American Institutions and Their InfluenceTocqueville, Alexis de
History
American Institutions and Their Influence
Tocqueville, Alexis de
Democracy; United States -- Politics and government
substitute for common sense and public morality.
* * * * *
DIFFERENCE BETWEEN THE POSITION OF THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES
AND THAT OF A CONSTITUTIONAL KING OF FRANCE.
Executive Power in the United States as Limited and as Partial as the
Supremacy which it Represents.--Executive Power in France as
Universal as the Supremacy it Represents.--The King a Branch of the
Legislature.--The President the mere Executor of the Law.--Other
Differences resulting from the Duration of the two Powers.--The
President checked in the Exercise of the executive Authority.--The
King Independent in its Exercise.--Notwithstanding these
Discrepancies, France is more akin to a Republic than the Union to a
Monarchy.--Comparison of the Number of public Officers depending upon
the executive Power in the two countries.
The executive power has so important an influence on the destinies of
nations that I am inclined to pause for an instant at this portion of
my subject, in order more clearly to explain the part it sustains
in America. In order to form an accurate idea of the position of the
president of the United States, it may not be irrelevant to compare it
to that of one of the constitutional kings of Europe. In this comparison
I shall pay but little attention to the external signs of power, which
are more apt to deceive the eye of the observer than to guide his
researches. When a monarchy is being gradually transformed into a
republic, the executive power retains the titles, the honors, the
etiquette, and even the funds of royalty, long after its authority has
disappeared. The English, after having cut off the head of one king,
and expelled another from his throne, were accustomed to accost the
successors of those princes upon their knees. On the other hand, when
a republic falls under the sway of a single individual, the demeanor of
the sovereign is simple and unpretending, as if his authority was not
yet paramount. When the emperors exercised an unlimited control over
the fortunes and the lives of their fellow-citizens, it was customary to
call them Caesar in conversation, and they were in the habit of supping
without formality at their friends' houses. It is therefore necessary to
look below the surface.
The sovereignty of the United States is shared between the Union and the
states, while in France it is undivided and compact: hence arises the
first and the most notable difference which exists between the president
of the United States and the king of France. In the United States the
executive power is as limited and partial as the sovereignty of the
Union in whose name it acts; in France it is as universal as the
authority of the state. The Americans have a federal, and the French a
national government.
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