Myrdal and Tocqueville on the American Creed and black Americans

Myrdal and De Tocqueville

Gunner Myrdal was an outsider peeking into American society around the 1940s, when segregation in the South was law and "separate but equal" status was conferred upon African-Americans. As an economist, Myrdal focused on the long-term impacts of slavery on the socio-economic conditions of the South, in both black and white communities. While his conclusions point out the disparaging and devastating effects of slavery on the African-American population, Myrdal's suggestions for minimizing the black population in America are radical and astounding. His book An American Dilemma: The Negro Problem and Modern Democracy, impacted the American legal system, as the author indicated how the American creed and constitution were not being "lived up to." Myrdal was referring to clauses in the Constitution regarding equality for all persons: Myrdal witnessed the failure of this ideal. Alexis de Tocqueville penned his work Democracy in America a century earlier than Myrdal, and wrote while slavery was still in effect in the United States. In the chapter section entitled, "Situation Of The Black Population In The United States, And Dangers With Which Its Presence Threatens The Whites," De Tocqueville notes that "the destiny of the negroes is in some measure interwoven with that of the Europeans." He cites slavery as an "evil" and a "calamity" that goes against Christian ideals. His view is therefore similar to that of Myrdal, who criticizes the secular government more so than Christianity but who nevertheless notes that the African-American community, and by extension the white community in America, suffers greatly as a result of slavery. Moreover, both authors attest that, as de Tocqueville states, "You may set the negro free, but you cannot make him otherwise than an alien to the European."

Both Myrdal and de Tocqueville therefore acknowledge that slavery has left so deep a scar on the American psyche that perhaps the only way to heal slavery's wounds is to extricate black people from American society, to liberate them from the continued bondages of racism and poverty that continue in spite of abolition. Myrdal proposes an insipid removal process, using birth control among other methods to "slowly" remove the African-American population from American soil. His suggestions, however astonishing, might not have been intentionally racist; Myrdal might have simply been acknowledging the cultural and ethnic differences that distinguish African-American from European-American people as de Tocqueville does. De Tocqueville acknowledges "the irreconcilable differences which separate the negro from the European in America." Moreover, he predicted that "the prejudice which repels the negroes seems to increase in proportion as they are emancipated." Myrdal's observations of the Jim Crow-era South attest to the accuracy of de Tocqueville's predictions.