was poor, I become rich, and I am not to expect that prosperity
will act upon my conduct, and leave my judgment free; my opinions
change with my fortune, and the happy circumstances which I turn to
my advantage furnish me with that decisive argument which was before
wanting. The influence of prosperity acts still more freely upon
the American than upon strangers. The American has always seen the
connection of public order and public prosperity, intimately united
as they are, go on before his eyes; he does not conceive that one can
subsist without the other; he has therefore nothing to forget; nor
has he, like so many Europeans, to unlearn the lessons of his early
education.

Chapter XVII: Principal Causes Maintaining The Democratic Republic--Part II

Influence Of The Laws Upon The Maintenance Of The Democratic Republic In
The United States

Three principal causes of the maintenance of the democratic
republic--Federal Constitutions--Municipal institutions--Judicial power.

The principal aim of this book has been to make known the laws of the
United States; if this purpose has been accomplished, the reader is
already enabled to judge for himself which are the laws that really tend
to maintain the democratic republic, and which endanger its existence.
If I have not succeeded in explaining this in the whole course of my
work, I cannot hope to do so within the limits of a single chapter. It
is not my intention to retrace the path I have already pursued, and
a very few lines will suffice to recapitulate what I have previously
explained.

Three circumstances seem to me to contribute most powerfully to the
maintenance of the democratic republic in the United States.

The first is that Federal form of Government which the Americans have
adopted, and which enables the Union to combine the power of a great
empire with the security of a small State.

The second consists in those municipal institutions which limit the
despotism of the majority, and at the same time impart a taste for
freedom and a knowledge of the art of being free to the people.

The third is to be met with in the constitution of the judicial power.
I have shown in what manner the courts of justice serve to repress the
excesses of democracy, and how they check and direct the impulses of the
majority without stopping its activity.

Influence Of Manners Upon The Maintenance Of The Democratic Republic In
The United States

I have previously re