An Outsider Looking In:
Alexis de Tocqueville
“A worldwide revolution toward
democracy is in full swing amongst us”
(Political Science 565)
Alexis de Tocqueville
• 1805-1859
• Minor French Aristocrat
• Parents almost executed
under Robespierre
• Liberal
• Active in French politics,
retires after Louis
Napoleon Bonaparte’s
1851 coup
• Democracy in America &
The Old Regime and the
Revolution
2
Democracy in America
• 1835 & 1840
– July Monarchy (July Revolution of 1830 –
Revolution of 1848)
• Tocqueville and Gustave de Beaumont sent by
French gov’t to study American prisons, but
just a pretext for a study of America
• Tocqueville & Beaumont travel US for nine
months, starting May 1831
3
Key Points
• Developmental analysis
• Equality the definitive characteristic of
American life
• Reconciliation of religion & liberty
• Relationship between law & morality
• Self-interest rightly understood
4
America in 1831
• Jacksonian democracy
– Expand suffrage to all white men (removed property restrictions for
voting)
– Militant egalitarianism
– Militant racism
– Suspicion of institutions of government and business
– Expansionism
• Indian Relocation Act of 1830
• Industrial Revolution
– Interchangeable parts, urbanization, national roads, early railroads
• Slavery
• Nation, States and sections
– Jackson a proponent of single national identity and of states’ rights
– North and South
5
Purpose of the Book
• “The first of the duties currently imposed
upon the rulers of our society is to educate
democracy, to reawaken, if possible, its
beliefs, to purify its morals, to control its
actions, gradually to substitute statecraft for
its inexperience and awareness of its true
interests for its blind instincts, to adapt its
government to times and places, and to mold
it according to its circumstances and people.”
(16)
6
The French 19th Century
•
•
•
•
•
•
1789: French Revolution: The First Republic
1804-1815 : Emperor Napoleon
1815 : Restoration of the Monarchy.
1830-1848 : Revolution: July Monarchy.
1848 : Revolution: Second Republic
1852-1870 : Second Empire under Napoleon
III
• 1879: Third Republic
7
Method
• The condition of society is normally the result
of circumstances, sometimes of laws, more
often than not a combination of these two
causes; but, once it is established, we can
consider it as the fundamental source of most
of the laws, customs, and ideas which regulate
the conduct of nations; whatever it does not
produce, it modifies. (58)
8
Method
• The entire man, so to speak, comes full
formed in the wrappings of his cradle. (37)
– Developmental approach
– Origins and early experiences definitive of people
and societies
– America is the only society in the Christian world
that is observable from its beginning
9
The Tide of History
• Toward equality
– In 1100, power is determined entirely by birth
– But the Church can provide a vehicle for social
mobility to people of all classes, and the growth of
Church power introduces paths to power for
commoners
– Rising power of money & trade can bring power to all,
regardless of birth
• Towns & commerce have been used by kings and aristocrats
to undercut one another, but towns and traders have grown
in power all the while (12-13)
• Technology, art, etc.
10
The Tide of History
• “The whole of the book in front of the reader has
been written under the pressure of a kind of
religious terror exercised upon the soul of the
author by the sight of this irresistible revolution
which has progressed over so many centuries,
surmounting all obstacles, and which is still
advancing today amid the ruins it has caused.”
(15)
– The will of God
– Teleological endpoint of Western civilization is
equality
11
Problems in French Society
• “But as we have left behind the social conditions
of our ancestors and have cast behind us their
institutions, ideas, and customs in one confused
heap, what have we put in their place?” (19)
– Majesty of royalty gone, but the laws have not
inherited it, people fear and despise authority
– Powerful aristocrats who could oppose despotic gov’t
are gone, but nothing is in their place
– People of all classes have become selfish and
materialistic
12
Problems in French Society
• We have abandoned whatever advatages the
old regime possessed without grasping those
gains offered by the present state of things;
we have destroyed an aristocratic society and,
as we complacently stand in the midst of the
ruins of the old building, we seem willing to
stand there forever. (20)
13
Problems in French Society
• In France, the representatives of Christianity and
those of liberty and equality have, for historical
reasons, become enemies, when they should be
one and the same. (21)
• It is not simply, therefore, to satisfy a curiosity,
albeit justified, that I have examined America; my
aim has been to discover lessons from which we
may profit. (23)
– In this way, the book is about France as much as it is
America
14
Climate and Character
• Contextual, developmental approach
• South America, though dangerous, due to its
climate “produced a kind of draining influence
which riveted man to the present and rendered
him indifferent to the future.”
• In, North America, though, “all was weighty,
serious, solemn; it might be said that it had been
created to become the realm of the mind just as
the other was the home of the senses.” (31)
15
What about the natives?
• “Noble savage” stereotype
• Brave, generous, honest, barbaric, strong, cruel and not
especially bright.
• Maybe the degenerate remnants of a previously
great civilization? (35, App. C, 824)
– Complex grammar, but low levels of technology
– A product of Tocqueville’s method, which supposes
linear development?
• They weren’t really using the land, which was
meant for the Europeans to exploit. (36)
16
Common Features of American
Colonists, derived from England
• Language
• Political heritage of rights and liberty, gov’t by
consent
• Religious conflicts result in serious character,
value of intellect & dispute, purified morals
• Unsettled, immigrant character of new
colonies means no one is predisposed to
accept the superiority of anyone else (39-40)
17
Colonists of the South
• Seekers of gold, adventurers without
substance or character
• Later, farmers & craftsmen, w/better moral,
but more or less identical with English lower
classes
• No noble views, no spiritual thought presided
over the creation of these new settlements
(41)
– Entirely mercantile
18
Slavery in the Colonies
• Brings dishonor to work; it introduces idleness
into society together with ignorance and
pride, poverty, and indulgence. It weakens
the powers of the mind and dampens human
effort. The influence of slavery, together with
the English character, explains the customs
and social conditions of the South.
19
New England Colonists
• Political ideas have permeated all of the
United States, and now the world
– “A beacon lit upon mountain tops”
• Middle class
• Not adventurers, immigrate with families,
good morals
• Came to N. America not in search of wealth,
“Their object was the triumph of an idea.”
(42-43)
20
“Pilgrims”
• Puritanism “almost as much a political theory
as a religious doctrine.” (46)
– Equality before God
– Emphasis on mutually agreed upon covenant for
governance
– Laws passed by consent of the community
• Along with penal laws “redolent of the narrow bigotry
of sect and religious fanaticism” exist political laws
“which, although enacted two hundred years ago, seem
still to anticipate the spirit of freedom of our own
times.” (52)
21
Aspects of Puritan Gov’t
• All in service of religious aims
– Voting on gov’t, laws, taxes
– Personal responsibility of those in power
– Individual freedom
– Trial by jury
– Universal (male) militia service
– Public education
– Protection of the poor
– Record keeping & administration (51-54)
22
Religion, Liberty & Equality
• “The founders of New England were both
sectarian fanatics & noble innovators.” (55)
– Believing religious law eternal, they saw political laws
as infinitely flexible
– Reconciling the spirit of liberty and spirit of religion
– The town was organized before the nation, and at the
Revolution the New England concept of equality came
to organize the new nation
• “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are
created equal...”
23
Law & Society in America
• I am astonished that commentators old and new
have not attributed to the laws of inheritance a
greater influence on the progress of human
affairs. (60)
– Primogeniture keeps wealth & property unified
• A modern corporation has a similar function
– Equal inheritance divides it, diffusing wealth and
dividing it among heirs
• For T., this is a major cause for the then relative equality of
wealth in the United States as compared to Europe
24
Equality of Education
• Almost everyone has access to primary
education, almost no one has access to higher
education
• Very few born rich enough not to work, have
no leisure for study, never develop a taste for
it
• Interest primarily in practical knowledge,
rather than abstract academic forms of
knowledge (65-66)
25
Politics and Equality
• “Equality ends up by infiltrating the world of
politics as it does everywhere else.” (66-67)
• Two kinds of political equality:
– All have equal rights
– No one has any
• Americans have chosen the former
– Women? Slaves?
26
Popular Sovereignty
• At the time of the Revolution, equality was so
ingrained in American society that there was
no thought of instituting an aristocracy
• “The people reign in the American political
world like God over the universe. It is the
cause and aim of all things, everything comes
from them and everything is absorbed in
them.” (71)
27
Method
• “The condition of society is normally the
result of circumstances, sometimes of laws,
more often than not a combination of these
two causes; but, once it is established, we can
consider it as the fundamental source of most
of the laws, customs, and ideas which regulate
the conduct of nations; whatever it does not
produce, it modifies.” (58)
28
“Pilgrims”
• Puritanism “almost as much a political theory
as a religious doctrine.” (46)
– Equality before God
– Emphasis on mutually agreed upon covenant for
governance
– Laws passed by consent of the community
• Along with penal laws “redolent of the narrow bigotry
of sect and religious fanaticism” exist political laws
“which, although enacted two hundred years ago, seem
still to anticipate the spirit of freedom of our own
times.” (52)
29
Aspects of Puritan Gov’t
• All in service of religious aims
– Voting on gov’t, laws, taxes
– Personal responsibility of those in power
– Individual freedom
– Trial by jury
– Universal (male) militia service
– Public education
– Protection of the poor
– Record keeping & administration (51-54)
30
Religion, Liberty & Equality
• “The founders of New England were both
sectarian fanatics & noble innovators.” (55)
– Believing religious law eternal, they saw political laws
as infinitely flexible
– Reconciling the spirit of liberty and spirit of religion
– The town was organized before the nation, and at the
Revolution the New England concept of equality came
to organize the new nation
• “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are
created equal...”
31
Law & Society in America
• “I am astonished that commentators old and new
have not attributed to the laws of inheritance a
greater influence on the progress of human
affairs.” (60)
– Primogeniture keeps wealth & property unified
• A modern corporation has a similar function
– Equal inheritance divides it, diffusing wealth and
dividing it among heirs
• For T., this is a major cause for the then relative equality of
wealth in the United States as compared to Europe
32
Politics and Equality
• “Equality ends up by infiltrating the world of
politics as it does everywhere else.” (66-67)
• Two kinds of political equality:
– All have equal rights
– No one has any
• Americans have chosen the former
– Women? Slaves?
33
Popular Sovereignty
• At the time of the Revolution, equality was so
ingrained in American society that there was
no thought of instituting an aristocracy
– Any remaining
• “The people reign in the American political
world like God over the universe. It is the
cause and aim of all things, everything comes
from them and everything is absorbed in
them.” (71)
34
Bottom-Up Gov’t
• In America, township  state  federal gov’t
(71)
• Man it is that makes monarchies and founds
republics; the township seems a direct gift
from the hand of God. But if the town has
existed as long as man has, its freedom is
uncommon and easily broken
– The US is remarkable for the amount of power
allowed municipal & local gov’ts
35
• “The strength of free nations resides in the township. Tow
institutions are to freedom what primary schools are to
knowledge: they bring it within people’s reach and give
men the enjoyment and habit of using it for peaceful ends.
Without town institutions a nation can establish a free
government but has not the spirit of freedom itself.” (73)
– Town gov’t trains individuals in self-gov’t, ownership of and
active participation in it
– Democracy as a way of being
– NE towns best at this
– This also makes Americans unbearably touchy about criticism
from foreigners: it is a criticism of their own creation (277)
36
Centralization
• Two kinds (103):
– Governmental: national issues (national law, war,
foreign relations)
• For T., this is very important to accomplish. The nation may
speak with one voice. (104)
– Administrative: Zoning, construction, local issues
• For T, this is bad. It diminishes the sense that individuals
govern themselves, reducing civic pride. (104)
• America has highly centralized its government,
but has a decentralized administration (103)
37
• A central gov’t may administer more
efficiently & wisely, but it detracts from a
nation’s democratic spirit (107)
– “Men must walk in freedom, responsible for their
own behavior.” (108)
– The advantages Americans get from decentralized
administration are political, while in France
“Subjects still exist but citizens are no more. (110,
111)
38
Force of Ideas
• “You will never come across true exercise of
power among men, except by the free
agreement of their wills; only patriotism or
religion can carry, over a long period, the
whole body of citizens toward the same goal.”
(111)
– Decentralization of administration results in
heightened patriotism, and forms a check against
a potentially tyrannical central gov’t
– The habit of freedom (114)
39