Liberty & Order

Texts:

• Henry David Thoreau: Walden, The Maine Woods, Collected Essays and Poems, ed. Elizabeth Hall Witherell and Robert F. Sayre (Library of America, 2007)
• The Portable Emerson, ed. Jeffrey S. Cramer (Penguin, 2014)

Readings:

• Emerson, “Divinity School Address” (PE, 74–90)
• Emerson, “The Transcendentalist” (PE, 112–27)
• Thoreau, Walden, Ch. 1: “Economy”

Discussion Questions:

1. Emerson says that transcendentalism is merely “Idealism as it appears in 1842” (p. 112). So, what then does he mean by “idealism”?  And what particular shape does Emerson think it is taking in America in 1842?
2. A transcendentalist can also be defined as a thinker who aspires to the transcendent – or, in Emerson’s words, to “what is above him” (p. 75). So, what exactly is this thing up above, beyond the material world, that the transcendentalist seeks?
3. Walden begins not with the world of the things up there, but with the world of things down here – the needs of the body, and the quest “to solve some of the problems of life, not only theoretically, but practically” (p. 14). How does this compare to Emerson’s transcendentalism?  What overlaps do you find?  What divergences?

Readings:

• Emerson, “Self-Reliance” (PE, 150–72)
• Emerson, “The American Scholar” (PE, 56–73)
• Thoreau, Walden, Ch. 2: “Where I Lived and What I Lived For”

Discussion Questions:

1. What exactly does it mean, in Emerson’s words, to “trust thyself”? What kind of individualism is he advocating for?  How does this compare to other individualisms with which you might be familiar?  How does this emphasis on individualism comport with his focus on higher things?
2. Emerson thinks that in order to “trust thyself,” one needs to “know thyself” (p. 59). What does he mean by this?  What prevents American students from attaining this most valuable of all knowledge?  What prevents American students from realizing themselves as an “active soul” – which he explicitly says is the only thing in the world of any value? (p. 60)
3. What, according to Thoreau, does it mean to be “awake”? To “live deliberately”?  To “live deep and suck out all the marrow of life” (p. 74)? Why exactly did he have to go to Walden to see whether and how this could be done?

Readings:

• Emerson, “Politics” (PE, 279–90)
• Emerson, “Spiritual Laws” (PE, 191–209)
• Thoreau, “Civil Disobedience”
• Thoreau, Walden, Ch. 11: “Higher Laws”

Discussion Questions:

1. How does Emerson define the State? What distinguishes a good state from a bad state? What is the end that the good state seeks to achieve?
2. What sort of laws can a state enact, according to Emerson? What exactly are “spiritual laws,” and how do they compare to ordinary laws?
3. “Civil Disobedience” is quite obviously the story of a conflict between higher laws and political laws. On what grounds did Thoreau choose to follow these higher laws rather than state laws? Was his choice justified?

Readings:

• Emerson, “The Over-Soul” (PE, 210–25)
• Emerson, “Uses of Great Men” (PE, 318–34)
• Thoreau, “Life without Principle”
• Thoreau, Walden, Ch. 12: “Brute Neighbors”

Discussion Questions:

1. What exactly is the “over-soul”? What sort of communication do great people have with it, according to Emerson?
2. What exactly is human greatness good for, according to Emerson? Why exactly does he speak of the “uses” of great men?  How are great people good for themselves?  How might great people be good for others?
3. How does Thoreau understand human greatness? What examples does “Life Without Principle” offer of human smallness?  What exactly does Thoreau mean when he asks us: “what is the value of any political freedom, but as a means to moral freedom” (p. 889)?

Readings:

• Emerson, “The Fugitive Slave Law: Speech at Concord” (PE, 747–91)
• Emerson, “John Brown: Speech at Salem” (PE 401–403)
• Thoreau, “Slavery in Massachusetts”
• Thoreau, “A Plea for Captain John Brown”
• Thoreau, “The Last Days of John Brown”

Discussion Questions:

1. One could argue that neither Emerson nor Thoreau were ever really political until they were compelled to confront the challenge of slavery in 1850. How did the Fugitive Slave Law change them? What response did it prompt in them, and how does this response comport with the core principles of the transcendentalist?
2. Both Thoreau and Emerson were clearly fascinated by John Brown. Why? In what ways did he speak to the longings for and vision of human greatness?

Readings:

• 1, Introduction (pp. 3–15)
• 1, Part 1:

• • Ch. 4, “On the Principle of the Sovereignty of the People in America” (pp. 53–55)
  • Ch. 5, “Necessity of Studying What Takes Place in the Particular States Before Speaking of the Government of the Union”:
    • Sections up through “On the Spirit of the Township in New England” (pp. 56–65)
  • Ch. 6, “On Judicial Power in the United States and its Action on Political Society” (pp. 93–99)
  • Ch. 8, “On the Federal Constitution”:
    • Sections up through “Legislative Powers” (pp. 105–13)
    • Sections from “Crisis of the Election” up through “On the Reelection of the President” (pp. 126–30)
    • Sections from “Elevated Rank Held by the Supreme Court Among the Great Powers of the State” up through “On the Advantages of the Federal System Generally, And its Special Utility for America” (pp. 141–54)

  Discussion Questions:

  • What are the potential advantages and disadvantages, for American students of American politics, of the proudly foreign perspective that Tocqueville brings to the study of American politics?
  • Is Tocqueville struck by the same things about the American constitutional system that Americans today tend to be most proud of (or most ashamed of)?
  • To what extent is the constitutional system described by Tocqueville still operative in 21^st-century American politics? And to the extent that it is not, does that make Tocqueville less relevant today?

Readings:

• Vol. 1, Part 2:
  • Introductory note (p. 165)
  • Ch. 6, “What Are the Real Advantages that American Society Derives from the Government of Democracy” (pp. 220–35)
  • Ch. 7, “On the Omnipotence of the Majority in the United States and Its Effects” (235–49)
  • Ch. 8, “On What Tempers the Tyranny of the Majority in the United States” (pp. 250–64)

Discussion Questions:

• Does American society still derive the same “real advantages” from our democratic system of government that Tocqueville said we did in the 1830s?
• Is the American majority as “omnipotent” today as Tocqueville claimed it was? Even if it is, is that as much of a problem as he claims it is?
• Is Tocqueville right to see lawyers as a kind of American aristocracy? If so, is he right to think this is a good thing for the country?

Readings:

• Vol. 1, Part 2, Ch. 9, “On the Principal Causes Tending to Maintain a Democratic Republic in the United States”:
  • Sections from “On the Influence of the Laws on the Maintenance of a Democratic Republic in the United States” up through “That the Laws Serve to Maintain a Democratic Republic in the United States More Than Physical Causes, and Mores More Than Laws” (pp. 274–95)
• Vol. 2, “Notice” (pp. 399–400)
• Vol. 2, Part 2, “Influence of Democracy on the Sentiments of the Americans”:
  • Ch. 1, “Why Democratic Peoples Show a More Ardent and More Lasting Loves for Equality Than for Freedom” (pp. 479–82)
  • Ch. 2, “On Individualism in Democratic Countries” (pp. 482–84)
  • Ch. 3, “How Individualism is Greater At the End of a Democratic Revolution Than in Any Other Period” (pp. 484–85)
  • Ch. 4, “How the Americans Combat Individualism With Free Institutions” (pp. 485–88)
  • Ch. 5, “On the Use that the Americans Make of Association in Civil Life” (pp. 489–92)
  • Ch. 6, “On the Relation Between Associations and Newspapers” (pp. 493–95)
  • Ch. 7, “Relations Between Civil Associations and Political Associations” (pp. 496–500)
  • Ch. 8, “How the Americans Combat Individualism by the Doctrine of Self-Interest Well Understood” (pp. 500–03)

Discussion Questions:

• Is Tocqueville right to view American religion as a “political institution”? What can studying American religion, or more generally American “mores,” teach us about American law and politics?
• Is Tocqueville right to see what he calls “individualism” as a serious threat to democratic governments? If so, what forms does that threat take today?
• How should Tocqueville’s recommendations about how to combat “individualism” be updated, modified, and/or abandoned in our digital age?

Readings:

• Vol. 2, Part 1, “Influence of Democracy on Intellectual Movement in the United States”:
  • Ch. 5, “How, In the United States, Religion Knows How to Make Use of Democratic Instincts” (pp. 417–24)
• Vol. 2, Part 2, “Influence of Democracy on the Sentiments of the Americans”:
  • Ch. 9, “How the Americans Apply the Doctrine of Self-Interest Well Understood in the Matter of Religion” (pp. 504–06)
  • Ch. 10, “On the Taste for Material Well-Being in America” (pp. 506–08)
  • Ch. 11, “On the Particular Effects That the Love of Material Enjoyments Produces in Democratic Centuries” (pp. 508–09)
  • Ch. 12, “Why Certain Americans Display Such an Exalted Spiritualism” (pp. 510–11)
  • Ch. 13, “Why the Americans Show Themselves So Restive in the Midst of Their Well-Being” (pp. 511–14)
  • Ch. 14, “How the Taste for Material Enjoyments Among Americans Is United With Love of Freedom and With Care for Public Affairs” (pp. 514–17)
  • Ch. 15, “How Religious Beliefs at Times Turn the Souls of Americans Toward Immaterial Enjoyments” (pp. 517–21)
  • Ch. 16, “How the Excessive Love of Well-Being Can Be Harmful to Well-Being” (pp. 521–22)
  • Ch. 17, “How in Times of Equality and Doubt It Is Important to Move Back the Object of Human Actions” (pp. 522–24)
• Vol. 2, Part 3, “Influence of Democracy on Mores Properly So-Called”:
  • Ch. 8, “Influence of Democracy on the Family” (pp. 558–63)
  • Ch. 9, “Education of Girls in the United States” (pp. 563–65)
  • Ch. 10, “How the Girl is Found Beneath the Features of the Wife” (pp. 565–67)
  • Ch. 11, “How Equality of Conditions Contributes to Maintaining Good Mores in America” (pp. 567–73)
  • Ch. 12, “How the Americans Understand the Equality of Man and Woman” (pp. 573–76)

Discussion Questions:

• Do Tocqueville’s descriptions of American religion and the American “taste for well-being” ring true today?
• To the extent that Tocqueville’s observations about American culture (as we would now call it) remain interesting to us, can they also teach us anything about American politics? Can they provide any guidance to contemporary American statesmanship?
• Clearly a lot has changed since Tocqueville described family life and the different roles of the sexes in 19^th-century America. What, if anything, can we still learn from his description of the role of women and family life in American democracy?

Readings:

• Vol. 2, Part 3, “Influence of Democracy on Mores Properly So-Called”:
  • Ch. 21, “Why Great Revolutions Will Become Rare” (pp. 606–17)
  • Ch. 22, “Why Democratic Peoples Naturally Desire Peace and Democratic Armies Naturally Desire War” (pp. 617–22)
  • Ch. 23, “Which is the Most Warlike and the Most Revolutionary Class in Democratic Armies” (pp. 623–25)
  • Ch. 24, “What Makes Democratic Armies Weaker Than Other Armies When Entering into Campaign and More Formidable When War Is Prolonged” (pp. 626–29)
  • Ch. 25, “On Discipline in Democratic Armies” (pp. 629–30)
  • Ch. 26, “Some Considerations on War in Democratic Societies” (pp. 631–35)
• Vol. 2, Part 4, “On the Influence that Democratic Ideas and Sentiments Exert on Political Society”:
  • Ch. 6, “What Kind of Despotism Democratic Nations Have to Fear” (pp. 661–65)
  • Ch. 7, “Continuation of the Preceding Chapters” (pp. 666–73)
  • Ch. 8, “General View of the Subject” (pp. 673–76)

Discussion Questions:

• How worried should we be about the American army? Is Tocqueville right about the potential dangers it poses to democratic society?
• How worried should we be about “mild despotism”? Does Tocqueville offer adequate recommendations for how to avoid it?
• Tocqueville ends the book on a note of what could be called stern optimism. Does he give good grounds for that? Is stern optimism the most reasonable reaction to everything that he has been telling us about America?