Tocqueville, Charles-Alexis-Clérel de

(1805-1859)

   historian, political figure

   Charles-Alexis-Clérel de Tocqueville, who wrote a classic study of the United States, was born in Paris, where he studied law. A magistrate during the restoration, he was commissioned by the july monarchy to travel to the United States to do a study of the American penal system. He expanded on that subject and wrote De la Démocratie en Amérique (Democracy in America; 1835-40), for which he is famous. Even in the United States, this work has always been considered the most incisive and prophetic analysis of American culture and civilization. A deputy, then foreign minister (1849), Toc-queville left political life after the coup d'état of December 2, 1851, and dedicated himself to historical studies; his work L'ancien Régime et la Révolution (1856) was widely received. As in his other writings, Tocqueville, through a penetrating analysis of the principal political and social ideas of his age, emphasized the evolutionary aspects underlying all social changes. He interpreted the French revolution of 1789 as the result of gradual changes in the structure of government and in political attitudes toward freedom and equality. The great danger, as he stated, is the loss of freedom in the name of the popular will, and he concluded that the remedies to avoid such a despotism of the majority are at once political (decentralization, freedom of the press, defense of local liberties), social (development of associations), and judicial (independence of judiciary power). This presentation, based on historical facts, uses a methodology that evokes that of Montesquieu, whom Tocqueville approaches in his rigorous logic and his clear and austere style. Tocqueville was elected to the Académie Française in 1858.