In 1831, Alexis de Tocqueville was sent by the French government to investigate the American prison system. De Tocqueville took this opportunity to discover the democratic system and propose a very precise analysis of it. He published this one in two volumes, in 1835 and 1840, to describe and analyze the American system and democracy in general, pointing already to some of the abuses we know today. This edition offers in a single book the two volumes of De Tocqueville.