Not until I went into the churches of America and heard her pulpits flame with righteousness did I understand the secret of her genius and power. America is great because America is good, and if America ever ceases to be good, America will cease to be great.
ALEXIS DE TOCQUEVILLEDespotism often presents itself as the repairer of all the ills suffered, the support of just rights, defender of the oppressed, and founder of order.
More Alexis de Tocqueville Quotes
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Those who prize freedom only for the material benefits it offers have never kept it for long.
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This so-called tolerance, which, in my opinion, is nothing but a huge indifference.
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Any measure that establishes legal charity on a permanent basis and gives it an administrative form thereby creates an idle and lazy class, living at the expense of the industrial and working class.
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When a large number of organs of the press come to advance along the same track, their influence becomes almost irresistible in the long term, and public opinion, struck always from the same side, ends by yielding under their blows.
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Rulers who destroy men’s freedom commonly begin by trying to retain its forms. … They cherish the illusion that they can combine the prerogatives of absolute power with the moral authority that comes from popular assent.
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The tie of language is perhaps the strongest and the most durable that can unite mankind.
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Society is endangered not by the great profligacy of a few, but by the laxity of morals amongst all.
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I have seen Americans making great and sincere sacrifices for the key common good and a hundred times I have noticed that, when needs be, they almost always gave each other faithful support.
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If ever America undergoes great revolutions, they will be brought about by the presence of the black race on the soil of the United States – that is to say, they will owe their origin not to the equality but to the inequality of conditions.
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The best laws cannot make a constitution work in spite of morals; morals can turn the worst laws to advantage.
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I do not know if the people of the United States would vote for superior men if they ran for office, but there can be no doubt that such men do not run.
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However energetically society in general may strive to make all the citizens equal and alike, the personal pride of each individual will always make him try to escape from the common level, and he will form some inequality somewhere to his own profit.
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As the past has ceased to throw its light upon the future, the mind of man wanders in obscurity.
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There is hardly a political question in the United States which does not sooner or later turn into a judicial one.
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The greatness of America lies not in being more enlightened than any other nation, but rather in her ability to repair her faults.
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