Marx, Tocqueville, and Race in America

While Alexis de Tocqueville described America as the 'absolute democracy, ' Karl Marx saw the nation as a 'defiled republic' so long as it permitted the enslavement of blacks. August J. Nimtz argues that Marx, unlike Tocqueville, not only recognized that the overthrow of slavery and the cessation of racial oppression were central to democracy's realization but was willing to act on these convictions.