Relevant classic texts (3) I just finished reading Alexis de Tocqueville’s Democracy in America for the first time. I read it over the past two years or so in weekly lunch meetings with my friend Bruce Sanborn. Carleton College’s Professor Larry Cooper, also a friend, served as our preceptor. We used the terrific edition translated, edited, and introduced by Harvey Mansfield and Delba Winthrop that is published by the University of Chicago Press. Like almost everyone who has ever read the book, Bruce and I are in awe of Tocqueville. Like readers in every generation, I think it seems to have been written for ours. I recommend Paul Rahe’s