Alexis de Tocqueville was born in Paris and came from a prominent lineage, with his father serving as a royalist prefect under the Bourbon restoration.
In 1831, at the age of twenty-five, Alexis de Tocqueville made his fateful journey to America, where he observed the thrilling reality of a functioning democracy. From that moment onward, the French aristocrat would dedicate his life as a writer and politician to ending despotism in his country and bringing it into a new age.
Quotes from Alexis de Tocqueville’s “Democracy in America”:
- “The greatness of America lies not in being more enlightened than any other nation, but rather in her ability to repair her faults.”
- “Americans are so enamored of equality that they would rather be equal in slavery than unequal in freedom.”
- “In democratic ages, human beings rarely sacrifice themselves for one another voluntarily; they almost always do so because they are impelled to by some power outside themselves.”
- “Despotism often presents itself as the repairer of all ills suffered, the support of just rights, defender of the oppressed and founder of order.”
- “The best laws cannot make a constitution work in spite of morals; morals can turn the worst laws to advantage.”
- “I do not know if the people of the United States would vote for superior men if they ran for office, but there can be no doubt that such men do not run.”
- “The most dangerous moment for a bad government is when it begins to reform.”
- “The Americans combine the notions of Christianity and of liberty so intimately in their minds that it is impossible to make them conceive the one without the other.”
- “The will of man is not shattered, but softened, bent, and guided; men are seldom forced by it to act, but they are constantly restrained from acting. Such power does not destroy, but it prevents existence; it does not tyrannize, but it compresses, extinguishes, and stupefies a people, till each nation is reduced to nothing better than a flock of timid and industrious animals, of which the government is the shepherd.”
- “Americans combine the notions of Christian morality and of liberty so intimately in their minds that it is impossible to make them conceive the one without the other.”
- “In the United States, the most enlightened are the most religious; and the most religious are the most enlightened.”
- Americans of all ages, all conditions, and all dispositions constantly form associations… Wherever at the head of some new undertaking you see the government in France, or a man of rank in England, in the United States you will be sure to find an association.”
