SOURCE: "Tocqueville's Misreading of America, America's Misreading of Tocqueville." The Tocqueville Review IV, No. I, (Spring-Summer 1982): 5-22.

In the following paper, presented at Hobart and William Smith Colleges' Tocqueville's American Journey: A Sesquicentennial Symposium, Pessen claims that Tocqueville's judgments of American life were more often based on preconceptions than observations.

I am delighted to have been invited to participate in this celebration of Alexis de Tocqueville. For, as a conscientious worker, I have interpreted the invitation as a summons to reread Democracy in America. What a pleasure to lose oneself in a book of such wisdom, originality of interpretation, intellectual boldness, sweep, erudition, wisdom, and felicity of style, particularly after having recently endured, as book reviewer, books so crabbed in theme and manner of telling as to induce physical as well as mental pain! As the few of you likely to be familiar with my publications will know...