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> It’s an important distinction. Is it? New York City grew from 60,000-ish to 3 million from 1800 to 1900 - did a person from Europe that move to New York city

> It’s an important distinction. Is it? New York City grew from 60,000-ish to 3 million from 1800 to 1900 - did a person from Europe that move to New York city in 1816 or 1876 immigrate or settle? They were not getting 40 acre land grants!

rayiner 3y ago
That’s a fair point. New Amsterdam is a good example of a place that has long been a “city of immigrants.” But I’d submit that it’s not representative of America, and is in fact the opposite of the America Alexis de Tocqueville wrote about.
- tptacek 3y ago
  I think he'd disagree with you. In fact, he does, explicitly, and specifically about New York! But, serious question: who gives a shit about the America Alexis de Tocqueville wrote about?
  - rayiner 3y ago
    In a footnote to Chapter 9 of “Democracy in America”—addressing what maintains Republican government in America—de Tocqueville writes about Philadelphia and New York: “Also in [their] midst is found a multitude of Europeans pushed daily by misfortune and loose behavior to the shores of the New World; these men bring to the United States our worst vices, and they have none of the interests that could combat the inﬂuence of those vices. Inhabiting the country without being citizens, they are ready to take advantage of all the passions that agitate the country; consequently we have for some time seen serious riots break out in Philadelphia and New York. Such disorders are unknown in the rest of the country, which is not worried about them, because until now the city population has not exercised any power or any inﬂuence on the rural population. I regard the large size of certain American cities and above all the nature of their inhabitants, however, as a genuine danger that threatens the future of the democratic republics of the New World, and I am not afraid to predict that it is there that they will perish[.]” The America that de Tocqueville wrote about is America. At least, it’s the America that’s special and worthy of emulation. It’s a democratic America, where free, independent citizens engage in collective self-governance. New York City is the antithesis of that—a place where elites leverage ethnic conflict to garner votes, to control a population that mostly doesn’t have the tools or traditions necessary for self-government.
    - pvg 3y ago
      In 1831, the year of Tocqueville's visit, Nat Turner's rebellion took place in rural America, a part of what would eventually became the deadliest conflict in the republic's history and the closest it came to perishing. It has contrived to survive Tammany Hall and Gritty (so far).
    - JamisonM 3y ago
      You gotta pump the brakes on on the de Tocqueville worship buddy, I love the guy but he didn't unlock the secret of America, pastoralism was a fad at the time and he was as guilty of it as many others. (That said, do listen to these excellent radio shows about his time in America! https://www.cbc.ca/radio/ideas/tocqueville-s-america-revisited-part-1-1.3803726 https://www.cbc.ca/radio/ideas/tocqueville-s-america-revisit... ) > New York City is .. a place where elites leverage ethnic conflict to garner votes This is sort of an hilarious assertion at this moment in time.. I mean, elites didn't pick Eric Adams to be mayor of NYC.. they think he is a buffoon!

rayiner 3y ago

That’s a fair point. New Amsterdam is a good example of a place that has long been a “city of immigrants.” But I’d submit that it’s not representative of America, and is in fact the opposite of the America Alexis de Tocqueville wrote about.

tptacek 3y ago
I think he'd disagree with you. In fact, he does, explicitly, and specifically about New York! But, serious question: who gives a shit about the America Alexis de Tocqueville wrote about?
- rayiner 3y ago
  In a footnote to Chapter 9 of “Democracy in America”—addressing what maintains Republican government in America—de Tocqueville writes about Philadelphia and New York: “Also in [their] midst is found a multitude of Europeans pushed daily by misfortune and loose behavior to the shores of the New World; these men bring to the United States our worst vices, and they have none of the interests that could combat the inﬂuence of those vices. Inhabiting the country without being citizens, they are ready to take advantage of all the passions that agitate the country; consequently we have for some time seen serious riots break out in Philadelphia and New York. Such disorders are unknown in the rest of the country, which is not worried about them, because until now the city population has not exercised any power or any inﬂuence on the rural population. I regard the large size of certain American cities and above all the nature of their inhabitants, however, as a genuine danger that threatens the future of the democratic republics of the New World, and I am not afraid to predict that it is there that they will perish[.]” The America that de Tocqueville wrote about is America. At least, it’s the America that’s special and worthy of emulation. It’s a democratic America, where free, independent citizens engage in collective self-governance. New York City is the antithesis of that—a place where elites leverage ethnic conflict to garner votes, to control a population that mostly doesn’t have the tools or traditions necessary for self-government.
  - pvg 3y ago
    In 1831, the year of Tocqueville's visit, Nat Turner's rebellion took place in rural America, a part of what would eventually became the deadliest conflict in the republic's history and the closest it came to perishing. It has contrived to survive Tammany Hall and Gritty (so far).
  - JamisonM 3y ago
    You gotta pump the brakes on on the de Tocqueville worship buddy, I love the guy but he didn't unlock the secret of America, pastoralism was a fad at the time and he was as guilty of it as many others. (That said, do listen to these excellent radio shows about his time in America! https://www.cbc.ca/radio/ideas/tocqueville-s-america-revisited-part-1-1.3803726 https://www.cbc.ca/radio/ideas/tocqueville-s-america-revisit... ) > New York City is .. a place where elites leverage ethnic conflict to garner votes This is sort of an hilarious assertion at this moment in time.. I mean, elites didn't pick Eric Adams to be mayor of NYC.. they think he is a buffoon!