IN SEARCH OF A FRENCHMAN

So let’s say a super being from the Organian star system materialized on earth, came to your house, and told you that he can bring one dead person back to life, but it can’t be someone who died in the recent past and it can’t be a member of your family. “Oh yes,” the Organian added, “it also can’t be a religious figure – that would make the question so easy that even Dan Quayle could answer it. I want you to think before you answer.”

So who would it be for you?

Obviously, I’m supposed to say Spinoza. But don’t kid yourself: that dude is a religious figure. Any man who serves as a moral exemplar and is considered the founder of a beloved philosophy of life is a religious figure. The fact that nobody deifies him only means that the religion he’s associated with – perish the thought – isn’t likely to give rise to fundamentalism … or cost people zillions of dollars in dues. Truly, if I ever meet a fundamentalist Spinozist, I’ll suggest not only that he’s missing the point but that he’d be better off taking a Civil Service Exam and accepting a job as a Deputy Assistant Chief in some kind of bureaucracy.

So I’d better remove from consideration any kind of spiritual leader, my dear departed father, and anyone born recently enough to watch Arlen Specter and Anita Hill talk about perjury and pubic hair. Who, then, do I hope to see resuscitated?

There are a few possibilities – Goethe, for example, is no religious figure. Neither is Jefferson. But I won’t go for them. Perhaps in spite of the right wingers who believe that Paris is somehow less civilized then Lubbock, I’ve got to go French. I’ve got to go with Alexis de Tocqueville.

De Tocqueville came to America in 1831 with the job of investigating our prison system. Like any great mind, however, he failed to stay “on task,” and instead scripted an analysis of our culture that has never again been equaled for its combination of comprehensiveness, objectivity and insight. His book had everything, even an analysis of why democratic nations “incline toward pantheism.” (That realization made the poor Frenchman sad, but it pleases me no end.) But mostly, what it did is describe a young nation that, for de Tocqueville, represented the Platonic form of democracy. The land de Tocqueville described wasn’t the Gilded Age, the age of dire poverty and incredible opulence. Instead, de Tocqueville America was a place of growing equality, where people actively participated in all sorts of organizations – political, charitable, social, you name it – and turned a vast expanse of land into a macrocosm of old Athens (minus the love for philosophy – some things about America never change). According to De Tocqueville, “democratic nations show a more ardent and enduring love of equality than of liberty.” Such was his impression from visiting our American ancestors only a half century after the birth of our nation.

I could go on for pages describing de Tocqueville’s impressions of Jacksonian America. But for the moment, thanks to the Organians, I don’t have to understand my world solely from examining history. I can find a genius from the nation’s past and commission him to explain the present. Here’s my request for de Tocqueville: “Come back to America today, and investigate our prison system. Please!” OK. So I’m not especially interested in our prison system. I want him to do the same number on George Bush’s America that he did for the America of Andrew Jackson. I have my own impressions, but I want to know if I’m right. And I want to hear the talking heads on TV dutifully report on his findings so that the present state of our democracy can become unmasked. And our work can be cut out for us.

I’m betting that de Tocqueville could use a lot of words for our land, but “vibrant democracy” wouldn’t be among them. Nor, obviously, would he be likely to remark that our love for equality continues to exceed our appreciation for liberty. The old Tocqueville described an America that was “restless,” despite its prosperity, and I suspect the resuscitated de Tocqueville would find the same applies today. But are we restless for equality, for charity, for justice? Are we restless in our passion to ensure that our democracy remains healthy, that our would-be plutocrats don’t get too fat and powerful, that our liberties remain available to all, and that we never embarrass ourselves in dealings overseas?

I wonder. But I recognize my biases. I recognize my utopianism. That’s why I want to hear from de Tocqueville. I don’t trust the talking heads on TV to put the basic facts about our society in perspective. We need a profound, objective thinker who’s willing to take on the big questions about our political and economic system and our culture. And then we need to listen to what s/he says. I’m guessing he or she will tell us that we’re plenty restless when it comes to our own material prosperity and the prosperity and status of our own children. But when it comes to the higher ideals of a democracy, perhaps we’ve grown a bit too lazy. And perhaps, the world is starting to take notice of the results.