From 1839 to 1848, Tocqueville, elected
and reelected from Valognes, sat without interruption in the Chamber of
Deputies, where he constantly voted with the constitutional opposition.
His nature was too sensitive and his health too delicate to enable him
to hold a foremost place as orator in the debates of this period. His
habits of mind were, moreover, those of a writer rather than of a public
speaker. But the firmness and moderation of his principles and the
clearness and justice of his opinions secured for him a general respect,
and gave weight and influence to his counsels. "In 1839, having been
named reporter on the proposition relative to the abolition of slavery
in the colonies, he succeeded," says his biographer, "not only in
tracing with an able and sure hand the great principles of justice and
of humanity which should lead on the triumph of this holy cause, but
also, by words full of respect for existing interests and acquired
rights, in preparing the government and the public mind for a
concession, and the colonists for a compromise." He was frequently
intrusted with the duty of reporting on other projects of the first
importance; but special labors of this sort did not prevent him from
taking broad and large views of the political and moral tendencies of
the time, and of forecasting with clear insight the results of the
measures of the government and of the influences at work upon the
people.
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