It’s more than that. Tocqueville studied the civil institutions of our democracy, our history, geography, culture, and politics. His insights were often profound and it is surprising how many are relevant today.

Look back over the notes you made during your reading and see if you can find some of those points that are still important today (like the good and bad of a free press). You should find several.

What do you think of this from Vol I:

“On the one side were wealth, strength, and leisure, accompanied by the pursuit of luxury, the refinements of taste, the pleasures of wit, and the cultivation of the arts; on the other were labor, clownishness, and ignorance. But in the midst of this coarse and ignorant multitude it was not uncommon to meet with energetic passions, generous sentiments, profound religious convictions, and wild virtues.”

What does he make of a people who claim to individualism and self-determination but also exhibit “generous sentiments, profound religious convictions, and wild virtues”? Do you think this holds true of America today?

In a monarchy, the king is sovereign. Where is the sovereignty in America? Does he think this is good or bad? Why?

Reread chapter Vol. 2, Chapter XIX. What do you think of his observations? Do you think he was right? Is what he says about ambition in America true today?

He talks about the dangers of democracy and the dangers TO democracy. Have any of those dangers gotten a foothold in our society today? If so, have they brought about change for the better, or for the worse?

You asked if he is trying to make a point. He has described some of the most important foundations and basic characteristics of our basis of government — including the influence of individual character on government and of government on the individual.

He reveals the positives of this form of government and the dangers inherent in it, as well as the national character.

I don’t know if this is your first AP class, but try to examine the book not as something you are going to take a multiple choice test on, but as something to explore.

I hope you will enjoy your discussions on it when classes begin. All the best to you!

Like most of the quotes on Y!A, this one is either garbled or misattributed. The actual quote dates from 1951, when Elmer T. Peterson wrote in ‘The Daily Oklahoman’: “A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the majority discovers it can vote itself largess out of the public treasury. After that, the majority always votes for the candidate promising the most benefits with the result the democracy collapses because of the loose fiscal policy ensuing, always to be followed by a dictatorship, then a monarchy.” Nothing to do with de Tocqueville at all. The ‘Daily Oklahoman’ is probably more at your level.