Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

Skip to comments.

Tocqville - Defining democratic despotism (Liberalism)
Democracy in America ^ | 1831 | Alexis Tocqvile

Posted on 06/16/2003 6:52:49 AM PDT by austinite

Above this race of men stands an immense and tutelary power, which takes upon itself alone to secure their gratifications and to watch over their fate. That power is absolute, minute, regular, provident, and mild. It would be like the authority of a parent if, like that authority, its object was to prepare men for manhood; but it seeks, on the contrary, to keep them in perpetual childhood: it is well content that the people should rejoice, provided they think of nothing but rejoicing. For their happiness such a government willingly labors, but it chooses to be the sole agent and the only arbiter of that happiness; it provides for their security, foresees and supplies their necessities, facilitates their pleasures, manages their principal concerns, directs their industry, regulates the descent of property, and subdivides their inheritances: what remains, but to spare them all the care of thinking and all the trouble of living?

Thus it every day renders the exercise of the free agency of man less useful and less frequent; it circumscribes the will within a narrower range and gradually robs a man of all the uses of himself. The principle of equality has prepared men for these things;it has predisposed men to endure them and often to look on them as benefits.

After having thus successively taken each member of the community in its powerful grasp and fashioned him at will, the supreme power then extends its arm over the whole community. It covers the surface of society with a network of small complicated rules, minute and uniform, through which the most original minds and the most energetic characters cannot penetrate, to rise above the crowd. The will of man is not shattered, but softened, bent, and guided; men are seldom forced by it to act, but they are constantly restrained from acting. Such a power does not destroy, but it prevents existence; it does not tyrannize, but it compresses, enervates, extinguishes, and stupefies a people, till each nation is reduced to nothing better than a flock of timid and industrious animals, of which the government is the shepherd.


TOPICS: Government
KEYWORDS: alexisdetocqueville; tocqueville; tocqville
Not bad for a 19th Century frog poly-sci type. Seems he hit modern liberalism on the head.
1 posted on 06/16/2003 6:52:49 AM PDT by austinite
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | View Replies]

To: austinite
That's always been one of my fave passages ...
2 posted on 06/16/2003 6:56:10 AM PDT by Mr. Buzzcut
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: austinite
Tocqvile

Alexis de Tocqueville

3 posted on 06/16/2003 6:59:32 AM PDT by newgeezer (Your mileage may vary.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: austinite
It would be like the authority of a parent if, like that authority, its object was to prepare men for manhood; but it seeks, on the contrary, to keep them in perpetual childhood.

I think that's the kernel in this shell.

The main tool the postmodern socialist state uses to keep the populace happy is the sexual revolution. That's why we see so much pornography and why abortion (and increasingly perversion) is the bottom line on which liberal politicians will not give an inch. They want universal sex without responsibility, without family commitment, and without faith or love, because that's the best way to keep the common people in a state of perpetual childishness and dependence on their masters.

And that's why you see so many sixty-year-old hippies and yuppies who still haven't grown up.

4 posted on 06/16/2003 7:14:20 AM PDT by Cicero (Marcus Tullius)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Cicero
They want universal sex without responsibility, without family commitment, and without faith or love,

Then why is prostitution illegal almost everywhere in the U.S.?

5 posted on 06/16/2003 7:17:58 AM PDT by austinite
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 4 | View Replies]

To: austinite
read later
6 posted on 06/16/2003 8:27:20 AM PDT by LiteKeeper
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: austinite
Seems he hit modern society on the head. De Toq, that old anarchist.
7 posted on 06/16/2003 1:21:39 PM PDT by gcruse (Support home churching.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.

Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson