Lester Steed

HIST 2700
Professor Moore
Document paper #2
The rise of an Industrial Aristocracy by Alexis de Tocqueville, 1831
I have shown how democracy favors developments in industry and
multiplies industrialists without measure; we are going to see the path
by which industry in its turn could well lead men back to aristocracy.
The Tyranny of the Majority by Alexis de Tocqueville, 1831
It is the very essence of democratic governments that the empire of
the majority is absolute; for in democracies, outside the majority there
is nothing that resists it.
Several particular circumstances also tend to render the power of the
majority in America not only predominant, but irresistible.
The moral empire of the majority is founded in part on the idea that
there is more enlightenment and wisdom in many men united than in
one alone, in the number of legislators than in their choice. It is the
theory of equality applied to intellects
Defining the constitutional limits of slavery by Salmon P. Chase, 1850
First that in 1787 the national policy in respect to slavery was one of
restriction, limitation, and discouragement. Second that it was

generally expected that under the action of the State Governments

slavery would gradually disappear from the states.
Common themes include: slavery vs free labor
Slavery in the south and factory workers in the north shared a kind of
common bond in poverty. The slave, though he had a master to care for him was
still subject to the masters whim, and could be hung for running away. The factory
worker, though he was free to find another job, had no security in his place of work,
nor wealthy patron for his family. Both occupied social positions at the bottom of the
social ladder, and would be the ones most likely hurt in any upheaval or unrest.
Neither slavery nor the issues with free labor were addressed for a long time
because of what the majority believed about freedom and property; namely that
being free, the factory worker had all the government support he needed. Slaves,
being property were also cared for and needed no more support than they already
had. This was what Alexis de Tocqueville was talking about in The tyranny of the
Majority in 1831, that;
The majority in the United States therefore has immense power in
fact, and a power in opinion almost as great; and once it has formed on
a question, there are so to speak no obstacles that can, I shall not say
stop, but even delay its advance, and allow it the time to hear the
complaints of those it crushes as it passes.
Alexis de Tocqueville also said in 1831 of the industrial workers of the north
that;

Master and worker here have nothing alike and each day they differ
more. They are joined only as two links at the extremes of a long chain.
Each occupies a place that is made for him and that he cannot leave.
The one is in a continual, strict, and necessary dependence on the
other, and he seems born to obey as the latter is to command. What is
this if not aristocracy? (The Rise of an Industrial Aristocracy)
The south seems to have embraced aristocracy early on, so saw white males
as born to command as slaves were born to obey. Salmon P Chase noted in his
speech; Constitutional limits of slavery (1851),
What have been the resultsof the subversion of the original policy of
slavery restriction and discouragement instead of slavery being regarded
as a curse, a reproach, a blight, an evil, a wrong, a sin, we are told that it is
the most stable foundation of our institutions; the happiest relation that labor
can sustain to capitol; a blessing to both races
Those in the south saw slavery as an improvement on the condition of
workers in the north, as the slave had security, which has been mentioned before.
In my opinion, the only thing the industrial worker had that the slave did not was
hope to better his condition. This hope carried him through a multitude of evils at
work, and if he failed there, he could move west.
Westward expansion allowed the ideal of free labor to work without regulation
for long enough for it to become an established tradition and system, allowing
bosses to continuously exploit their workers. Yet a was fought over slavery, which
better cared for its workers. Free labor has its success stories, yet the majority of
the lower classes would never break free of their social class. We see this today in

minority issues. Many times it is not actually race that limits minorities so much as
social class, determined in large part by income.