“The Union is as happy and as free as a small people, and as glorious and as strong as a great nation (p.186)”.

 

Tocqueville provides an interesting analysis of the catch-22 for nations. Being a small, less powerful nation is good for freedom and stable government, but means it isn’t strong enough to defend its borders and interests against more powerful states. “Physical strength is therefore one of the first conditions of the happiness and even of the existence of nations (p.184)”. Larger, more powerful nations, on the other hand, can get their way in the world, but are at much greater risk of political instability and leave their people less free and less well governed, as power and its corrupting influences are greater in such states. And if a nation is foolish enough to pursue empire, according to Tocqueville, it will only exaggerate these problems and likely lead to its eventual ruin. “It may therefore be asserted as a general proposition that nothing is more opposed to the well-being and the freedom of man than vast empires (p.183)”.

 

So what is a nation to do? They would do well to follow the example set by America, according to Tocqueville. The Americans created a nation that was both small and large. Both weak and powerful. By leaving most political power in the hands of the individual states, the government of America is many small governments, leaving them “as happy and free as a small people.” But, by creating a federal government and limiting its power to only those things that it needed in order to be strong as a nation of the world, America was large and powerful in the areas it needed to be, “as glorious and as strong as a great nation.”

 

The trick is in giving enough power to your federal government for it to be strong to outsiders, but not so much power that it can bully the state governments and the people in general. This reminds me, to a certain extent, of the guardians in Plato’s Republic. The guardians had to be vicious towards outsiders, but peaceful towards citizens. Plato used the analogy of dogs, who remain aggressive to those they don’t know, but are man’s best friend to those they do. In essence, the Americans found a way to institutionalize Plato’s dogs, or guardians. The federal government is Plato’s dog. Rather than a class of people, it is an institution. The founders made it strong enough to be a threat to outsiders, but weak enough that it wouldn’t become a menace to the people. The Americans, it can be said, put their federal government on a short leash.
This analogy from the Republic is not the only one that can be made. For Tocqueville keeps mentioning how wise the creators of this system of government were. It is as if the philosopher-kings had a brief run in power. “The chief cause of the superiority of the Federal Constitution lay in the character of the legislators who composed it”. “…the people chose the men who most deserved the esteem, rather than those who had gained the affections, of the country (p. 172)”. Also, the wisest citizens were able to influence the masses when deciding how much power the federal government should have: “…they were little agitated by the passions which generally oppose the extension of federal authority in a nation, and those passions were checked by the wisdom of the chief citizens (p. 180)”. In short, America allowed philosophers to rule for a brief period, you could argue.