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Section XXVII Chapter XVI: Causes Mitigating Tyranny In
The United States—Part I
Chapter Summary
The national majority does not pretend to conduct all business—Is
obliged to employ the town and county magistrates to execute its supreme
decisions.
I have already pointed out the distinction which is to be made between
a centralized government and a centralized administration. The former
exists in America, but the latter is nearly unknown there. If the
directing power of the American communities had both these instruments
of government at its disposal, and united the habit of executing its own
commands to the right of commanding; if, after having established the
general principles of government, it descended to the details of public
business; and if, having regulated the great interests of the country,
it could penetrate into the privacy of individual interests, freedom
would soon be banished from the New World.
But in the United States the majority, which so frequently displays the
tastes and the propensities of a despot, is still destitute of the more
perfect instruments of tyranny. In the American republics the activity
of the central Government has never as yet been extended beyond a
limited number of objects sufficiently prominent to call forth its
attention. The secondary affairs of society have never been regulated
by its authority, and nothing has hitherto betrayed its desire of
interfering in them. The majority is become more and more absolute, but
it has not increased the prerogatives of the central government; those
great prerogatives have been confined to a certain sphere; and although
the despotism of the majority may be galling upon one point, it cannot
be said to extend to all. However the predominant party in the nation
may be carried away by its passions, however ardent it may be in the
pursuit of its projects, it cannot oblige all the citizens to comply
with its desires in the same manner and at the same time throughout the
country. When the central Government which represents that majority has
issued a decree, it must entrust the execution of its will to agents,
over whom it frequently has no control, and whom it cannot perpetually
direct. The townships, municipal bodies, and counties may therefore be
looked upon as concealed break-waters, which check or part the tide of
popular excitement. If an oppressive law were passed, the liberties of
the people would still be protected by the means by which that law would
be put in execution: the majority cannot descend to the details and (as
I will venture to style them) the puerilities of administrative tyranny.
Nor does the people entertain that full consciousness of its authority
which would prompt it to interfere in these matters; it knows the
extent of its natural powers, but it is unacquainted with the increased
resources which the art of government might furnish.
This point deserves attention, for if a democratic republic similar to
that of the United States were ever founded in a country where the power
of a single individual had previously subsisted, and the effects of a
centralized administration had sunk deep into the habits and the laws
of the people, I do not hesitate to assert, that in that country a more
insufferable despotism would prevail than any which now exists in the
monarchical States of Europe, or indeed than any which could be found on
this side of the confines of Asia.
The Profession Of The Law In The United States Serves To Counterpoise
The Democracy
Utility of discriminating the natural propensities of the members of
the legal profession—These men called upon to act a prominent part in
future society—In what manner the peculiar pursuits of lawyers give an
aristocratic turn to their ideas—Accidental causes which may check this
tendency—Ease with which the aristocracy coalesces with legal men—Use
of lawyers to a despot—The profession of the law constitutes the only
aristocratic element with which the natural elements of democracy will
combine—Peculiar causes which tend to give an aristocratic turn of mind
to the English and American lawyers—The aristocracy of America is
on the bench and at the bar—Influence of lawyers upon American
society—Their peculiar magisterial habits affect the legislature, the
administration, and even the people.
In visiting the Americans and in studying their laws we perceive that
the authority they have entrusted to members of the legal profession,
and the influence which these individuals exercise in the Government, is
the most powerful existing security against the excesses of democracy.
This effect seems to me to result from a general cause which it is
useful to investigate, since it may produce analogous consequences
elsewhere.
The members of the legal profession have taken an important part in all
the vicissitudes of political society in Europe during the last five
hundred years. At one time they have been the instruments of those
who were invested with political authority, and at another they have
succeeded in converting political authorities into their instrument. In
the Middle Ages they afforded a powerful support to the Crown, and since
that period they have exerted themselves to the utmost to limit the
royal prerogative. In England they have contracted a close alliance with
the aristocracy; in France they have proved to be the most dangerous
enemies of that class. It is my object to inquire whether, under all
these circumstances, the members of the legal profession have been
swayed by sudden and momentary impulses; or whether they have been
impelled by principles which are inherent in their pursuits, and which
will always recur in history. I am incited to this investigation by
reflecting that this particular class of men will most likely play a
prominent part in that order of things to which the events of our time
are giving birth.
Men who have more especially devoted themselves to legal pursuits derive
from those occupations certain habits of order, a taste for formalities,
and a kind of instinctive regard for the regular connection of ideas,
which naturally render them very hostile to the revolutionary spirit and
the unreflecting passions of the multitude.
The special information which lawyers derive from their studies ensures
them a separate station in society, and they constitute a sort of
privileged body in the scale of intelligence. This notion of their
superiority perpetually recurs to them in the practice of their
profession: they are the masters of a science which is necessary, but
which is not very generally known; they serve as arbiters between the
citizens; and the habit of directing the blind passions of parties in
litigation to their purpose inspires them with a certain contempt
for the judgment of the multitude. To this it may be added that they
naturally constitute a body, not by any previous understanding, or by an
agreement which directs them to a common end; but the analogy of their
studies and the uniformity of their proceedings connect their minds
together, as much as a common interest could combine their endeavors.
A portion of the tastes and of the habits of the aristocracy may
consequently be discovered in the characters of men in the profession of
the law. They participate in the same instinctive love of order and of
formalities; and they entertain the same repugnance to the actions of
the multitude, and the same secret contempt of the government of the
people. I do not mean to say that the natural propensities of lawyers
are sufficiently strong to sway them irresistibly; for they, like most
other men, are governed by their private interests and the advantages of
the moment.
In a state of society in which the members of the legal profession are
prevented from holding that rank in the political world which they enjoy
in private life, we may rest assured that they will be the foremost
agents of revolution. But it must then be inquired whether the cause
which induces them to innovate and to destroy is accidental, or whether
it belongs to some lasting purpose which they entertain. It is true that
lawyers mainly contributed to the overthrow of the French monarchy in
1789; but it remains to be seen whether they acted thus because they had
studied the laws, or because they were prohibited from co-operating in
the work of legislation.
Five hundred years ago the English nobles headed the people, and spoke
in its name; at the present time the aristocracy supports the throne,
and defends the royal prerogative. But aristocracy has, notwithstanding
this, its peculiar instincts and propensities. We must be careful not
to confound isolated members of a body with the body itself. In all
free governments, of whatsoever form they may be, members of the legal
profession will be found at the head of all parties. The same remark
is also applicable to the aristocracy; for almost all the democratic
convulsions which have agitated the world have been directed by nobles.
A privileged body can never satisfy the ambition of all its members; it
has always more talents and more passions to content and to employ than
it can find places; so that a considerable number of individuals are
usually to be met with who are inclined to attack those very privileges
which they find it impossible to turn to their own account.
I do not, then, assert that all the members of the legal profession are
at all times the friends of order and the opponents of innovation, but
merely that most of them usually are so. In a community in which lawyers
are allowed to occupy, without opposition, that high station which
naturally belongs to them, their general spirit will be eminently
conservative and anti-democratic. When an aristocracy excludes the
leaders of that profession from its ranks, it excites enemies which
are the more formidable to its security as they are independent of the
nobility by their industrious pursuits; and they feel themselves to be
its equal in point of intelligence, although they enjoy less opulence
and less power. But whenever an aristocracy consents to impart some of
its privileges to these same individuals, the two classes coalesce very
readily, and assume, as it were, the consistency of a single order of
family interests.
I am, in like manner, inclined to believe that a monarch will always
be able to convert legal practitioners into the most serviceable
instruments of his authority. There is a far greater affinity between
this class of individuals and the executive power than there is between
them and the people; just as there is a greater natural affinity between
the nobles and the monarch than between the nobles and the people,
although the higher orders of society have occasionally resisted the
prerogative of the Crown in concert with the lower classes.
Lawyers are attached to public order beyond every other consideration,
and the best security of public order is authority. It must not be
forgotten that, if they prize the free institutions of their country
much, they nevertheless value the legality of those institutions far
more: they are less afraid of tyranny than of arbitrary power; and
provided that the legislature take upon itself to deprive men of their
independence, they are not dissatisfied.
I am therefore convinced that the prince who, in presence of an
encroaching democracy, should endeavor to impair the judicial authority
in his dominions, and to diminish the political influence of lawyers,
would commit a great mistake. He would let slip the substance
of authority to grasp at the shadow. He would act more wisely in
introducing men connected with the law into the government; and if he
entrusted them with the conduct of a despotic power, bearing some marks
of violence, that power would most likely assume the external features
of justice and of legality in their hands.
The government of democracy is favorable to the political power of
lawyers; for when the wealthy, the noble, and the prince are excluded
from the government, they are sure to occupy the highest stations, in
their own right, as it were, since they are the only men of information
and sagacity, beyond the sphere of the people, who can be the object of
the popular choice. If, then, they are led by their tastes to combine
with the aristocracy and to support the Crown, they are naturally
brought into contact with the people by their interests. They like the
government of democracy, without participating in its propensities
and without imitating its weaknesses; whence they derive a twofold
authority, from it and over it. The people in democratic states does not
mistrust the members of the legal profession, because it is well known
that they are interested in serving the popular cause; and it listens
to them without irritation, because it does not attribute to them any
sinister designs. The object of lawyers is not, indeed, to overthrow the
institutions of democracy, but they constantly endeavor to give it an
impulse which diverts it from its real tendency, by means which are
foreign to its nature. Lawyers belong to the people by birth and
interest, to the aristocracy by habit and by taste, and they may be
looked upon as the natural bond and connecting link of the two great
classes of society.
The profession of the law is the only aristocratic element which can be
amalgamated without violence with the natural elements of democracy, and
which can be advantageously and permanently combined with them. I am
not unacquainted with the defects which are inherent in the character
of that body of men; but without this admixture of lawyer-like
sobriety with the democratic principle, I question whether democratic
institutions could long be maintained, and I cannot believe that a
republic could subsist at the present time if the influence of lawyers
in public business did not increase in proportion to the power of the
people.
This aristocratic character, which I hold to be common to the legal
profession, is much more distinctly marked in the United States and in
England than in any other country. This proceeds not only from the legal
studies of the English and American lawyers, but from the nature of
the legislation, and the position which those persons occupy in the
two countries. The English and the Americans have retained the law of
precedents; that is to say, they continue to found their legal opinions
and the decisions of their courts upon the opinions and the decisions of
their forefathers. In the mind of an English or American lawyer a taste
and a reverence for what is old is almost always united to a love of
regular and lawful proceedings.
This predisposition has another effect upon the character of the legal
profession and upon the general course of society. The English and
American lawyers investigate what has been done; the French advocate
inquires what should have been done; the former produce precedents,
the latter reasons. A French observer is surprised to hear how often
an English dr an American lawyer quotes the opinions of others, and how
little he alludes to his own; whilst the reverse occurs in France. There
the most trifling litigation is never conducted without the introduction
of an entire system of ideas peculiar to the counsel employed; and the
fundamental principles of law are discussed in order to obtain a
perch of land by the decision of the court. This abnegation of his own
opinion, and this implicit deference to the opinion of his forefathers,
which are common to the English and American lawyer, this subjection of
thought which he is obliged to profess, necessarily give him more timid
habits and more sluggish inclinations in England and America than in
France.
The French codes are often difficult of comprehension, but they can be
read by every one; nothing, on the other hand, can be more impenetrable
to the uninitiated than a legislation founded upon precedents. The
indispensable want of legal assistance which is felt in England and in
the United States, and the high opinion which is generally entertained
of the ability of the legal profession, tend to separate it more and
more from the people, and to place it in a distinct class. The French
lawyer is simply a man extensively acquainted with the statutes of his
country; but the English or American lawyer resembles the hierophants of
Egypt, for, like them, he is the sole interpreter of an occult science.
The station which lawyers occupy in England and America exercises no
less an influence upon their habits and their opinions. The English
aristocracy, which has taken care to attract to its sphere whatever is
at all analogous to itself, has conferred a high degree of importance
and of authority upon the members of the legal profession. In English
society lawyers do not occupy the first rank, but they are contented
with the station assigned to them; they constitute, as it were, the
younger branch of the English aristocracy, and they are attached to
their elder brothers, although they do not enjoy all their privileges.
The English lawyers consequently mingle the taste and the ideas of the
aristocratic circles in which they move with the aristocratic interests
of their profession.
And indeed the lawyer-like character which I am endeavoring to depict is
most distinctly to be met with in England: there laws are esteemed not
so much because they are good as because they are old; and if it be
necessary to modify them in any respect, or to adapt them the
changes which time operates in society, recourse is had to the most
inconceivable contrivances in order to uphold the traditionary fabric,
and to maintain that nothing has been done which does not square with
the intentions and complete the labors of former generations. The
very individuals who conduct these changes disclaim all intention of
innovation, and they had rather resort to absurd expedients than plead
guilty to so great a crime. This spirit appertains more especially to
the English lawyers; they seem indifferent to the real meaning of what
they treat, and they direct all their attention to the letter, seeming
inclined to infringe the rules of common sense and of humanity rather
than to swerve one title from the law. The English legislation may be
compared to the stock of an old tree, upon which lawyers have engrafted
the most various shoots, with the hope that, although their fruits may
differ, their foliage at least will be confounded with the venerable
trunk which supports them all.
In America there are no nobles or men of letters, and the people is apt
to mistrust the wealthy; lawyers consequently form the highest political
class, and the most cultivated circle of society. They have therefore
nothing to gain by innovation, which adds a conservative interest to
their natural taste for public order. If I were asked where I place the
American aristocracy, I should reply without hesitation that it is not
composed of the rich, who are united together by no common tie, but that
it occupies the judicial bench and the bar.
The more we reflect upon all that occurs in the United States the more
shall we be persuaded that the lawyers as a body form the most powerful,
if not the only, counterpoise to the democratic element. In that country
we perceive how eminently the legal profession is qualified by its
powers, and even by its defects, to neutralize the vices which are
inherent in popular government. When the American people is intoxicated
by passion, or carried away by the impetuosity of its ideas, it is
checked and stopped by the almost invisible influence of its legal
counsellors, who secretly oppose their aristocratic propensities to its
democratic instincts, their superstitious attachment to what is antique
to its love of novelty, their narrow views to its immense designs, and
their habitual procrastination to its ardent impatience.
The courts of justice are the most visible organs by which the legal
profession is enabled to control the democracy. The judge is a lawyer,
who, independently of the taste for regularity and order which he has
contracted in the study of legislation, derives an additional love of
stability from his own inalienable functions. His legal attainments have
already raised him to a distinguished rank amongst his fellow-citizens;
his political power completes the distinction of his station, and gives
him the inclinations natural to privileged classes.
Armed with the power of declaring the laws to be unconstitutional, *a
the American magistrate perpetually interferes in political affairs. He
cannot force the people to make laws, but at least he can oblige it not
to disobey its own enactments; or to act inconsistently with its own
principles. I am aware that a secret tendency to diminish the judicial
power exists in the United States, and by most of the constitutions of
the several States the Government can, upon the demand of the two houses
of the legislature, remove the judges from their station. By some other
constitutions the members of the tribunals are elected, and they are
even subjected to frequent re-elections. I venture to predict that these
innovations will sooner or later be attended with fatal consequences,
and that it will be found out at some future period that the attack
which is made upon the judicial power has affected the democratic
republic itself.
[Footnote a: See chapter VI. on the "Judicial Power in the United
States."]
It must not, however, be supposed that the legal spirit of which I have
been speaking has been confined, in the United States, to the courts of
justice; it extends far beyond them. As the lawyers constitute the only
enlightened class which the people does not mistrust, they are naturally
called upon to occupy most of the public stations. They fill the
legislative assemblies, and they conduct the administration; they
consequently exercise a powerful influence upon the formation of the
law, and upon its execution. The lawyers are, however, obliged to yield
to the current of public opinion, which is too strong for them to resist
it, but it is easy to find indications of what their conduct would be if
they were free to act as they chose. The Americans, who have made such
copious innovations in their political legislation, have introduced very
sparing alterations in their civil laws, and that with great difficulty,
although those laws are frequently repugnant to their social condition.
The reason of this is, that in matters of civil law the majority is
obliged to defer to the authority of the legal profession, and that the
American lawyers are disinclined to innovate when they are left to their
own choice.
It is curious for a Frenchman, accustomed to a very different state of
things, to hear the perpetual complaints which are made in the United
States against the stationary propensities of legal men, and their
prejudices in favor of existing institutions.
The influence of the legal habits which are common in America extends
beyond the limits I have just pointed out. Scarcely any question arises
in the United States which does not become, sooner or later, a subject
of judicial debate; hence all parties are obliged to borrow the ideas,
and even the language, usual in judicial proceedings in their
daily controversies. As most public men are, or have been, legal
practitioners, they introduce the customs and technicalities of their
profession into the affairs of the country. The jury extends this
habitude to all classes. The language of the law thus becomes, in some
measure, a vulgar tongue; the spirit of the law, which is produced in
the schools and courts of justice, gradually penetrates beyond their
walls into the *** of society, where it descends to the lowest
classes, so that the whole people contracts the habits and the tastes of
the magistrate. The lawyers of the United States form a party which is
but little feared and scarcely perceived, which has no badge peculiar to
itself, which adapts itself with great flexibility to the exigencies
of the time, and accommodates itself to all the movements of the social
body; but this party extends over the whole community, and it penetrates
into all classes of society; it acts upon the country imperceptibly, but
it finally fashions it to suit its purposes.
Chapter XVI: Causes Mitigating Tyranny In The United States—Part II
Trial By Jury In The United States Considered As A Political Institution
Trial by jury, which is one of the instruments of the sovereignty of the
people, deserves to be compared with the other laws which establish that
sovereignty—Composition of the jury in the United States—Effect of
trial by jury upon the national character—It educates the people—It
tends to establish the authority of the magistrates and to extend a
knowledge of law among the people.
Since I have been led by my subject to recur to the administration of
justice in the United States, I will not pass over this point without
adverting to the institution of the jury. Trial by jury may be
considered in two separate points of view, as a judicial and as a
political institution. If it entered into my present purpose to inquire
how far trial by jury (more especially in civil cases) contributes to
insure the best administration of justice, I admit that its utility
might be contested. As the jury was first introduced at a time when
society was in an uncivilized state, and when courts of justice were
merely called upon to decide on the evidence of facts, it is not an easy
task to adapt it to the wants of a highly civilized community when the
mutual relations of men are multiplied to a surprising extent, and have
assumed the enlightened and intellectual character of the age. *b
[Footnote b: The investigation of trial by jury as a judicial
institution, and the appreciation of its effects in the United States,
together with the advantages the Americans have derived from it, would
suffice to form a book, and a book upon a very useful and curious
subject. The State of Louisiana would in particular afford the curious
phenomenon of a French and English legislation, as well as a French and
English population, which are gradually combining with each other. See
the "Digeste des Lois de la Louisiane," in two volumes; and the "Traite
sur les Regles des Actions civiles," printed in French and English at
New Orleans in 1830.]
My present object is to consider the jury as a political institution,
and any other course would divert me from my subject. Of trial by jury,
considered as a judicial institution, I shall here say but very few
words. When the English adopted trial by jury they were a semi-barbarous
people; they are become, in course of time, one of the most enlightened
nations of the earth; and their attachment to this institution seems
to have increased with their increasing cultivation. They soon spread
beyond their insular boundaries to every corner of the habitable globe;
some have formed colonies, others independent states; the mother-country
has maintained its monarchical constitution; many of its offspring have
founded powerful republics; but wherever the English have been they have
boasted of the privilege of trial by jury. *c They have established it,
or hastened to re-establish it, in all their settlements. A judicial
institution which obtains the suffrages of a great people for so long
a series of ages, which is zealously renewed at every epoch of
civilization, in all the climates of the earth and under every form of
human government, cannot be contrary to the spirit of justice. *d
[Footnote c: All the English and American jurists are unanimous upon
this head. Mr. Story, judge of the Supreme Court of the United States,
speaks, in his "Treatise on the Federal Constitution," of the advantages
of trial by jury in civil cases:—"The inestimable privilege of a
trial by jury in civil cases—a privilege scarcely inferior to that
in criminal cases, which is counted by all persons to be essential to
political and civil liberty. . . ." (Story, book iii., chap. xxxviii.)]
[Footnote d: If it were our province to point out the utility of the
jury as a judicial institution in this place, much might be said, and
the following arguments might be brought forward amongst others:—
By introducing the jury into the business of the courts you are enabled
to diminish the number of judges, which is a very great advantage. When
judges are very numerous, death is perpetually thinning the ranks of
the judicial functionaries, and laying places vacant for newcomers. The
ambition of the magistrates is therefore continually excited, and they
are naturally made dependent upon the will of the majority, or the
individual who fills up the vacant appointments; the officers of the
court then rise like the officers of an army. This state of things is
entirely contrary to the sound administration of justice, and to the
intentions of the legislator. The office of a judge is made inalienable
in order that he may remain independent: but of what advantage is it
that his independence should be protected if he be tempted to sacrifice
it of his own accord? When judges are very numerous many of them must
necessarily be incapable of performing their important duties, for a
great magistrate is a man of no common powers; and I am inclined to
believe that a half-enlightened tribunal is the worst of all instruments
for attaining those objects which it is the purpose of courts of justice
to accomplish. For my own part, I had rather submit the decision of a
case to ignorant jurors directed by a skilful judge than to judges a
majority of whom are imperfectly acquainted with jurisprudence and with
the laws.]
I turn, however, from this part of the subject. To look upon the jury as
a mere judicial institution is to confine our attention to a very narrow
view of it; for however great its influence may be upon the decisions
of the law courts, that influence is very subordinate to the powerful
effects which it produces on the destinies of the community at large.
The jury is above all a political institution, and it must be regarded
in this light in order to be duly appreciated.
By the jury I mean a certain number of citizens chosen indiscriminately,
and invested with a temporary right of judging. Trial by jury, as
applied to the repression of crime, appears to me to introduce an
eminently republican element into the government upon the following
grounds:—
The institution of the jury may be aristocratic or democratic, according
to the class of society from which the jurors are selected; but it
always preserves its republican character, inasmuch as it places the
real direction of society in the hands of the governed, or of a portion
of the governed, instead of leaving it under the authority of the
Government. Force is never more than a transient element of success; and
after force comes the notion of right. A government which should only
be able to crush its enemies upon a field of battle would very soon be
destroyed. The true sanction of political laws is to be found in penal
legislation, and if that sanction be wanting the law will sooner or
later lose its cogency. He who punishes infractions of the law is
therefore the real master of society. Now the institution of the jury
raises the people itself, or at least a class of citizens, to the bench
of judicial authority. The institution of the jury consequently invests
the people, or that class of citizens, with the direction of society. *e
[Footnote e: An important remark must, however, be made. Trial by jury
does unquestionably invest the people with a general control over the
actions of citizens, but it does not furnish means of exercising this
control in all cases, or with an absolute authority. When an absolute
monarch has the right of trying offences by his representatives, the
fate of the prisoner is, as it were, decided beforehand. But even if
the people were predisposed to convict, the composition and the
non-responsibility of the jury would still afford some chances favorable
to the protection of innocence.]
In England the jury is returned from the aristocratic portion of
the nation; *f the aristocracy makes the laws, applies the laws, and
punishes all infractions of the laws; everything is established upon a
consistent footing, and England may with truth be said to constitute an
aristocratic republic. In the United States the same system is applied
to the whole people. Every American citizen is qualified to be an
elector, a juror, and is eligible to office. *g The system of the jury,
as it is understood in America, appears to me to be as direct and as
extreme a consequence of the sovereignty of the people as universal
suffrage. These institutions are two instruments of equal power, which
contribute to the supremacy of the majority. All the sovereigns who have
chosen to govern by their own authority, and to direct society instead
of obeying its directions, have destroyed or enfeebled the institution
of the jury. The monarchs of the House of Tudor sent to prison jurors
who refused to convict, and Napoleon caused them to be returned by his
agents.
[Footnote f: [This may be true to some extent of special juries, but
not of common juries. The author seems not to have been aware that the
qualifications of jurors in England vary exceedingly.]]
[Footnote g: See Appendix, Q.]
However clear most of these truths may seem to be, they do not command
universal assent, and in France, at least, the institution of trial by
jury is still very imperfectly understood. If the question arises as to
the proper qualification of jurors, it is confined to a discussion of
the intelligence and knowledge of the citizens who may be returned, as
if the jury was merely a judicial institution. This appears to me to
be the least part of the subject. The jury is pre-eminently a political
institution; it must be regarded as one form of the sovereignty of the
people; when that sovereignty is repudiated, it must be rejected, or it
must be adapted to the laws by which that sovereignty is established.
The jury is that portion of the nation to which the execution of the
laws is entrusted, as the Houses of Parliament constitute that part
of the nation which makes the laws; and in order that society may be
governed with consistency and uniformity, the list of citizens qualified
to serve on juries must increase and diminish with the list of electors.
This I hold to be the point of view most worthy of the attention of the
legislator, and all that remains is merely accessory.
I am so entirely convinced that the jury is pre-eminently a political
institution that I still consider it in this light when it is applied in
civil causes. Laws are always unstable unless they are founded upon the
manners of a nation; manners are the only durable and resisting power
in a people. When the jury is reserved for criminal offences, the people
only witnesses its occasional action in certain particular cases; the
ordinary course of life goes on without its interference, and it
is considered as an instrument, but not as the only instrument, of
obtaining justice. This is true a fortiori when the jury is only applied
to certain criminal causes.
When, on the contrary, the influence of the jury is extended to civil
causes, its application is constantly palpable; it affects all the
interests of the community; everyone co-operates in its work: it thus
penetrates into all the usages of life, it fashions the human mind to
its peculiar forms, and is gradually associated with the idea of justice
itself.
The institution of the jury, if confined to criminal causes, is always
in danger, but when once it is introduced into civil proceedings it
defies the aggressions of time and of man. If it had been as easy to
remove the jury from the manners as from the laws of England, it would
have perished under Henry VIII, and Elizabeth, and the civil jury did in
reality, at that period, save the liberties of the country. In whatever
manner the jury be applied, it cannot fail to exercise a powerful
influence upon the national character; but this influence is
prodigiously increased when it is introduced into civil causes. The
jury, and more especially the jury in civil cases, serves to communicate
the spirit of the judges to the minds of all the citizens; and this
spirit, with the habits which attend it, is the soundest preparation for
free institutions. It imbues all classes with a respect for the thing
judged, and with the notion of right. If these two elements be removed,
the love of independence is reduced to a mere destructive passion. It
teaches men to practice equity, every man learns to judge his neighbor
as he would himself be judged; and this is especially true of the jury
in civil causes, for, whilst the number of persons who have reason to
apprehend a criminal prosecution is small, every one is liable to have
a civil action brought against him. The jury teaches every man not to
recoil before the responsibility of his own actions, and impresses him
with that manly confidence without which political virtue cannot exist.
It invests each citizen with a kind of magistracy, it makes them all
feel the duties which they are bound to discharge towards society, and
the part which they take in the Government. By obliging men to turn
their attention to affairs which are not exclusively their own, it rubs
off that individual egotism which is the rust of society.
The jury contributes most powerfully to form the judgement and to
increase the natural intelligence of a people, and this is, in my
opinion, its greatest advantage. It may be regarded as a gratuitous
public school ever open, in which every juror learns to exercise his
rights, enters into daily communication with the most learned and
enlightened members of the upper classes, and becomes practically
acquainted with the laws of his country, which are brought within the
reach of his capacity by the efforts of the bar, the advice of the
judge, and even by the passions of the parties. I think that the
practical intelligence and political good sense of the Americans are
mainly attributable to the long use which they have made of the jury in
civil causes. I do not know whether the jury is useful to those who are
in litigation; but I am certain it is highly beneficial to those who
decide the litigation; and I look upon it as one of the most efficacious
means for the education of the people which society can employ.
What I have hitherto said applies to all nations, but the remark I
am now about to make is peculiar to the Americans and to democratic
peoples. I have already observed that in democracies the members of the
legal profession and the magistrates constitute the only aristocratic
body which can check the irregularities of the people. This aristocracy
is invested with no physical power, but it exercises its conservative
influence upon the minds of men, and the most abundant source of its
authority is the institution of the civil jury. In criminal causes, when
society is armed against a single individual, the jury is apt to
look upon the judge as the passive instrument of social power, and to
mistrust his advice. Moreover, criminal causes are entirely founded upon
the evidence of facts which common sense can readily appreciate; upon
this ground the judge and the jury are equal. Such, however, is not the
case in civil causes; then the judge appears as a disinterested arbiter
between the conflicting passions of the parties. The jurors look up to
him with confidence and listen to him with respect, for in this instance
their intelligence is completely under the control of his learning. It
is the judge who sums up the various arguments with which their memory
has been wearied out, and who guides them through the devious course of
the proceedings; he points their attention to the exact question of
fact which they are called upon to solve, and he puts the answer to the
question of law into their mouths. His influence upon their verdict is
almost unlimited.
If I am called upon to explain why I am but little moved by the
arguments derived from the ignorance of jurors in civil causes, I reply,
that in these proceedings, whenever the question to be solved is not
a mere question of fact, the jury has only the semblance of a judicial
body. The jury sanctions the decision of the judge, they by the
authority of society which they represent, and he by that of reason and
of law. *h
[Footnote h: See Appendix, R.]
In England and in America the judges exercise an influence upon criminal
trials which the French judges have never possessed. The reason of
this difference may easily be discovered; the English and American
magistrates establish their authority in civil causes, and only transfer
it afterwards to tribunals of another kind, where that authority was
not acquired. In some cases (and they are frequently the most important
ones) the American judges have the right of deciding causes alone. *i
Upon these occasions they are accidentally placed in the position which
the French judges habitually occupy, but they are invested with far more
power than the latter; they are still surrounded by the reminiscence of
the jury, and their judgment has almost as much authority as the voice
of the community at large, represented by that institution. Their
influence extends beyond the limits of the courts; in the recreations of
private life as well as in the turmoil of public business, abroad and in
the legislative assemblies, the American judge is constantly surrounded
by men who are accustomed to regard his intelligence as superior to
their own, and after having exercised his power in the decision
of causes, he continues to influence the habits of thought and the
characters of the individuals who took a part in his judgment.
[Footnote i: The Federal judges decide upon their own authority almost
all the questions most important to the country.]
The jury, then, which seems to restrict the rights of magistracy, does
in reality consolidate its power, and in no country are the judges so
powerful as there, where the people partakes their privileges. It is
more especially by means of the jury in civil causes that the American
magistrates imbue all classes of society with the spirit of their
profession. Thus the jury, which is the most energetic means of making
the people rule, is also the most efficacious means of teaching it to
rule well.
Chapter XVII: Principal Causes Maintaining The Democratic Republic—Part I
Principal Causes Which Tend To Maintain The Democratic Republic In The
United States
A democratic republic subsists in the United States, and the principal
object of this book has been to account for the fact of its existence.
Several of the causes which contribute to maintain the institutions of
America have been involuntarily passed by or only hinted at as I was
borne along by my subject. Others I have been unable to discuss, and
those on which I have dwelt most are, as it were, buried in the details
of the former parts of this work. I think, therefore, that before I
proceed to speak of the future, I cannot do better than collect within
a small compass the reasons which best explain the present. In this
retrospective chapter I shall be succinct, for I shall take care to
remind the reader very summarily of what he already knows; and I shall
only select the most prominent of those facts which I have not yet
pointed out.
All the causes which contribute to the maintenance of the democratic
republic in the United States are reducible to three heads:—
I. The peculiar and accidental situation in which Providence has placed
the Americans.
II. The laws.
III. The manners and customs of the people.
Accidental Or Providential Causes Which Contribute To The Maintenance
Of The Democratic Republic In The United States The Union has no
neighbors—No metropolis—The Americans have had the chances of birth in
their favor—America an empty country—How this circumstance contributes
powerfully to the maintenance of the democratic republic in America—How
the American wilds are peopled—Avidity of the Anglo-Americans in taking
possession of the solitudes of the New World—Influence of physical
prosperity upon the political opinions of the Americans.
A thousand circumstances, independent of the will of man, concur to
facilitate the maintenance of a democratic republic in the United
States. Some of these peculiarities are known, the others may easily be
pointed out; but I shall confine myself to the most prominent amongst
them.
The Americans have no neighbors, and consequently they have no great
wars, or financial crises, or inroads, or conquest to dread; they
require neither great taxes, nor great armies, nor great generals; and
they have nothing to fear from a scourge which is more formidable to
republics than all these evils combined, namely, military glory. It
is impossible to deny the inconceivable influence which military
glory exercises upon the spirit of a nation. General Jackson, whom the
Americans have twice elected to the head of their Government, is a man
of a violent temper and mediocre talents; no one circumstance in the
whole course of his career ever proved that he is qualified to govern a
free people, and indeed the majority of the enlightened classes of
the Union has always been opposed to him. But he was raised to the
Presidency, and has been maintained in that lofty station, solely by
the recollection of a victory which he gained twenty years ago under
the walls of New Orleans, a victory which was, however, a very ordinary
achievement, and which could only be remembered in a country where
battles are rare. Now the people which is thus carried away by the
illusions of glory is unquestionably the most cold and calculating, the
most unmilitary (if I may use the expression), and the most prosaic of
all the peoples of the earth.
America has no great capital *a city, whose influence is directly or
indirectly felt over the whole extent of the country, which I hold to be
one of the first causes of the maintenance of republican institutions
in the United States. In cities men cannot be prevented from concerting
together, and from awakening a mutual excitement which prompts
sudden and passionate resolutions. Cities may be looked upon as large
assemblies, of which all the inhabitants are members; their populace
exercises a prodigious influence upon the magistrates, and frequently
executes its own wishes without their intervention.
[Footnote a: The United States have no metropolis, but they already
contain several very large cities. Philadelphia reckoned 161,000
inhabitants and New York 202,000 in the year 1830. The lower orders
which inhabit these cities constitute a rabble even more formidable
than the populace of European towns. They consist of freed blacks in the
first place, who are condemned by the laws and by public opinion to
a hereditary state of misery and degradation. They also contain a
multitude of Europeans who have been driven to the shores of the New
World by their misfortunes or their misconduct; and these men inoculate
the United States with all our vices, without bringing with them any of
those interests which counteract their baneful influence. As inhabitants
of a country where they have no civil rights, they are ready to turn all
the passions which agitate the community to their own advantage; thus,
within the last few months serious riots have broken out in Philadelphia
and in New York. Disturbances of this kind are unknown in the rest of
the country, which is nowise alarmed by them, because the population of
the cities has hitherto exercised neither power nor influence over the
rural districts. Nevertheless, I look upon the size of certain American
cities, and especially on the nature of their population, as a real
danger which threatens the future security of the democratic republics
of the New World; and I venture to predict that they will perish from
this circumstance unless the government succeeds in creating an armed
force, which, whilst it remains under the control of the majority of the
nation, will be independent of the town population, and able to repress
its excesses.
[The population of the city of New York had risen, in 1870, to 942,292,
and that of Philadelphia to 674,022. Brooklyn, which may be said to form
part of New York city, has a population of 396,099, in addition to that
of New York. The frequent disturbances in the great cities of America,
and the excessive corruption of their local governments—over which
there is no effectual control—are amongst the greatest evils and
dangers of the country.]]
To subject the provinces to the metropolis is therefore not only
to place the destiny of the empire in the hands of a portion of the
community, which may be reprobated as unjust, but to place it in the
hands of a populace acting under its own impulses, which must be avoided
as dangerous. The preponderance of capital cities is therefore a serious
blow upon the representative system, and it exposes modern republics to
the same defect as the republics of antiquity, which all perished from
not having been acquainted with that form of government.
It would be easy for me to adduce a great number of secondary causes
which have contributed to establish, and which concur to maintain, the
democratic republic of the United States. But I discern two principal
circumstances amongst these favorable elements, which I hasten to point
out. I have already observed that the origin of the American settlements
may be looked upon as the first and most efficacious cause to which the
present prosperity of the United States may be attributed. The Americans
had the chances of birth in their favor, and their forefathers imported
that equality of conditions into the country whence the democratic
republic has very naturally taken its rise. Nor was this all they did;
for besides this republican condition of society, the early settler
bequeathed to their descendants those customs, manners, and opinions
which contribute most to the success of a republican form of government.
When I reflect upon the consequences of this primary circumstance,
methinks I see the destiny of America embodied in the first Puritan who
landed on those shores, just as the human race was represented by the
first man.
The chief circumstance which has favored the establishment and the
maintenance of a democratic republic in the United States is the nature
of the territory which the American inhabit. Their ancestors gave them
the love of equality and of freedom, but God himself gave them the means
of remaining equal and free, by placing them upon a boundless continent,
which is open to their exertions. General prosperity is favorable to
the stability of all governments, but more particularly of a democratic
constitution, which depends upon the dispositions of the majority, and
more particularly of that portion of the community which is most exposed
to feel the pressure of want. When the people rules, it must be rendered
happy, or it will overturn the State, and misery is apt to stimulate it
to those excesses to which ambition rouses kings. The physical causes,
independent of the laws, which contribute to promote general prosperity,
are more numerous in America than they have ever been in any other
country in the world, at any other period of history. In the United
States not only is legislation democratic, but nature herself favors the
cause of the people.
In what part of human tradition can be found anything at all similar to
that which is occurring under our eyes in North America? The celebrated
communities of antiquity were all founded in the midst of hostile
nations, which they were obliged to subjugate before they could flourish
in their place. Even the moderns have found, in some parts of South
America, vast regions inhabited by a people of inferior civilization,
but which occupied and cultivated the soil. To found their new states
it was necessary to extirpate or to subdue a numerous population, until
civilization has been made to blush for their success. But North America
was only inhabited by wandering tribes, who took no thought of the
natural riches of the soil, and that vast country was still, properly
speaking, an empty continent, a desert land awaiting its inhabitants.
Everything is extraordinary in America, the social condition of
the inhabitants, as well as the laws; but the soil upon which these
institutions are founded is more extraordinary than all the rest.
When man was first placed upon the earth by the Creator, the earth was
inexhaustible in its youth, but man was weak and ignorant; and when he
had learned to explore the treasures which it contained, hosts of his
fellow creatures covered its surface, and he was obliged to earn an
asylum for repose and for freedom by the sword. At that same period
North America was discovered, as if it had been kept in reserve by the
Deity, and had just risen from beneath the waters of the deluge.
That continent still presents, as it did in the primeval time, rivers
which rise from never-failing sources, green and moist solitudes, and
fields which the ploughshare of the husbandman has never turned. In this
state it is offered to man, not in the barbarous and isolated condition
of the early ages, but to a being who is already in possession of
the most potent secrets of the natural world, who is united to his
fellow-men, and instructed by the experience of fifty centuries. At
this very time thirteen millions of civilized Europeans are peaceably
spreading over those fertile plains, with whose resources and whose
extent they are not yet themselves accurately acquainted. Three or four
thousand soldiers drive the wandering races of the aborigines before
them; these are followed by the pioneers, who pierce the woods, scare
off the beasts of prey, explore the courses of the inland streams, and
make ready the triumphal procession of civilization across the waste.
The favorable influence of the temporal prosperity of America upon the
institutions of that country has been so often described by others,
and adverted to by myself, that I shall not enlarge upon it beyond the
addition of a few facts. An erroneous notion is generally entertained
that the deserts of America are peopled by European emigrants, who
annually disembark upon the coasts of the New World, whilst the American
population increases and multiplies upon the soil which its forefathers
tilled. The European settler, however, usually arrives in the United
States without friends, and sometimes without resources; in order to
subsist he is obliged to work for hire, and he rarely proceeds beyond
that belt of industrious population which adjoins the ocean. The desert
cannot be explored without capital or credit; and the body must be
accustomed to the rigors of a new climate before it can be exposed to
the chances of forest life. It is the Americans themselves who daily
quit the spots which gave them birth to acquire extensive domains in
a remote country. Thus the European leaves his cottage for the
trans-Atlantic shores; and the American, who is born on that very coast,
plunges in his turn into the wilds of Central America. This double
emigration is incessant; it begins in the remotest parts of Europe, it
crosses the Atlantic Ocean, and it advances over the solitudes of
the New World. Millions of men are marching at once towards the same
horizon; their language, their religion, their manners differ, their
object is the same. The gifts of fortune are promised in the West, and
to the West they bend their course. *b
[Footnote b: [The number of foreign immigrants into the United States in
the last fifty years (from 1820 to 1871) is stated to be 7,556,007. Of
these, 4,104,553 spoke English—that is, they came from Great Britain,
Ireland, or the British colonies; 2,643,069 came from Germany or
northern Europe; and about half a million from the south of Europe.]]
No event can be compared with this continuous removal of the human race,
except perhaps those irruptions which preceded the fall of the Roman
Empire. Then, as well as now, generations of men were impelled forwards
in the same direction to meet and struggle on the same spot; but the
designs of Providence were not the same; then, every newcomer was the
harbinger of destruction and of death; now, every adventurer brings with
him the elements of prosperity and of life. The future still conceals
from us the ulterior consequences of this emigration of the Americans
towards the West; but we can readily apprehend its more immediate
results. As a portion of the inhabitants annually leave the States in
which they were born, the population of these States increases very
slowly, although they have long been established: thus in Connecticut,
which only contains fifty-nine inhabitants to the square mile, the
population has not increased by more than one-quarter in forty years,
whilst that of England has been augmented by one-third in the lapse of
the same period. The European emigrant always lands, therefore, in
a country which is but half full, and where hands are in request:
he becomes a workman in easy circumstances; his son goes to seek his
fortune in unpeopled regions, and he becomes a rich landowner. The
former amasses the capital which the latter invests, and the stranger as
well as the native is unacquainted with want.
The laws of the United States are extremely favorable to the division
of property; but a cause which is more powerful than the laws prevents
property from being divided to excess. *c This is very perceptible in
the States which are beginning to be thickly peopled; Massachusetts
is the most populous part of the Union, but it contains only eighty
inhabitants to the square mile, which is must less than in France, where
162 are reckoned to the same extent of country. But in Massachusetts
estates are very rarely divided; the eldest son takes the land, and the
others go to seek their fortune in the desert. The law has abolished
the rights of primogeniture, but circumstances have concurred to
re-establish it under a form of which none can complain, and by which no
just rights are impaired.
[Footnote c: In New England the estates are exceedingly small, but they
are rarely subjected to further division.]
A single fact will suffice to show the prodigious number of individuals
who leave New England, in this manner, to settle themselves in the
wilds. We were assured in 1830 that thirty-six of the members of
Congress were born in the little State of Connecticut. The population of
Connecticut, which constitutes only one forty-third part of that of
the United States, thus furnished one-eighth of the whole body of
representatives. The States of Connecticut, however, only sends five
delegates to Congress; and the thirty-one others sit for the new Western
States. If these thirty-one individuals had remained in Connecticut,
it is probable that instead of becoming rich landowners they would
have remained humble laborers, that they would have lived in obscurity
without being able to rise into public life, and that, far from becoming
useful members of the legislature, they might have been unruly citizens.
These reflections do not escape the observation of the Americans any
more than of ourselves. "It cannot be doubted," says Chancellor Kent
in his "Treatise on American Law," "that the division of landed estates
must produce great evils when it is carried to such excess as that
each parcel of land is insufficient to support a family; but these
disadvantages have never been felt in the United States, and many
generations must elapse before they can be felt. The extent of our
inhabited territory, the abundance of adjacent land, and the continual
stream of emigration flowing from the shores of the Atlantic towards
the interior of the country, suffice as yet, and will long suffice, to
prevent the parcelling out of estates."
It is difficult to describe the rapacity with which the American rushes
forward to secure the immense *** which fortune proffers to him.
In the pursuit he fearlessly braves the arrow of the Indian and the
distempers of the forest; he is unimpressed by the silence of the woods;
the approach of beasts of prey does not disturb him; for he is goaded
onwards by a passion more intense than the love of life. Before him lies
a boundless continent, and he urges onwards as if time pressed, and he
was afraid of finding no room for his exertions. I have spoken of the
emigration from the older States, but how shall I describe that which
takes place from the more recent ones? Fifty years have scarcely elapsed
since that of Ohio was founded; the greater part of its inhabitants were
not born within its confines; its capital has only been built thirty
years, and its territory is still covered by an immense extent of
uncultivated fields; nevertheless the population of Ohio is already
proceeding westward, and most of the settlers who descend to the fertile
savannahs of Illinois are citizens of Ohio. These men left their first
country to improve their condition; they quit their resting-place to
ameliorate it still more; fortune awaits them everywhere, but happiness
they cannot attain. The desire of prosperity is become an ardent and
restless passion in their minds which grows by what it gains. They early
broke the ties which bound them to their natal earth, and they have
contracted no fresh ones on their way. Emigration was at first necessary
to them as a means of subsistence; and it soon becomes a sort of game of
chance, which they pursue for the emotions it excites as much as for the
gain it procures.
Sometimes the progress of man is so rapid that the desert reappears
behind him. The woods stoop to give him a passage, and spring up again
when he has passed. It is not uncommon in crossing the new States of
the West to meet with deserted dwellings in the midst of the wilds; the
traveller frequently discovers the vestiges of a log house in the most
solitary retreats, which bear witness to the power, and no less to the
inconstancy of man. In these abandoned fields, and over these ruins of
a day, the primeval forest soon scatters a fresh vegetation, the beasts
resume the haunts which were once their own, and Nature covers the
traces of man's path with branches and with flowers, which obliterate
his evanescent track.
I remember that, in crossing one of the woodland districts which still
cover the State of New York, I reached the shores of a lake embosomed in
forests coeval with the world. A small island, covered with woods whose
thick foliage concealed its banks, rose from the centre of the waters.
Upon the shores of the lake no object attested the presence of man
except a column of smoke which might be seen on the horizon rising from
the tops of the trees to the clouds, and seeming to hang from heaven
rather than to be mounting to the sky. An Indian shallop was hauled
up on the sand, which tempted me to visit the islet that had first
attracted my attention, and in a few minutes I set foot upon its banks.
The whole island formed one of those delicious solitudes of the New
World which almost lead civilized man to regret the haunts of the
savage. A luxuriant vegetation bore witness to the incomparable
fruitfulness of the soil. The deep silence which is common to the
wilds of North America was only broken by the hoarse cooing of the
wood-pigeon, and the tapping of the woodpecker upon the bark of trees.
I was far from supposing that this spot had ever been inhabited, so
completely did Nature seem to be left to her own caprices; but when I
reached the centre of the isle I thought that I discovered some traces
of man. I then proceeded to examine the surrounding objects with care,
and I soon perceived that a European had undoubtedly been led to seek a
refuge in this retreat. Yet what changes had taken place in the scene of
his labors! The logs which he had hastily hewn to build himself a
shed had sprouted afresh; the very props were intertwined with living
verdure, and his cabin was transformed into a bower. In the midst of
these shrubs a few stones were to be seen, blackened with fire and
sprinkled with thin ashes; here the hearth had no doubt been, and the
chimney in falling had covered it with rubbish. I stood for some time in
silent admiration of the exuberance of Nature and the littleness of man:
and when I was obliged to leave that enchanting solitude, I exclaimed
with melancholy, "Are ruins, then, already here?"
In Europe we are wont to look upon a restless disposition, an unbounded
desire of riches, and an excessive love of independence, as propensities
very formidable to society. Yet these are the very elements which ensure
a long and peaceful duration to the republics of America. Without these
unquiet passions the population would collect in certain spots, and
would soon be subject to wants like those of the Old World, which it is
difficult to satisfy; for such is the present good fortune of the New
World, that the vices of its inhabitants are scarcely less favorable
to society than their virtues. These circumstances exercise a great
influence on the estimation in which human actions are held in the two
hemispheres. The Americans frequently term what we should call cupidity
a laudable industry; and they blame as faint-heartedness what we
consider to be the virtue of moderate desires.
In France, simple tastes, orderly manners, domestic affections, and the
attachments which men feel to the place of their birth, are looked upon
as great guarantees of the tranquillity and happiness of the State. But
in America nothing seems to be more prejudicial to society than these
virtues. The French Canadians, who have faithfully preserved the
traditions of their pristine manners, are already embarrassed for room
upon their small territory; and this little community, which has so
recently begun to exist, will shortly be a prey to the calamities
incident to old nations. In Canada, the most enlightened, patriotic,
and humane inhabitants make extraordinary efforts to render the people
dissatisfied with those simple enjoyments which still content it. There,
the seductions of wealth are vaunted with as much zeal as the charms of
an honest but limited income in the Old World, and more exertions are
made to excite the passions of the citizens there than to calm them
elsewhere. If we listen to their eulogies, we shall hear that nothing is
more praiseworthy than to exchange the pure and homely pleasures which
even the poor man tastes in his own country for the dull delights of
prosperity under a foreign sky; to leave the patrimonial hearth and
the turf beneath which his forefathers sleep; in short, to abandon the
living and the dead in quest of fortune.
At the present time America presents a field for human effort far more
extensive than any sum of labor which can be applied to work it. In
America too much knowledge cannot be diffused; for all knowledge, whilst
it may serve him who possesses it, turns also to the advantage of those
who are without it. New wants are not to be feared, since they can be
satisfied without difficulty; the growth of human passions need not be
dreaded, since all passions may find an easy and a legitimate object;
nor can men be put in possession of too much freedom, since they are
scarcely ever tempted to misuse their liberties.
The American republics of the present day are like companies of
adventurers formed to explore in common the waste lands of the New
World, and busied in a flourishing trade. The passions which agitate
the Americans most deeply are not their political but their commercial
passions; or, to speak more correctly, they introduce the habits they
contract in business into their political life. They love order, without
which affairs do not prosper; and they set an especial value upon a
regular conduct, which is the foundation of a solid business; they
prefer the good sense which amasses large fortunes to that enterprising
spirit which frequently dissipates them; general ideas alarm their
minds, which are accustomed to positive calculations, and they hold
practice in more honor than theory.
It is in America that one learns to understand the influence which
physical prosperity exercises over political actions, and even over
opinions which ought to acknowledge no sway but that of reason; and it
is more especially amongst strangers that this truth is perceptible.
Most of the European emigrants to the New World carry with them that
wild love of independence and of change which our calamities are so apt
to engender. I sometimes met with Europeans in the United States who had
been obliged to leave their own country on account of their political
opinions. They all astonished me by the language they held, but one of
them surprised me more than all the rest. As I was crossing one of the
most remote districts of Pennsylvania I was benighted, and obliged
to beg for hospitality at the gate of a wealthy planter, who was a
Frenchman by birth. He bade me sit down beside his fire, and we began to
talk with that freedom which befits persons who meet in the backwoods,
two thousand leagues from their native country. I was aware that my host
had been a great leveller and an ardent demagogue forty years ago, and
that his name was not unknown to fame. I was, therefore, not a little
surprised to hear him discuss the rights of property as an economist or
a landowner might have done: he spoke of the necessary gradations which
fortune establishes among men, of obedience to established laws, of
the influence of good morals in commonwealths, and of the support which
religious opinions give to order and to freedom; he even went to far
as to quote an evangelical authority in corroboration of one of his
political tenets.
I listened, and marvelled at the feebleness of human reason. A
proposition is true or false, but no art can prove it to be one or the
other, in the midst of the uncertainties of science and the conflicting
lessons of experience, until a new incident disperses the clouds of
doubt; I was poor, I become rich, and I am not to expect that prosperity
will act upon my conduct, and leave my judgment free; my opinions
change with my fortune, and the happy circumstances which I turn to
my advantage furnish me with that decisive argument which was before
wanting. The influence of prosperity acts still more freely upon
the American than upon strangers. The American has always seen the
connection of public order and public prosperity, intimately united
as they are, go on before his eyes; he does not conceive that one can
subsist without the other; he has therefore nothing to forget; nor
has he, like so many Europeans, to unlearn the lessons of his early
education.
Chapter XVII: Principal Causes Maintaining The Democratic Republic—Part II
Influence Of The Laws Upon The Maintenance Of The Democratic Republic In
The United States
Three principal causes of the maintenance of the democratic
republic—Federal Constitutions—Municipal institutions—Judicial power.
The principal aim of this book has been to make known the laws of the
United States; if this purpose has been accomplished, the reader is
already enabled to judge for himself which are the laws that really tend
to maintain the democratic republic, and which endanger its existence.
If I have not succeeded in explaining this in the whole course of my
work, I cannot hope to do so within the limits of a single chapter. It
is not my intention to retrace the path I have already pursued, and
a very few lines will suffice to recapitulate what I have previously
explained.
Three circumstances seem to me to contribute most powerfully to the
maintenance of the democratic republic in the United States.
The first is that Federal form of Government which the Americans have
adopted, and which enables the Union to combine the power of a great
empire with the security of a small State.
The second consists in those municipal institutions which limit the
despotism of the majority, and at the same time impart a taste for
freedom and a knowledge of the art of being free to the people.
The third is to be met with in the constitution of the judicial power.
I have shown in what manner the courts of justice serve to repress the
excesses of democracy, and how they check and direct the impulses of the
majority without stopping its activity.
Influence Of Manners Upon The Maintenance Of The Democratic Republic In
The United States
I have previously remarked that the manners of the people may be
considered as one of the general causes to which the maintenance of a
democratic republic in the United States is attributable. I here used
the word manners with the meaning which the ancients attached to the
word mores, for I apply it not only to manners in their proper sense of
what constitutes the character of social intercourse, but I extend it to
the various notions and opinions current among men, and to the mass
of those ideas which constitute their character of mind. I comprise,
therefore, under this term the whole moral and intellectual condition of
a people. My intention is not to draw a picture of American manners,
but simply to point out such features of them as are favorable to the
maintenance of political institutions.
Religion Considered As A Political Institution, Which Powerfully
Contributes To The Maintenance Of The Democratic Republic Amongst The
Americans
North America peopled by men who professed a democratic and republican
Christianity—Arrival of the Catholics—For what reason the Catholics
form the most democratic and the most republican class at the present
time.
Every religion is to be found in juxtaposition to a political opinion
which is connected with it by affinity. If the human mind be left
to follow its own bent, it will regulate the temporal and spiritual
institutions of society upon one uniform principle; and man will
endeavor, if I may use the expression, to harmonize the state in which
he lives upon earth with the state which he believes to await him in
heaven. The greatest part of British America was peopled by men who,
after having shaken off the authority of the Pope, acknowledged no other
religious supremacy; they brought with them into the New World a form
of Christianity which I cannot better describe than by styling it a
democratic and republican religion. This sect contributed powerfully to
the establishment of a democracy and a republic, and from the earliest
settlement of the emigrants politics and religion contracted an alliance
which has never been dissolved.
About fifty years ago Ireland began to pour a Catholic population into
the United States; on the other hand, the Catholics of America made
proselytes, and at the present moment more than a million of Christians
professing the truths of the Church of Rome are to be met with in
the Union. *d The Catholics are faithful to the observances of their
religion; they are fervent and zealous in the support and belief of
their doctrines. Nevertheless they constitute the most republican and
the most democratic class of citizens which exists in the United States;
and although this fact may surprise the observer at first, the causes by
which it is occasioned may easily be discovered upon reflection.
[Footnote d: [It is difficult to ascertain with accuracy the amount of
the Roman Catholic population of the United States, but in 1868 an able
writer in the "Edinburgh Review" (vol. cxxvii. p. 521) affirmed that the
whole Catholic population of the United States was then about 4,000,000,
divided into 43 dioceses, with 3,795 churches, under the care of 45
bishops and 2,317 clergymen. But this rapid increase is mainly supported
by immigration from the Catholic countries of Europe.]]
I think that the Catholic religion has erroneously been looked upon as
the natural enemy of democracy. Amongst the various sects of Christians,
Catholicism seems to me, on the contrary, to be one of those which are
most favorable to the equality of conditions. In the Catholic Church,
the religious community is composed of only two elements, the priest and
the people. The priest alone rises above the rank of his flock, and all
below him are equal.
On doctrinal points the Catholic faith places all human capacities upon
the same level; it subjects the wise and ignorant, the man of genius and
the vulgar crowd, to the details of the same creed; it imposes the same
observances upon the rich and needy, it inflicts the same austerities
upon the strong and the weak, it listens to no compromise with mortal
man, but, reducing all the human race to the same standard, it confounds
all the distinctions of society at the foot of the same altar, even as
they are confounded in the sight of God. If Catholicism predisposes
the faithful to obedience, it certainly does not prepare them for
inequality; but the contrary may be said of Protestantism, which
generally tends to make men independent, more than to render them equal.
Catholicism is like an absolute monarchy; if the sovereign be removed,
all the other classes of society are more equal than they are in
republics. It has not unfrequently occurred that the Catholic priest
has left the service of the altar to mix with the governing powers of
society, and to take his place amongst the civil gradations of men. This
religious influence has sometimes been used to secure the interests
of that political state of things to which he belonged. At other times
Catholics have taken the side of aristocracy from a spirit of religion.
But no sooner is the priesthood entirely separated from the government,
as is the case in the United States, than is found that no class of men
are more naturally disposed than the Catholics to transfuse the doctrine
of the equality of conditions into the political world. If, then, the
Catholic citizens of the United States are not forcibly led by the
nature of their tenets to adopt democratic and republican principles,
at least they are not necessarily opposed to them; and their social
position, as well as their limited number, obliges them to adopt these
opinions. Most of the Catholics are poor, and they have no chance of
taking a part in the government unless it be open to all the citizens.
They constitute a minority, and all rights must be respected in order
to insure to them the free exercise of their own privileges. These two
causes induce them, unconsciously, to adopt political doctrines,
which they would perhaps support with less zeal if they were rich and
preponderant.
The Catholic clergy of the United States has never attempted to oppose
this political tendency, but it seeks rather to justify its results. The
priests in America have divided the intellectual world into two parts:
in the one they place the doctrines of revealed religion, which command
their assent; in the other they leave those truths which they believe to
have been freely left open to the researches of political inquiry.
Thus the Catholics of the United States are at the same time the most
faithful believers and the most zealous citizens.
It may be asserted that in the United States no religious doctrine
displays the slightest hostility to democratic and republican
institutions. The clergy of all the different sects hold the same
language, their opinions are consonant to the laws, and the human
intellect flows onwards in one sole current.
I happened to be staying in one of the largest towns in the Union, when
I was invited to attend a public meeting which had been called for the
purpose of assisting the Poles, and of sending them supplies of arms and
money. I found two or three thousand persons collected in a vast hall
which had been prepared to receive them. In a short time a priest in
his ecclesiastical robes advanced to the front of the hustings: the
spectators rose, and stood uncovered, whilst he spoke in the following
terms:—
"Almighty God! the God of Armies! Thou who didst strengthen the hearts
and guide the arms of our fathers when they were fighting for the sacred
rights of national independence; Thou who didst make them triumph over
a hateful oppression, and hast granted to our people the benefits
of liberty and peace; Turn, O Lord, a favorable eye upon the other
hemisphere; pitifully look down upon that heroic nation which is even
now struggling as we did in the former time, and for the same rights
which we defended with our blood. Thou, who didst create Man in the
likeness of the same image, let not tyranny mar Thy work, and establish
inequality upon the earth. Almighty God! do Thou watch over the destiny
of the Poles, and render them worthy to be free. May Thy wisdom direct
their councils, and may Thy strength sustain their arms! Shed forth Thy
terror over their enemies, scatter the powers which take counsel against
them; and vouchsafe that the injustice which the world has witnessed for
fifty years, be not consummated in our time. O Lord, who holdest alike
the hearts of nations and of men in Thy powerful hand; raise up allies
to the sacred cause of right; arouse the French nation from the apathy
in which its rulers retain it, that it go forth again to fight for the
liberties of the world.
"Lord, turn not Thou Thy face from us, and grant that we may always be
the most religious as well as the freest people of the earth. Almighty
God, hear our supplications this day. Save the Poles, we beseech Thee,
in the name of Thy well-beloved Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, who died
upon the cross for the salvation of men. Amen."
The whole meeting responded "Amen!" with devotion.
Indirect Influence Of Religious Opinions Upon Political Society In The
United States
Christian morality common to all sects—Influence of religion upon the
manners of the Americans—Respect for the marriage tie—In what manner
religion confines the imagination of the Americans within certain
limits, and checks the passion of innovation—Opinion of the Americans
on the political utility of religion—Their exertions to extend and
secure its predominance.
I have just shown what the direct influence of religion upon politics
is in the United States, but its indirect influence appears to me to be
still more considerable, and it never instructs the Americans more fully
in the art of being free than when it says nothing of freedom.
The sects which exist in the United States are innumerable. They all
differ in respect to the worship which is due from man to his Creator,
but they all agree in respect to the duties which are due from man to
man. Each sect adores the Deity in its own peculiar manner, but all
the sects preach the same moral law in the name of God. If it be of the
highest importance to man, as an individual, that his religion should be
true, the case of society is not the same. Society has no future life to
hope for or to fear; and provided the citizens profess a religion, the
peculiar tenets of that religion are of very little importance to its
interests. Moreover, almost all the sects of the United States are
comprised within the great unity of Christianity, and Christian morality
is everywhere the same.
It may be believed without unfairness that a certain number of Americans
pursue a peculiar form of worship, from habit more than from conviction.
In the United States the sovereign authority is religious, and
consequently hypocrisy must be common; but there is no country in the
whole world in which the Christian religion retains a greater influence
over the souls of men than in America; and there can be no greater proof
of its utility, and of its conformity to human nature, than that its
influence is most powerfully felt over the most enlightened and free
nation of the earth.
I have remarked that the members of the American clergy in general,
without even excepting those who do not admit religious liberty, are
all in favor of civil freedom; but they do not support any particular
political system. They keep aloof from parties and from public affairs.
In the United States religion exercises but little influence upon the
laws and upon the details of public opinion, but it directs the manners
of the community, and by regulating domestic life it regulates the
State.
I do not question that the great austerity of manners which is
observable in the United States, arises, in the first instance, from
religious faith. Religion is often unable to restrain man from the
numberless temptations of fortune; nor can it check that passion for
gain which every incident of his life contributes to arouse, but
its influence over the mind of woman is supreme, and women are the
protectors of morals. There is certainly no country in the world
where the tie of marriage is so much respected as in America, or where
conjugal happiness is more highly or worthily appreciated. In Europe
almost all the disturbances of society arise from the irregularities of
domestic life. To despise the natural bonds and legitimate pleasures of
home, is to contract a taste for excesses, a restlessness of heart, and
the evil of fluctuating desires. Agitated by the tumultuous passions
which frequently disturb his dwelling, the European is galled by the
obedience which the legislative powers of the State exact. But when the
American retires from the turmoil of public life to the *** of his
family, he finds in it the image of order and of peace. There his
pleasures are simple and natural, his joys are innocent and calm; and
as he finds that an orderly life is the surest path to happiness, he
accustoms himself without difficulty to moderate his opinions as well
as his tastes. Whilst the European endeavors to forget his domestic
troubles by agitating society, the American derives from his own home
that love of order which he afterwards carries with him into public
affairs.
In the United States the influence of religion is not confined to the
manners, but it extends to the intelligence of the people. Amongst
the Anglo-Americans, there are some who profess the doctrines of
Christianity from a sincere belief in them, and others who do the same
because they are afraid to be suspected of unbelief. Christianity,
therefore, reigns without any obstacle, by universal consent; the
consequence is, as I have before observed, that every principle of the
moral world is fixed and determinate, although the political world is
abandoned to the debates and the experiments of men. Thus the human mind
is never left to wander across a boundless field; and, whatever may be
its pretensions, it is checked from time to time by barriers which it
cannot surmount. Before it can perpetrate innovation, certain primal and
immutable principles are laid down, and the boldest conceptions of
human device are subjected to certain forms which retard and stop their
completion.
The imagination of the Americans, even in its greatest flights, is
circumspect and undecided; its impulses are checked, and its works
unfinished. These habits of restraint recur in political society, and
are singularly favorable both to the tranquillity of the people and
to the durability of the institutions it has established. Nature and
circumstances concurred to make the inhabitants of the United States
bold men, as is sufficiently attested by the enterprising spirit with
which they seek for fortune. If the mind of the Americans were free from
all trammels, they would very shortly become the most daring innovators
and the most implacable disputants in the world. But the revolutionists
of America are obliged to profess an ostensible respect for Christian
morality and equity, which does not easily permit them to violate the
laws that oppose their designs; nor would they find it easy to surmount
the scruples of their partisans, even if they were able to get over
their own. Hitherto no one in the United States has dared to advance the
maxim, that everything is permissible with a view to the interests of
society; an impious adage which seems to have been invented in an age of
freedom to shelter all the tyrants of future ages. Thus whilst the law
permits the Americans to do what they please, religion prevents them
from conceiving, and forbids them to commit, what is rash or unjust.
Religion in America takes no direct part in the government of society,
but it must nevertheless be regarded as the foremost of the political
institutions of that country; for if it does not impart a taste for
freedom, it facilitates the use of free institutions. Indeed, it is
in this same point of view that the inhabitants of the United States
themselves look upon religious belief. I do not know whether all the
Americans have a sincere faith in their religion, for who can search the
human heart? but I am certain that they hold it to be indispensable to
the maintenance of republican institutions. This opinion is not peculiar
to a class of citizens or to a party, but it belongs to the whole
nation, and to every rank of society.
In the United States, if a political character attacks a sect, this may
not prevent even the partisans of that very sect from supporting him;
but if he attacks all the sects together, everyone abandons him, and he
remains alone.
Whilst I was in America, a witness, who happened to be called at the
assizes of the county of Chester (State of New York), declared that he
did not believe in the existence of God, or in the immortality of the
soul. The judge refused to admit his evidence, on the ground that the
witness had destroyed beforehand all the confidence of the Court in
what he was about to say. *e The newspapers related the fact without any
further comment.
[Footnote e: The New York "Spectator" of August 23, 1831, relates the
fact in the following terms:—"The Court of Common Pleas of Chester
county (New York) a few days since rejected a witness who declared his
disbelief in the existence of God. The presiding judge remarked that
he had not before been aware that there was a man living who did not
believe in the existence of God; that this belief constituted the
sanction of all testimony in a court of justice, and that he knew of
no cause in a Christian country where a witness had been permitted to
testify without such belief."]
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; and with them this conviction does not spring
from that barren traditionary faith which seems to vegetate in the soul
rather than to live.
I have known of societies formed by the Americans to send out ministers
of the Gospel into the new Western States to found schools and churches
there, lest religion should be suffered to die away in those remote
settlements, and the rising States be less fitted to enjoy free
institutions than the people from which they emanated. I met with
wealthy New Englanders who abandoned the country in which they were born
in order to lay the foundations of Christianity and of freedom on the
banks of the Missouri, or in the prairies of Illinois. Thus religious
zeal is perpetually stimulated in the United States by the duties of
patriotism. These men do not act from an exclusive consideration of the
promises of a future life; eternity is only one motive of their devotion
to the cause; and if you converse with these missionaries of Christian
civilization, you will be surprised to find how much value they set upon
the goods of this world, and that you meet with a politician where you
expected to find a priest. They will tell you that "all the American
republics are collectively involved with each other; if the republics of
the West were to fall into anarchy, or to be mastered by a despot,
the republican institutions which now flourish upon the shores of the
Atlantic Ocean would be in great peril. It is, therefore, our interest
that the new States should be religious, in order to maintain our
liberties."
Such are the opinions of the Americans, and if any hold that the
religious spirit which I admire is the very thing most amiss in America,
and that the only element wanting to the freedom and happiness of the
human race is to believe in some blind cosmogony, or to assert with
Cabanis the secretion of thought by the brain, I can only reply that
those who hold this language have never been in America, and that they
have never seen a religious or a free nation. When they return from
their expedition, we shall hear what they have to say.
There are persons in France who look upon republican institutions as a
temporary means of power, of wealth, and distinction; men who are the
condottieri of liberty, and who fight for their own advantage, whatever
be the colors they wear: it is not to these that I address myself. But
there are others who look forward to the republican form of government
as a tranquil and lasting state, towards which modern society is daily
impelled by the ideas and manners of the time, and who sincerely desire
to prepare men to be free. When these men attack religious opinions,
they obey the dictates of their passions to the prejudice of their
interests. Despotism may govern without faith, but liberty cannot.
Religion is much more necessary in the republic which they set forth in
glowing colors than in the monarchy which they attack; and it is more
needed in democratic republics than in any others. How is it possible
that society should escape destruction if the moral tie be not
strengthened in proportion as the political tie is relaxed? and what can
be done with a people which is its own master, if it be not submissive
to the Divinity?
Chapter XVII: Principal Causes Maintaining The Democratic Republic—Part III
Principal Causes Which Render Religion Powerful In America Care taken
by the Americans to separate the Church from the State—The laws, public
opinion, and even the exertions of the clergy concur to promote
this end—Influence of religion upon the mind in the United States
attributable to this cause—Reason of this—What is the natural state of
men with regard to religion at the present time—What are the peculiar
and incidental causes which prevent men, in certain countries, from
arriving at this state.
The philosophers of the eighteenth century explained the gradual decay
of religious faith in a very simple manner. Religious zeal, said they,
must necessarily fail, the more generally liberty is established and
knowledge diffused. Unfortunately, facts are by no means in accordance
with their theory. There are certain populations in Europe whose
unbelief is only equalled by their ignorance and their debasement,
whilst in America one of the freest and most enlightened nations in the
world fulfils all the outward duties of religious fervor.
Upon my arrival in the United States, the religious aspect of the
country was the first thing that struck my attention; and the longer I
stayed there the more did I perceive the great political consequences
resulting from this state of things, to which I was unaccustomed. In
France I had almost always seen the spirit of religion and the spirit
of freedom pursuing courses diametrically opposed to each other; but in
America I found that they were intimately united, and that they reigned
in common over the same country. My desire to discover the causes of
this phenomenon increased from day to day. In order to satisfy it I
questioned the members of all the different sects; and I more especially
sought the society of the clergy, who are the depositaries of the
different persuasions, and who are more especially interested in
their duration. As a member of the Roman Catholic Church I was more
particularly brought into contact with several of its priests, with
whom I became intimately acquainted. To each of these men I expressed my
astonishment and I explained my doubts; I found that they differed upon
matters of detail alone; and that they mainly attributed the peaceful
dominion of religion in their country to the separation of Church and
State. I do not hesitate to affirm that during my stay in America I did
not meet with a single individual, of the clergy or of the laity, who
was not of the same opinion upon this point.
This led me to examine more attentively than I had hitherto done, the
station which the American clergy occupy in political society. I learned
with surprise that they filled no public appointments; *f not one of
them is to be met with in the administration, and they are not even
represented in the legislative assemblies. In several States *g the law
excludes them from political life, public opinion in all. And when I
came to inquire into the prevailing spirit of the clergy I found that
most of its members seemed to retire of their own accord from the
exercise of power, and that they made it the pride of their profession
to abstain from politics.
[Footnote f: Unless this term be applied to the functions which many
of them fill in the schools. Almost all education is entrusted to the
clergy.]
[Footnote g: See the Constitution of New York, art. 7, Section 4:— "And
whereas the ministers of the gospel are, by their profession, dedicated
to the service of God and the care of souls, and ought not to be
diverted from the great duties of their functions: therefore no minister
of the gospel, or priest of any denomination whatsoever, shall at any
time hereafter, under any pretence or description whatever, be eligible
to, or capable of holding, any civil or military office or place within
this State."
See also the constitutions of North Carolina, art. 31; Virginia; South
Carolina, art. I, Section 23; Kentucky, art. 2, Section 26; Tennessee,
art. 8, Section I; Louisiana, art. 2, Section 22.]
I heard them inveigh against ambition and deceit, under whatever
political opinions these vices might chance to lurk; but I learned
from their discourses that men are not guilty in the eye of God for any
opinions concerning political government which they may profess with
sincerity, any more than they are for their mistakes in building a house
or in driving a furrow. I perceived that these ministers of the gospel
eschewed all parties with the anxiety attendant upon personal interest.
These facts convinced me that what I had been told was true; and it
then became my object to investigate their causes, and to inquire how it
happened that the real authority of religion was increased by a state
of things which diminished its apparent force: these causes did not long
escape my researches.
The short space of threescore years can never content the imagination
of man; nor can the imperfect joys of this world satisfy his heart. Man
alone, of all created beings, displays a natural contempt of existence,
and yet a boundless desire to exist; he scorns life, but he dreads
annihilation. These different feelings incessantly urge his soul to
the contemplation of a future state, and religion directs his musings
thither. Religion, then, is simply another form of hope; and it is no
less natural to the human heart than hope itself. Men cannot abandon
their religious faith without a kind of aberration of intellect, and
a sort of violent distortion of their true natures; but they are
invincibly brought back to more pious sentiments; for unbelief is an
accident, and faith is the only permanent state of mankind. If we only
consider religious institutions in a purely human point of view, they
may be said to derive an inexhaustible element of strength from man
himself, since they belong to one of the constituent principles of human
nature.
I am aware that at certain times religion may strengthen this influence,
which originates in itself, by the artificial power of the laws, and
by the support of those temporal institutions which direct society.
Religions, intimately united to the governments of the earth, have been
known to exercise a sovereign authority derived from the twofold source
of terror and of faith; but when a religion contracts an alliance of
this nature, I do not hesitate to affirm that it commits the same error
as a man who should sacrifice his future to his present welfare; and
in obtaining a power to which it has no claim, it risks that authority
which is rightfully its own. When a religion founds its empire upon the
desire of immortality which lives in every human heart, it may aspire
to universal dominion; but when it connects itself with a government,
it must necessarily adopt maxims which are only applicable to certain
nations. Thus, in forming an alliance with a political power, religion
augments its authority over a few, and forfeits the hope of reigning
over all.
As long as a religion rests upon those sentiments which are the
consolation of all affliction, it may attract the affections of mankind.
But if it be mixed up with the bitter passions of the world, it may be
constrained to defend allies whom its interests, and not the principle
of love, have given to it; or to repel as antagonists men who are still
attached to its own spirit, however opposed they may be to the powers
to which it is allied. The Church cannot share the temporal power of the
State without being the object of a portion of that animosity which the
latter excites.
The political powers which seem to be most firmly established have
frequently no better guarantee for their duration than the opinions of
a generation, the interests of the time, or the life of an individual.
A law may modify the social condition which seems to be most fixed and
determinate; and with the social condition everything else must change.
The powers of society are more or less fugitive, like the years which
we spend upon the earth; they succeed each other with rapidity, like the
fleeting cares of life; and no government has ever yet been founded upon
an invariable disposition of the human heart, or upon an imperishable
interest.
As long as a religion is sustained by those feelings, propensities,
and passions which are found to occur under the same forms, at all the
different periods of history, it may defy the efforts of time; or at
least it can only be destroyed by another religion. But when religion
clings to the interests of the world, it becomes almost as fragile a
thing as the powers of earth. It is the only one of them all which
can hope for immortality; but if it be connected with their ephemeral
authority, it shares their fortunes, and may fall with those transient
passions which supported them for a day. The alliance which religion
contracts with political powers must needs be onerous to itself; since
it does not require their assistance to live, and by giving them its
assistance to live, and by giving them its assistance it may be exposed
to decay.
The danger which I have just pointed out always exists, but it is
not always equally visible. In some ages governments seem to be
imperishable; in others, the existence of society appears to be more
precarious than the life of man. Some constitutions plunge the
citizens into a lethargic somnolence, and others rouse them to feverish
excitement. When governments appear to be so strong, and laws so stable,
men do not perceive the dangers which may accrue from a union of Church
and State. When governments display so much weakness, and laws so much
inconstancy, the danger is self-evident, but it is no longer possible
to avoid it; to be effectual, measures must be taken to discover its
approach.
In proportion as a nation assumes a democratic condition of society, and
as communities display democratic propensities, it becomes more and more
dangerous to connect religion with political institutions; for the
time is coming when authority will be bandied from hand to hand, when
political theories will succeed each other, and when men, laws, and
constitutions will disappear, or be modified from day to day, and this,
not for a season only, but unceasingly. Agitation and mutability are
inherent in the nature of democratic republics, just as stagnation and
inertness are the law of absolute monarchies.
If the Americans, who change the head of the Government once in
four years, who elect new legislators every two years, and renew the
provincial officers every twelvemonth; if the Americans, who have
abandoned the political world to the attempts of innovators, had not
placed religion beyond their reach, where could it abide in the ebb and
flow of human opinions? where would that respect which belongs to it
be paid, amidst the struggles of faction? and what would become of its
immortality, in the midst of perpetual decay? The American clergy were
the first to perceive this truth, and to act in conformity with it. They
saw that they must renounce their religious influence, if they were to
strive for political power; and they chose to give up the support of the
State, rather than to share its vicissitudes.
In America, religion is perhaps less powerful than it has been at
certain periods in the history of certain peoples; but its influence
is more lasting. It restricts itself to its own resources, but of those
none can deprive it: its circle is limited to certain principles, but
those principles are entirely its own, and under its undisputed control.
On every side in Europe we hear voices complaining of the absence of
religious faith, and inquiring the means of restoring to religion some
remnant of its pristine authority. It seems to me that we must first
attentively consider what ought to be the natural state of men with
regard to religion at the present time; and when we know what we have to
hope and to fear, we may discern the end to which our efforts ought to
be directed.
The two great dangers which threaten the existence of religions are
schism and indifference. In ages of fervent devotion, men sometimes
abandon their religion, but they only shake it off in order to adopt
another. Their faith changes the objects to which it is directed, but
it suffers no decline. The old religion then excites enthusiastic
attachment or bitter enmity in either party; some leave it with anger,
others cling to it with increased devotedness, and although persuasions
differ, irreligion is unknown. Such, however, is not the case when a
religious belief is secretly undermined by doctrines which may be termed
negative, since they deny the truth of one religion without affirming
that of any other. Progidious revolutions then take place in the human
mind, without the apparent co-operation of the passions of man, and
almost without his knowledge. Men lose the objects of their fondest
hopes, as if through forgetfulness. They are carried away by an
imperceptible current which they have not the courage to stem, but which
they follow with regret, since it bears them from a faith they love, to
a scepticism that plunges them into despair.
In ages which answer to this description, men desert their religious
opinions from lukewarmness rather than from dislike; they do not reject
them, but the sentiments by which they were once fostered disappear. But
if the unbeliever does not admit religion to be true, he still considers
it useful. Regarding religious institutions in a human point of view,
he acknowledges their influence upon manners and legislation. He admits
that they may serve to make men live in peace with one another, and to
prepare them gently for the hour of death. He regrets the faith which
he has lost; and as he is deprived of a treasure which he has learned to
estimate at its full value, he scruples to take it from those who still
possess it.
On the other hand, those who continue to believe are not afraid openly
to avow their faith. They look upon those who do not share their
persuasion as more worthy of pity than of opposition; and they are aware
that to acquire the esteem of the unbelieving, they are not obliged to
follow their example. They are hostile to no one in the world; and as
they do not consider the society in which they live as an arena in which
religion is bound to face its thousand deadly foes, they love their
contemporaries, whilst they condemn their weaknesses and lament their
errors.
As those who do not believe, conceal their incredulity; and as those who
believe, display their faith, public opinion pronounces itself in favor
of religion: love, support, and honor are bestowed upon it, and it is
only by searching the human soul that we can detect the wounds which it
has received. The mass of mankind, who are never without the feeling
of religion, do not perceive anything at variance with the established
faith. The instinctive desire of a future life brings the crowd about
the altar, and opens the hearts of men to the precepts and consolations
of religion.
But this picture is not applicable to us: for there are men amongst us
who have ceased to believe in Christianity, without adopting any other
religion; others who are in the perplexities of doubt, and who already
affect not to believe; and others, again, who are afraid to avow that
Christian faith which they still cherish in secret.
Amidst these lukewarm partisans and ardent antagonists a small number of
believers exist, who are ready to brave all obstacles and to scorn all
dangers in defence of their faith. They have done violence to human
weakness, in order to rise superior to public opinion. Excited by the
effort they have made, they scarcely knew where to stop; and as they
know that the first use which the French made of independence was to
attack religion, they look upon their contemporaries with dread, and
they recoil in alarm from the liberty which their fellow-citizens are
seeking to obtain. As unbelief appears to them to be a novelty, they
comprise all that is new in one indiscriminate animosity. They are at
war with their age and country, and they look upon every opinion which
is put forth there as the necessary enemy of the faith.
Such is not the natural state of men with regard to religion at the
present day; and some extraordinary or incidental cause must be at
work in France to prevent the human mind from following its original
propensities and to drive it beyond the limits at which it ought
naturally to stop. I am intimately convinced that this extraordinary and
incidental cause is the close connection of politics and religion.
The unbelievers of Europe attack the Christians as their political
opponents, rather than as their religious adversaries; they hate the
Christian religion as the opinion of a party, much more than as an
error of belief; and they reject the clergy less because they are the
representatives of the Divinity than because they are the allies of
authority.
In Europe, Christianity has been intimately united to the powers of
the earth. Those powers are now in decay, and it is, as it were, buried
under their ruins. The living body of religion has been bound down
to the dead corpse of superannuated polity: cut but the bonds which
restrain it, and that which is alive will rise once more. I know not
what could restore the Christian Church of Europe to the energy of its
earlier days; that power belongs to God alone; but it may be the effect
of human policy to leave the faith in the full exercise of the strength
which it still retains.
How The Instruction, The Habits, And The Practical Experience Of The
Americans Promote The Success Of Their Democratic Institutions
What is to be understood by the instruction of the American people—The
human mind more superficially instructed in the United States than in
Europe—No one completely uninstructed—Reason of this—Rapidity with
which opinions are diffused even in the uncultivated States of the
West—Practical experience more serviceable to the Americans than
book-learning.
I have but little to add to what I have already said concerning the
influence which the instruction and the habits of the Americans exercise
upon the maintenance of their political institutions.
America has hitherto produced very few writers of distinction; it
possesses no great historians, and not a single eminent poet. The
inhabitants of that country look upon what are properly styled literary
pursuits with a kind of disapprobation; and there are towns of very
second-rate importance in Europe in which more literary works are
annually published than in the twenty-four States of the Union put
together. The spirit of the Americans is averse to general ideas; and it
does not seek theoretical discoveries. Neither politics nor manufactures
direct them to these occupations; and although new laws are perpetually
enacted in the United States, no great writers have hitherto inquired
into the general principles of their legislation. The Americans have
lawyers and commentators, but no jurists; *h and they furnish examples
rather than lessons to the world. The same observation applies to the
mechanical arts. In America, the inventions of Europe are adopted with
sagacity; they are perfected, and adapted with admirable skill to the
wants of the country. Manufactures exist, but the science of manufacture
is not cultivated; and they have good workmen, but very few inventors.
Fulton was obliged to proffer his services to foreign nations for a long
time before he was able to devote them to his own country.
[Footnote h: [This cannot be said with truth of the country of Kent,
Story, and Wheaton.]]
The observer who is desirous of forming an opinion on the state of
instruction amongst the Anglo-Americans must consider the same object
from two different points of view. If he only singles out the learned,
he will be astonished to find how rare they are; but if he counts the
ignorant, the American people will appear to be the most enlightened
community in the world. The whole population, as I observed in another
place, is situated between these two extremes. In New England, every
citizen receives the elementary notions of human knowledge; he is
moreover taught the doctrines and the evidences of his religion, the
history of his country, and the leading features of its Constitution.
In the States of Connecticut and Massachusetts, it is extremely rare to
find a man imperfectly acquainted with all these things, and a person
wholly ignorant of them is a sort of phenomenon.
When I compare the Greek and Roman republics with these American States;
the manuscript libraries of the former, and their rude population, with
the innumerable journals and the enlightened people of the latter; when
I remember all the attempts which are made to judge the modern republics
by the assistance of those of antiquity, and to infer what will happen
in our time from what took place two thousand years ago, I am tempted
to burn my books, in order to apply none but novel ideas to so novel a
condition of society.
What I have said of New England must not, however, be applied
indistinctly to the whole Union; as we advance towards the West or the
South, the instruction of the people diminishes. In the States which are
adjacent to the Gulf of Mexico, a certain number of individuals may
be found, as in our own countries, who are devoid of the rudiments of
instruction. But there is not a single district in the United States
sunk in complete ignorance; and for a very simple reason: the peoples
of Europe started from the darkness of a barbarous condition, to advance
toward the light of civilization; their progress has been unequal;
some of them have improved apace, whilst others have loitered in their
course, and some have stopped, and are still sleeping upon the way. *i
[Footnote i: [In the Northern States the number of persons destitute of
instruction is inconsiderable, the largest number being 241,152 in
the State of New York (according to Spaulding's "Handbook of American
Statistics" for 1874); but in the South no less than 1,516,339 whites
and 2,671,396 colored persons are returned as "illiterate."]]
Such has not been the case in the United States. The Anglo-Americans
settled in a state of civilization, upon that territory which their
descendants occupy; they had not to begin to learn, and it was
sufficient for them not to forget. Now the children of these same
Americans are the persons who, year by year, transport their dwellings
into the wilds; and with their dwellings their acquired information and
their esteem for knowledge. Education has taught them the utility of
instruction, and has enabled them to transmit that instruction to their
posterity. In the United States society has no infancy, but it is born
in man's estate.
The Americans never use the word "peasant," because they have no idea of
the peculiar class which that term denotes; the ignorance of more remote
ages, the simplicity of rural life, and the rusticity of the villager
have not been preserved amongst them; and they are alike unacquainted
with the virtues, the vices, the coarse habits, and the simple graces
of an early stage of civilization. At the extreme borders of the
Confederate States, upon the confines of society and of the wilderness,
a population of bold adventurers have taken up their abode, who pierce
the solitudes of the American woods, and seek a country there, in order
to escape that poverty which awaited them in their native provinces. As
soon as the pioneer arrives upon the spot which is to serve him for a
retreat, he fells a few trees and builds a loghouse. Nothing can offer
a more miserable aspect than these isolated dwellings. The traveller
who approaches one of them towards nightfall, sees the flicker of the
hearth-flame through the chinks in the walls; and at night, if the wind
rises, he hears the roof of boughs shake to and fro in the midst of
the great forest trees. Who would not suppose that this poor hut is the
asylum of rudeness and ignorance? Yet no sort of comparison can be drawn
between the pioneer and the dwelling which shelters him. Everything
about him is primitive and unformed, but he is himself the result of the
labor and the experience of eighteen centuries. He wears the dress,
and he speaks the language of cities; he is acquainted with the past,
curious of the future, and ready for argument upon the present; he is,
in short, a highly civilized being, who consents, for a time, to inhabit
the backwoods, and who penetrates into the wilds of the New World with
the Bible, an axe, and a file of newspapers.
It is difficult to imagine the incredible rapidity with which public
opinion circulates in the midst of these deserts. *j I do not think that
so much intellectual intercourse takes place in the most enlightened
and populous districts of France. *k It cannot be doubted that, in the
United States, the instruction of the people powerfully contributes to
the support of a democratic republic; and such must always be the case,
I believe, where instruction which awakens the understanding is not
separated from moral education which amends the heart. But I by no means
exaggerate this benefit, and I am still further from thinking, as so
many people do think in Europe, that men can be instantaneously made
citizens by teaching them to read and write. True information is mainly
derived from experience; and if the Americans had not been gradually
accustomed to govern themselves, their book-learning would not assist
them much at the present day.
[Footnote j: I travelled along a portion of the frontier of the United
States in a sort of cart which was termed the mail. We passed, day and
night, with great rapidity along the roads which were scarcely marked
out, through immense forests; when the gloom of the woods became
impenetrable the coachman lighted branches of fir, and we journeyed
along by the light they cast. From time to time we came to a hut in
the midst of the forest, which was a post-office. The mail dropped an
enormous bundle of letters at the door of this isolated dwelling, and
we pursued our way at full gallop, leaving the inhabitants of the
neighboring log houses to send for their share of the treasure.
[When the author visited America the locomotive and the railroad were
scarcely invented, and not yet introduced in the United States. It
is superfluous to point out the immense effect of those inventions
in extending civilization and developing the resources of that vast
continent. In 1831 there were 51 miles of railway in the United States;
in 1872 there were 60,000 miles of railway.]]
[Footnote k: In 1832 each inhabitant of Michigan paid a sum equivalent
to 1 fr. 22 cent. (French money) to the post-office revenue, and each
inhabitant of the Floridas paid 1 fr. 5 cent. (See "National Calendar,"
1833, p. 244.) In the same year each inhabitant of the Departement du
Nord paid 1 fr. 4 cent. to the revenue of the French post-office. (See
the "Compte rendu de l'administration des Finances," 1833, p. 623.)
Now the State of Michigan only contained at that time 7 inhabitants
per square league and Florida only 5: the public instruction and the
commercial activity of these districts is inferior to that of most of
the States in the Union, whilst the Departement du Nord, which contains
3,400 inhabitants per square league, is one of the most enlightened and
manufacturing parts of France.]
I have lived a great deal with the people in the United States, and I
cannot express how much I admire their experience and their good sense.
An American should never be allowed to speak of Europe; for he will then
probably display a vast deal of presumption and very foolish pride. He
will take up with those crude and vague notions which are so useful to
the ignorant all over the world. But if you question him respecting his
own country, the cloud which dimmed his intelligence will immediately
disperse; his language will become as clear and as precise as his
thoughts. He will inform you what his rights are, and by what means he
exercises them; he will be able to point out the customs which obtain in
the political world. You will find that he is well acquainted with the
rules of the administration, and that he is familiar with the mechanism
of the laws. The citizen of the United States does not acquire his
practical science and his positive notions from books; the instruction
he has acquired may have prepared him for receiving those ideas, but
it did not furnish them. The American learns to know the laws by
participating in the act of legislation; and he takes a lesson in the
forms of government from governing. The great work of society is ever
going on beneath his eyes, and, as it were, under his hands.
In the United States politics are the end and aim of education;
in Europe its principal object is to fit men for private life. The
interference of the citizens in public affairs is too rare an occurrence
for it to be anticipated beforehand. Upon casting a glance over society
in the two hemispheres, these differences are indicated even by its
external aspect.
In Europe we frequently introduce the ideas and the habits of private
life into public affairs; and as we pass at once from the domestic
circle to the government of the State, we may frequently be heard to
discuss the great interests of society in the same manner in which we
converse with our friends. The Americans, on the other hand, transfuse
the habits of public life into their manners in private; and in their
country the jury is introduced into the games of schoolboys, and
parliamentary forms are observed in the order of a feast.
End of Chapter XXVI, Part III �