"Why Study History?" According to Alexis de Tocqueville

Alexis de Tocqueville was a French aristocrat who toured the United States in the 1840's to study why republican government had succeeded in America, but not in France. One of his greatest discoveries was that the American Revolution, unlike the French Revolution, was not a true "revolution." The American patriots who secured national independence did not fundamentally reorganize society from the top-down; rather, they simply fought to uphold the traditions of self-government that had developed naturally amongst the American people over time - traditions which King George III began to systematically usurp after centuries of "benign neglect" by the mother country toward the internal affairs of the colonies.

Change is often necessary, but it cannot be forced by a top-down authority; otherwise, disastrous and oppressive results will follow. The past - all the traditions, customs, culture, and heritage that have evolved naturally amongst a nation - must always illuminate the future.

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