Latest / Comps List Radio / Episode 14: Alexis de Tocqueville, "Democracy in America,"
Transcript
- Robert Ferguson: From H-Pole World Headquarters on the World Wide Web. This is Comps List Radio with Robert Ferguson and Marie Totten. And joined today by the broader ⁓ H-Pole universe. We have ⁓ Akreedy Sethy and Grant Madsen. ⁓ this is, I guess it's the first episode of season two of Comps List Radio. So that's very exciting. ⁓ we're on to a new academic year. ⁓ it's a it's a balmy 118 degrees here in Tempe, Arizona. Creedy, what's it like outside of Delhi? It's extremely humid. We had a couple of rainy days, so now it's pretty humid. I can imagine. ⁓ Marie, Conway, Arkansas checking in from from just outside of Conway, Arkansas. How's ⁓ how's our how's how's mid Arcan middle Arkansas? It's hot. It's been stormy. We've been out of power. So glad to be here. Glad to have power. Glad to be on season two. Here we go. Well, we haven't been canceled yet. Not yet. ⁓ and Grant, Provo, Utah. Check how how are things there? It's ⁓ I'm sort of surprised. We're ⁓ the coolest, I think, of every place. We're only eighty two degrees right now and ⁓ very sunny. ⁓ it's a beautiful day. So sorry you guys aren't all here where ⁓ yeah, we get ⁓ cooler and dry heat. So anyway. We got hit with a massive dust storm last night. Like a true big hab came in and like just like and rattled our windows for like a good forty-five minutes. It was pretty crazy. Yeah. Yeah, the joys of living in ⁓ in central, you know, or in the the Valley of the Sun is that ⁓ our storms are are actually quite scary sometimes when we get them. ⁓ anyways, so this is ⁓ the first episode of season two. ⁓ you know probably because it's the first episode of the season, I guess we should probably introduce ourselves ⁓ a little bit. ⁓ granted Akreedy have been on previous episodes. Marie and I, for those of you who are just joining us, are your usual co-pilots. ⁓ we know you have lots of listening options when it comes to podcasts. So we appreciate you choosing ours. The purpose of the podcast as initially kind of in ⁓ designed is that ⁓ you know, we are a political history ⁓ group at H poll. That's our job to be stewards of political history. And we realize that there's a lot of books that I think previous generation read a lot of and inspired them that you know, haven't that haven't trickled down through the consulates, just as there's been a proliferation of writing in the last twenty or thirty years. But I think there's sort of been an assumed knowledge of what's in those books that I just think has been lost. ⁓ and so we're trying to recover that and just help graduate students and and early scholars on some level ⁓ engage with some of these classical ideas ⁓ and hopefully be able to either integrate it into their own work, better understand them, and maybe better understand some of the other stuff that's actually on their comps lists. and do it in a fairly digestible format. That's at least. the goal. ⁓ I'm a postdoctoral fellow here at the Center for American Institutions at Arizona State University. and ⁓ yeah, I I I guess I'm a I my my what I usually research and write about is the South agriculture and foreign affairs. and ⁓ the institutional politics that kind of mediates in between. ⁓ Marie, can you tell the the the fine listeners a little bit about yourself? Yes, and you did such a great job explaining the purpose of the podcast as well. And hopefully we're reaching that audience at this point. But I'm Marie Totten. I'm a visiting assistant professor at the University of Central Arkansas. And I am a political biographer. And I'm currently working on a political biography of a Arkansas segregationist. So in the South as well, although you and I do often travel outside of the South when we are talking about least work. Yeah, we are not a Southern specific podcast, although although when we when you and I both end up with a Southern work, we we we tend to get a little it maybe it gets a little granular. ⁓ but anyway, ⁓ Akreeti, can you tell us a little bit about yourself? You're joining us from a long way away. So yeah. So ⁓ hi, it's nice to be here with you all. ⁓ my name is Dakriti Sethki and I am basically a research associate at VIF New Delhi. And I'm also in the process of finishing my PhD from Center of Study of America's JNU New Delhi. And ⁓ currently at VIF I am actively covering the midterms. So that's something that's been on my radar. But it's always a pleasure to be with you all. Well, you know what, Akredi, I'm glad you brought that up because so I I I told the people I told our the the our everybody on the podcast that I'm Going to be cross-posting this with another podcast that I do. And ⁓ I'm gonna have to get you on that because we're doing midterm coverage a little more narrowly there. So I think that would be it would be really good to have you on there. so for those who are listening, who so for those from the politics of the past audience, welcome. Glad you're here. And ⁓ hopefully that's a ⁓ wet your appetite for a future episode of politics of the past. ⁓ but anyway, Grant, ⁓ Tell can you ⁓ tell the fine people a little bit about yourself? Yeah, sure. I'm an associate professor at ⁓ Brigham Young University in the history department. I do a lot of economic, political, and and intellectual history with ⁓ like everybody kind of in my generation with a you had to be sort of international in your focus if you wanted to get a job, ⁓ when I went on the job market. So that's true for me too. And ⁓ and I'm super happy to be with all of you. It's very nice of ⁓ you, Rob and Marie to let ⁓ let a creedy and me into the ⁓ into the fold as it were, right? To join you. So this is gonna be fun, I think. Well it should be. I I I admit that doing so was a little bit self doing this was a little bit selfishly. We are sort of hoping that we could, you know, ease our own burdens here. ⁓ so this episode we th th the ⁓ this episode began I think talking about this episode a long time ago. Because we were trying to figure out what we thought the most important book was for political historians in the United States. And ⁓ Grant and his re wonderful research assistant put together a list of about 400 books that he thought were sort of germane to the topic. And we all kind of, I think, cons in consensus agreed that this was the most important book. And that's Alexis de Tocqueville's Democracy in America. Now, I don't know how much peer pressure was involved in that. Like after four people say that that's the number one book, is the fifth person gonna really disagree at that point? Well, it might be one of those situations where we all had a book that we thought was more important, but that Tocqueville ended up, you know, sort of top five enough so that we he just sort of on average ended up at the top. So if we border counted this enough, it was gonna end up with ⁓ Tocqueville at the top. But that was a shout out to our social choice listeners if they're ⁓ because I'm sure there's a lot of big fans of like Ken Arrow that are listening to this right now. ⁓ okay. So yeah, that's kind of where it came from. you know let me start with ⁓ you know you know Before we get too far into the book itself, I I'm gonna actually try to like be a little more ⁓ intentional. It's a word the kids use, right? As to how I actually ⁓ pilot this a little bit. So Marie, are you able to give could you tell us a little bit about Alexis de Tocqueville and where this book, Democracy in America, actually came from? Yes. ⁓ so Tocqueville was born in eighteen ⁓ five. He came from an aristocratic family in France. His family barely survived the terror in France. ⁓ I read his great grandfather was actually guillotined. His parents were imprisoned. And so he grew up in that era. He grew up seeing that. So the potential and then how that potential played out in France. Essentially is what he's looking at. ⁓ he's a lawyer by training. He went on in the eighteen thirties to visit the United States. think he was twenty-four, twenty-five years old when he came to the United States in 1831. And he was, ⁓ he brought an associate with him and he was looking mostly at the prison system, or that was the idea. The idea was he was going to come and look at the prison system. And he did give a report. He wrote a report after he left the United States on the prison system. But it's going to be these two volumes, Democracy in America, the first and the second, that are going to be the work that come out of this trip. And he's looking at dem I mean, he's looking at democracy in America. He's looking at these Enlightenment ideas and seeing how they have played out on the ground, essentially, in these works. And ⁓ I think that one of the reasons we may think this is the most important work is so many political historians respond to this in some way. Either they use some of these ideas in their work. I mean, some of these ideas come straight from the Enlightenment, so we hear them there. And we hear them in other works as well. So his ideas, even if you don't know it's Tocqueville, his ideas are in a lot of the work that we've talked about and that we will talk about in the future. And so I do think that this work is important, even though there are some issues. He's writing this during ⁓ Jackson, Jacksonian America. He's writing this during the second great awakening. It's a particular time and place. And he's writing this for the French to show, okay, this has happened here. Can this happen in France? Can we have this type of democracy in France? So he's asking this question from the very beginning. Now Americans love this, especially New Englanders, because he is ⁓ he is absol he adores them in a way. He writes these glowing passages about how democracy has worked in New England. And I know we'll talk about some of this, the reasons why he thinks that this has worked. But I think that's a good overview, a good starting point of the context of this, ⁓ these volumes. That's great. I think that that that that's really great. ⁓ yeah, I mean he he's we're gonna probably dig into this a little bit, but ⁓ he's coming to the United States in the wake of the eighteen thirty revolution in France, which is a liberal revolution and after the kind of the return to autocracy under Charles the Tenth. and ⁓ so again, it's this sort of like, okay, so we're back. We kind of feel like maybe we're back in the seventeen eighties a little bit, early 1790s in France. How can we prevent that from going the bloody way the first one did? And ending with a Napoleon. Right. so I think that's you know, yeah, Marie, I think you you touched on the I think what's really important here is that he is he is speaking to an inner to to a French audience and trying and asking a French question. Right. Right. ⁓ so Grant, ⁓ how when did you first encounter Tocqueville? Let me start with that. ⁓ yeah, so not probably not until actually, can I I want to answer that a couple different ways? That's a good question. So I would say Tocqueville in some ways is just in the water, right? You don't even recognize it in the United States. Like the Tocquevillian account of ⁓ America, the development of the United States is not all that different from for those who are old like me, ⁓ Schoolhouse Rock. I don't know if you remember this, either those cartoons. I mean, if you go back and you read Toqueville, you're like, ⁓ yeah, ⁓ like this is this is what Schoolhouse Rock told me. Kind of this this ⁓ account of the development of American institutions that starts with the Puritans. That's rooted in sort of town hall ⁓ democracy, that's very associational and civic minded, ⁓ as a result of those associations. All of that, that's just that is what I understood the history of the country to be. And, you know, and so going back and rereading Tocqueville as we did to prep for this, I was like, ⁓ yeah, okay, I I see it more clearly. ⁓ now like that this was just kind of how I understood the country growing up. It all felt very familiar in a lot of ways. ⁓ which I think is I mean I know we're probably going to talk about this more, which is ⁓ how do historians make use of Tocqueville? Right. Because ⁓ there's to there's like sort of like the account Tocqueville gives that I think is useful in some ways. There's also all the descriptive things he's doing that are really useful, you know, make him a great primary source document and ⁓ and so on. So I would say in an informal sense, Tocqueville is the water I swam in as a child, and then didn't start to realize the source of that in some ways, ⁓ until grad school and started reading him. But the interesting thing, I don't know about you guys, but I mean we all I'm I bet most of us came to Tocqueville piecemeal, right? He covers so much ground that, you know, so ⁓ Tocqueville. The primary source was probably the first way I encountered him. And that was mostly ⁓ you know, for whatever weird reason, ⁓ through feminist writings, where his notion of separate spheres and all the rest is super useful and sort of the gender analysis he made of the country. And then ⁓ later, sort of the associational approach, and then after that, ⁓ some things I know we're gonna talk about, some of the warnings about the dangers, the downsides of democracy. And then probably later than that. rereading him, ⁓ you know, reading him against the grain to say like how exceptional really is the United States. Yeah. So anyway, there's a lot of ways to encounter him. In a lot of ways I feel like I've had to reread him and reunderstand him over the years. But ⁓ anyway, so that's that's my long ⁓ story with hopefully a lot of hooks for us to talk about stuff ⁓ moving forward. No, I I I I think that's really good. ⁓ Creedy, ⁓ you know, you're you were educated in India, which is a long way away from the United States, although you're an American you're you're an American a resear you know professional but what did did when in your life did you encounter Tocqueville? Or or it was three weeks ago when I assigned this the first time. No, so ⁓ I think it was during my postgraduate days. ⁓ so one of my ⁓ associate professor he was still new. Just fresh out of college, just finished his PhD. So he had a lot of fashion. And ⁓ I think we were his first batch. So he came in the class with a lot of insight about Hollywood and about whatever he thinks of America. And I I always I was always fascinated ⁓ with America, but I think that was when I heard the term toquill. And I think ⁓ because of him, I ended up really diving deep into the literature. And ⁓ when I graduated, he gifted me his poppy, which he bought off Toquil. And I still have that. And that definitely came in handy. So I think it started from there, but ⁓ it took me a lot of years to properly understand what that literature was all about, because I think at that time I was still young, still trying to understand this field. I don't I won't I won't be cocky enough to say that I understand it now. I think it's it's one of those texts you're gonna always go back to, but I definitely understand it a little bit better than what I did back in the day. So I think that's my Toqueville story. Fair enough. I mean I'll give you so I'm Canadian, ⁓ for those who don't know. ⁓ I'll give you an you know, I I thought it was Toqueville until not that long ago. Because in Canada, a toque is an a winter hat, like a beanie. Americans might know it as a beanie or a toboggan, depending on where you're from. And ⁓ we call it a toque and it's spelled T-O-Q-U-E. There's no C in it, but it's spelled T-O-Q-U-E. So it just it's I I just assumed it was a it was toque film. So ⁓ yeah, it wasn't until actually embarrassingly recently. Like I I it wasn't last year, but it was within the last decade that I actually realized it was Coqueville. Because people were talking about this Cokeville guy that I had no idea who they were referring to. So ⁓ that's the kind of expertise that you're gonna get by listening to this podcast. ⁓ okay. Well, I I think Grant ⁓ touched on some really important questions ⁓ that I'd I'd really like to discuss. ⁓ may maybe we try to focus on ⁓ the ⁓ what he, you know, the some of the arguments that he's actually making, and then we'll kind of approach it from how do historians treat this. And then thirdly, okay, what are the warnings here that he's talked about? So Grant, do you want to tell us like what is his overall argument? Wow. ⁓ I mean, it's a it's a big argument and there's several arguments. I want to be clear, but you know, what do you think is maybe the ⁓ his most salient argument? Yeah, I mean, I think most interpreters would say, and and you already laid it out, what what are the in some ways the downsides? to a society dedicated to ⁓ equality. Right. Like ⁓ if if you're gonna if you're gonna make that sort of like the organizing principle of social life, what what are the consequences of that? Right. And I think you were you know, you, Rob, you and Marie both kind of pointed out already, he's seen he's seen how that can go off the rails, right? He's lived through the French Revolution. And so he he's aware of how bad that can get. And so then the core question is ⁓ like you said, you know, so is that about is is that happening in the United States? Will that happen in the United States? And if the answer is no, why not? Right. So those are the core questions. And and so and I think why we really like him is that he's he's really nuanced about how well about what the consequences are for. thinking of everybody as essentially equal and and consequences in terms of, you know, like getting stuff done, right? Like how how do you organize building a road or, you know, or or just having any kind of governance when everybody sort of feels like they are equal. And so, ⁓ and so that's I think one of the core questions is how do you if you don't have a hierarchy, how do you actually organize social action? Right. So ⁓ we'd say it's a, you know, ⁓ political scientists would say, you know, there's a he's challenging, he's encountering a collective action problem in some ways. How do you, you know, that that sort of thing, right? So that's that's one of the things he thinks through. And ⁓ anyway, so ⁓ so with that kind of in mind, he ends up with these really interesting, very nuanced arguments about ⁓ this is why it's working and this is how it can go off the rails, right? So one of the things he wants to say is it works. You know, one of the things that's a challenge with being equal is that ⁓ it tends to atomize individual citizens, right? So that's where the collective action problem comes. If we're all equal individuals, why do we ever combine together to collectively solve a problem? But then he has this fascinating account of it's exactly our weakness that brings us together, right? It's it creates a recognition that I only can get stuff done if I combine with my fellow citizens. And that that's why associations end up being such an important part of his analysis, is that's where it teaches us how to cooperate. And ⁓ and how to come together. Yeah, and he says, well, you know, equality also, but that also highlights ⁓ that ⁓ kind of individual weakness, which maybe will drive some of us towards what he calls kind of a soft depot despotism, right? Like maybe in the interest of this solving this collective action problem, we will give over some of our liberty to the state in order to protect us and care for us. And so There is a danger in so you know, and and I think that's again, so his analysis is always kind of good news, bad news, right? Here's here's how it can go wrong, here's how Americans have solved it, but here's how it can still go wrong, that sort of thing. So I don't know if I'm I'm not covering all of the key points, I'm sure, but ⁓ but that's that's the problem, at least. You know, I think he treats democracy as a problem as much as a sociological fact, right? It's it's ⁓ and and so it's What what are the ways democracy solves certain issues, but what are some of the issues that it keeps ⁓ that that it will raise as well in terms of just how to organize a a peaceful, successful, you know, society? Yeah, I think that's that that that's a really good yeah. I mean, I I think that speaks to exactly what what the are like what the problem is that he's trying to solve, or what what are the broader problems that he's trying to solve? You know, what are the c what are the opportunities, what are the limitations of what it actually means if if everybody is equal. And of course he's writing in Jacksonian America. And we know not everybody is equal then, but it is a universal man white manhood suffrage. and in some states it's actually universal suffrage. But of course that's got the great story of of ⁓ the Quakers in Pennsylvania. Hold on, why don't you let and the question was like why don't you let black people vote? And the guy says it is, you know, he's they are absolutely able to vote. They have the right. They just know that their citizens will be really the fellow citizens will be really upset if they do. Right. Right. Well, no, and I do you raise an interesting question. And one of the things I also want to mention is ⁓ you get and you may know more about this, but I think it's really interesting that ⁓ that he starts with the I mean, I guess as an aristocrat, he would start with ⁓ equality rather than freedom, but he sees the ⁓ freedom as ⁓ emerging from equality, not the other way around. Right. And ⁓ and maybe that's because the Declaration of Independence puts them in that order, right? We all men are created equal, ⁓ you know, and then the rights follow from that. But ⁓ but it but it seems to me that most people ⁓ well I shouldn't say most, but but that a lot of critics of America, people that worry about ⁓ the kinds of problems he worries about start with the freedom problem. You know, and say, Well, if you if you let everybody do what they want, that's why you have collective action problems is you know, people are too free. But he says, No, the problem is they're too equal. And and it you're right, Robbie, it's kind of an ironic thing at that particular moment because I think from our vantage we'd say it wasn't all that equal. But I suppose he could come back and say, Yeah, but ⁓ but as an organizing principle, we keep coming back to equality as a core political issue and and so on. Well, y you had people voting in the United States that were not that had no political rights anywhere else in the world, right? You'd have, you know, mechanics in Philadelphia voting who would have never who it that that that I mean, we don't realize until the ⁓ I can't remember the the first year of the great reforms of the UK. Is it eighteen thirty six? And Tocqueville's writing before that, right? And I mean like The actual s like voter rules in England, which is also one of the most democratic or the UK, which is one of the most democratic places in the world in the eighteen thirties, or had with some of the broadest political rights in the world in the eighteen thirties. And like the voter lists are minuscule before the great reforms began in 36. And so I mean, yeah, I mean it, you know, universal white manhood suffrage is not exactly perfectly equal, but from Tocqueville's perspective, it would appear very equal. Especially with his priors on certain other things. Yeah, and with the people who are ch ⁓ with him as he's touring America. You know, he's with lawyers and other elite who are showing him certain aspects of the United States that he wouldn't get if he was with a common working man or even spent time with a a a poor woman or an enslaved person. So a complete, I mean, that matters a lot when looking at Tocqueville and looking at this work, that he's gonna get what they show him. And that's what they're showing him. And it looks much more equal than what he's seeing in Europe as well. So absolutely his experience here would suggest, you know, this fight between equality and the idea that we need to give up some of our rights for protection. I know he doesn't use that word, but for like a larger government, larger protection overall. And this kind of push and pull. And in the United States, he sees that pull toward equality. And like Grant said, eventually after equality comes freedom. He also, something that Grant said about the collective action problem, one of the things that he says in here is that if everyone is equal to have a role and a say in government, then they are gonna act collectively. They are gonna act ideally for the public good. And that's what he's seeing in these townships where you have, according to Tocqueville, everyone being able to ⁓ talk about problems and decide how to handle those problems at the very, very local level. So they have some buy-in to what's going on. They have some buy-in to their government. They're learning how to do government in real time as this is playing out. And I think this is one of the really strong arguments that he makes here is is the township and then the associations that just to follow up on what Grant was saying earlier. A a creedy. ⁓ His overall argument about you know what we're getting at here in e i in inequality. Does this res does d does is this sort of an argument that would resonate for people living in India? To some extent. But then I think whenever I think about Toquill, first of all, I think before this podcast, I never thought about Toquil from an Indian lens. I think it was only when I revisited the text I actually started thinking. So ⁓ before I go ahead, let me just say that I have I haven't gone through on my own thoughts completely. It's all fragment fragmented in my own head. But ⁓ maybe after this podcast I'll have a bit more clarity. But I think if I think it from the India context, I think there are some things that really stood out for me. I did not necessarily resolve inequality bit, but I think in terms of similarities, or if I have to connect it with India, I think so. First of all, I think Tokwa's core proposition is that democracy is not sustained by elections alone, right? Like citizens need habits and institutions through which they actually practice self-government. And I think I think this has a very strong parallel in India, because India is not simply a parliamentary democracy at the union level, right? ⁓ It has constitutional federalism, ⁓ state governments, panchayati raj institutions, municipalities, courts, political parties, ⁓ a very engaging civil society organization, professional associations, and so on and so forth. So I think the Indian constitution therefore provides multiple levels And ⁓ channels through which citizens can participate in public life. ⁓ for example, the Supreme Court describes India as a federal system with a separation of power, right? ⁓ fundamental rights and independent judiciary. So all these things I was like, okay, yeah, I think this this is something that India also does. I mean, of course, the world he saw back in the day was very different from what it is now. And again, the geography and the diversity, all of that makes India a very distinct case. But I think there are a few things where I was like, okay, yeah, I can connect certain things because the again, I'm not saying that it's exactly how an English town was. The whole township, local township, which he spoke about it again and again, is not exactly like that in India. But Sanchayati Raj, which is like these village unions at the grassroot level, that's where the politics actually starts. The community comes in together, I think. I was like, yeah, I can I can make certain similarities there. Yeah. I mean I he really is taken by the townships for sure. And I mean he does extend that to counties in the south. ⁓ but I think Marie and I would both argue that the counties in the south are are different than New England townships. Yeah, and he certainly thought that. He did, yeah. ⁓ but he does say that there is sort of this still this, you know, active democratic opportunity at the county level. Where and I mean and and that makes sense. I mean, ⁓ You know, it i it's easier to act locally than it is to act nationally, right? ⁓ so if you have opportunities to act locally, that it it kind of gives you respect for the for the system, in a way that ⁓ and ⁓ an appreciation for things and teaches you habits that otherwise might you might miss. and ⁓ I I I had a point that I was building to and I completely completely lost it. Not for the first or last time for anybody who listens to this podcast on the regular. ⁓ No, I want to jump in on this because I think this is, I mean, we I don't know if if we want to spend a lot of time on the associational token. Yeah, that's thank you. That's thank you. That's where I was headed. So thank you, Grant. Yeah. But ⁓ I mean, this is the thing that ⁓ you know, I think is is still really fascinating ⁓ in the 21st century because ⁓ there's sort of no doubt that. in the United States, ⁓ the federal government ⁓ does a whole lot more than it did in eighteen thirty. And ⁓ and so this is I think this is why ⁓ certainly those on you know kind of on the right side of politics, ⁓ by which I mean like conservatives or libertarians, are are going to say, ⁓ you know, Tocqueville becomes a hero, right? Because Tocqueville's warning in the way that they would want to echo ⁓ that like you like democracy doesn't sustain itself. the more centralized things become, right? It it robs us of the power of those localities to be the incubators of democracy. I think I'm that's not a toque field phrase, right? That's no, but he but he uses public school of democracy. Yeah, there you go. So something like that, right. ⁓ and ⁓ and so ⁓ I mean I think this is a really interesting normative claim about democracy, right? Can it can ⁓ can it function ⁓ when We are so atomized that our vote in a sense doesn't count. You know, I mean, or it counts, but it it counts as United States, you know, what you know, one one hundred millionth of a ⁓ of a you know, of a voice in government, something like that. And I mean, I think it's about a hundred million people vote per you know, in in a big election in the US, a little more probably. But ⁓ I I mean it's closer to a billion. I don't know what it would be in India, ⁓ if everybody voted who was eligible to vote. But ⁓ you know, and ⁓ you know, in other words, it it raises this question, is democracy a national phenomena or is a local phenomena? Is it a is democracy a a practice that ⁓ extends all the way down into ⁓ you know, solving all problems or is it you know, and and if so, and but you know, what happens as govern as democracy centralizes more and more? Will will those institutions continue to sustain themselves? Yeah. I mean, you know, Tocqueville distinguishes between what he calls administrative centralization and governmental centralization. And he says, you know, the US Constitution, ⁓ combined with American history and the ⁓ the way that the states entered the union, that's ⁓ the people under the union, not say, but you know, the the that whole process created a federal system. And federal systems are still really novel in the 1830s, right? And he What he's coming to America at a time and he keeps referring to them as the majority, where there really is this incredible majority in the US, like a the Jacksonian majority, where you know they're dominating every they dominate every election essentially, certainly at the national level and at a lot of and at a lot of local, but not all local levels. And there is sort of this general cult and and he keeps referring to this cultural. Sort of supremacy as well that the Jacksonians have. ⁓ I I can't remember if it's in the essays that I that I gave you or not. I think it is, but where ⁓ he describes the fact that like there's clearly some elites who are very unhappy with Jacksonian America. But they in public, they profess being very happy. And isn't it so great that everybody gets a share in, you know, getting to shape society? And meanwhile, they themselves have basically retreated from public life and live in opulence in private. Right. Even though they disagree and you know, but in public, they have almost adopted the the trappings of the Jacksonian. So Tockeville's again part of his question is this majority could imp should be able to impose a really impressive tyranny. But it has it. And one of the things that he speaks to is one of the things that Grant you you've talked to is just institutionally there's governmental centralization, which means that the federal government does a few things, but in order to actually like ⁓ bring those ⁓ effectuate those laws, they're relying on local officials, local constables, local magistrates. Some of whom might be with the majority and some of them might be with the minority party. And it means that you just need this cooperation that isn't that the federal government doesn't really have the ability to like impose on, right? And so there's just this, these natural barriers to the Jacksonian majority becoming a suffocating authoritarian national tyranny. Right. And which he compares to administrative centralization, which is the way that you had things going in, which was the way how things worked in like. Louis XIV's France, where the Fed the national government, the central government did everything. And therefore a change at the top could change everything. There weren't those institutional barriers that the United States had. Yeah, so I'm sorry, Grant, go ahead. Yeah, as you say, so I'm not I'm gonna speak a little bit beyond my expertise, or maybe a lot beyond my expertise, because I'm not a 19th century historian. It's okay, Grant. I speak beyond my expertise all the time. That should probably be the name of this podcast. Yeah, beyond our expertise. That's great. That's great. But it seems to me that one of the historiographical issues about the 19th century, and especially in the last, say, 20 years. ⁓ and within sort of people who want to do political history of the 19th centuries, ⁓ is exactly the tension you kind of brought up right there is ⁓ how do you view the American state in the 19th century? And ⁓ of course, there's you know one branch ⁓ led by you know like Bill Novak, who I want to say, Hey, ⁓ the state is doing a whole lot. There, there, there's a myth of the weak American state. The American state was never weak, it was always very strong. ⁓ and you go through like local laws and they regulated everything, right? You know, Sabbath worship, alcohol consumption, you know, kind of all these things that today we'd say, you know, these they're violating all kinds of what we would think of as constitutional rights, you know, right and left, ⁓ because they can, right? Because, you know, that's that's what they, you know, the democracy empowers them to regulate, sort of whatever. But ⁓ the flip side is I think what you point out, Rob, is that's more kind of technical side, which is But there's a much smaller distinction between the populace and the state. Right. Like when it comes time to build a road, ⁓ the the end of the nineteenth century, it wasn't that you hire, you know, the federal government sent in a body of, you know, professional road builder builders from DC that are gonna go ahead and ⁓ you know take care of it kind of, you know, ⁓ like I think maybe it w so I'm again way beyond my expertise, maybe more what you would expect in France, right? Like Officials would show up and start saying this is how it needs to be done and and whatever else. But it was more you had a town hall and you kind of all got together and said, ⁓ all right, we got to build this road. Let's go do it. And and so I think this is what Tocqueville's getting at is that it that creates a sort of a gap between the ability of a national majority to impose its will, because it will always be interpreted ⁓ by the local community. And And so ⁓ and so what you get is I think if you fast forward a couple hundred years, ⁓ not quite, but ⁓ I think we call it ⁓ fiscal federalism now, where there's this idea that the the federal government can direct funds, it can initiate projects, but they always get reinterpreted by the states or the communities, which end up being the ones to implement them, and that this then undermines the tyranny of the majority. It ⁓ or it it maybe undermine is too strong a word, diffuses maybe. ⁓ it's it allows for that sort of imposition of central will to become ⁓ diffused enough that it doesn't feel like an imposition, right? It feels more like ⁓ okay, well, we gotta we gotta do this mandate. We're gonna f we're gonna do it this way and we can get everybody locally involved and you know, and so and that's true to for road building again today. The federal government will give the funds, but ends up being sort of a state and then local proposition as to who actually builds them and where they get built and all that kind of stuff. Yeah. I mean, I think that the and again, I I don't want to speak beyond my expertise here. Again, you know, again, eighteenth century France, not an expert. Even nineteenth century and even even eighteen thirties America, not an expert. I'm thinking about like a book like Brian Ballows, is it government out of sight or you know, something like where where the book is making an argument about how federal government is doing a lot more than you think in terms of infrastructure improvements. But then by the time it gets implemented, it's It has enough of a local flavor that it's out of sight. You know, it doesn't feel like the federal government doing it. Right. And it also helps again the the local citizenry become involved. They're involved. Whereas it's not, you just do as you're told, you get to pet, you know, and it's not just simply a petition to the to the to the central authority, like we need you to do this. It's a little bit of money. We can, you know, we can build this ourselves. And I I mean, I think this is so, you know, I talked about the majority, example the, you know, the the this challenge potentially or this threat of this overwhelming majority. ⁓ but we've talked around associations and we certainly used in the way that that Tocqueville meant them to. But what else do we does he refer to as associations? Because he he has a broader meaning for them. I mean, I'm thinking in the sense of like, If people need a home built, like if people need any local thing built, there's a committee struck, a local committee struck, and they just kind of do it. Right. And there's this notion, and they're gonna do it, and nobody's asking the other person what their politics is. And you start realizing you s you know, because there's all of these little ⁓ you know, Edmund Burke has something similar that he calls little platoons, but Toqueville civic associations, where there are ⁓ you know, people are just working together in kind of an apolitical environment. And it allows you to get to know people on a personal level and allows you to appreciate them as individuals. And that, like, you know, and then Charles Putnam, I think he built on this when he did bowl when he wrote bowling alone, where you know, we people use that bowling teams as the example that he uses. And, you know, you'd be on a bowling team and maybe four fifths of the bowling team would be Republican and there'd be one Democrat or vice versa. And you know, maybe sometimes you thought that person was a little weird, but there was never any like, but there was never any animosity. You just kind of, you were there to bowl. And that's what fundamentally mattered. And so there was this, and and he looks at if there's an American exceptionalism to some degree, at least socially, is he kind of looks at these things and he says these are kind of absent. Culturally and socially, at least in France. In ⁓ yeah. That freedom of association is so important to what he's talking about here because not only is he talking about civic associations, which are obviously these places where people can have this experience in building a home or solving problems without the use of the government. So they're practicing essentially how the government works at the very local level within these ⁓ civic associations. And I think that the freedom of association is something that also is a bulwark against the major the tyranny of the majority, because those are allowed to exist. You can have an association that speaks out against the federal government. You can have even if it's not necessarily a political party, you can have these associations in public, where in France a lot of that was pushed to private, and then you have conspirators. And he's got this great quote. ⁓ and I I been looking for it in my notes and I can't find it. But essentially in France he says you have conspirators and in the United States you don't have that because those associations can be open and free. And so this is such an an important part of this through line with the what makes American ex America exceptional as he's talking about. And also what is the bulwark against the tyranny of the majority. Yeah. ⁓ just to I don't do what Mari said I think ⁓ something that stood out to me personally was that I think for Tofel, ⁓ civic life is learned through participation. and associations teach individuals how to cooperate and take responsibility for matters beyond their private lives. And I think that is something that he found very fascinating in America. ⁓ in that sense, I think civic association is ⁓ one of the mechanisms through which civic responsibility becomes a habit, which eventually becomes a central piece in his. larger argument and observation about America. And I think it also Yeah, yeah. It f yeah, again and that I think that also builds into Tocqueville's sort of inherent the his inherent aristocrat because he he recognizes that these little civic associations are likely to be read by the town's most enlightened people. Right. And that therefore it will give people expo the common people exposure. To this to their more enlightened leaders, which will show that first of all, they're not some evil they're not some evil thing. They're not like, they're just, you know, they're ordinary people who might just be a little more learned than you. Right. And so it's but again, it's about the more opportunities you you create, these cross-class relationships to Tokville, and in in non-necessarily political settings, the more opportunity for cooperation you have. Maybe not perfectly solving the collective action problem, but you know, working towards the solution. Right. Right. Yeah. So ⁓ for what it's worth, ⁓ when I teach Tocqueville, ⁓ I like asking students, ⁓ what was the first election you participated in? And you know, and they'll say, you know, I I haven't yet because I just turned 18 or whatever else. And I'll be and I'll be like, No, think about it. Like, when was it when was the first time you remember voting on something? And and you kind of keep going. And they realize ⁓ you know, they probably voted in a, you know, in a kindergarten or first grade class for a class president or whatever else. And I will say, so this is a little bit what Tokyo's talking about is ⁓ there's this way that democracy as a again a collective action problem or a problem-solving approach is embedded in the way we deal with everything, right? Like ⁓ you know. ⁓ you're on a double date and you're trying to pick what movie to go to, how do you resolve this? You take a vote. And I'm like, it's and so I'm like, this is what Tocqueville is talking about in terms of training some o Democrats, essentially, which is ⁓ in every sort of social gathering, whenever there's a conflict, we don't know what to do next. We sort of instinctively say, well no, we'll how we'll we'll vote. Right. And and it has this, so I think Rob's exactly right. It has this first function of Of diffusing expertise ⁓ or, you know, ⁓ I guess ⁓ Togo would say, ⁓ as you said it, Rob, you know, bringing the the lower into the the orbit of the higher ⁓ citizenry. But ⁓ it also legitimates the practice, ⁓ which is I think really critical because the core question that seems to always be on the mind of any kind of political philosopher is why does the minority agree to lose, right? Like why why why am I okay? ⁓ Why why do I say, ⁓ the majority spoke? I I guess I have to go along, right? What you know, why don't I take up arms or secede or any of these sorts of things? And I think Tocqueville's trying to say, well, it's like because from like kindergarten on, we're just used to it. It just is the way we solve problems. And and that's what all these associational ⁓ and and other kinds of organizational experiences get us to buy into and legitimize the whole the whole process. ⁓ my kids voted ⁓ for donuts the other day in the car. I did not offer the election. I did not ⁓ but I was outvoted two to one and I informed I had to inform them that while I appreciate their democratic ⁓ enthusiasm, this is not a democracy. So maybe I snupped that out. So you refuse to lose. I refuse to lose. Exactly. No, you're not just kind of despotism. Honestly, I don't think my two year old knew what he was voting on. And so I honestly think there were some election irreg irregularities, if I'm being completely honest, watched by my five year old. Yeah, right. ⁓ and yeah, no, but I think what just Grant said, ⁓ yeah, an excellent point. I think that really stood out to me when I read it for the first time. I think when I read Tokwell, I think what stood out to me, especially on this night. Why a minority agrees to lose. And I think somehow people never thought that. I think the minority accepts, and I'm again speaking from a very Toquillian standpoint. I think the minority accepts losing because democracy gives it a legitimate way to continue participating. ⁓ it can disagree with ⁓ today's decision ⁓ while accepting the procedure that produced it. And I think that is such an important distinction, which I found interesting in the write-up. I think what Tokwil wants to prevent is is I think the majority using its victory to permanently silence or exclude the minority, right? I think ⁓ majority rule therefore ⁓ has to operate alongside constitutional protections and freedom of association. So I think that really stood out for me. Yeah. So if there's one thing I can bring up on this point, ⁓ only because the last time we were all together to talk about ⁓ a classic American work, we talked about the Federalist Papers. Yeah. I do think it's ⁓ worth noting the tension between Tocqueville and Madison, right? So Madison's great concern is factions, ⁓ and the way faction you know, and how to sort of accommodate factions. And Tocqueville seems to be saying actually factions are where people learn how to practice democracy, right? It's yeah, all of this coming together that is really, you know, as a faction that that's really important. ⁓ in order to keep democracy going. And and I think that's a really, you know, an interesting question to explore. ⁓ you know, like which as again is a kind of a normative political philosophy question. Like, are factions the ruin of ⁓ republics? Or is Tunkville onto something where if if contained in the right way, factions are the health of republics, you know? Yeah. And if he was ⁓ I'm sorry, Rob, go ahead. Just thinking about if he were writing when Madison were writing, what would he have thought of factions? Because by the time he's writing on in Jackson's era, there are two parties. There's a political system by that point. This argument over factions is over. You know, we've decided. So I wonder here, just in this kind of philosophical discussion, ⁓ what he would have thought if he were there, not just reading Madison. But if he were there writing during Madison's time, if that would have changed his perspective. Because it was, I mean, Madison couldn't see that the opposition would ⁓ willingly lose when he's thinking of that. And Tocqueville saw, okay, they will, you know, they will allow that. Yeah. I mean, eighteen hundred, I mean, we can't overstate the importance of eighteen hundred of that, right? Right. When the the Federalists willingly cede power. Right. and it's a but I mean There is this tension, but there is also one major common thread there between Madison and Tocqueville, which is fear of the majority. Right. Of an untrammeled majority, what can happen? And to some extent, Tocqueville's living in that. Like, or Tocqueville's visiting the United States in that moment. Right. And and in some ways, the system that Madison developed is being tested. under Jackson. Like it's absolutely being tested under Jackson. Right. Jackson goes to the limit of what he's allowed to do. Right. And ⁓ so we we we could talk about this endlessly, but I I do want to get talk about one more thing. ⁓ and then we ⁓ he's a lawyer and he likes lawyers. Yes. He does. what are you like Judicial supremacy, does he think that might be the secret? You know, aside from all the social and you know stuff that we've talked about, is that judicial supremacy the thing that I think he or the acceptance of judicial supremacy, the thing that kind of holds it all together? Yeah, so and let me throw I I agree, it's a great question. And ⁓ and once again, I wish I knew more about the nineteenth century, but my kind of rough understanding is that ⁓ people sued each other way more in the 19th century than today. Like the courts were involved in far more ⁓ disputes, and I mean they were typically again local courts, loc and and again, all these guys are I mean, it's ⁓ to be an attorney, I'm I'm pretty sure there's not the same kind there's definitely not the same kind of formal process of, you know, law school, passing the bar, licensure, all that kind of stuff. You read law. That was it. Right, exactly. So you know, so again, it's it's a lot more amateurish, but but the courts I think I I I mean, I think it's a good question because he does seem to suggest that the courts play this very important ⁓ diffusing role again that That diff that by being a little slower, but by being formalized and all the rest, tended to reduce social conflict in a way that didn't force it into the legislative process, right? That didn't force it to go through an administrative process. It's sort of once again, kind of the community coming together and ⁓ you know, I'm probably getting a little ahead of Tocqueville here, but it does seem that he has a sense, like you said, Rob, of Of ⁓ an independent judiciary as the secret sauce, as as performing this very important social function ⁓ resolving conflict ⁓ short of violence, ⁓ in a way that everybody kind of seems to buy into. Right. And he also and he also says that like judges are the aristocrats in American society, right? However, they are the aristocrats that the majority accepts. Right. And they will accept them as aristocrats. And part of that is because they when they sit on juries, they're participating in the process. They're the ones rendering judgment. Right. Even if there's bench trials, the the the which there were, ⁓ you know, the j by by by the juries actively rendering judgment and just seeing the judge as like some are you know, almost independent arbiter, right, in a non Solomon sort of way, right? Where, you know, the the people are making the decision. But that actually gives more credibility to the to the judicial aristocrats. And that of course, and Tocqueville talks about this, that the the one truly unique innovation of the American Constitution is the Supreme Court. And like that it can declare it can truly in a way like nothing else declare what is law and what is not, even if it cannot really officially make law itself, though of course people can argue that it that it doesn't and can. ⁓ but do you kind of do you see that? I mean, I think we you it's in Tocqueville, but I mean, do do you guys think that that the law and the legal system plays this important role in American society? I think that part of what he's talking about is that it tempers radicalism because they rely on precedent. And so, yeah, if you look at the fact that they rely on precedent, which gives them more legitimacy as well, because people say, okay, this has happened. They're they're not they're not radical themselves. And again, time and place here, you know, what he he's talking about a certain time and a certain era. ⁓ but I do think the law is an important part of what he's saying here and and pushing back against that radicalism, pushing back against what he saw in France. Because the courts do have that independence. And just like you said, serving on a jury is also a way for people to experience democracy, to experience control over this system. So they don't feel like it gets out of control. Right. And I and you know, it's funny, one of the things that he mentions is the importance of civil sitting on a civil jury rather than a criminal jury. And it makes me wonder. We there are so few civil jury trials anymore. Almost none. Because, you know, there's all these arbitration mechanisms that are set up going to trial so expensive. I mean, really the only people who go to trial very often anymore are like is in like family court and criminal court. Otherwise, everything's settled out of court, with the exception of ver you know, occasionally there's a case that goes it's the stakes are so big it has to. But it's very rare. And I just wonder, I mean, How many Americans have experience sitting on a civil jury? How many Americans have experience sitting on a jury anymore? Right. ⁓ anyway, it a Cree, India, this is a one distinct difference, I think, between the American constitution and the Indian constitution is the role of judges. Even though judges are, of course, very important in India, there is very clearly legislative supremacy. Yeah. Yeah. I think ⁓ I I don't know if it's a strong parallel, but I think Tokwill sees the judiciary as one of the barriers preventing democratic majorities from exercising unlimited power. ⁓ India's constitutional framework similarly gives judiciary a role ⁓ in enforcing constitutional limits and fundamental rights. ⁓ the Supreme Court states that the constitution is the supreme legal authority ⁓ and empowers the independent judiciary to invalidate ⁓ legislation or government action that violates the constitution. So in this case, it means that the Indian democracy ⁓ or the democratic system contains. ⁓ an important Toquelian element that is democracy is constitutionally structured rather than being reduced to simple majority rule. And I think that is one ⁓ similarity I could trace it to the whole Toquelian idea. So I think it is safe to say that ⁓ India combines popular sovereignty with constitutional sovereignty. Yeah. And I think that stood out to me when I was reading it, especially if I apply the India lens. Yeah, no, I think that's I mean, I think that's a really good point. I mean, it you see in India, you know, I mean, I I I simplified it, I shouldn't have said what I did, ⁓ because it, you know, I implied that it is just straight up legislative supremacy. It's not. It just in certain cases it is legislative, there is legislative supremacy in a way that doesn't exist in the United States. But ⁓ for the most part, it's common law in India, right? And the common law is this ⁓ this deference to precedent that the population accepts. Yeah. And I think that I'll tell you why. There is ⁓ it's a colonial explanation. I mean, our colonial era of course shaped us in a big way. I think the the big difference I could understand is that ⁓ Toque will, which what he admired about the American ⁓ judiciary was the restraint it showed, right? And that's not the case in India. Restraint is not the thing. I think it's the judicial activism, it's the It's basically judiciary is very actively involved in ⁓ whatever that's happening in the civic space. So I think that's one distinction that stood out for me. Right. Yeah. Yeah, that is that that's true because that that's that's actually a really an an interesting point that in a lot of countries where the legislature is really strong, it's very, very strong. But where it's not really strong, the judiciary is extremely strong. Yeah. And can be very active. ⁓ and so whereas in the United States it is a little more balanced actually. Which is which is interesting. So ⁓ one thing I'll just kind of throw out, ⁓ one ⁓ again, sort of in a teaching context. ⁓ if you read John Adams or it's another one of the founders talking about mixed forms of government, so you know they they're going back to the classics, there's a monarchy, there's aristocracy, there's democracy and And they say that ⁓ the best constitution is going to be a mix of the three. It's very nice to then have Stokefield come along and say essentially, ⁓ right, that the judiciary is the aristocracy, right? It's it's a it's a version of this, right? So you have you know, you have a president, which is you know, the one the judiciary can be the aristocracy and then the legislature can be the democracy, or you can kind of map this on to state and local government and so on, but but this idea of like ⁓ It functions ⁓ precisely because it's a it can be a bit of an aristocracy, right? It it can be ⁓ you know, and it I think it's interesting, like we tend to think of judges as the best educated ⁓ of government officials. Like we want that, right? We you know, if if you're on the Supreme Court, you'd better have gone not just to law school, but a really good law school, you know. One of two apparently. Yeah, what are right? Yeah, usually right. It's usually Harvard or Yale. We have I think Notre Dame made it onto the finally, yeah. We that it it was a great democratizing of the Supreme Court. Right. Exactly. And ⁓ and then on top of it, right, have maybe ideally taught at a an at one of those ⁓ institutions and and so on. So ⁓ so there is a kind of ⁓ and we put ⁓ in robes, you know, like there is a sort of aristocracy to the the judiciary that you can put them in wigs too. Toil's picking up on right, exactly. ⁓ any anyway, ⁓ I you know, we we are running out of time and I just wanna there is this sense of what could go wrong with the majority. ⁓ Grant alluded to soft despotism earlier. I don't know if we have the time to really dig too far into that, but ⁓ what what is the great threat that Tocqueville's talking about in a democracy? Part of it is just the ⁓ civil society not being engaged. It's just people not realizing that their freedoms are slowly being taken away because over generations you just take those for granted. And so you don't even know what's slowly being chipped away at. So the less engaged we are, the less likely the democracy is to stand. And so that's just like on a just a basic level, that's one of those threats. Yeah. And I think there's we haven't really talked about. Tocqueville's interaction is sort of a kind of materialism and, you know, I mean, writing it. I mean, another big thing happening early 19th century is the a spread of a kind of commercial capitalism. You know, and and I think that it serves a good function ⁓ in some ways it's again be a release valve. So Rob, you were talking about earlier, like the the fact that not everybody's bought it bought in course I choked on something right when I started talking. Somebody else talk for a second. ⁓ Well, ⁓ I I'm gonna pivot to you, Akredi. What what do you think is the great threat? ⁓ I think there are two things that stood out for me. I think ⁓ his first big major concern was individualism. So equality gives individuals independence, but it can also ⁓ encourage them to withdraw into private life, ⁓ you know, in the form of family or career and, you know, other material interests, I guess. And ⁓ they eventually become less concerned with public affairs. ⁓ I think if citizens stop participating, they become increasingly dependent on the administration. So I think this leads to we can't we you don't have the time to get into it, but sub-despotism. So I think government can become increasingly protective and administrative without openly destroying the democratic institutions. ⁓ citizens may continue to vote and retain formal rights. ⁓ But gradually I guess they surrender responsibility because the state can manage more of their lives. And I think that is something that really stood out for me when I was reading Toqueville. And it's crazy how ⁓ there's a reason why everyone goes back to Toqueville. It has really stood the test of time. I think the other thing which he speaks about, which stood out for me was I think the tyranny of the majority. ⁓ so majority rule is essential to democracy, and we all know, but the majority must not become unlimited. And I think that is something that nuance he presented very well. I think majority opinion can ⁓ exert social pressure and discourage ⁓ independent thought even without formal repression. I think this is why Topil placed such importance on local government or voluntary associations or federalism or constitutional restraints, I think all of that, or judiciary for that matter. I think these institutions ⁓ distribute power and give citizens opportunities to practice self-government. So I think these two things come to my mind. Yeah, sorry, Kay. I ate an MM. ⁓ and he got me. ⁓ I apologize. I choke. Nothing not a nothing screams material capitalist. That's right. Like choking on an MM. That's right. ⁓ yeah. So choking on our choking on our own prosperity, Grant. That's right. Total metaphor. ⁓ very meta. So Akriti said it all right. I guess the only thing I was gonna add is, yeah, I do think Toefil ⁓ I mean, he seems to admire the fact that well, so the materialism that he kind of sees around him lends itself to ⁓ a sort of mindset that frames democracy all again in almost materialist ways, where it's like, ⁓ you know, we do it because we get a better deal, right? That's like ⁓ there's something in it for me. So and it's also what brings us together. It's like I we combine together because collectively we can solve this problem. And so, but it's very utilitarian. And I think he does worry that utilitarian soil may not be rich enough to sustain the the flower of democracy. Right. It's it's if if it's just a kind of selfish, I'm doing this because in the long run I will be materially better off, that may not be enough to get through the hard times. And ⁓ you know, which you you we kind of look historically backwards, like you know, if you have a period like a Great Depression. ⁓ you know, is was that a moment at which democracy could be abandoned? And it certainly was in a lot of other countries, right? So, and so you you would say, well, Tocqueville's maybe onto something there, where it's like democracy only survives so long as it provides the goods. But once this once material growth slows, will people go right to like Rakree said, turn to a soft despotism, or even worse, right? ⁓ Depending on how bad the economic downturn is. Yeah. I mean, I I think one of the you know, a creedy sa said that Tocqueville ⁓ stands the test of time very well. And I and I think he does. One of the things about ⁓ Tocqueville is whatever you want, you'll find it here. Yeah. Right? The eye of this is one of the reasons I'm so curious to talk with people about Tocqueville, is that people get different things from them. And there is an eye of the beholder. I think there is stuff that if you want to see it, you'll find it in here. ⁓ So for instance, if you want to see ⁓ democracy or liberty as being related to some sort of like inner virtue, you'll find that in Tokville. If you want to see it as well, actually it's institutional structure. You'll find that in Tocqueville. Yeah. Is it some mix of the two? You'll find it in Tocqueville. And you can find it in in ⁓ or whatever else, you know, so many other things that you're looking for. you know, one of the the the passages that I reread for this, but I I had maybe hadn't appreciated the first time I read it, was that role of majority opinion that Atreiti was referring to, and just how coercive. Majority opinion can be. You'll retain your rights. Your property isn't going to be taken from you. Your life will not be worth it. Yet you seem to conform. We know you disagree. Why did you conform? And you almost like don't even realize you're conforming or that you're going against your beliefs. And Tocqueville recognizes this. And this is what he says is so dangerous about a democracy. And he just doesn't use this word because he predating this word by a hundred years, but there's this totalian totalitarianism in democracy that, you know, Louis XIV was net, you know, France was never totalitarian. Because the people still had their own thoughts. The people still like had their own ⁓ you know, privately they or you know, they they would do things that, you know, they would almost do subversive things for a laugh, right? That everybody knew what they were doing, but they were totally safe. It was never gonna cause but it would almost be this like galvanizing social thing and cultural thing. But in a democracy, the majority has this incredible ability. To coerce public opinion softly. And that's another aspect of this potential soft despotism, right? Where it's the despotism of public opinion. And that if you're too far outside of it, you are going to be so socially ostracized. The threat of being so socially ostracized is enough, even if you don't lose your actual physical liberty. you'll lose a so you you'll be so socially ostracized that it ⁓ is d it can be devast th that you'll just comply. Right. And if we're, you know, ⁓ in an era where we all communicate and for so many kids their relationships are online. So many young people their relationships are online. Social ostracism is closer to social death than baby have ever been. Yeah, you know, I and this is I think Toefield's on to something because like mo and you guys can correct me, but it seems like most when the internet first appeared, the idea was this was going to democratize information. You know, it'd be easier to get heterodox views because who's policing the internet? And that the irony, of course, is that the opposite happened, right? All and Toefield was onto something, right? That that by allowing more voices in, it somehow created a kind of Tyranny of the majority when it came to opinions and news sources and all this ⁓ sort of stuff where ⁓ like we we all tended to now get access to the same news sources and it and it's been the death of local news and ⁓ you know ⁓ it has had the opposite effect. Yeah. So I think I think that's right. I think he's onto a kind of dynamic that is counterintuitive. That the more voices you let in, the fewer opinions you get. Yeah. Yeah. May maybe we need an arch judge of the internet. We need we need we need an internet aristocracy. So the one thing I want to say, I want to go back to why we why he's a classic. ⁓ you know, why maybe we all ended up saying ⁓ we had to talk about him. And and Rob, I think you hit on a lot of things. I mean, there's everything everything you want is in Tocqueville. So it occurred to me as I was prepping, ⁓ some people go to Tocqueville because he's descriptive. He's a sociologist of a new at of a particular moment in time. And if you're a historian, like that's you know, it's just gold, right? It's he like he he was doing exactly what you'd want somebody to do in that period to help you write your book, you know. ⁓ and so he's he's a sociologist of 1830s, early, you know, well, mid-republic or mid-early republic America, something like that. Okay. He's also normative. He's a political scientist. He's trying to describe what will make democracy work. So ⁓ so he's saying, you know, this is how it functions and kind of in some ways how it has to function if it's going to avoid ⁓ all of the, you know, the the Robespierre or other kinds of fates of other sorts of republics, past or recent ⁓ recently, ⁓ that from his time. And then the last thing is he's kind of prophetic. So he's making predictions about how things are gonna go. And so I you you know, you can go to Tocqueville for a description, you can go to Tocqueville for normative claims. Or you can just start off your essa essay by saying or your article or whatever else you're writing. Toke Tockeville once said this is going to happen. And now it doesn't matter whether it happened or not. It's the perfect way to start your ⁓ you know, start whatever you're writing about. Because, you know, he's he's made a prediction that you can go back to. And and anyway, so he's like it's it's hard to not just be like, yeah, I'm gonna start everything I write with Tocqueville. Yeah, I mean, actually I think that your your point there is is Tocqueville it should I mean ⁓ Can be framed as prophecy. Yeah. Right? What you're reading here is prophecy. and ⁓ I think that makes it so inter it makes it so much more interesting to read when you're reading them as prophecy. Great, yeah. ⁓ all right, we are we are totally out of time here, and I want to be fair to everybody. ⁓ Marie, ⁓ what final thoughts? ⁓ I think that the idea that we're reading this as prophecy or reading it. you know, if from a president's view is interesting. I think that's right. And I think that we can gain a lot of understanding about ourselves today and what could have been or what didn't happen from reading Tocqueville. So not only from a historical lens, but also from the present looking back at our government. And I like how Grant brought up Schoolhouse Rock in the beginning because he is talking about what like the the the potential here and what it's supposed to be. Know what the ideas are and what he's saying, but what it's supposed to be. And so it is this kind of golden age that we like to think back on from when we did learn from schoolhouse rock when we were young. ⁓ so so yeah, and ⁓ I think this conversation was very illuminating overall. Akredi. ⁓ I think Bran touched something which I wanted to speak. So I'm glad that he brought it. I think he spoke about how descriptive ⁓ you know. The work is of Toquill. And there's this one section which really stood out to me when I was reading, and I think it was the majority tyranny. I think that section. And ⁓ the way he described it, I I have it in front of me, so I really wanted to talk about it. I think he said that local institutions like municipalities and counties, they function like hidden shoals, which slow down or divide the flood, constituted by the popular will. So he's basically making everyone picture the tide, right? And ⁓ he is ⁓ associating the tide with the majority opinion or a law the majority wants and ⁓ he's calling that tide as a flood coming in and the shoals don't stop it they just break it up or slow it down and divert it into channels so it doesn't hit everything at once with full force. And I think that kind of sort of blew my mind when I was reading it as a fourth graduate and I I ⁓ went back to it again. So I think that really stood out to me the way he explained whatever his ideas were and observations were because it was so descriptive. So I think for me that stood out was that he not only described America, I think he went one step ahead. He saw America as a laboratory of understanding democracy itself. And I think there were a lot of questions he answered and there were a lot of questions he sprinkled everywhere, questions which we can go back to even now. And I think sometimes half of the thing is just about asking the right questions. He asked questions like how does equality affect liberty at that time? Something that really something we can go back to even today, right? So I think or or for that matter, how do citizens learn self-government? Something that every country is trying to understand, or every democracy for that matter. So yeah, I think ⁓ Toqueville is gonna be with us till we turn eighty or ninety or whatever. We are always gonna come back to Toqueville. Grant, I'll I'll give you the I'll give you the final word. ⁓ I'm gonna do what I did last time you did this to me. I wanna defend let you have the final word because ⁓ I know this is close to your heart too. ⁓ so I I I'm I ⁓ reserve my time and ⁓ well how what's the way to say this in Congress? I I see my I concede time to ⁓ Well the gentleman yield Canada. Yeah. I yield my time. That's it. I yield my time to ⁓ the gentleman from Canada. Yeah. ⁓ I I honestly I don't have much more to say than I already have. I mean, I could talk, you know, we could all talk endlessly about Toqueville. ⁓ I think the the way of finishing, you mentioned his sociol so ⁓ he's a sociologist, he's so descriptive. ⁓ in some ways, he's a l he's a liberal Marx in that sense, in that he marks off an opera. Marx kind of touches on he's a historian, he's an economist, he's a sociologist, and they kind of all get mixed up together. But ⁓ when he's a sociologist, I think there's a lot of ⁓ You know, there's a lot of parallels in the way that they describe things, the way that they analyze things. Obviously, they're come to very different conclusions and have very different premises that they're operating from. But I think it's actually the fact that in a way that say, like, you know, David Ricardo is writing around the same time as a really prominent economist, but few people would be able to point to at their favorite David Ricardo passage. and it's when these great scholars of the period are are are kind of have this sociological bent. that have given them a ⁓ an enduring legacy, I think. And because they do so much for us. So ⁓ I'm saying nice things about sociologists. There we go. but on that note, thank you very much. ⁓ that was I thought that was a great discussion. ⁓ this is the start of season two. ⁓ if you're interested, please like and subscribe. it's ⁓ been a lot of fun and we got a lot of really, really fun stuff ⁓ on deck. So thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you, Rob Marie, for letting us crash the party. Great to be here, guys. Yes. Thank you.