Investigation of de Tocqueville’s Appeals to Logos
In 1776, the United State's Founding Fathers signed a document which stated "that all men are created equal," and this equality became the foundation for the values of the new progressive nation. Yet young America’s notion of equality does not seem evident for the black slave population and Native American population. The concept of the American is vague in the early years of America. The French writer Alexis de Tocqueville explores and recounts his view of American society and race relations in the early 1830s in his book titled Democracy in America. In de Tocqueville’s book, the pre-Civil War Americans are described as "three races naturally distinct," who are somewhat "hostile to each other," (de Tocqueville, 269). In the eighteenth chapter…show more content… Tocqueville effectively uses appeals to logos to predict the demise of the Native American population. Throughout chapter eighteen, de Tocqueville discusses the Native American’s inability to "conform to civilization" (de Tocqueville, 278). Tocqueville constantly describes the Native Americans as 'barbarous savages' and describes their "savage course of life" as an "erratic life" (de Tocqueville, 282). The aforementioned savage lifestyle diminishes Native Americans more than the overpowering Europeans and according to de Tocqueville, the Native Americans are too much "weakened to offer an effectual resistance," (de Tocqueville, 277). Even without the Europeans subjugation of the Native Americans, de Tocqueville predicts the Native American population will gradually be depleted as a result of the Native American’s previously mentioned “savage course of life”(de Tocqueville, 278). Tocqueville uses logic to argue that the Native Americans will never be able to effectively fight off the white Europeans as a result of self-weakening from their