon education. Townspeople paid taxes to support public schools. De Tocqueville correctly observes that the Puritans were a people of the Book who valued education and encouraged literacy to read Scripture. “It is religion that leads to enlightenment,” he wrote.

De Tocqueville argues that New Englanders clearly demonstrated the close ties of “the spirit of religion and the spirit of freedom” that “lend each other a mutual support.” Importantly, he states that Puritanism provided a natural law framework for liberty under law rather than licentiousness.

While he does not directly address the rich tradition of Protestant resistance theory that was similar to and predating the Enlightenment ideas of John Locke, De Tocqueville believes that Puritan covenant theology supported an understanding of civil liberty that the Founders would have understood. The Puritans believed that  the Creator was the source of natural rights. A just government supported a rule of  law and a moral society that protected the rights granted by the divine.

De Tocqueville concludes the chapter with an exploration of national character. He states that the English tradition of liberty obviously influenced colonial political ideas and practice, but he offers a rather bold assertion that in understanding the  American founding, “one ought therefore to distinguish carefully what is of Puritan origin or of English origin.” The tenor of the chapter is that one should not  underestimate just how important the Puritans were to shaping American democracy.

Tony Williams is a Senior Fellow at the Bill of Rights Institute and is the  author of six books including Washington and Hamilton: The Alliance that  Forged America, with Stephen Knott. Williams is currently writing a book on the Declaration of Independence.

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Essay 2: External Configuration Of Northern America – Volume 1, Part 1, Chapter 1 of Democracy in America by Alexis de Tocqueville

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Our Commissioners | Office of the Texas Governor | Greg Abbott

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 3 – 27 of this edition of Democracy in America, and stops at the Chapter 2 heading.

Please leave a comment in the blog below and automatically be entered in our weekly drawing for a free copy of the book!

In 1831, Alexis De Tocqueville came to America, sent by France to investigate the United States of America’s prison system. De Tocqueville does that and much more in his incredible, sprawling book that provides his impressions of democracy in North America.

De Tocqueville addresses in the first volume and part and chapter the majestic, sprawling geography of the United States. He refers to the “external configuration” of North America. De Tocqueville refers to the “methodical order” that separates land and water, with two vast regions divided. He notes the two great mountain ranges that separate the regions, one being the Alleghenies in the east, and the other the Rocky Mountains in the west.

In between the two mountain ranges is the “Father of Waters, or the Mississippi.” The valley watered by the Mississippi River “dispenses good and evil at will, and in that it is like the god”. De Tocqueville notes that the waters are responsible for the country’s sterility and abundance. He was very impressed with the Mississippi Valley, making the following glowing attribution:

“The Mississippi Valley is, all in all, the most magnificent dwelling that God has ever prepared for the habitation of man, and nonetheless one can say that it still forms only a vast wilderness.”

De Tocqueville would be pleased, one would think, if he could jump ahead almost 100 years to the present and see that the wilderness is no more.

Turning to the territory that is east of the Alleghenies and west of the Atlantic Ocean, De Tocqueville characterizes that part as “a long band of rocks and sand that the sea, in retreating, seems to have forgotten.” The small territory, 100 miles wide and 900 miles long, did not lend itself to ideal or easy farming. This land De Tocqueville describes was “on that inhospitable coast” where “were born and grew the English colonies that were day to become the United States of America”. When one reads and ponders that statement, one realizes how incredible it is that those colonies became the base for this great nation of ours, which spans beyond the Rockies to the west coast and beyond.

In this first part, De Tocqueville speaks much of the Native Americans and contemplates the first European settlers’ arriving to the new place. He writes of the time before the Europeans came to our shores and the inhabitants:

He speaks of the Indians as “equal and free.” He contemplates the “landing on the shores of North America” by Europeans having little impression on the natives, as “their presence gave rise neither to envy or fear.”

“Mild and hospitable in peace, pitiless in war, even beyond the known boundaries of human ferocity, the Indian would expose himself to die of hunger in order to assist the stranger who knocked at the door of his hut in the night ….. The most famous ancient republics had never admired a firmer courage, prouder souls, a more intractable love of independence than was hiding in the wild woods of the New World.”

“The Indian knew how to live without needs, to suffer without complaining, to die singing. ….they adored God, the creator of the universe. Their notions on great intellectual truths were generally simple and philosophical.”

De Tocqueville in this chapter identifies the resources and the bountifulness of the United States and provides reasons why the nation he wrote so much about was in the position it was, even before the Industrial Revolution that was soon to come.

In closing chapter 1, De Tocqueville sets up the overall premise of his book, the democracy he experienced.

He wrote, “It was there that civilized men were to try to build a society on new foundations, and applying for the first time theories until then unknown or reputed inapplicable, they were going to give the world a spectacle for which the history of the past had not prepared it.”

Much of what De Tocqueville wrote has weathered two hundred years and gone through massive changes, yet his views on the exterior lands is amazing and somewhat forecasting, as the map and America he explored in 1831 was not the sea to shining sea nation we live in today.

Daniel A. Cotter is Attorney and Counselor at Dickinson Wright PLLC. Dan focuses his practices in a variety of areas of corporate law and litigation, including insurance law, complex business disputes and counseling, employment law, corporate transactions, corporate governance and compliance, and cybersecurity and privacy law. Dan was an adjunct professor at The John Marshall Law School, and has taught Insurance Law, Accounting for Lawyers and SCOTUS Judicial Biography. Dan graduated summa cum laude from The John Marshall Law School and received his B.A. in Accounting from Monmouth College, magna cum laude. Dan is a frequent writer and presenter on various topics, including the nation’s history and the Supreme Court, and in 2019, his book, “The Chief Justices,” was published.”

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Introduction to Democracy in America by Alexis de Tocqueville: Why Every American Should Read a Book by a Frenchman

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Guest Essayist, Pete Peterson, Dean of the Pepperdine School of Public Policy

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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. Leave a comment in the blog below and automatically be entered in our weekly drawing for a free copy of the book!

In the introduction to their translation of Alexis De Tocqueville’s Democracy in America, the renowned Harvard historian, Harvey Mansfield, and his late wife, Delba Winthrop, describe the volume as “at once the best book ever written on democracy and the best book ever written on America.” Though written almost two centuries ago, the book’s insights on American culture and exceptionalism could not be more timely. Though coming in at 700+ pages in the Mansfield/Winthrop edited edition, it’s well worth an investment of time and study by every American.

Alexis De Tocqueville was a French aristocrat and government official who landed in the United States in 1831 with his friend, Gustave de Beaumont, ostensibly to study America’s prison system, but his plans soon change as he encounters a culture so different than his own. In the first paragraph of the book, De Tocqueville lays the foundation for his overarching argument about the country’s exceptional nature by declaring that what struck him most about America in those first few days of the visit was the “equality of conditions”. He goes on to argue that “this enormous influence this primary fact exerts on the course of society; it gives a certain direction to public spirit, a certain turn to the laws…and particular habits to the governed.” By “equality of conditions”, De Tocqueville did not mean to say that everyone lived in equal circumstances, but something closer to “equality of opportunity.”

From this firm foundation, De Tocqueville perceives the major cultural factor (what he calls “mores”) that appears to be necessary to support a country where equal opportunity reigned as the central economic dynamic. He quickly discovers that Americans hold to a doctrine he calls “self-interest rightly understood” – a worldview that dictates a certain degree of reliance on neighbors and community in order to accomplish tasks ranging from building churches to roadways. Remember, at this stage in America’s history, the federal government had little power to determine local affairs. As De Tocqueville writes, “they show with complacency how an enlightened regard for themselves constantly prompts them to assist each other, and inclines them willingly to sacrifice a portion of their time and property,” for the common good.

Comparing with his native Europe, De Tocqueville is also shocked to see religion and government mix in a way that’s actually beneficial rather than a source of bloody conflict. Unlike Europe, America did not have a national religion, but ironically, this contributed to a flourishing of faith in the country. From developing Americans’ political skills by serving in local church administrative councils, to working with faith-based nonprofits, De Tocqueville concludes, “Religion, which, among Americans, never mixes directly in the government of society should therefore be considered as the first of their political institutions; for if it does not give them the taste for freedom, it singularly facilitates their use of it.”

This willingness of Americans to collaborate through nonprofit and ad hoc civic organizations is what De Tocqueville describes as “associativeness”, and it’s a major distinction between this burgeoning republic and Europe. From temperance associations to foreign missionary support organizations, De Tocqueville sees Americans put their faith into action even as they respond to local needs that would have been the purview of government in Europe. He observes, “Everywhere that, at the head of a new undertaking, you see the government in France and a great lord in England, count on it that you will perceive an association in the United States.”

As we conclude our whirlwind review of Democracy in America, it’s worth noting that De Tocqueville’s last chapters in the book can be seen as prophetic in describing the future of American (and other democracies’) society. It’s not an optimistic perspective, and one grounded in the Frenchman’s belief that with the increasing wealth he foresees coming to this country, Americans will gradually withdraw from their associations, their faith, and the community-spirit. De Tocqueville looks to the future: “There is, in fact, a very perilous passage in the life of democratic peoples. When the taste for material enjoyments develops in one of these peoples more rapidly than enlightenment and the habits of freedom.”

De Tocqueville fears that as Americans earn the material benefits of freedom, they will look to government not to protect our liberties, but to protect our “stuff”. He describes this dynamic: “each of them desires that it [central government] aid him as an exception in the special affair that reoccupies him, and he seeks to attract the action of the government to his side, all the while wanting to shrink it for everyone else.”

It is here where De Tocqueville wonders whether the “self-interest rightly understood”, which drew Americans into civil society and community would become “self-interest wrongly understood”- a selfishness and withdrawal from the public square. For future leaders, De Tocqueville sees that “individual independence and local liberties will always be the product of art.” Are we seeing these trendlines today? I think these concerns, and the importance of citizen engagement are vital to consider during this election year, and beyond.

Pete Peterson is the Braun Family Dean’s Chair of Pepperdine University’s School of Public Policy. Prior to that he was the executive director of the School’s Davenport Institute, which trains local government officials to improve their public meeting processes. Pete speaks and writes widely on civic participation, viewpoint diversity in higher education, and the increasing role of technology in local government.

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