Two other aspects of American society forcibly attracted Tocqueville's attention. The first was that America was characterised by an equality of social conditions. There were no aristocrats and no masters, only employers and employees. The second was that there was no central government to speak of and that "localities manage their own affairs unfettered". "What strikes the traveller," he told Chabrol later in the year, "is the spectacle of a society that walks on its own, without benefit of a guide or a crutch."

When Tocqueville sailed home to France he was still uncertain about what he would make of his disordered notes and disconnected impressions. "I believe," he wrote modestly, "that if, upon my return I have the leisure, I might write something passable on the United States." How Tocqueville came to write something that was much more than passable is disclosed in the bilingual edition of Democracy in America, prepared by Eduardo Nolla and published by Liberty Fund at a bargain price for two large volumes. This is a major piece of scholarship which, through its meticulous reading of the original manuscript and its variants, fully reveals the complex layering and composition of Tocqueville's text. We can also see how Tocqueville came progressively to refine his argument, in the process discarding discussion of aspects of American society no longer suited to his purpose. 

Of his central themes, the most important was that in the United States it was the people who could be truly said to govern. Not only did they control the executive and legislative powers but, as Tocqueville noted, there existed "no lasting obstacles" to their prejudices, passions and interests. The result of this unlimited power was the tyranny of the majority. The originality of this tyranny lay in the fact that it left the body alone but enslaved the soul. 

There has long been debate about the differences in content and argument to be found in the two volumes of Democracy in America. Certainly the second volume was received with less acclaim and its frame of reference was without doubt more European. In particular Tocqueville identified another form of tyranny that reduced "each nation to being nothing more than a flock of timid sheep and industrious animals, of which government is the shepherd". Less brutal and milder than the forms of despotism that had come before, it would regulate and hinder, enervate and direct, prevent rather than destroy, provide for all our needs and facilitate all our pleasures. Under its tutelage citizens would lose the capacity to think, feel and act for themselves. The greatest cause of this new development, Tocqueville believed, was the industrialisation of the economy, the State coming to exercise ever more extensive functions and to employ more and more people.