Strauss’s Lectures on Tocqueville

Strauss (Reference Strauss and Weinberger1954, 7) begins his 1954 “Natural Right” course by offering high praise of Democracy in America:

In contrast to many contemporary political scientists, Tocqueville does not simply accept that democracy is good or that it is the best regime. Its goodness must be interrogated, even challenged. This clarifies Strauss’s (Reference Strauss1959a, 81 n. 2) sole published remark on Tocqueville. Strauss is not calling Tocqueville a modern echo of classical political philosophy; he is simply showing how Tocqueville belongs to the broader tradition of political philosophy as distinguished from present-day political science.

For Strauss (Reference Strauss and Weinberger1954, 189), Tocqueville’s political science is of “utmost interest” because it is guided by an awareness of a fundamental alternative to liberal democracy. Strauss believes that the analysis of contemporary political scientists is inadequate because it often contrasts liberal democracy with communism or fascism. These regimes are “most unattractive alternatives from which we learn nothing except self-complacency.”Footnote ⁷ Tocqueville’s political science, in contrast, juxtaposes liberal democracy “with a respectable alternative, and that is what makes him so valuable” (193). Aristocracy, for Tocqueville, is a respectable alternative that produces magnanimous souls, towering intellects, and refined cultures.

Strauss (Reference Strauss and Weinberger1954, 189) is astonished at how perspicacious and profound his analysis is despite his relatively short stay in America: “I believe that no book comparable in breadth and depth has ever been produced afterward. I believe in no other case in regard to any other country; that a man after such a short sojourn in a country could give such a comprehensive and profound analysis.” Strauss argues that part of the reason why Tocqueville was such a good observer was that he had excellent teachers: Montesquieu and Rousseau. This intellectual inheritance allowed him to offer a profound “philosophic analysis” (189).Footnote ⁸ Although Strauss (Reference Strauss and Zinman1966, 62) finds Tocqueville’s thought to ultimately be derivative of these two thinkers, he sees Democracy in America as a first-rate elaboration of their thought. As a result, he believes that it is absolutely “necessary [for every student of political science to read] Tocqueville’s work” (Strauss Reference Strauss and Weinberger1954, 192).

Despite Tocqueville being an “excellent observer” of modern liberal democracy, Strauss (Reference Strauss and Weinberger1954, 190) believes that “he had in his head a certain notion of what democracy is from the French democratic tradition, especially Rousseau” (see also Jaume Reference Jaume2013, 21–35). Rousseau framed Tocqueville’s conception of equality, of how it is more natural and just than inequality, and of how it has a historical trajectory. These Rousseauean insights deepen Tocqueville’s analysis, but Strauss (Reference Strauss and Weinberger1954, 190) argues that Tocqueville was “sometimes misled by his preconceived notions of democracy.”Footnote ⁹

Strauss (Reference Strauss1953, 286) implies that Tocqueville, following Rousseau, sees democracy as more natural than aristocracy. Democracy is more natural because it liberates man from the conventional bonds that aristocracy creates. Aristocracy creates an unnatural and fixed inequality in society and in the family. Democracy overturns the barriers erected by aristocracy and returns individuals to a state that more closely resembles natural equality in society and the family (Strauss Reference Strauss and Weinberger1954, 190–91). For this reason, Strauss quotes Tocqueville’s ([1835–40] Reference Tocqueville, Nolla and Schleifer2012, 1040) famous remark about democracy strengthening natural bonds and weakening conventional bonds (see also Manent Reference Manent1996, 71). The implication of this is that Tocqueville, following Rousseau, sees democracy as the regime that best approximates natural equality.Footnote ¹⁰

Strauss also notices that Tocqueville’s analysis of the “democratic temper” resembles Rousseau’s description of natural man. Rousseau’s state-of-nature account memorably portrays natural man as having two guiding principles prior to the development of reason: self-preservation and pity. Early man is like a timid animal, concerned with preservation and unconcerned with harming others. Strauss (Reference Strauss and Weinberger1954, 190) claims that Tocqueville adopts this doctrine of “systemic egoism” and “compassion” when describing modern democratic man. Similar to Rousseau’s depiction of man in the state of nature, Tocqueville ([1835–40] Reference Tocqueville, Nolla and Schleifer2012, 993) states that democratic individuals do not “inflict useless evils, and when, without hurting themselves very much, they can relieve the sufferings of others, they take pleasure in doing so.” Tocqueville goes on to state that equality of conditions makes individuals independent but also acutely aware of their weakness. This state of affairs leads citizens to unite with one another out of self-interest and to have a general compassion for all members of the human race. While general human sympathy for others increases, great devotion or self-sacrifice for one’s country decreases. Strauss sees this as a restatement of Rousseau’s doctrine.

Rousseau undergirds not only Tocqueville’s understanding of democracy but also history.Footnote ¹¹ Strauss’s Reference Strauss and Weinberger1954 course transcript, like Natural Right and History, argues that Rousseau introduced the idea of history into the modern natural right tradition. According to Strauss’s (Reference Strauss and Weinberger1954, 208–9) interpretation of Rousseau, man acquires his humanity over time, through the historical process. Moreover, the bitter experience of despotism ultimately “made men wise” and allowed them to discover and establish just governments. History, thus, gives man his humanity and shows him true political legitimacy. Strauss provocatively argues that Burke and Tocqueville were “captive” to Rousseau’s historical philosophy (179). Although Burke and Tocqueville ultimately reject Rousseau’s radical political proposals, they are reliant on his ideas of how history transforms human beings and reveals the true character of political justice. Even in rejecting Rousseau’s more abstract proposals, they both do so in the name of history. A new civil equality that reflects natural equality—what Rousseau sought to establish through his political philosophy—does not require a radical remaking of human nature; no revolution based on abstract principles is needed. History already tends in the direction of equality. Strauss (Reference Strauss and Weinberger1954, 188) succinctly encapsulates Burke’s (and, by implication, Tocqueville’s) modification of Rousseau’s historical teaching as follows: “[T]rust in the historical process rather than in ‘abstract principles.’”Footnote ¹²

According to Strauss, Burke and Tocqueville’s modified Rousseauean historical perspective eventually leads to a secularized understanding of providence. Strauss argues that Burke attempts to save aristocracy from being overturned by revolutionary democracy, but realizes that the principles of the French Revolution and of democracy itself may be the future, possibly even ordained by God. Quoting from the last paragraph of Burke’s Thoughts on French Affairs, Strauss reveals how Burke ultimately concedes that the revolution of modern society may be the workings of providence.Footnote ¹³ Burke ([1791] Reference Burke1907, 375) states that those who “persist in opposing this mighty current in human affairs, will appear rather to resist the decrees of Providence itself, than the mere designs of men.” After quoting this passage, Strauss reminds his students that Tocqueville states something similar about the democratic revolution in the introduction to Democracy in America. Echoing Burke, Tocqueville ([1835–40] Reference Tocqueville, Nolla and Schleifer2012, 10) states that this movement is “a providential fact”; to resist it is to resist God himself. Strauss (Reference Strauss and Weinberger1954, 179) appropriately remarks that “where Burke stops, Tocqueville begins.” The acceptance of the modern democratic revolution as a providential fact is the start of Tocqueville’s political philosophy.Footnote ¹⁴

Unlike Burke, who ultimately settles for “conservative aristocracy,” Tocqueville supports a form of “anti-revolutionary democracy” or “conservative democracy.” Tocqueville thus “accept[s] democracy, but imbue[s] it with the moderate spirit of Burke” (Strauss Reference Strauss and Weinberger1954, 179; cf. Lakoff Reference Lakoff1998).Footnote ¹⁵ Strauss is sympathetic to Tocqueville’s conservative defense of liberal democracy, but ultimately finds his philosophic analysis to be inadequate. Strauss (Reference Strauss and Weinberger1954, 196) contends that students of Tocqueville must be aware of “the enormous power of the tradition of democratic theory over the mind of Tocqueville.” This influence, he contends, misdirected Tocqueville’s observations and his general analysis. Although Tocqueville saw “the dangers inherent in democracy, perhaps more clearly than any other democratic writer” (107), Strauss still considered him to be beholden to the democratic tradition. To elucidate this flaw, Strauss examines why Tocqueville ultimately decides in favor of democracy, even while seeing the threat it brings to human freedom and excellence.

According to Strauss, Tocqueville provides three different reasons for why democracy should not be resisted. The first is that democracy is a historical or “providential fact”: we have no choice but to accept it.Footnote ¹⁶ Strauss (Reference Strauss and Weinberger1954, 202) finds this argument to be inadequate because the historical fact of democracy does not mean that it is good nor that it comes from God. Democracy “could very well be divine punishment inflicted on men for their sins.” This argument is “not the theological understanding of providence, but what is loosely called the secularized version of providence, meaning an understanding according to which the ways of God are not inscrutable.”Footnote ¹⁷ According to the theological understanding of providence, the ways of God are inscrutable; man cannot know that God wills democracy (202).

The second argument in favor of democracy is that it is rooted in Christianity. Strauss characterizes this position as being “of a more serious nature.” For Tocqueville, liberal democracy brings to fruition Christian principles of freedom, equality, and charity. Liberal democracy is, as far as Tocqueville (Reference Tocqueville and Lukacs1959) is concerned, an effective means of accomplishing the Christian ideals of freedom and equality for all (see also Galston Reference Galston1987, 505–6). Or as Strauss (Reference Strauss and Weinberger1954, 202) states: “[M]odern democracy fulfills the will of the New Testament on political things.” The problem with this argument is that it relies on faith, not reason. Simply because democracy fulfills the ideals of Christianity does not make it better than aristocracy.

The third argument that Strauss (Reference Strauss and Weinberger1954, 203) is concerned with is Tocqueville’s claim that “democracy is more just than aristocracy.” At the end of Democracy in America, Tocqueville ([1835–40] Reference Tocqueville, Nolla and Schleifer2012, 1282) states that equality is less elevated, but that “it is more just.” It is this justice that gives democracy its grandeur and beauty. According to Strauss (Reference Strauss and Weinberger1954, 203), this is “a very peculiar notion of justice.” Strauss states that “one could say in Aristotelian language [that] he dogmatically accepts the democratic notion of justice, justice simply identical with equality, so that the kind of reasonable inequality corresponding to merit is not considered” (204; cf. Henary Reference Henary2014; Tocqueville [1835–40] Reference Tocqueville, Nolla and Schleifer2012, 314–17). The issue is that Tocqueville “identifies aristocracy with the ancien régime with all of its residues of feudalism, which are not of course of the essence of aristocracy” (Strauss Reference Strauss and Weinberger1954, 205). For Aristotle, the essence of aristocracy is the rule of the best with a view to the common advantage and according to the standard of virtue, not simply according to property. Tocqueville, of course, recognizes the higher aristocratic claim to rule, but focuses less on virtue. Classical thinkers, according to Strauss (Reference Strauss1953, 133–34), argue that a just society is one that leads to human perfection or virtue. Since human beings are unequal in their ability to arrive at this end, “equal rights for all appeared to the classics as most unjust” (134–35). Tocqueville appears to accept the modern natural right teaching that conceives of all men as naturally free and equal. A just society, therefore, is one that ensures freedom and equality for all. Freedom and equality take the place of virtue (Strauss Reference Strauss and Weinberger1954, 110, 134). Strauss, in contrast to many of his students, emphasizes the unclassical and un-Aristotelian character of Tocqueville’s political philosophy.

Strauss notices that despite Tocqueville having a philosophical argument for the superior justice of democracy, he ultimately diminishes the power of reason to determine which social state is best. After stating that democracy is more just, Tocqueville ([1835–40] Reference Tocqueville, Nolla and Schleifer2012, 1282) states that aristocracy and democracy are “two distinct humanities, each of which has its particular advantages and disadvantages, its good and its evil which are its own.” The two societies “are not comparable.” Strauss (Reference Strauss and Weinberger1954, 203) sees this as an “inability or unwillingness to make a decision between two social systems which both impress him in different ways.” Democracy is superior “from the point of view of just” and aristocracy is superior “from the point of view of human elevation.” His hesitation to resolve this “insoluble value conflict” shows that “he doesn’t see any criterion for deciding the ultimate superiority” of one social state over another. Strauss sees this as an early form of relativism, albeit “a very balanced and moderate ‘relativism.’” Reason, the traditional criterion, is abandoned in the name of history. In the introduction to Democracy, Tocqueville ([1835–40] Reference Tocqueville, Nolla and Schleifer2012, 28) states: “I did not even claim to judge if the social revolution, whose march seems irresistible to me, was advantageous or harmful to humanity.” In Strauss’s (Reference Strauss and Behnegar1956, 148) “Historicism and Modern Relativism” course, he states something similar: “Tocqueville could not decide unqualifiedly in favor of democracy. The decision was made for him, as it were, by history.”

Strauss (Reference Strauss and Weinberger1954, 205) states that Tocqueville’s political philosophy is “sound for most practical purposes,” but insufficient from “the point of view of theory.” The fundamental problem with Tocqueville is that he is not a philosopher. He “is a sociologist,” meaning that for him “the fundamental fact which moves man and society are not so much opinions or ideas, but social conditions” (203).Footnote ¹⁸ Tocqueville “thinks [that] a fundamental change in social conditions has occurred, [and] that leads to certain theories, and the theories are mere by-products of the social change” (203). A clear example of this is when Tocqueville speaks of enlightened self-interest. Equality of conditions, not any particular accepted philosophic idea, causes Americans to honor this philosophy. Strauss (Reference Strauss and Weinberger1954, 194), in contrast, sees a clear line between enlightened self-interest and early American Enlightenment thinkers such as Benjamin Franklin. These Enlightenment theories, not the democratic social state, “are older than the conditions of which Tocqueville speaks and may be said to have brought about these conditions.” For Strauss, ideas are more important than social conditions. The problem with Tocqueville is that he is “constantly inclined to minimize the importance of theory” (193–94).

Strauss (Reference Strauss and Weinberger1954, 204) ends his interpretation of Tocqueville by touching on the theme of the course, “namely, the problem of natural right.” He argues that Tocqueville follows in the modern tradition by diminishing the power of theory and reason to determine what is best. The early modern rationalism and “its natural right doctrine” was “based on a subordination of reason and of the intellect to something nonrational, nonintellectual, sub-intellectual: the fundamental needs of man, and sentiment and so on.” Later thinkers (Tocqueville being one of these thinkers) “radicalize this tendency” to subordinate reason. History, not reason or the nonrational needs of man, determines what is best, what is possible. This loss in the power of reason, this minimization of the importance of theory, constitutes the “crisis of modern natural right.”

Overall, Strauss admires Tocqueville’s sober and thoughtful analysis of liberal democracy, but finds it inadequate on philosophic grounds. He argues that Tocqueville overly relies on Rousseau’s understanding of the naturalness of equality and the transformative effect of history. Tocqueville, like Burke, unwittingly modifies and advances Rousseau’s historical teaching. Rather than return to Aristotelian moderation grounded in practical reason, Burke and Tocqueville look to history. Tocqueville’s secularized understanding of providence is flawed and limits the political alternatives that were once open to classical thinkers, especially Aristotle. Additionally, Tocqueville’s modern and Christian conception of justice clouds his judgment of democracy. His overall diminishment of reason and theory prevents him from seeing the problematic character of modern natural right. Liberal democracy, a regime whose raison d’être is the equal protection of individual rights, is not the most just regime. Strauss ultimately agrees with Plato and Aristotle that the best and most just form of government is the rule of the wise, not the rule of the many (Smith Reference Smith2000). Tocqueville is unwilling to firmly make this judgment. He accepts the historical and providential dispensation of equality. Political philosophy is reduced to a form of democratic theory that attempts to preserve freedom in times of equality. The more capacious ancient horizon offered by Aristotle and other ancient thinkers is neglected. Despite certain classical intimations in Tocqueville’s thought, he is unable to escape the modern horizon.

Similar to Strauss’s (Reference Strauss and Harvey Lomax1976) critique of Carl Schmitt, one could say he believes that Tocqueville’s thought remains within “the horizon of liberalism” (1976, 122). Tocqueville’s dissatisfaction with modern liberal democracy is restrained by his unconscious acceptance of the modern natural right teaching and Rousseau’s historic-democratic theory. Moreover, Tocqueville’s secularized Christianity limits his theoretical “horizon” (Strauss Reference Strauss and Weinberger1954, 205): his willingness to accept democracy as a dispensation from God is flawed. As Strauss states, the deepest “limitation of the horizon exemplified by Tocqueville” is that the question of democracy “is settled, the question is settled by the successful establishment of this order” (205). If one wants to adequately understand the problematic character of the early modern project, one must gain “a horizon beyond liberalism”—a horizon, one could say, beyond Tocqueville (Strauss Reference Strauss and Harvey Lomax1976, 122).

In the following section, I will focus on Strauss’s comparison of Tocqueville and Nietzsche in his 1954 “Natural Right” transcript and in his wider oeuvre. Strauss argues that Nietzsche provides a horizon beyond liberalism, albeit a radical one that has its own theoretical and practical limits. His intellectual superiority allows him to see with greater clarity the problematic nature of liberal democracy. Nietzsche attacks early modern liberal ideas of rights, equality, and freedom. Moreover, he makes an unabashed critique of Christian and democratic notions of justice. Strauss does not fully agree with Nietzsche’s approach, but he argues that his philosophic analysis is more profound than Tocqueville’s.

Strauss’s Comparison of Tocqueville and Nietzsche

In Strauss’s (Reference Strauss1975, 98) famous “Three Waves of Modernity” article, he argues that Nietzsche’s critique of the theoretical underpinnings of liberal democracy “cannot be dismissed or forgotten.” Two years after the 1954 “Natural Right” course, Strauss (Reference Strauss1995, 305) declared in a lecture: “All rational liberal philosophic positions have lost their significance and power. One may deplore this but I for one cannot bring myself to cling to philosophic positions which have been shown to be inadequate.” Although Strauss found the liberal philosophic position to be inadequate, he also found the solutions proposed by Nietzsche and other thinkers to be inadequate. For this reason, he sought to retrieve a form of classical rationalism that could serve as “a solid basis for rational liberalism” (305).Footnote ¹⁹ Strauss’s endeavor to discover a new foundation for liberalism (or some other form of modern political life) required an engagement with Tocqueville and Nietzsche, two of the most perceptive writers on liberal democracy.

In Strauss’s 1959 lecture course on Nietzsche, he compares Tocqueville’s argument for the justness of democracy with Nietzsche’s critique of democracy. Strauss (Reference Strauss and Velkley1959b, 77) notes that Nietzsche, like Tocqueville, sees the link between Christianity and democracy, as well as the contention of democracy being more just by Christian standards. But in contrast to Tocqueville, “Nietzsche turns it around.” Democracy is not actually more just: this is simply what the defenders of democracy claim. In reality, the many are resentful of the few, and thus seek to subjugate them to their rule. This so-called justice is nothing more than resentment and revenge. This Christian notion of justice is what Nietzsche calls slave morality. Nietzsche, according to Strauss, presents a powerful philosophic critique of democracy, one that Tocqueville does not adequately address. For this reason and others, he argues that Nietzsche is ultimately “much deeper and [more] comprehensive than [Tocqueville]” (24).

Despite Tocqueville’s limits, his analysis of the democratic phenomenon of mediocrity reminds Strauss of Nietzsche’s very similar observations.Footnote ²⁰ Democracy produces a certain leveling of society where no great virtue or vice exists. In the 1954 “Natural Right” course, Strauss (Reference Strauss and Weinberger1954, 201) quotes Tocqueville’s ([1835–40] Reference Tocqueville, Nolla and Schleifer2012, 1281) memorable lines regarding this universal leveling:

Commenting on this passage, Strauss states that Tocqueville is describing the phenomenon of mediocrity or philistinism. Strauss sees a link between what Tocqueville describes as degraded democratic individuals and what Nietzsche calls the “last man, namely the man who has little pleasures by day, little pleasures by night, and thinks he has discovered happiness” (201).Footnote ²¹

Strauss (Reference Strauss and Weinberger1954, 201) mentions Nietzsche to show the connection between the “very moderate and humane criticism of the modern development by Tocqueville and the extreme revolt against it which is represented by Nietzsche.” Strauss appears to find greater truth in Nietzsche’s “extreme revolt” and “a real difficulty in Tocqueville’s position” (196). Strauss states that “liberal democracy today has never been so soberly analyzed, and so sympathetically as it was by Tocqueville,” but he does not rest satisfied with this moderate analysis of liberal democracy (195). Tocqueville’s minimization of the importance of theory prevents him from seeing that there are fundamental flaws in the modern philosophic foundations of liberalism, including his own historically informed liberalism.

The problem that Tocqueville believes to be the result of modern democracy, Strauss believes to be the result of the original principles of modern liberal democracy. For Strauss (Reference Strauss1968, 64), the problem of modern liberalism is that it inevitably leads to a “perverted liberalism which contends ‘that just to live, securely and happily, and protected but otherwise unregulated, is man’s simple but supreme goal’ and which forgets quality, excellence, or virtue.” The founders of liberalism made self-preservation, rather than virtue, the guiding principle of politics. Rights take the place of duties. One has a right, or freedom, to live as one pleases, but no one has a duty to be virtuous, to be excellent (Strauss Reference Strauss1953, 181–82). This radical transformation of how we think about justice and the purpose of politics was inaugurated by modern political philosophers, not the democratic social state. Tocqueville’s supposed lack of philosophic depth and modern concern for liberty blinded him to certain theoretical difficulties inherent in liberalism.

Strauss argues that freedom, not human greatness, is Tocqueville’s summum bonum. Although Strauss (Reference Strauss and Weinberger1954, 199) recognized and admired Tocqueville’s abiding concern for greatness, and his understanding of how freedom is “directly connected with human excellence,” he compares it to Nietzsche’s radical attachment to greatness. Strauss argues that Tocqueville “sided with democracy in spite of his reservations.” Because providence had decided in favor of democracy, the only alternatives are democracy or despotism. Aristocratic greatness was no longer a viable option for Tocqueville. He therefore settled for the greatness that is to be found in a democratic context.Footnote ²² “Nietzsche,” Strauss argues, “is less concerned with political freedom than with human greatness.” He “sees possibilities of human greatness in the nineteenth century which transcend everything possible in the past, in a new type of tyrants, in a new ruling class … of a military character” (255). Strauss disapproves of Nietzsche’s glorification of a new aristocracy founded on military strength and atheism, but he admires his unflinching attachment to greatness.Footnote ²³ This singular focus on greatness allowed him to be a more perspicacious critic of liberal democracy (cf. Herold Reference Herold2021, 183–84; Mansfield Reference Mansfield2010, 112).

Although Strauss believes that Tocqueville’s ultimate embrace of modern equality and freedom clouded his judgment, he admires Tocqueville’s moderate and practical mind, which prevented him from falling into the same errors as Nietzsche. This moderation is something that Strauss’s students find admirable about Tocqueville and perhaps a source of Strauss’s qualified embrace of liberal democracy. Strauss (Reference Strauss and Weinberger1954, 202) seems to suggest that in practice, it is better to follow Tocqueville’s “very moderate and humane criticism” of modern liberal democracy than Nietzsche’s extreme rejection of it.

Strauss (Reference Strauss and Weinberger1954, 277) makes it clear that Nietzsche’s “extreme revolt” against liberal democracy had serious consequences: “Nietzsche in an indirect way prepared the climate in which Nazism would grow.” Although “Nietzsche was not a Nazi and would have been the very first to run away from Germany and Hitler,” he nonetheless bears some responsibility for that regime being inspired by him. Nietzsche’s glorification of subjugation and cruelty, as well as his claim that Christianity is nothing more than slave morality, paved the way for “right-wing extremism.” Moreover, Nietzsche’s way of writing added fuel to his radical ideas: “You can’t write such sentences about the Homeric heroes, that they raped all the women and killed anyone they didn’t like, and regard it fundamentally as a students’ prank, and presenting that [as something] good” (277). Nietzsche’s imprudent lack of decorum and civility was a problem. For Strauss, “there are certain kinds of sentences which a responsible man must never say and write. Nietzsche wrote a lot of sentences which a responsible man should never have written, because they were certain to be misused” (257). Tocqueville, in contrast, refrained from using such imprudent and cruel language. Perhaps for this reason, among others, Strauss admonishes his students earlier in the course to “be satisfied with the sober, middle-of-the-road position of Tocqueville” (108).

Strauss, one could say, charts a middle course between Tocqueville and Nietzsche. He follows Tocqueville in that he attempts to moderate the democratic spirit rather than radically overturn it. He is more persuaded by Nietzsche’s theoretical critique of liberal democracy, but he moderately admires decent liberal constitutionalism. Similar to Strauss’s judgment about liberal democracy in his “Three Waves” article, one may conclude that he finds Tocqueville’s political philosophy to be good in practice, but inadequate in theory. Tocqueville’s moderation, his concern for religion, human greatness, and the life of the mind, and his dread of mediocrity makes him a different kind of modern thinker, one that Strauss admired. But Tocqueville, according to Strauss, is too reliant on history and diminishes the power of theory to shape and decide what is best for a political community. His sociological approach constricts his attempt to understand the origin of contemporary problems and adequately respond to them.

A Tocquevillian Response to Leo Strauss

Although Strauss’s pedagogical critique of Tocqueville is insightful and philosophically astute, I would like to offer a preliminary Tocquevillian response. This response is directed at Strauss, but has broader implications. It provides scholars with a Tocquevillian alternative to contemporary critics of liberalism. This preliminary response is not meant to be exhaustive; rather, it is meant to be an enticement for scholars to put Tocqueville and Strauss in greater dialogue with one another. This effort will contribute to the ongoing debate surrounding liberalism.

One of the most jarring interpretations that Strauss presents is his critique of Tocqueville’s providential argument in favor of democracy. Strauss argues that the success of democracy does not prove that God wills it or that it is good: the victory of democracy could very well be divine punishment rather than divine sanction. Despite the illuminating character of this counterargument, Strauss does not take up the rhetorical and historical aspect of Tocqueville’s argument. One could argue, as some of Strauss’s own students have, that Tocqueville’s providential thesis is highly rhetorical (Zetterbaum Reference Zetterbaum1967, 15–19). There was a clear rationale behind Tocqueville’s providential rhetoric. Many French aristocrats simply saw democracy as an evil and wanted to return to some version of the Old Regime. A return to throne and altar was not wholly off the table in France. Tocqueville needed to convince conservative Catholics and other parties that democracy was the future. It is surprising that Strauss does not take this into greater consideration when examining Tocqueville’s thought.

Strauss overemphasizes Tocqueville’s acceptance of democracy based on history. Tocqueville does not fatalistically accept the outcome of history. In his chapter on democratic historians in Democracy, he memorably states that aristocratic historians overemphasize the role of great individuals and democratic historians overemphasize the role of a “single great historical system” (Tocqueville [1835–40] Reference Tocqueville, Nolla and Schleifer2012, 857). He attempts to find a mean between these two extremes. Strauss, one could say, takes a more aristocratic historical interpretation and attributes to Tocqueville a democratic historical system. Tocqueville, however, denies the idea that societies have no “ability to modify their own fate” and that they are subject to “an inflexible providence or to a sort of blind fatality” (858). He wants to acknowledge the role of grand historical developments, but he does not give history an ineluctable power. He memorably ends Democracy by acknowledging that providence/history places certain limits on the destiny of men, but that “within its vast limits, man is powerful and free; so are peoples” (1285). In a letter late in life, Tocqueville criticizes Hegelian historical determinism. The Germans, Tocqueville (Reference Tocqueville1861) writes, embraced Hegel because “his doctrines asserted that, in a political sense, all established facts ought to be submitted to as legitimate; and that the very circumstance of their existence was sufficient to make obedience to them a duty.”Footnote ²⁴ Tocqueville rejects the idea that history can legitimate any political fact or occurrence. History does not replace reason as the criterion of judgment.

In Strauss’s attempt to give a grand historical narrative, he overly generalizes Tocqueville as a sociological thinker who abandons the standard of reason in favor of a moderate form of relativism.Footnote ²⁵ Tocqueville is not rejecting reason as a criterion of judgment when he states that aristocracy and democracy each have their own advantages and disadvantages; he is simply asserting a reasonable and commonsensical claim that there are good and bad aspects of each social state, and, more broadly, all governments.Footnote ²⁶ Ultimately, Tocqueville’s so-called relativism may simply be a form of nuanced prudential calculation that recognizes changing circumstances and therefore the need for a certain flexibility. Tocqueville’s ([1835–40] Reference Tocqueville, Nolla and Schleifer2012, 955) general idea that there are a variety of means for a fixed end is visible in Democracy in America: “All the art of the legislator consists in clearly discerning in advance these natural inclinations of human societies, in order to know where the effort of the citizens must be aided, and where it would instead be necessary to slow it down. For these obligations differ according to the times. Only the end toward which humanity must always head is unchanging; the means to reach that end constantly vary.” This passage seems to suggest that Tocqueville maintains a fixed end while allowing for a variety of means to achieve a given end. Tocqueville does not seem to abandon the standard of reason on historicist or relativist grounds (Arellano Reference Arellano2020, 63; Kuź Reference Kuź2016, 67–72).Footnote ²⁷

Strauss overlooks the fact that Tocqueville’s political philosophy is grounded on a fixed understanding of human nature and the longing for transcendence. In Democracy, Tocqueville ([1835–40] Reference Tocqueville, Nolla and Schleifer2012, 940) memorably states that there is an “unchanging foundation” in human nature and that “the soul has needs that must be satisfied” (Kitch Reference Kitch2016). This normative standard is certainly less robust than what is found in classical or medieval rationalism, but it is still grounded in a form of rationalism that sees nature and transcendent human longing as providing a norm or standard (Herold Reference Herold2021, 184).Footnote ²⁸ In Natural Right and History, Strauss (Reference Strauss1953, 178) states that Niccolò Machiavelli had no concern for the “natural inclinations of man or of the human soul whose demands simply transcend the lowered goal.” The same cannot be said of Tocqueville. The demands of natural inclinations and of the human soul play a vital role in his political philosophy.

Strauss may have been unfamiliar with some of Tocqueville’s later pronouncements that suggest a fixed understanding of human nature. In a lecture before the French Academy of Moral and Political Sciences in 1852, Tocqueville (Reference Tocqueville, Danoff and Hebert2011, 17–18) states that there are two parts to the “science of politics”: “one fixed and the other in motion.” The first is “founded on the very nature of man,” on “his needs as revealed by philosophy and history,” and “on his instincts, which change their objects according to the times without changing their nature, and which are as immortal as his race.”Footnote ²⁹ This first theoretical aspect “teaches us what laws are best adapted to the general and permanent condition of humanity.” The second aspect of politics is the practical side that provides for “the passing needs of the moment.” Tocqueville, thus, makes a distinction between theory and practice and grounds his politics on a normative theoretical account of human nature that is unchanging. He believes that there are aspects of our humanity that never change and others that are subject to variation. He does not give a detailed account of what is mutable and what is fixed in human affairs; nevertheless, within Democracy, he gives some examples of where he retains a nonrelativistic account of justice.

In Democracy, when speaking of the plight of Native Americans, Tocqueville makes an illuminating statement that seems to suggest he maintains some fixed standard of natural right and reason. He recounts how he read a report for the Committee of Indian Affairs where an individual claimed that Native Americans had no right of property. In response, Tocqueville ([1835–40] Reference Tocqueville, Nolla and Schleifer2012, 547 n. 29) states: “While reading this report, written moreover by a skillful hand, you are astonished by the facility and ease with which, from the first words, the author gets rid of arguments founded on natural right and reason, that he calls abstract and theoretical principles.” In this example, Tocqueville appears to argue that there is a natural right or justice that theoretical reason can discover. He does not make great use of these concepts, perhaps due to the revolutionary character of modern natural right and the ever-volatile character of French society, but he seems to maintain some standard of right and justice that transcends time or place.

Strauss’s tentative indictment of Tocqueville as being a derivative thinker lacking philosophic depth is oversimplified. Surprisingly, Strauss does not examine why Tocqueville may have been compelled to “constantly minimize the importance of theory” in his published writings. In the wake of the French Revolution, Tocqueville realized that abstract philosophic theories are dangerous. During the Revolution, intellectuals naïvely incorporated philosophic ideas in their writings and taught citizens how to question the foundations of religion and society. Tocqueville, therefore, may have intentionally minimized the importance of theory to moderate elements of modern political philosophy (Ceaser Reference Ceaser2011, 226–27; Mansfield Reference Mansfield and Henderson2014). This minimization of theory may not simply be a product of his historical perspective, as Strauss suggests, but may reflect a certain understanding of the difference between theory and practice (Ceaser Reference Ceaser2011, 242; Mansfield Reference Mansfield2010, 4).Footnote ³⁰

Strauss’s implied critique of Tocqueville as ultimately not being a philosopher is valid to a certain extent;Footnote ³¹ nevertheless, Strauss is too quick to describe Tocqueville as a derivative thinker who minimizes the importance of abstract ideas.Footnote ³² In his lecture before the French Academy, Tocqueville reiterates the danger of philosophy, but also acknowledges the utmost importance of “pure theory” for political science. He explicitly cites “Plato, Aristotle, Machiavelli, Montesquieu, [and] Rousseau” as the brilliant thinkers who establish the theoretical foundations of political science. Rather than give a sociological or a historicist account of how their ideas were a product of their times, Tocqueville (Reference Tocqueville, Danoff and Hebert2011, 19–20) boldly states that the political sciences of these great thinkers is what shapes society:

In this speech, the importance of theory is not minimized; theory, especially political theory, is elevated and presented as the first cause of social and political change.Footnote ³³ The great thinkers produce the general ideas, which then produce the facts and laws that political men “believe they invent.” Later in the speech, Tocqueville goes so far as to state that the theoretical books of Aristotle, Montesquieu, and Rousseau “have made us what we are.” Contrary to what Strauss suggests, Tocqueville recognizes the transformative effect of ideas and political theory.

Strauss, however, astutely detects a protohistoricist tendency to Tocqueville’s early thought that minimizes the power of philosophers to transcend their particular historical horizons. For example, Tocqueville thought that Plato and Aristotle were unable to see that slavery is unjust and against nature because they were part of the “aristocracy of masters.” Christ, he famously argues in Democracy, had to “come to earth in order to make it understood that all members of the human species were naturally similar and equal” (Tocqueville [1835–40] Reference Tocqueville, Nolla and Schleifer2012, 733). The social condition of inequality of conditions prevented philosophers from seeing certain natural truths.Footnote ³⁴ In Natural Right and History, Strauss (Reference Strauss1953, 23) bluntly states: “It is obviously untrue to say, for instance, that Aristotle could not have conceived of the injustice of slavery, for he did conceive of it.” These protohistoricist ideas in Democracy may simply reflect the thoughts of a youthful Tocqueville or perhaps a lack of familiarity with Aristotle.Footnote ³⁵ His 1852 speech before the Academy gives reason to believe that the later Tocqueville shared, to a large extent, Strauss’s general view about the power of reason to transcend social horizons and the ability to create new ones.

Tocqueville’s approach is more nuanced than what Strauss argues. Rather than call Tocqueville a sociologist, it is perhaps better to think of him as a sociopolitical thinker with a multifaceted approach. Tocqueville (Reference Tocqueville and Lukacs1959) once told his friend Arthur de Gobineau that he examines “the habits of people” rather than “books.” As we have just seen, the ideas in books are important, but they do not explain in full the changing social and political habits of a people. Philosophic ideas are one cause among a variety of causes that transform society. There is never simply one causal factor. Even though Tocqueville ([1835–40] Reference Tocqueville, Nolla and Schleifer2012, 74, 692) speaks of the democratic social state as being the primary cause of all the changes he sees taking place, he also does not consider it to be the sole cause (see also C. Zuckert Reference Zuckert and Masugi1991, 126). It has been rightly noted that he sees intellectual ideas and social forces as having a “reciprocal influence on each other” (Arellano Reference Arellano2020, 52). His sociopolitical approach attempts to provide a more nuanced analysis of human affairs (M. Zuckert Reference Zuckert, Alulis and Lawler1993). By examining all aspects of society, not simply the ideas articulated by philosophers, Tocqueville provides a fuller—and perhaps more accurate—portrait.

For Strauss, modern philosophers such as Machiavelli, Thomas Hobbes, John Locke, and Rousseau bear much of the responsibility for the problems we face in contemporary liberal democracy. The loss of human greatness, the precariousness of political and intellectual freedom, the disintegration of social and political unity in Western countries, and growing secularization are somehow the result of modern intellectual ideas. While it is important and fruitful to take into consideration Strauss’s philosophic narrative regarding the decline of the West, it may seem strange and far-fetched to many. Are these thinkers really the primary cause of our current discontent? Is it not perhaps more accurate to say that there are a variety of factors that have produced the current instability and disenchantment found in contemporary liberal democratic regimes? While Strauss may criticize Tocqueville for minimizing the importance of theory, one may criticize Strauss for overemphasizing the importance of theory.

Strauss’s overly intellectualized theory of historical change has inspired many scholars and intellectuals to present oversimplified critiques of liberal democracy. Scholars influenced by Strauss often see the theoretical foundations of liberalism as the primary cause of our current problems. The state-of-nature anthropology of liberalism is somehow the cause of waning orthodox faith, degraded citizens, moral decay, and even high rates of divorce. What is needed, according to some, is a novel return to premodern, Aristotelian or Thomistic political foundations (Deneen Reference Deneen2018; Manent Reference Manent2020; Milbank and Pabst Reference Milbank and Pabst2016). Although the writings of these contemporary scholars are illuminating, they often depict modern political thought in monolithic terms and overemphasize its negative qualities.Footnote ³⁶ More radical intellectuals are also inspired by Strauss’s provocative and memorable critiques of modern philosophy. Scholars have documented how these intellectuals follow Strauss in an immoderate way and attempt to revive Nietzsche’s radical critique of liberal democracy.Footnote ³⁷ The 1954 “Natural Right” transcript reveals that Strauss (Reference Strauss and Weinberger1954, 277) would reject such radical writings as another instance of Nietzsche’s ideas paving the way for a new form of “right-wing extremism.” It would perhaps go too far to blame Strauss for inspiring Nietzschean radicalism, but it is not difficult to see how his writings provide a certain antiliberal vocabulary that is easily appropriated. For this reason, some critics of Strauss portray him as an enemy of liberal democracy (Drury Reference Drury1988; McCormick Reference McCormick2021; Xenos Reference Xenos2008), and many of his admirers have been at pains to present him as a friendly critic (Pangle Reference Pangle2006; Schiff Reference Schiff2010; Smith Reference Smith2006).