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TO M. GUSTAVE DE BEAUMONT. - Alexis de Tocqueville, Memoir, Letters, and Remains of Alexis de Tocqueville, vol. 2 [1861]

Edition used:

Memoir, Letters, and Remains of Alexis de Tocqueville. Translated from the French by the translator of Napoleon’s Correspondence with King Joseph. With large Additions. In Two Volumes (London: Macamillan, 1861). 2 vols.

Part of: Memoir, Letters, and Remains of Alexis de Tocqueville, 2 vols.

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TO M. GUSTAVE DE BEAUMONT.

Versailles. Grille du Grand-Montreuil, September 14, 1851.

. . . The conseil général lasted for two full weeks, and ended only on the night of the 7th. . . . All passed as well as I could wish. The legal revision, as proposed by the Committee of the Assembly, was voted after a speech from me. . . . It is hard to ascertain the real state of public opinion in my department; so great is the reserve with which individuals express themselves, partly from prudence, and partly from not knowing what to think. There is almost universal silence. No people, while thinking of nothing but politics, ever talked of them so little. At last I think that I discovered as much as this:—no passionate attachment to the President of the Republic; great tolerance for his opponents; and a general inclination to re-elect him, because he is already there. Any other in his place would have almost the same chance, so strong is their dislike of agitation, and their horror of what they do not know. . . . I persist, then, in maintaining the opinion which, as you know, has always been mine, that the re-election of the President is inevitable, and that the only question is as to the amount of the majority. . . . The sort of light which falls on this one point in our future, does not make the rest of the picture more clear.

What will be the consequence of this popular coup d’état, I cannot tell. It seems to me, that it will be difficult to avoid a crisis of some sort, perhaps a period of considerable suffering. I think, with you, that we should hold ourselves, not aloof, but in reserve; and especially, as you say, without pledging ourselves to any civil war, with the hope that at the last moment we may be able to interpose, and if the President triumphs, to make our stand on constitutional liberty. But how little influence has one over events in such times as these! There is one resolution to which I am determined to hold: either to carry our liberties triumphantly through this crisis, or to fall with them; all the rest is secondary. But this is a question of life and death. . . .

The illusions of most people are wonderful. When I talk with some of them, I feel as if I were in a lunatic asylum. It is true that I do not possess the parent of all illusions—enthusiasm. I have no enthusiasm; how should I have any? Of the possible solutions, not one is to my taste; I see only a choice of evils. The nation lives upon illusions as to the real state of the country—on illusions as to the army. . . . As to the latter, yesterday a general, whom I will not name, described to me happily its spirit. “The army,” he said, “is like a young lady, well brought up, who asks for nothing better than to give herself away, but who will never submit to violence, nor bestow herself without the consent of her parents, her parents being the President and the Assembly.”