Them: Why We Hate Each Other--and How to Heal

by Ben Sasse

He observed that in town after town after town, people discovered something they needed or wanted to do, and they didn’t wait for the government to give them permission, or instructions, or funding. They just got together and did it. In the great book he published about his travels, Democracy in America, Tocqueville wrote: “Americans come together to hold celebrations, to build hotels, to erect churches, to start libraries, to send missionaries to every corner of the earth; they create hospitals, prisons, schools. They wrestle over difficult questions.” He made a pointed comparison: “Every job that in France would be done by the government or in England by some great noble, in America you can bet is being done by a group of volunteers.” At the heart of America, he observed, was a twofold spirit: of self-sufficiency and of neighborliness.