American Institutions and Their Influence by Alexis de Tocqueville et al

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The omnipotence of the majority and the rapid as well as absolute manner
in which its decisions are executed in the United States, have not only
the effect of rendering the law unstable, but they exercise the same
influence upon the execution of the law and the conduct of the public
administration. As the majority is the only power which it is important
to court, all its projects are taken up with the greatest ardor; but no
sooner is its attention distracted, than all this ardor ceases; while in
the free states of Europe, the administration is at once independent and
secure, so that the projects of the legislature are put into execution,
although its immediate attention may be directed to other objects.

In America certain meliorations are undertaken with much more zeal and
activity than elsewhere; in Europe the same ends are promoted by much
less social effort, more continuously applied.

Some years ago several pious individuals undertook to meliorate the
condition of the prisons. The public was excited by the statements which
they put forward, and the regeneration of criminals became a very
popular undertaking. New prisons were built; and, for the first time,
the idea of reforming as well as of punishing the delinquent, formed a
part of prison discipline. But this happy alteration, in which the
public had taken so hearty an interest, and which the exertions of the
citizens had irresistibly accelerated, could not be completed in a
moment. While the new penitentiaries were being erected (and it was the
pleasure of the majority they should be terminated with all possible
celerity), the old prisons existed, which still contained a great number
of offenders. These jails became more unwholesome and more corrupt in
proportion as the new establishments were beautified and improved,
forming a contrast which may readily be understood. The majority was so
eagerly employed in founding the new prisons, that those which already
existed were forgotten; and as the general attention was diverted to a
novel object, the care which had hitherto been bestowed upon the others
ceased. The salutary regulations of discipline were first relaxed, and
afterward broken; so that in the immediate neighborhood of a prison
which bore witness to the mild and enlightened spirit of our time,
dungeons might be met with, which reminded the visitor of the barbarity
of the middle ages.

* * * * *

TYRANNY OF THE MAJORITY.

How the Principle of the Sovereignty of the People is to be
understood.--Impossibility of conceiving a mixed Government.--The
sovereign Power must centre somewhere.--Precautions to be taken to
control its Action.--These Precautions have not been taken in the United
States.--Consequences.

I hold it to be an impious and an execrable maxim that, politically
speaking, a people has a right to do whatsoever it pleases; and yet I
have asserted that all authority originates in the will of the majority.
Am I, then, in contradiction with myself?

A general law--which bears the name of justice--has been made and
sanctioned, not only by a majority of this or that people, but by a
majority of mankind. The rights of every people are consequently
confined within the limits of what is just. A nation may be considered
in the light of a jury which is empowered to represent society at large,
and to apply the great and general law of justice. Ought such a jury,
which represents society, to have more power than the society in which
the laws it applies originate?

When I refuse to obey an unjust law, I do not contest the right which
the majority has of commanding, but I simply appeal from the sovereignty
of the people to the sovereignty of mankind. It has been asserted that a
people can never entirely outstep the boundaries of justice and of
reason in those affairs which are more peculiarly its own; and that
consequently full power may fearlessly be given to the majority by which
it is represented. But this language is that of a slave.

A majority taken collectively may be regarded as a being whose opinions,
and most frequently whose interests, are opposed to those of another
being, which is styled a minority. If it be admitted that a man,
possessing absolute power, may misuse that power by wronging his
adversaries, why should a majority not be liable to the same reproach?
Men are not apt to change their characters by agglomeration; nor does
their patience in the presence of obstacles increase with the
consciousness of their strength.[184] And for these reasons I can never
willingly invest any number of my fellow-creatures with that unlimited
authority which I should refuse to any one of them.

I do not think it is possible to combine several principles in the same
government, so as at the same time to maintain freedom, and really to
oppose them to one another. The form of government which is usually
termed _mixed_ has always appeared to me to be a mere chimera.
Accurately speaking, there is no such thing as a mixed government (with
the meaning usually given to that word), because in all communities some
one principle of action may be discovered, which preponderates over the
others. England in the last century, which has been more especially
cited as an example of this form of government, was in point of fact an
essentially aristocratic state, although it comprised very powerful
elements of democracy: for the laws and customs of the country were
such, that the aristocracy could not but preponderate in the end, and
subject the direction of public affairs to its own will. The error arose
from too much attention being paid to the actual struggle which was
going on between the nobles and the people, without considering the
probable issue of the contest, which was in reality the important point.
When a community really has a mixed government, that is to say, when it
is equally divided between two adverse principles, it must either pass
through a revolution, or fall into complete dissolution.

I am therefore of opinion that some one social power must always be made
to predominate over the others; but I think that liberty is endangered
when this power is checked by no obstacles which may retard its course,
and force it to moderate its own vehemence.

Unlimited power is in itself a bad and dangerous thing; human beings are
not competent to exercise it with discretion; and God alone can be
omnipotent, because his wisdom and his justice are always equal to his
power. But no power upon earth is so worthy of honor for itself, or of
reverential obedience to the rights which it represents, that I would
consent to admit its uncontrolled and all-predominate authority. When I
see that the right and the means of absolute command are conferred on a
people or upon a king, upon an aristocracy or a democracy, a monarchy or
a republic, I recognize the germ of tyranny, and I journey onward to a
land of more hopeful institutions.

In my opinion the main evil of the present democratic institutions of
the United States does not arise, as is often asserted in Europe, from
their weakness, but from their overpowering strength; and I am not so
much alarmed at the excessive liberty which reigns in that country, as
at the very inadequate securities which exist against tyranny.

When an individual or a party is wronged in the United States, to whom
can he apply for redress? If to public opinion, public opinion
constitutes the majority; if to the legislature, it represents the
majority, and implicitly obeys its instructions: if to the executive
power, it is appointed by the majority and is a passive tool in its
hands; the public troops consist of the majority under arms; the jury is
the majority invested with the right of hearing judicial cases; and in
certain states even the judges are elected by the majority. However
iniquitous or absurd the evil of which you complain may be, you must
submit to it as well as you can.[185]

If, on the other hand, a legislative power could be so constituted as to
represent the majority without necessarily being the slave of its
passions; an executive, so as to retain a certain degree of uncontrolled
authority; and a judiciary, so as to remain independent of the two other
powers; a government would be formed which would still be democratic,
without incurring any risk of tyrannical abuse.

I do not say that tyrannical abuses frequently occur in America at the
present day; but I maintain that no sure barrier is established against
them, and that the causes which mitigate the government are to be found
in the circumstances and the manners of the country more than its laws.

* * * * *

EFFECTS OF THE UNLIMITED POWER OF THE MAJORITY UPON THE ARBITRARY
AUTHORITY OF THE AMERICAN PUBLIC OFFICERS.

Liberty left by the American Laws to public Officers within a certain
Sphere.--Their Power.

A distinction must be drawn between tyranny and arbitrary power. Tyranny
may be exercised by means of the law, and in that case it is not
arbitrary; arbitrary power may be exercised for the good of the
community at large, in which case it is not tyrannical. Tyranny usually
employs arbitrary means, but, if necessary, it can rule without them.

In the United States the unbounded power of the majority, which is
favorable to the legal despotism of the legislature, is likewise
favorable to the arbitrary authority of the magistrates. The majority
has an entire control over the law when it is made and when it is
executed; and as it possesses an equal authority over those who are in
power, and the community at large, it considers public officers as its
passive agents, and readily confides the task of serving its designs to
their vigilance. The details of their office and the privileges which
they are to enjoy are rarely defined beforehand; but the majority treats
them as a master does his servants, when they are always at work in his
sight, and he has the power of directing or reprimanding them at every
instant.

In general the American functionaries are far more independent than the
French civil officers, within the sphere which is prescribed to them.
Sometimes, even, they are allowed by the popular authority to exceed
those bounds; and as they are protected by the opinion, and backed by
the cooperation of the majority, they venture upon such manifestations
of their power as astonish a European. By this means habits are formed
in the heart of a free country which may some day prove fatal to its
liberties.

* * * * *

POWER EXERCISED BY THE MAJORITY IN AMERICA UPON OPINION.

In America, when the Majority has once irrevocably decided a Question,
all Discussion ceases.--Reason of this.--Moral Power exercised by the
Majority upon Opinion.--Democratic Republics have deprived Despotism of
its physical Instruments.--Their Despotism sways the Minds of Men.

It is in the examination of the display of public opinion in the United
States, that we clearly perceive how far the power of the majority
surpasses all the powers with which we are acquainted in Europe.
Intellectual principles exercise an influence which is so invisible and
often so inappreciable, that they baffle the toils of oppression. At the
present time the most absolute monarchs in Europe are unable to prevent
certain notions, which are opposed to their authority, from circulating
in secret throughout their dominions, and even in their courts. Such is
not the case in America; so long as the majority is still undecided,
discussion is carried on; but as soon as its decision is irrevocably
pronounced, a submissive silence is observed; and the friends, as well
as the opponents of the measure, unite in assenting to its propriety.
The reason of this is perfectly clear: no monarch is so absolute as to
combine all the powers of society in his own hands, and to conquer all
opposition, with the energy of a majority, which is invested with the
right of making and of executing the laws.

The authority of a king is purely physical, and it controls the actions
of the subject without subduing his private will; but the majority
possesses a power which is physical and moral at the same time; it acts
upon the will as well as upon the actions of men, and it represses not
only all contest, but all controversy.

I know no country in which there is so little true independence of mind
and freedom of discussion as in America. In any constitutional state in
Europe every sort of religious and political theory may be advocated and
propagated abroad; for there is no country in Europe so subdued by any
single authority, as not to contain citizens who are ready to protect
the man who raises his voice in the cause of truth, from the
consequences of his hardihood. If he is unfortunate enough to live under
an absolute government, the people is upon his side; if he inhabits a
free country, he may find a shelter behind the authority of the throne,
if he require one. The aristocratic part of society supports him in some
countries, and the democracy in others. But in a nation where democratic
institutions exist, organized like those of the United States, there is
but one sole authority, one single element of strength and success, with
nothing beyond it.

In America, the majority raises very formidable barriers to the liberty
of opinion: within these barriers an author may write whatever he
pleases, but he will repent it if he ever step beyond them. Not that he
is exposed to the terrors of an auto-da-fe, but he is tormented by the
slights and persecutions of daily obloquy. His political career is
closed for ever, since he has offended the only authority which is able
to promote his success. Every sort of compensation, even that of
celebrity, is refused to him. Before he published his opinions, he
imagined that he held them in common with many others; but no sooner has
he declared them openly, than he is loudly censured by his overbearing
opponents, while those who think, without having the courage to speak,
like him, abandon him in silence. He yields at length, oppressed by the
daily efforts he has been making, and he subsides into silence as if he
was tormented by remorse for having spoken the truth.

Fetters and headsmen were the coarse instruments which tyranny formerly
employed; but the civilisation of our age has refined the arts of
despotism, which seemed however to have been sufficiently perfected
before. The excesses of monarchical power had devised a variety of
political means of oppression; the democratic republics of the present
day have rendered it as entirely an affair of the mind, as that will
which it is intended to coerce. Under the absolute sway of an individual
despot, the body was attacked in order to subdue the soul; and the soul
escaped the blows which were directed against it, and rose superior to
the attempt; but such is not the course adopted by tyranny in democratic
republics; there the body is left free, and the soul is enslaved. The
sovereign can no longer say, "You shall think as I do on pain of death;"
but he says, "You are free to think differently from me, and to retain
your life, your property, and all that you possess; but if such be your
determination, you are henceforth an alien among your people. You may
retain your civil rights, but they will be useless to you, for you will
never be chosen by your fellow-citizens, if you solicit their suffrages;
and they will affect to scorn you, if you solicit their esteem. You will
remain among men, but you will be deprived of the rights of mankind.
Your fellow-creatures will shun you like an impure being; and those who
are most persuaded of your innocence will abandon you too, lest they
should be shunned in their turn. Go in peace! I have given you your
life, but it is an existence incomparably worse than death."

Absolute monarchies have thrown an odium upon despotism; let us beware
lest democratic republics should restore oppression, and should render
it less odious and less degrading in the eyes of the many, by making it
still more onerous to the few.

Works have been published in the proudest nations of the Old World,
expressly intended to censure the vices and deride the follies of the
time; Labruyère inhabited the palace of Louis XIV. when he composed his
chapter upon the Great, and Molière criticised the courtiers in the very
pieces which were acted before the court. But the ruling power in the
United States is not to be made game of; the smallest reproach irritates
its sensibility, and the slightest joke which has any foundation in
truth, renders it indignant; from the style of its language to the more
solid virtues of its character, everything must be made the subject of
encomium. No writer, whatever be his eminence, can escape from this
tribute of adulation to his fellow-citizens. The majority lives in the
perpetual exercise of self-applause; and there are certain truths which
the Americans can only learn from strangers or from experience.

If great writers have not at present existed in America, the reason is
very simply given in these facts; there can be no literary genius
without freedom of opinion, and freedom of opinion does not exist in
America. The inquisition has never been able to prevent a vast number of
anti-religious books from circulating in Spain. The empire of the
majority succeeds much better in the United States, since it actually
removes the wish of publishing them. Unbelievers are to be met with in
America, but, to say the truth, there is no public organ of infidelity.
Attempts have been made by some governments to protect the morality of
nations by prohibiting licentious books. In the United States no one is
punished for this sort of works, but no one is induced to write them;
not because all the citizens are immaculate in their manners, but
because the majority of the community is decent and orderly.

In these cases the advantages derived from the exercise of this power
are unquestionable; and I am simply discussing the nature of the power
itself. This irresistible authority is a constant fact, and its
beneficent exercise is an accidental occurrence.

* * * * *

EFFECTS OF THE TYRANNY OF THE MAJORITY UPON THE NATIONAL CHARACTER IN
THE AMERICANS.

Effects of the Tyranny of the Majority more sensibly felt hitherto in
the Manners than in the Conduct of Society.--They check the development
of leading Characters.--Democratic Republics, organized like the United
States, bring the Practice of courting favor within the reach of the
many.--Proofs of this Spirit in the United States.--Why there is more
Patriotism in the People than in those who govern in its name.

The tendencies which I have just alluded to are as yet very slightly
perceptible in political society; but they already begin to exercise an
unfavorable influence upon the national character of the Americans. I am
inclined to attribute the paucity of distinguished political characters
to the ever-increasing activity of the despotism of the majority in the
United States.

When the American revolution broke out, they arose in great numbers; for
public opinion then served, not to tyrannize over, but to direct the
exertions of individuals. Those celebrated men took a full part in the
general agitation of mind common at that period, and they attained a
high degree of personal fame, which was reflected back upon the nation,
but which was by no means borrowed from it.

In absolute governments, the great nobles who are nearest to the throne
flatter the passions of the sovereign, and voluntarily truckle to his
caprices. But the mass of the nation does not degrade itself by
servitude; it often submits from weakness, from habit, or from
ignorance, and sometimes from loyalty. Some nations have been known to
sacrifice their own desires to those of the sovereign with pleasure and
with pride; thus exhibiting a sort of independence in the very act of
submission. These peoples are miserable, but they are not degraded.
There is a great difference between doing what one does not approve, and
feigning to approve what one does; the one is the necessary case of a
weak person, the other befits the temper of a lacquey.

In free countries, where every one is more or less called upon to give
his opinions in the affairs of state; in democratic republics, where
public life is incessantly commingled with domestic affairs, where the
sovereign authority is accessible on every side, and where its attention
can almost always be attracted by vociferation, more persons are to be
met with who speculate upon its foibles, and live at the cost of its
passions, than in absolute monarchies. Not because men are naturally
worse in these states than elsewhere, but the temptation is stronger,
and of easier access at the same time. The result is a far more
extensive debasement of the characters of citizens.

Democratic republics extend the practice of currying favor with the
many, and they introduce it into a great number of classes at once: this
is one of the most serious reproaches that can be addressed to them. In
democratic states organized on the principles of the American republics,
this is more especially the case, where the authority of the majority is
so absolute and so irresistible, that a man must give up his rights as a
citizen, and almost abjure his quality as a human being, if he intends
to stray from the track which it lays down.

In that immense crowd which throngs the avenues to power in the United
States, I found very few men who displayed any of that manly candor, and
that masculine independence of opinion, which frequently distinguished
the Americans in former times, and which constitute the leading feature
in distinguished characters wheresoever they may be found. It seems, at
first sight, as if all the minds of the Americans were formed upon one
model, so accurately do they correspond in their manner of judging. A
stranger does, indeed, sometimes meet with Americans who dissent from
these rigorous formularies; with men who deplore the defects of the
laws, the mutability and the ignorance of democracy; who even go so far
as to observe the evil tendencies which impair the national character,
and to point out such remedies as it might be possible to apply; but no
one is there to hear these things besides yourself, and you, to whom
these secret reflections are confided, are a stranger and a bird of
passage. They are very ready to communicate truths which are useless to
you, but they continue to hold a different language in public.

If ever these lines are read in America, I am well assured of two
things: in the first place, that all who peruse them will raise their
voices to condemn me; and in the second place, that very many of them
will acquit me at the bottom of their conscience.

[The author's views upon what he terms the tyranny of the majority, the
despotism of public opinion in the United States, have already excited
some remarks in this country, and will probably give occasion to more.
As stated in the preface to this edition, the editor does not conceive
himself called upon to discuss the speculative opinions of the author
and supposes he will best discharge his duty by confining his
observations to what he deems errors of fact or law. But in reference to
this particular subject, it seems due to the author to remark, that he
visited the United States at a particular time, when a successful
political chieftain had succeeded in establishing his party in power, as
it seemed, firmly and permanently; when the preponderance of that party
was immense, and when there seemed little prospect of any change. He may
have met with men, who sank under the astonishing popularity of General
Jackson, who despaired of the republic, and who therefore shrank from
the expression of their opinions. It must be confessed, however, that
the author is obnoxious to the charge which has been made, of the want
of perspicuity and distinctness in this part of his work. He does not
mean that the press was silent, for he has himself not only noticed, but
furnished proof of the great freedom, not to say licentiousness, with
which it assailed the character of the president, and the measures of
his administration.

He does not mean to represent the opponents of the dominant party as
having thrown down their weapons of warfare, for his book shows
throughout his knowledge of the existence of an active and able party,
constantly opposing and harassing the administration.

But, after a careful perusal of the chapters on this subject, the editor
is inclined to the opinion, that M. De Tocqueville intends to speak of
the _tyranny of the party_ in excluding from public employment all those
who do not adopt the _Shibboleth_ of the majority. The language at pp.
266, 267, which he puts in the mouth of a majority, and his observations
immediately preceding this note, seem to furnish the key to his meaning;
although it must be admitted that there are other passages to which a
wider construction may be given. Perhaps they may be reconciled by the
idea that the author considers the acts and opinions of the dominant
party as the just and true expression of public opinion. And hence, when
he speaks of the intolerance of public opinion, he means the
exclusiveness of the party, which, for the time being, may be
predominant. He had seen men of acknowledged competency removed from
office, or excluded from it, wholly on the ground of their entertaining
opinions hostile to those of the dominant party, or majority. And he had
seen this system extended to the very lowest officers of the government,
and applied by the electors in their choice of all officers of all
descriptions; and this he deemed persecution--tyranny--despotism. But he
surely is mistaken in representing the effect of this system of terror
as stifling all complaint, silencing all opposition, and inducing
"enemies and friends to yoke themselves alike to the triumphant car of
the majority." He mistook a temporary state of parties for a permanent
and ordinary result, and he was carried away by the immense majority
that then supported the administration, to the belief of a universal
acquiescence. Without intending here to speak of the merits or demerits
of those who represented that majority, it is proper to remark, that the
great change which has taken place since the period when the author
wrote, in the political condition of the very persons who he supposed
then wielded the terrors of disfranchisement against their opponents, in
itself furnishes a full and complete demonstration of the error of his
opinions respecting the "true independence of mind and freedom of
discussion" in America. For without such discussion to enlighten the
minds of the people, and without a stern independence of the rewards and
threats of those in power, the change alluded to could not have
occurred.