And then this young ambitious lawyer was given a very interesting assignment.
He was invited to study the penitentiary system in the United States and
find out if there are aspects in the treatment of criminals over there
that might be adopted in France.
So from May 1831 until February 1832,
the 26 year old Tocqueville and his friend Gustave de Beaumont
traveled through the United States, visited prisons,
talked to judges and lawyers and prepared their official government report.
Back in France, they published the outcomes of their research in a book
on the penal system in the United States and its applicability in France, and
I can testify here that the copy of the first edition of that study is still
in the drawer of his desk at the consul.
But during that trip, Tocqueville had noticed and studied so
much more than just courtrooms and prisons, and
in 1835, he published the first volume of his two volume masterpiece,
On Democracy in America.
That book was an instant success, and from that moment on Tocqueville
was a name to reckon with in Paris intellectual circles.
The second volume of the book appeared in 1840.
One year before Tocqueville had become a member of Parliament, representative
of the District of Valognes, where the village of Tocqueville can be found.