Part I, sections A–D, contains Tocqueville's correspondence with his American friends after the publication of Volume Two of Democracy in America. Although some of the letters that Tocqueville wrote to and received from his American colleagues and friends during this period were either lost or destroyed, the letters that have been preserved offer a comprehensive view of Tocqueville's sustained intellectual dialogue with his American correspondents after 1840.

Most of Tocqueville's letters collected in this volume were originally published in French, whereas several letters are new to our edition. However, with one exception, none of Tocqueville's letters to his American friends after 1840 have previously been translated into English. As for the letters that Tocqueville received from his American correspondents, they have not been published before in their entirety (either in France or elsewhere) and appear in print here for the first time. These letters have been collected from libraries in the United States (more information about the sources of the texts included here can be found in Appendix 3).

The majority of the letters received by Tocqueville from America after 1840 were written in English; a small number of them were originally written in French and have been translated for this edition. Some letters are available only as copies, the originals having been lost, and are to be found at Yale University's Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library.