Econlib

The Library

Other Sites

Front Page arrow Titles (by Subject) arrow (K) Page 165 - Democracy in America: Historical-Critical Edition, vol. 2

Return to Title Page for Democracy in America: Historical-Critical Edition, vol. 2

Search this Title:

(K) Page 165 - Alexis de Tocqueville, Democracy in America: Historical-Critical Edition, vol. 2 [1835]

Edition used:

Democracy in America: Historical-Critical Edition of De la démocratie en Amérique, ed. Eduardo Nolla, translated from the French by James T. Schleifer. A Bilingual French-English editions, (Indianapolis: Liberty Fund, 2010). Vol. 2.

Part of: Democracy in America: Historical-Critical Edition, 4 vols.

About Liberty Fund:

Liberty Fund, Inc. is a private, educational foundation established to encourage the study of the ideal of a society of free and responsible individuals.


(K) Page 165

What could you say better today, now that the French Revolution has made what are called its conquests in the matter of centralization?

In 1789, Jefferson wrote from Paris to one of his friends: “Never was there a country where the mania for governing too much had taken deeper roots and done more mischief than in France.” Letter to Madison, 28 August 1789.

The truth is that in France, for several centuries, the central power has always done all that it could to extend administrative centralization; in this course it has never had any other limit than its strength.

The central power born from the French Revolution went further in this than any of its predecessors, because it was stronger and more clever than any of them. Louis XIV submitted the details of communal existence to the wishes of the intendant; Napoleon submitted them to those of the minister. It is always the same principle, extended to consequences more or less remote.