America is great because she is good. If America ceases to be good, America will cease to be great.
- Alexis de Tocqueville Quote

An American cannot converse, but he can discuss, and his talk falls into a dissertation. He speaks to you as if he was addressing a meeting; and if he should chance to become warm in the discussion, he will say "Gentlemen" to the person with whom he is conversing.
- Alexis de Tocqueville Quote

Consider any individual at any period of his life, and you will always find him preoccupied with fresh plans to increase his comfort.
- Alexis de Tocqueville Quote

Grant me thirty years of equal division of inheritances and a free press, and I will provide you with a republic.
- Alexis de Tocqueville Quote

He was as great as a man can be without morality.
- Alexis de Tocqueville Quote

History is a gallery of pictures in which there are few originals and many copies.
- Alexis de Tocqueville Quote

I know of no country in which there is so little independence of mind and real freedom of discussion as in America.
- Alexis de Tocqueville Quote

In a revolution, as in a novel, the most difficult part to invent is the end.
- Alexis de Tocqueville Quote

In America the majority raises formidable barriers around the liberty of opinion; within these barriers an author may write what he pleases, but woe to him if he goes beyond them.
- Alexis de Tocqueville Quote

In other words, a democratic government is the only one in which those who vote for a tax can escape the obligation to pay it.
- Alexis de Tocqueville Quote

In politics shared hatreds are almost always the basis of friendships.
- Alexis de Tocqueville Quote

In the United States, the majority undertakes to supply a multitude of ready-made opinions for the use of individuals, who are thus relieved from the necessity of forming opinions of their own.
- Alexis de Tocqueville Quote

Liberty cannot be established without morality, nor morality without faith.
- Alexis de Tocqueville Quote

No protracted war can fail to endanger the freedom of a democratic country.
- Alexis de Tocqueville Quote

The American Republic will endure until the day Congress discovers that it can bribe the public with the public's money.
- Alexis de Tocqueville Quote

The Americans combine the notions of religion and liberty so intimately in their minds, that it is impossible to make them conceive of one without the other.
- Alexis de Tocqueville Quote

The French want no-one to be their superior. The English want inferiors. The Frenchman constantly raises his eyes above him with anxiety. The Englishman lowers his beneath him with satisfaction.
- Alexis de Tocqueville Quote

The greatness of America lies not in being more enlightened than any other nation, but rather in her ability to repair her faults.
- Alexis de Tocqueville Quote

The Indian knew how to live without wants, to suffer without complaint, and to die singing.
- Alexis de Tocqueville Quote

The main business of religions is to purify, control, and restrain that excessive and exclusive taste for well-being which men acquire in times of equality.
- Alexis de Tocqueville Quote

The power of the periodical press is second only to that of the people.
- Alexis de Tocqueville Quote

The whole life of an American is passed like a game of chance, a revolutionary crisis, or a battle.
- Alexis de Tocqueville Quote

There are many men of principle in both parties in America, but there is no party of principle.
- Alexis de Tocqueville Quote

There are two things which will always be very difficult for a democratic nation: to start a war and to end it.
- Alexis de Tocqueville Quote

There is hardly a pioneer's hut which does not contain a few odd volumes of Shakespeare. I remember reading the feudal drama of Henry V for the first time in a log cabin.
- Alexis de Tocqueville Quote

We succeed in enterprises which demand the positive qualities we possess, but we excel in those which can also make use of our defects.
- Alexis de Tocqueville Quote

What is most important for democracy is not that great fortunes should not exist, but that great fortunes should not remain in the same hands. In that way there are rich men, but they do not form a class.
- Alexis de Tocqueville Quote