Letters from America

by Alexis de Tocqueville, Frederick Brown (Editor)

Young Alexis de Tocqueville arrived in the United States for the first time in May 1831, commissioned by the French government to study the American prison system. For the next nine months he and his companion, Gustave de Beaumont, traveled and observed not only prisons but also the political, economic, and social systems of the early republic. Along the way, they frequently reported back to friends and family members in France. This book presents the first translation of the complete letters Tocqueville wrote during that seminal journey, accompanied by excerpts from Beaumont’s correspondence that provide details or different perspectives on the places, people, and American life and attitudes the travelers encountered. These delightful letters provide an intimate portrait of the complicated, talented Tocqueville, who opened himself without prejudice to the world of Jacksonian America. Moreover, they contain many of the impressions and ideas that served as preliminary sketches for Democracy in America , his classic account of the American democratic system that remains an important reference work to this day. Accessible, witty, and charming, the letters Tocqueville penned while in America are of major interest to general readers, scholars, and students alike.

Genres: History, Philosophy, Nonfiction, Classics, Politics, American History

304 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2010

About the author

Alexis Charles Henri Clérel, comte de Tocqueville, usually known as just Tocqueville, was a French aristocrat, diplomat, sociologist, political scientist, political philosopher, and historian. He is best known for his works Democracy in America (appearing in two volumes, 1835 and 1840) and The Old Regime and the Revolution (1856). In both, he analyzed the living standards and social conditions of individuals as well as their relationship to the market and state in Western societies. Democracy in America was published after Tocqueville's travels in the United States and is today considered an early work of sociology and political science.
Tocqueville was active in French politics, first under the July Monarchy (1830–1848) and then during the Second Republic (1849–1851) which succeeded the February 1848 Revolution. He retired from political life after Louis Napoléon Bonaparte's 2 December 1851 coup and thereafter began work on The Old Regime and the Revolution. Tocqueville argued the importance of the French Revolution was to continue the process of modernizing and centralizing the French state which had begun under Louis XIV. He believed the failure of the Revolution came from the inexperience of the deputies who were too wedded to abstract Enlightenment ideals.
Tocqueville was a classical liberal who advocated parliamentary government and was skeptical of the extremes of majoritarianism. During his time in parliament, he was first a member of the centre-left before moving to the centre-right, and the complex and restless nature of his liberalism has led to contrasting interpretations and admirers across the political spectrum.

Reviews

[Karl Rove]

This is a must read for fans of de Tocqueville’s DEMOCRACY IN AMERICA. This collection draws from letters sent home to family and friends by de Tocqueville and his traveling companion during their trip in the 1830s to investigate America’s prisons. From this excursion came de Tocqueville’s majestic study of the rising new nation.

The letters show that from the trip’s first moments, the two Frenchmen were taken with the idea of more than just a formal report on America’s corrections system. For example, in a letter to his mother de Tocqueville writes of “two slim notebooks” in which he has “recorded verbatim the conversations I’ve had with America’s most remarkable men” from which he wants to use to write a broader study.

The collection shows his mind at work, mulling over what he’s seen and attempting to comprehend what he’s seen. He shares impressions and toys with lines of criticism, exposition and praise. The “general ideas I’ve thus far expressed about this country,” he writes, “are in letters t family and one or two French correspondents. Even they were formulated on the fly…Will I ever publish anything about America? The truth is, I don’t know.”

Thank god he did and this wonderful collection deepens our understanding of his masterpiece and the two young Frenchmen who held a mirror to our nation’s soul in its early days.

[Mommalibrarian · Rating 4 out of 5]

The book includes correspondence sent by de Tocqueville and his companion Gustave de Beaumont. I found Beaumont's letters very insightful but as he did not follow up with a famous book, his life is lost to us. Of course there were many things described and thought that I had never heard of. My history training, straight from the textbook, was pretty minimal compared to all the different thoughts, ideas, and actions that were actually in place in American in 1831.

On the fact that American's eat a lot: "So far, this is the only respect in which I do not challenge their superiority; they, on the other hand, reckon themselves superior in many ways. People here seem to reek of national pride. It seeps through their politeness."

Tocqueville had trouble locating the 'government' in America because so much was left to the individual, locality, with a little to the state, and almost nothing to the nation. "... the states have no enemies and consequently no armies, no taxes, no central government; the executive power is only the transient executor of the will of the elected bodies; it dispenses neither money nor power." Things have changed!

He was shocked that education was prized for all citizens. Apparently, the French did not believe the masses should be educated. "... my conviction that the most rational government is not the one in which all concerned participate, but the one directed by the most enlightened and moral classes of society..."

And then there is the matter of inheritance. The American system differed from the French. You will have to read the book to find out how and why this disturbed de Tocqueville.

[Philip · Rating 3 out of 5]

An enjoyable collection of letters put together and made available in English by Frederick Brown, this was my first foray into Tocqueville's work and being such, was a wonderful introduction to the thinker. What better way to get a sense of someone's personality and inner thoughts than in the letters they sent off to their friends and family, and a thanks needs also be submitted to those who allowed things once private to be released publicly for general edification. In some respects this creates the drawback of having such an intimate portrait, in that political problems that loomed so large in Tocqueville's mind and were of major importance in the 1830s, are really just a historical footnote for the modern reader. As Cioran, a philosopher, would point out, Tocqueville shed so many tears and probably hairs stressing over events that bear little to no importance to the modern general reader. For someone with no knowledge of mid-1800s French politics, these sections of the novel were kind of a drag, though they did reveal how deeply Tocqueville was connected to his country and family who would be affected by political instability. It's also interesting to see how in the eyes of history, we kind of attribute the work of a great man as being entirely personal, made by him alone, where in these letters we can clearly see that Tocqueville's ideas could have only been developed by the help of his friends and family. Many a time he would ask them for their own opinions, writing personalized essays on subjects necessary for his research, or provide a soundboard for ideas that would be later developed in "Democracy in America." He also asks his correspondents to keep his letters so he could reread them later, making them invaluable record-keepers. In some ways, it's a shame that history puts the spotlight on one individual when, like many things in life, the end product was a team effort.

In terms of criticism of this work, the one thing I would have enjoyed having is a map outlining Tocqueville's journey in post-revolutionary America. A few times in this work, Tocqueville will describe his current location to his correspondent, asking them to pull out their own map of the United States, and it would have been fun to follow along ourselves in a convenient manner with an in-volume map. I also would have been interested in a short biographical introduction of our translator and editor Frederick Brown. He does provide a short historical introduction so readers can properly orient themselves in the time period, but doesn't include anything on personal challenges he might have faced in organizing and translating Tocqueville's work, which I do find interesting.

On a personal level, I found Tocqueville's empathetic writing style to be very endearing, and this collection of letters took the tone of a road-trip adventure. Of course there were a few dark spots in between the nightly soirees and picturesque landscapes, an important historical account of both the conditions of slavery and ousting of natives, that reveal the social struggles of early America. As a person trying to learn French, it was heartening to see two Frenchmen struggle to learn English. Moreover, as a Canadian, hearing Tocqueville describe early Canada was very amusing and instructive. An aristocrat of "Old-France" relating his impressions of the culture and people of "New-France" was something completely new to me, which in my mind should make this work an especial interest to French-Canadians. Overall, I really enjoyed this collection of letters. Being what it is, it doesn't really have a narrative structure, and so, there's no real ending. It should be viewed as more of a primer to Tocqueville's later works which I look forward to reading.

Some interesting quotes I found worth remembering:

Tocqueville on the very relatable struggle of language learning pg.23
"In Paris, we fancied we knew English, not unlike collegiate school graduates who think that their baccalaureate is a certificate of learning. We were soon disabused of that notion. All we had was a basic vehicle for making rapid progress. We truly drove ourselves during the ocean crossing; I remember days on a windswept deck translating English when it was difficult to hold a pen. Unfortunately, with so many French speakers aboard we could always fall back on our native language. Here the situation is different. As no one speaks French, we have had to give it up. Our conversation is entirely in English. It may sound pitiful, but at least we make ourselves understood and understand everything. Interlocutors even tell us we show great promise. If we do end up mastering the language, it will be an excellent acquisition. The benefits we've already reaped illustrate for me the foolishness of a Monsieur de Belisle, who travels to lands where he cannot converse. One might as well take strolls in one's room with the windows shuttered."

Tocqueville's amusing take on American eating habits pg.24
"At first we found the absence of wine from meals a serious deprivation, and we are still baffled by the sheer quantity of food that people somehow stuff down their gullets. Besides breakfast, dinner, and tea, with which Americans eat ham, they have very copious suppers and often a snack. So far, this is the only respect in which I do not challenge their superiority; they, on the other hand, reckon themselves superior in many ways. People here seem to reek of national pride. It seeps through their politeness."

Tocqueville on American society of the time pg.66 and pg.140
"For openers, my dear friend, imagine a society compounded of all the nations of the world: English, French, Germans.....People each having a language, a belief, different opinions; in a word, a society lacking roots, memories, prejudices, habits, common ideas, a national character....and a hundred times happier than ours. More virtuous? I doubt it. What binds such diverse elements together and makes a nation of it all? Self-interest. That is the key. The individual's self-interest, which isn't bashful; it displays itself openly and propagates itself as a social theory."
"America doesn't populate itself by any other means: I haven't met a single person born on the soil he inhabits. This immigrant society resembles no other. They are all people without a country, whom material interest alone has displaced. They come in search of cheap land, where an acre sells for 6 francs. Since their own establishment in a new territory is itself a risky venture; they bring their urban metiers with them. Thus, every farmer is also a trader or a craftsmen.....The occupants are literate; their language is not that of the lowest class; in every single one of these log cabins newspapers are read and tea is taken twice a day. There is no lower class, but neither is there an upper. There is only a uniform society, headless and tailless, topless and bottomless. Nothing in it is abject, and nothing refined. It is, I believe, the happiest of societies, but, in my view, not the most agreeable."

Tocqueville's excellent advice to a melancholic friend pg.219
"There is yet another fantasy of early youth which one must guard against. When I first began to reflect upon the world, I believed that it was full of demonstrable truths; that one had only to look hard to see them. But when I applied myself to considering matters, all I perceived was a tangle of doubts. I don't have words, my dear Charles, to express the horrible state into which this discovery cast me. I've never been more miserable; I can only compare myself to a man who, seized with vertigo, feels the floor quaking underfoot and sees the walls around him shifting. I'm still horrified when I think about that period. I daresay I wrestled mightily with doubt and in a spirit of rare desperation. And only yesterday (!) did I convince myself that the search for absolute, demonstrable truth, like the search for perfect happiness, is futile. Which isn't to say that there aren't some truths worthy of our whole-hearted conviction, but you can be sure that they are very few. For the immense majority of questions to which we need answers, all we have are likelihoods, approximations. To despair over this is to despair over being human, for therein lies one of the most inflexible laws of our nature. Does it follow that man should never act because he can never be sure of anything? That is by no means my creed. When I must determine something important, I carefully weigh the pros and cons, and, instead of despairing over the lack of absolute certainty, I soldier on as if I had no doubts at all. Experience has taught me that it is better, all things considered, to strike out vigorously in the wrong direction than to stand paralyzed by indecision or to act feebly."

Tocqueville's opinion of American slavery after observing it firsthand pg.249
"We acquainted ourselves there with a breed of humanity and a way of life completely unknown to us. The only inhabitants of that region are men called Virginians. They have preserved a moral and physical identity all their own; they are a people apart, with national prejudices and a distinctive character. There, for the first time, we the opportunity to observe the social consequences of slavery. The right [north] bank of the Ohio is a scene of animation and industry; work is honored, no one owns slaves. But cross the river and you suddenly find yourself in another universe. Gone is the spirit of enterprise. Work is considered not only onerous but shameful: whoever engages in it degrades himself. The white man is meant to ride horseback, to hunt, to smoke all day long; using one's hands is what a slave does. South of Ohio, whites form a veritable aristocracy that, like every other, marries low prejudices to lofty instincts. It is said-and I am much inclined to believe it-that these men are incomparably more sensitive to issues of honor than their counterparts up North. They are straightforward, hospitable, and value many things higher than money. They will end up being dominated by the North, however. The latter grows richer and more populous by the day, while the South, if it grows at all, grows poorer."

Comments Tocqueville and Beaumont made about French-Canada which probably, politically speaking, are still relevant today pg.170~176 and pg.230.
"We found this country terribly exciting. Of its 900,000 inhabitants, more than 800,000 are French; subjected to English domination by the shameful treaty of 1763, which ceded Canada to England, Canadians have always been a people apart; entirely distinct from the English seeking to introduce themselves among them. They preserve their language, their mores, and their nationality. The English government is mild, not the least tyrannical; its wrong was its original conquest. The conquered will remember their defeat long after the conqueror no longer remembers his victory."
"Every year, England, Ireland, and Scotland disgorge boatlands of adventurers seeking cheap land in America. The English government, which has a stake in building up Canada's English population, directs them this way, so that Canadians, if they don't take care, will find themselves engulfed by a foreign majority, and drowned. What aggravates the danger is the fact that wealthy people in Canada are almost all English; the English control major commerce and industry; they fill the country's two big cities, Quebec and Montreal. They do their utmost to crush the Canadian population, whose poverty they scorn and whose happiness they do not comprehend."
"French have been living here in the midst of an English population for eighty years-subject to the laws of England and more completely cut off from the mother country than if they inhabited the poles. Well, what do you know! They are still French, feature for feature.....Like us, they are lively, brisk, intelligent, scoffing, hot-headed, loquacious, and terribly difficult to manage when their passions are inflamed. They make good warriors and love noise more than money. Living beside them, also native born, are Englishmen as phlegmatic and rational as those living on the banks of the Thames-people who abide by precedents, who believe in the first things first; estimable citizens who think that war is the greatest scourge, but who would wage it as bravely as others because they reckon that some things are more intolerable than death."

"The French of America possessed within themselves all the resources to be a great people. They are still the finest offspring of the European family in the New World. But, overwhelmed by numbers, they were bound to succumb. Their abandonment is one of the most dishonorable episodes of Louis XV's inglorious reign. I have just seen in Canada a million brave, intelligent French, made to constitute a one day great French nation in America, who live rather like strangers in their own land. The conquerors control commerce, employment, wealth, power. They populate the upper classes and dominate all of society. The vanquished, wherever they don't enjoy decisive numerical superiority, are day by day losing their customs, their language, their national character. There you have the effects of conquest, or rather, of desertion. Today the die is cast: all of North America will speak English."

[Wai Yip Tung · Rating 4 out of 5]

During Alexis De Tocqueville’s nine months journey in America, he and his travel mate Gustave de Beaumont wrote many letters to their family in France. They are part travelogue, part private communication, and much thought about America’s society and political system. They are compiled into a book The Letters From America. I took this as my companion reading during my own America trip. It is a wonderful window to the past. The narrative helps me to connect with the colonial and the early United States period.

In those days, transportation was difficult. Communication is through writing letters, which take considerable time and effort to mail across the Atlantic. Nevertheless, it strikes me how close De Tocqueville is to his extended family by their incessant letter writing despite the difficulty.

De Tocqueville has a rather favorable view of America. It is a far cry from the grumpiness shown in contemporary Americans. He finds every American happy and satisfied. Everyone works. They found contentment in pragmatic matters and in pursuit of wealth. They have little appetite in politics and in creating bureaucracy that is much more characteristic in Europe.

They have also seen the America that was just beginning to grow into the continental power of today. They made a side trip to Michigan, then a frontier and wilderness area. They have met and stayed with Indians. They were also eye witnesses of the shameful history of the Indian Removal Act, when the United States forced expelled Indians from their homeland. He shared a boat with the Choctaws, women, children, and old people, during the crossing of the Mississippi in the infamous Trail of Tears. What we learn from books, he has witnessed first hand.

[Chrisanne · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fascinating observations. Less polished than his book, but still interesting.

His growth (Maybe there's a better word?) is also observable. Comparing his first opinions of Americans to his distinctly different final few would be a fun project. I believe he comes across the beginning of The Trail of Tears--- at least, a quick search suggests it. His observations there (and elsewhere) about the government's dealings with the Native Americans and his(and Beaumont's) observations of slavery would be interesting to get some commentary on.

An overview of the recipients' identities in one section would be nice. But the footnotes are helpful.

Just had to add: I totally sympathized with him. His world was crazy. Stuck in another country while his family, with aristocratic ties, watches things crescendo towards another revolution. The uncertainty of it was so jarring.

[Amy · Rating 4 out of 5]

It's absolutely sobering how much is still relevant now, and how much these letters back home foretold many of the problems in America today. I also loved how human they were-- Tocqueville letters talked about his illnesses, and Beaumont wrote about the various women he met.

[Ben Thompson · Rating 5 out of 5]

fascinating reportage of just what it was like inAmerica in 1831, from the point of view of two travelers traveling by stagecoach, steamship, and foot

[Cynthia · Rating 4 out of 5]

Just what the title says, this is collection of letters that de Tocqueville wrote to family and friends when he visited the United States in 1831-2. The history and observations are quite interesting but I couldn't read too many of the letters at one time mainly because of his style which would have been common in his day - very florid and emotional. One wonders why he actually stayed in the US as long as he did since he constantly refers to missing everyone and worrying about conditions in France. Of interest among his observations of Americans that he mentions several times are the extreme religiosity in the US, their preoccupation with making money and that young women have a lot of freedom but once married they are seldom seen.

[Brianna · Rating 4 out of 5]

"I have yet to hear anyone, whatever his social rank, publicly express misgivings about the republic being the best of all possible governments or challenge the proposition that a nation has the right to live under a government of its own choosing."

I've been eyeing up Tocqueville's Democracy in America, but have never read it (yet) so I thought this might be a good prologue. I wasn't disappointed. It was the perfect bridge between two topics I've been reading a lot about -- the French Revolution and the Founding Fathers.

Tocqueville's observations of Americans (who apparently never laugh), our religions, the lack of a central government, and the way we treat blacks and Native Americans give an interesting perspective about our young nation.

[kathleen · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really enjoyed reading de Tocqueville's letters. They reflected his immediate impressions of America, both in the cities and in the deep frontier. The letters also remind me how much we take our instant communication with loved ones for granted -- he spent as much time yearning for news of home as he did describing his experiences in America. These letters are not earth shattering, but rather reflect the thoughtful reflections of two intelligent young men, and as such were very interesting, hence the 4 stars. I was simultaneously reading the section of Melvin Bragg's "The Adventure of English" dealing with the young American Republic, and found many interesting connections.

[Chris Hubbs · Rating 3 out of 5]

A short volume that provides some interesting insights into early 1800's American culture. However, it often gets repetitive, and you have to be willing to put up with the constant personal notes, requests for replies, etc. (These are letters, after all...)

Interesting as a snapshot of a certain place and time, but increasingly tedious toward the end.

[Howard Mansfield · Rating 3 out of 5]

Brown combines Tocqueville's letters home with those of his traveling companion Gustave de Beaumont, giving us an excellent account of their trip.