Democracy in America: In Two Volumes

Foreword

xxviii Foreword “In this regard, you will pardon me, I hope, if I express a regret that I believe is general. You have pushed too far a scruple, otherwise very laudable, of not wanting to publish anything that had not absolutely received the final touch of the author. I know well the conscientiousness that caused our friend to present the expression of his thought to the public only after he had brought it to the highest perfection that he felt capable of giving it; but it is one thing to put a piece of writing aside in order to make it more perfect and something else to want it suppressed when fate has decreed that the process of perfecting it cannot take place. Even the rough drafts of a thinker and observer like Tocqueville would be of inestimable value for thinkers to come; and unless he opposed it while alive, it seems to me that there would be no disadvantage in publishing his imperfect manuscripts while presenting them only for what they are and scrupulously retainingall the indications of an intention to go back to some piece and to submit its ideas to a later verification.”1 In these words, following the publication of the complete works, John Stuart Mill expressed his regret to the editor, Gustave de Beaumont, for not having been able to read the whole body of Tocqueville’s unpublished papers. Within the framework of this edition, I wanted to revisit Beaumont’s decision and in part to satisfy Mill’s desire. I have resolved not only to offer to the reader the text of Democracy in America revised and corrected, but also to give an important placetothenotes, drafts,andmaterialsof allkinds that accompanied the period of its writing. I have therefore chosen to present to the reader at the same time a new 1. The Later Letters of John Stuart Mill, 1849–1873 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1972. J. S. Mill Collected Works, XV), p. 719. [Note: Original is in French.] foreword xxix edition of the Democracy and a different edition. This new Democracy is not only the one that Tocqueville presented to the reader of 1835 and then to the reader of 1840. It is enlarged, amplified by a body of texts that has never existed in the form that I give it today. If the added pages that follow are indeed from Tocqueville’s pen, most of them existed only as support, as necessary scaffolding for the constructionof thework.Assuch,theywere naturally meant to disappear from the final version. Drawn out of obscurity, they are going to reappear in the middle of the known text. These fragments, revived by the choice of the editor, appear between brackets in the main text and in notes. They must be treated with caution. Although they have been brought back to life here, it is advisable not to forget that Tocqueville had condemned them to disappearance. If they often lead to some interesting site, they also lead many times to a labyrinth or to an impenetrable wall. Then we will be forced to agree with the judgment that once relegated them to oblivion. What interest does their presence have then? Above all that of vividly highlighting the extraordinary complexity of the writing of the Democracy and aiding in its comprehension by presenting a portion of the erasures and over-writings, the prodigious “layering” of Tocqueville’s great work. The reader will discover, for example, how Tocqueville, often hesitant, uncertain about the direction to follow, asks for advice from his family and friends, and how the latter guide histhoughtwhenwritingsomeparagraphs and sentences. He will better understand the reasons for certain additions and deletions. He will also be able to note certain changes due to the criticisms made by the first readers of the manuscript. Finally and above all, he will see how Tocqueville proceeded with the elaboration of the main ideas of his book. Every text is unstable for a long time. When it has acquired a certain coherence and the author judges it complete, it is printed. Every typographic reproduction leads, however, to adulteration, an adulteration as necessary as it is inevitable. The printed book cannot convey either the handwriting or the look of the manuscript. Only a facsimile, a perfect reproduction of the original, made on the same paper, damaged by time and humidity, would manage to show to the reader Democracy in America in all its complexity and liveliness. But it would be an illusory Democracy, [18...