American Institutions and Their Influence by Alexis de Tocqueville et al

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Thus, in the midst of the uncertain future, one event at least is sure.
At a period which may be said to be near (for we are speaking of the
life of a nation), the Anglo-Americans will alone cover the immense
space contained between the polar regions and the tropics, extending
from the coasts of the Atlantic to the shores of the Pacific ocean. The
territory which will probably be occupied by the Anglo-Americans at some
future time, may be computed to equal three-quarters of Europe in
extent.[298] The climate of the Union is upon the whole preferable to
that of Europe, and its natural advantages are not less great; it is
therefore evident that its population will at some future time be
proportionate to our own. Europe, divided as it is between so many
different nations, and torn as it has been by incessant wars and the
barbarous manners of the Middle Ages, has notwithstanding attained a
population of 410 inhabitants to the square league.[299] What cause can
prevent the United States from having as numerous a population in time?

Many ages must elapse before the divers offsets of the British race in
America cease to present the same homogeneous characteristics; and the
time cannot be foreseen at which a permanent inequality of conditions
will be established in the New World. Whatever differences may arise,
from peace or from war, from freedom or oppression, from prosperity or
want, between the destinies of the different descendants of the great
Anglo-American family, they will at least preserve an analogous social
condition, and they will hold in common the customs and the opinions to
which that social condition has given birth.

In the Middle Ages, the tie of religion was sufficiently powerful to
imbue all the different populations of Europe with the same
civilisation. The British of the New World have a thousand other
reciprocal ties; and they live at a time when the tendency to equality
is general among mankind. The Middle Ages were a period when everything
was broken up; when each people, each province, each city, and each
family, had a strong tendency to maintain its distinct individuality. At
the present time an opposite tendency seems to prevail, and the nations
seem to be advancing to unity. Our means of intellectual intercourse
unite the most remote parts of the earth; and it is impossible for men
to remain strangers to each other, or to be ignorant of the events which
are taking place in any corner of the globe. The consequence is, that
there is less difference, at the present day, between the Europeans and
their descendants in the New World, than there was between certain towns
in the thirteenth century, which were only separated by a river. If this
tendency to assimilation brings foreign nations closer to each other, it
must _a fortiori_ prevent the descendants of the same people from
becoming aliens to each other.

The time will therefore come when one hundred and fifty millions of men
will be living in North America,[300] equal in condition, the progeny of
one race, owing their origin to the same cause, and preserving the same
civilisation, the same language, the same religion, the same habits, the
same manners, and imbued with the same opinions, propagated under the
same forms. The rest is uncertain, but this is certain; and it is a fact
new to the world--a fact fraught with such portentous consequences as to
baffle the efforts even of the imagination.

There are, at the present time, two great nations in the world, which
seem to tend toward the same end, although they started from different
points; I allude to the Russians and the Americans. Both of them have
grown up unnoticed; and while the attention of mankind was directed
elsewhere, they have suddenly assumed a most prominent place among the
nations; and the world learned their existence and their greatness at
almost the same time.

All other nations seem to have nearly reached their natural limits, and
only to be charged with the maintenance of their power; but these are
still in the act of growth;[301] all the others are stopped, or continue
to advance with extreme difficulty; these are proceeding with ease and
with celerity along a path to which the human eye can assign no term.
The American struggles against the natural obstacles which oppose him;
the adversaries of the Russian are men; the former combats the
wilderness and savage life; the latter, civilisation with all its
weapons and its arts; the conquests of the one are therefore gained by
the ploughshare; those of the other, by the sword. The Anglo-American
relies upon personal interest to accomplish his ends, and gives free
scope to the unguided exertions and common sense of the citizens; the
Russian centres all the authority of society in a single arm; the
principal instrument of the former is freedom; of the latter, servitude.
Their starting-point is different, and their courses are not the same;
yet each of them seems to be marked out by the will of Heaven to sway
the destinies of half the globe.

* * * * *

Notes:

[297] The foremost of these circumstances is, that nations which are
accustomed to free institutions and municipal government are better able
than any others to found prosperous colonies. The habit of thinking and
governing for oneself is indispensable in a new country, where success
necessarily depends, in a great measure, upon the individual exertions
of the settlers.

[298] The United States already extend over a territory equal to one
half of Europe. The area of Europe is 500,000 square leagues, and its
population 205,000,000 of inhabitants. (Maltebrun, liv. 114, vol., vi.,
p. 4.)

[299] See Maltebrun, liv. 116, vol. vi., p.92.

[300] This would be a population proportionate to that of Europe, taken
at a mean rate of 410 inhabitants to the square league.

[301] Russia is the country in the Old World in which population
increases most rapidly in proportion.

APPENDICES

APPENDIX A.--Page 17.

For information concerning all the countries of the West which have not
been visited by Europeans, consult the account of two expeditions
undertaken at the expense of congress by Major Long. This traveller
particularly mentions, on the subject of the great American desert, that
a line may be drawn nearly parallel to the 20th degree of longitude[302]
(meridian of Washington), beginning from the Red river and ending at the
river Platte. From this imaginary line to the Rocky mountains, which
bound the valley of the Mississippi on the west, lie immense plains,
which are almost entirely covered with sand, incapable of cultivation,
or scattered over with masses of granite. In summer, these plains are
quite destitute of water, and nothing is to be seen on them but herds of
buffaloes and wild horses. Some hordes of Indians are also found there,
but in no great number.

Major Long was told, that in travelling northward from the river Platte,
you find the same desert constantly on the left; but he was unable to
ascertain the truth of this report. (Long's Expedition, vol. ii., p.
361.)

However worthy of confidence may be the narrative of Major Long, it must
be remembered that he only passed through the country of which he
speaks, without deviating widely from the line which he had traced out
for his journey.

[302] The 20th degree of longitude according to the meridian of
Washington, agrees very nearly with the 97th degree on the meridian of
Greenwich.

APPENDIX B.--Page 18.

South America, in the regions between the tropics, produces an
incredible profusion of climbing-plants, of which the Flora of the
Antilles alone presents us with forty different species.

Among the most graceful of these shrubs is the passion-flower, which,
according to Descourtiz, grows with such luxuriance in the Antilles, as
to climb trees by means of the tendrils with which it is provided, and
form moving bowers of rich and elegant festoons, decorated with blue and
purple flowers, and fragrant with perfume. (Vol. i., p. 265.)

The _mimosa scandens_ (acacia à grandes gousses) is a creeper of
enormous and rapid growth, which climbs from tree to tree, and sometimes
covers more than half a league. (Vol. iii., p. 227.)

APPENDIX C.--Page 20.

The languages which are spoken by the Indians of America, from the Pole
to Cape Horn, are said to be all formed upon the same model, and subject
to the same grammatical rules; whence it may fairly be concluded that
all the Indian nations sprang from the same stock.

Each tribe of the American continent speaks a different dialect; but the
number of languages, properly so called, is very small, a fact which
tends to prove that the nations of the New World had not a very remote
origin.

Moreover, the languages of America have a great degree of regularity;
from which it seems probable that the tribes which employ them had not
undergone any great revolutions, or been incorporated, voluntarily, or
by constraint, with foreign nations. For it is generally the union of
several languages into one which produces grammatical irregularities.

It is not long since the American languages, especially those of the
north, first attracted the serious attention of philologists, when the
discovery was made that this idiom of a barbarous people was the product
of a complicated system of ideas and very learned combinations. These
languages were found to be very rich, and great pains had been taken at
their formation to render them agreeable to the ear.

The grammatical system of the Americans differs from all others in
several points, but especially in the following:--

Some nations in Europe, among others the Germans, have the power of
combining at pleasure different expressions, and thus giving a complex
sense to certain words. The Indians have given a most surprising
extension to this power, so as to arrive at the means of connecting a
great number of ideas with a single term. This will be easily understood
with the help of an example quoted by Mr. Duponceau, in the Memoirs of
the Philosophical Society of America.

"A Delaware woman, playing with a cat or a young dog," says this writer,
"is heard to pronounce the word _kuligatschis_; which is thus composed;
_k_ is the sign of the second person, and signifies 'thou' or 'thy;'
_uli_ is a part of the word _wulit_, which signifies 'beautiful,'
'pretty;' _gat_ is another fragment of the word _wichgat_, which means
'paw;' and lastly, _schis_ is a diminutive giving the idea of smallness.
Thus in one word the Indian woman has expressed, 'Thy pretty little
paw.'"

Take another example of the felicity with which the savages of America
have composed their words. A young man of Delaware is called _pilape_.
This word is formed from _pilsit_, chaste, innocent; and _lenape_, man;
viz., man in his purity and innocence.

This facility of combining words is most remarkable in the strange
formation of their verbs. The most complex action is often expressed by
a single verb, which serves to convey all the shades of an idea by the
modification of its construction.

Those who may wish to examine more in detail this subject, which I have
only glanced at superficially, should read:--

1. The correspondence of Mr. Duponceau and the Rev. Mr. Hecwelder
relative to the Indian languages; which is to be found in the first
volume of the Memoirs of the Philosophical Society of America, published
at Philadelphia, 1819, by Abraham Small, vol i., pp 356-464.

2. The grammar of the Delaware or Lenape language by Geiberger, the
preface of Mr. Duponceau. All these are in the same collection, vol.
iii.

3. An excellent account of these works, which is at the end of the 6th
volume of the American Encyclopaedia.

APPENDIX D.--Page 22.

See in Charlevoix, vol i., p. 235, the history of the first war which
the French inhabitants of Canada carried on, in 1610, against the
Iroquois. The latter, armed with bows and arrows, offered a desperate
resistance to the French and their allies. Charlevoix is not a great
painter, yet he exhibits clearly enough, in this narrative, the contrast
between the European manners and those of savages, as well as the
different way in which the two races of men understood the sense of
honor.

When the French, says he, seized upon the beaver-skins which covered the
Indians who had fallen, the Hurons, their allies, were greatly offended
at this proceeding; but without hesitation they set to work in their
usual manner, inflicting horrid cruelties upon the prisoners, and
devouring one of those who had been killed, which made the Frenchmen
shudder. The barbarians prided themselves upon a scrupulousness which
they were surprised at not finding in our nation; and could not
understand that there was less to reprehend in the stripping of dead
bodies, than in the devouring of their flesh like wild beasts.

Charlevoix, in another place (vol. i., p. 230), thus describes the first
torture of which Champlain was an eyewitness, and the return of the
Hurons into their own village.

"Having proceeded about eight leagues," says he, "our allies halted: and
having singled out one of their captives, they reproached him with all
the cruelties which he had practised upon the warriors of their nation
who had fallen into his hands, and told him that he might expect to be
treated in like manner; adding, that if he had any spirit, he would
prove it by singing. He immediately chanted forth his death-song, and
then his war-song, and all the songs he knew, 'but in a very mournful
strain,' says Champlain, who was not then aware that all savage music
has a melancholy character. The tortures which succeeded, accompanied by
all the horrors which we shall mention hereafter, terrified the French,
who made every effort to put a stop to them, but in vain. The following
night one of the Hurons having dreamed that they were pursued, the
retreat was changed to a real flight, and the savages never stopped
until they were out of the reach of danger."

The moment they perceived the cabins of their own village, they cut
themselves long sticks, to which they fastened the scalps which had
fallen to their share, and carried them in triumph. At this sight, the
women swam to the canoes, where they received the bloody scalps from the
hands of their husbands, and tied them round their necks.

The warriors offered one of these horrible trophies to Champlain; they
also presented him with some bows and arrows--the only spoils of the
Iroquois which they had ventured to seize--entreating him to show them
to the king of France.

Champlain lived a whole winter quite alone among these barbarians,
without being under any alarm for his person or property.

APPENDIX E.--Page 36.

Although the puritanical strictness which presided over the
establishment of the English colonies in America is now much relaxed,
remarkable traces of it are still found in their habits and their laws.
In 1792, at the very time when the anti-Christian republic of France
began its ephemeral existence, the legislative body of Massachusetts
promulgated the following law, to compel the citizens to observe the
sabbath. We give the preamble, and the principal articles of this law,
which is worthy of the reader's attention.

"Whereas," says the legislator, "the observation of the Sunday is an
affair of public interest; inasmuch as it produces a necessary
suspension of labor, leads men to reflect upon the duties of life and
the errors to which human nature is liable, and provides for the public
and private worship of God the creator and governor of the universe, and
for the performance of such acts of charity as are the ornament and
comfort of Christian societies:--

"Whereas, irreligious or light-minded persons, forgetting the duties
which the sabbath imposes, and the benefits which these duties confer on
society, are known to profane its sanctity, by following their pleasures
or their affairs; this way of acting being contrary to their own
interest as Christians, and calculated to annoy those who do not follow
their example; being also of great injury to society at large, by
spreading a taste for dissipation and dissolute manners;--

"Be it enacted and ordained by the governor, council, and
representatives convened in general court of assembly, that all and
every person and persons shall, on that day, carefully apply themselves
to the duties of religion and piety; that no tradesman or laborer shall
exercise his ordinary calling, and that no game or recreation shall be
used on the Lord's day, upon pain of forfeiting ten shillings;--

"That no one shall travel on that day, or any part thereof, under pain
of forfeiting twenty shillings; that no vessel shall leave a harbor of
the colony; that no person shall keep outside the meetinghouse during
the time of public worship, or profane the time by playing or talking,
on penalty of five shillings.

"Public-houses shall not entertain any other than strangers or lodgers,
under a penalty of five shillings for every person found drinking or
abiding therein.

"Any person in health who, without sufficient reason, shall omit to
worship God in public during three months, shall be condemned to a fine
of ten shillings.

"Any person guilty of misbehavior in a place of public worship shall be
fined from five to forty shillings.

"These laws are to be enforced by the tithing-men of each township, who
have authority to visit public-houses on the Sunday. The innkeeper who
shall refuse them admittance shall be fined forty shillings for such
offence.

"The tithing-men are to stop travellers, and to require of them their
reason for being on the road on Sunday: any one refusing to answer shall
be sentenced to pay a fine not exceeding five pounds sterling. If the
reason given by the traveller be not deemed by the tithing-men
sufficient, he may bring the traveller before the justice of the peace
of the district." (_Law of the 8th March, 1792: General Laws of
Massachusetts_, vol. i., p. 410.)

On the 11th March, 1797, a new law increased the amount of fines, half
of which was to be given to the informer. (_Same collection_, vol. ii.,
p. 525.)

On the 16th February, 1816, a new law confirmed these measures. (_Same
collection_, vol. ii., p. 405.)

Similar enactments exist in the laws of the state of New York, revised
in 1827 and 1828. (See _Revised Statutes_, part i., chapter 20, p. 675.)
In these it is declared that no one is allowed on the sabbath to sport,
to fish, play at games, or to frequent houses where liquor is sold. _No
one_ can travel except in case of necessity.

And this is not the only trace which the religious strictness and
austere manners of the first emigrants have left behind them in the
American laws.

In the revised statutes of the state of New York, vol. i., p. 662, is
the following clause:--

"Whoever shall win or lose in the space of twenty-four hours, by gaming
or betting, the sum of twenty-five dollars, shall be found guilty of a
misdemeanor, and, upon conviction, shall be condemned to pay a fine
equal to at least five times the value of the sum lost or won; which
will be paid to the inspector of the poor of the township. He that loses
twenty-five dollars or more, may bring an action to recover them; and if
he neglects to do so, the inspector of the poor may prosecute the
winner, and oblige him to pay into the poor box both the sum he has
gained and three times as much beside."

The laws we quote from are of recent date; but they are unintelligible
without going back to the very origin of the colonies. I have no doubt
that in our days the penal part of these laws is very rarely applied.
Laws preserve their inflexibility long after the manners of a nation
have yielded to the influence of time. It is still true, however, that
nothing strikes a foreigner on his arrival in America more forcibly than
the regard to the sabbath.

There is one, in particular, of the large American cities, in which all
social movements begin to be suspended even on Saturday evening. You
traverse its streets at the hour at which you expect men in the middle
of life to be engaged in business, and young people in pleasure; and you
meet with solitude and silence. Not only have all ceased to work, but
they appear to have ceased to exist. Neither the movements of industry
are heard, nor the accents of joy, nor even the confused murmur which
arises from the midst of a great city. Chains are hung across the
streets in the neighborhood of the churches; the half closed shutters of
the houses scarcely admit a ray of sun into the dwellings of the
citizens. Now and then you perceive a solitary individual, who glides
silently along the deserted streets and lanes.

Next day, at early dawn, the rolling of carriages, the noise of hammers,
the cries of the population, begin to make themselves heard again. The
city is awake. An eager crowd hastens toward the resort of commerce and
industry; everything around you bespeaks motion, bustle, hurry. A
feverish activity succeeds to the lethargic stupor of yesterday: you
might almost suppose that they had but one day to acquire wealth and to
enjoy it.

APPENDIX F.--Page 41.

It is unnecessary for me to say, that in the chapter which has just been
read, I have not had the intention of giving a history of America. My
only object was to enable the reader to appreciate the influence which
the opinions and manners of the first emigrants had exercised upon the
fate of the different colonies and of the Union in general. I have
therefore confined myself to the quotation of a few detached fragments.

I do not know whether I am deceived, but it appears to me that by
pursuing the path which I have merely pointed out, it would be easy to
present such pictures of the American republics as would not be unworthy
the attention of the public, and could not fail to suggest to the
statesman matter for reflection.

Not being able to devote myself to this labor, I am anxious to render it
easy to others; and for this purpose, I subjoin a short catalogue and
analysis of the works which seem to me the most important to consult.

At the head of the general documents, which it would be advantageous to
examine, I place the work entitled An Historical Collection of State
Papers, and other authentic Documents, intended as Materials for a
History of the United States of America, by Ebenezer Hasard. The first
volume of this compilation, which was printed at Philadelphia in 1792,
contains a literal copy of all the charters granted by the crown of
England to the emigrants, as well as the principal acts of the colonial
governments, during the commencement of their existence. Among other
authentic documents, we here find a great many relating to the affairs
of New England and Virginia during this period. The second volume is
almost entirely devoted to the acts of the confederation of 1643. This
federal compact, which was entered into by the colonies of New England
with the view of resisting the Indians, was the first instance of union
afforded by the Anglo-Americans. There were besides many other
confederations of the same nature, before the famous one of 1776, which
brought about the independence of the colonies.

Each colony has, besides, its own historic monuments, some of which are
extremely curious; beginning with Virginia, the state which was first
peopled. The earliest historian of Virginia was its founder, Capt. John
Smith. Capt. Smith has left us an octavo volume, entitled, The generall
Historic of Virginia and New England, by Captain John Smith, sometymes
Governour in those Countryes, and Admirall of New England; printed at
London in 1627. The work is adorned with curious maps and engravings of
the time when it appeared; the narrative extends from the year 1584 to
1626. Smith's work is highly and deservedly esteemed. The author was one
of the most celebrated adventurers of a period of remarkable adventure;
his book breathes that ardor for discovery, that spirit of enterprise
which characterized the men of his time, when the manners of chivalry
were united to zeal for commerce, and made subservient to the
acquisition of wealth.

But Capt. Smith is remarkable for uniting, to the virtues which
characterized his contemporaries, several qualities to which they were
generally strangers: his style is simple and concise, his narratives
bear the stamp of truth, and his descriptions are free from false
ornament.

This author throws most valuable light upon the state and condition of
the Indians at the time when North America was first discovered.

The second historian to consult is Beverley, who commences his narrative
with the year 1595, and ends it with 1700. The first part of his book
contains historical documents, properly so called, relative to the
infancy of the colonies. The second affords a most curious picture of
the Indians at this remote period. The third conveys very clear ideas
concerning the manners, social condition, laws, and political customs of
the Virginians in the author's lifetime.

Beverley was a native of Virginia, which occasions him to say at the
beginning of his book that he entreats his readers not to exercise their
critical severity upon it, since, having been born in the Indies, he
does not aspire to purity of language. Notwithstanding this colonial
modesty, the author shows throughout his book the impatience with which
he endures the supremacy of the mother-country. In this work of Beverley
are also found numerous traces of that spirit of civil liberty which
animated the English colonies of America at the time when he wrote. He
also shows the dissensions which existed among them and retarded their
independence. Beverley detests his catholic neighbors of Maryland, even
more than he hates the English government; his style is simple, his
narrative interesting and apparently trustworthy.