Introduction

As readers of this volume will be aware by now, Theodore Sedgwick was one of Tocqueville's most faithful correspondents after 1840. Tocqueville first became acquainted with the Sedgwick family when he and Beaumont visited them in Stocksbridge, Massachusetts, in September 1831. His friendship with the young Theodore was sealed when the latter was appointed as an attaché to Edward Livingston, U. S. Minister to France, in 1833. After returning to New York in 1834, he established a successful legal practice and was later U. S. District Attorney of the southern district of New York.

Despite ill health and the exacting demands of his legal profession, Sedgwick was also a prolific author. In his day, he was best known for his Treatise on the Measure of Damages; or An Inquiry into the Principles Which Govern the Amount of Compensation Recovered in Suits at Law, a compilation of English and American statutory and case law first published in 1847. Sedgwick was also the author of Thoughts on the Proposed Annexation of Texas to the United States, in which he opposed annexation of the former independent republic on the grounds that it would weaken the Union by extending slavery and by reducing the nation's faith in constitutional law. Also worth noting is another book by Sedgwick entitled The American Citizen: His True Position, Character and Duties, where, in Tocquevillian tones, he proclaimed that “the true greatness” of America lay “in the equal condition of its people, and in the exercise of those virtues which forever flow from that equal condition.