Democracy in America 论美国的民主读书报告

A Book Report on Of Democracy in AmericaOf Democracy in America, written by Alexis de Tocqueville, is a magnificent work for us to understand “the most democratic country”in the world. The book purports to compare France and United States, particularly in the realms of democracy and liberty. In this book, he covers nearly every imaginable aspect of American government, politics, society, and culture. By comparing what he had observed in the United States to what he knew of France Tocqueville was able to show the ways in which liberty and democracy had flourished in America. The book has two V ols. which were written in different times. V ol.1 is divided into two parts. The first part tells us the political system in America, and the second part analyses American democracy on the ground of sociology. V ol.2 contains four parts, and he expounds his political philosophy and political sociology under the background of America. The basic idea of this book is the recognition of the inevitable decline of aristocracy and the development of equality and democracy is unstoppable. Here, I want to focus on seven chapters in the V ol.1.To introduce America, Tocqueville begins with the description of the geographical layout of North America in the first chapter: Physical Configuration of North America. He points out the Mississippi River valley, still a largely uninhabited wilderness, “is the most magnificent habitation ever prepared by God for man.”Native tribes settled in everywhere, but actually they did not possess the land for they are hunters. The area around the Mississippi and in the plains is so well-suited for trade and industry that civilized man was destined to build a society there.In the second chapter, Tocqueville talks the origins of America. The chapter is very important because it provides the origin of this country that is to follow. Immigrants to America have a common language and they shared the common sense of local government. Two branches of colonies in the south and the north explored the continent in different purposes, but English government was pleased because theythink the colonists are potential revolutionaries and the colonies enjoyed the great freedom. The laws on the continent is based on the laws of their motherland and it gradually formed some features as public affairs, individual freedom, trial by jury, etc. and local independence flourished and organized as a republic. Religion spirits and liberty spirits were getting well along with each other.The third chapter is where the author focuses on the social state of the Anglo-Americans. The laws of inheritance in American promoted the advance of equality. The colonies are not equality in wealth, but also equality in education. For the sake of equality, people in America surrender freedom as the consequences of the social state of the Anglo-Americans.The fourth chapter focuses on the principle of sovereignty of the people in America. This principle dominates the whole society of American, and Americans have already take possession of the principle before their revolution. As a result of the revolution, it develops the principle of sovereignty. V oting qualifications were progressively eradicated. In America, the people really do rule.In chapter 5, Tocqueville thinks we need to study what happens in the states before discussing the government of the union. Political and administrative activities in each state are fasten to three centers of powers----township, county and state. The township is rooted in nature and in man’s natural sociability. In The American system of Townships, the author talks about townships exist in every nation and it is difficult to maintain and keep the local freedom. He also talks about the significance of keeping the freedom of township freedom and why he chooses the towns in New England as the priority to study. The township is the place where the people most directly exercise power to rule. Selectmen generally act on already established principles agreed upon by majority. To change anything the need summon all the voters by calling a town meeting. The life in the township is based on the principles of sovereignty and equality of the people. The spirit of the township is that citizens are devoted to make contribution to their town, and they are unwilling generally to work for matters that do not affect their private interest. Few are willing to try for high government offices which are hard to get and which are out of direct sphere ofpersonal interests. In “Administration in New England”, Tocqueville points out that the administration is almost invisible in America. Through the division of power, authority is kept in check without diminishing its effectiveness which Europeans cannot understand. He notices that further from New England power of the township is diminished and power of the county is increased. He summarizes his description municipal government by saying: “Election of administrative officers, irrevocability from office, absence of administrative hierarchy, and the use of judicial weapons to control secondary authorities are the chief characteristics of American administration from Maine to the Floridas". Tocqueville speaks only briefly on the states of America because most constitutional governments have used the same items to ruling their own countries. He then tells us the legislative power and executive power of the state and political effects of administrative decentralization in the United States.In chapter 6, the author introduces the judicial power in the United States to us. he summarizes three characteristics and how Americans transferred judicial power into strong political power. Then he answers what is the difference between American judiciary and other countries’, why the judges are able to declared the law unconstitutional and how they use this right. The measures to prevent judges from abusing the right also mentioned in this chapter.Tocqueville holds his opinion on the political jurisdiction in the United States in chapter 7. the political courts in America only have the power to remove form office, not to punish under criminal law for the aim of political jurisdiction in America is to take power form those who abuse it. And political jurisdiction is the measure the government uses often. Though it is mild, and because of that, it becomes the most powerful weapon in governor’s hands.Memorable sentences1. It is evident to all alike that a great democratic revolution is going on amongst us; but there are two opinions as to its nature and consequences. To some it appears to be a novel accident, which as such may still be checked; to others it seems irresistible, because it is the most uniform, the most ancient, and the most permanent tendency which is to be found in history.2. The different relations of men became more complicated and more numerous as society gradually became more stable and more civilized.3. From the time when the exercise of the intellect became the source of strength and of wealth, it is impossible not to consider every addition to science, every fresh truth, and every new idea as a germ of power placed within the reach of the people.4. The whole book which is here offered to the public has been written under the impression of a kind of religious dread produced in the author's mind by the contemplation of so irresistible a revolution, which has advanced for centuries in spite of such amazing obstacles, and which is still proceeding in the midst of the ruins it has made.5. I admit that, in a democratic State thus constituted, society will not be stationary; but the impulses of the social body may be regulated and directed forwards; if there be less splendor than in the halls of an aristocracy, the contrast of misery will be less frequent also; the pleasures of enjoyment may be less excessive, but those of comfort will be more general; the sciences may be less perfectly cultivated, but ignorance will be less common; the impetuosity of the feelings will be repressed, and the habits of the nation softened; there will be more vices and fewer crimes.6. North America presents in its external form certain general features which it is easy to discriminate at the first glance.7. Sometimes, quietly gliding along the argillaceous bed which nature has assigned to it, sometimes swollen by storms, the Mississippi waters 2,500 miles in its course.8. If, in polished countries, the lowest of the people are rude and uncivil, it is notmerely because they are poor and ignorant, but that, being so, they are in daily contact with rich and enlightened men.9. In that land the great experiment was to be made, by civilized man, of the attempt to construct society upon a new basis; and it was there, for the first time, that theories hitherto unknown, or deemed impracticable, were to exhibit a spectacle for which the world had not been prepared by the history of the past.10. When the equal partition of property is established by law, the intimate connection is destroyed between family feeling and the preservation of the paternal estate; the property ceases to represent the family; for as it must inevitably be divided after one or two generations, it has evidently a constant tendency to diminish, and must in the end be completely dispersed.11. The sons of the great landed proprietor, if they are few in number, or if fortune befriends them, may indeed entertain the hope of being as wealthy as their father, but not that of possessing the same property as he did; the riches must necessarily be composed of elements different from his.12. What is called family pride is often founded upon an illusion of self-love. A man wishes to perpetuate and immortalize himself, as it were, in his great-grandchildren.13. It is impossible to believe that equality will not eventually find its way into the political world as it does everywhere else.14. From the same social position, then, nations may derive one or the other of two great political results; these results are extremely different from each other, but they may both proceed from the same cause.15. These two tendencies, apparently so discrepant, are far from conflicting; they advance together, and mutually support each other.16. I do not mean that there is any deficiency of wealthy individuals in the United States; I know of no country, indeed, where the love of money has taken stronger hold on the affections of men, and where the profounder contempt is expressed for the theory of the permanent equality of property.17. This picture, which may perhaps be thought to be overcharged, still gives a very imperfect idea of what is taking place in the new States of the West and South-west18. In America the principle of the sovereignty of the people is not either barrenor concealed, as it is with some other nations; it is recognized by the customs and proclaimed by the laws; it spreads freely, and arrives without impediment at its most remote consequences.19. When a nation modifies the elective qualification, it may easily be foreseen that sooner or later that qualification will be entirely abolished.20. The great political principles which govern American society at this day undoubtedly took their origin and their growth in the State. It is therefore necessary to become acquainted with the State in order to possess a clue to the remainder.21. A nation is always able to establish great political assemblies, because it habitually contains a certain number of individuals fitted by their talents, if not by their habits, for the direction of affairs.22. A highly civilized community spurns the attempts of a local independence, is disgusted at its numerous blunders, and is apt to despair of success before the experiment is completed.Its sphere is indeed small and limited, but within that sphere its action is unrestrained; and its independence gives to it a real importance which its extent and population may not always ensure.23. The State and the townships possess all the power requisite to conduct public business. The budget of the county is drawn up by its officers, and is voted by the legislature, but there is no assembly which directly or indirectly represents the county.24. Nothing is more striking to an European traveller in the United States than the absence of what we term the Government, or the Administration.25. The revolution of the United States was the result of a mature and dignified taste for freedom, and not of a vague or ill-defined craving for independence.26. It was never assumed in the United States that the citizen of a free country has a right to do whatever he pleases; on the contrary, social obligations were there imposed upon him more various than anywhere else.27. The first difficulty is to procure the obedience of an authority as entirely independent of the general laws of the State as the township is.28. We have seen that in Massachusetts the mainspring of public administration lies in the township. It forms the common centre of the interests and affections ofthe citizens.29. The absence of a central government will not, then, as has often been asserted, prove the destruction of the republics of the New World; far from supposing that the American governments are not sufficiently centralized, I shall prove hereafter that they are too much so.30. The system of local administration produces several different effects in America. The Americans seem to me to have outstepped the limits of sound policy in isolating the administration of the Government; for order, even in second-rate affairs, is a matter of national importance.31. The Americans have retained all the ordinary characteristics of judicial authority, and have carefully restricted its action to the ordinary circle of its functions.32. In the United States the constitution governs the legislator as much as the private citizen; as it is the first of laws it cannot be modified by a law, and it is therefore just that the tribunals should obey the constitution in preference to any law.。