Like so many other Americans of his generation he migrated westward and was admitted to the bar in Nashville, Tennessee, where he practiced law and entered into politics, serving in the Tennessee state senate. One of the most prominent statesmen of his era, Thomas Hart Benton was born near Hillsboro, North Carolina, in 1782, and attended Chapel Hill College, which later became the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Two decades later, however, in his memoir, Thirty Years’ View, Benton attacked what he considered de Tocqueville’s misinterpretation of American democracy.

At the time that de Tocqueville observed the two houses, Missouri senator Thomas Hart Benton stood among those eloquent advocates that he admired. The vulgarity of the House was the result of its direct election by the people, while the elevation of the Senate resulted from its indirect election through state legislatures, which shielded them from the “petty passions” of democracy. “The Senate is composed of eloquent advocates, and statesmen of note, whose language would at all times do honor to the most remarkable parliamentary debates of Europe.” De Tocqueville attributed the difference to the manner of election of the two houses. In the House, de Tocqueville was dismayed by what he called the “vulgar demeanor” of the members, whom he regarded as obscure individuals: “village lawyers, men of trade, or even persons belonging to the lower classes of society.” The visitor found the Senate more to his liking. Capitol in 1832, he sat in the galleries of the House and Senate to watch American democracy in action. When the French aristocrat Alexis de Tocqueville visited the U.S.

Tocqueville democracy