American Aurora

by Richard N. Rosenfeld

  Wednesday, January 26, 1791. Today, the U.S. Senate receives a message from the president of the French National Assembly. The Annals report:

  A message was received from … the President of the National Assembly of France …

  Mr. President,

  The National Assembly has worn, during three days, mourning for Benjamin Franklin …

  The name of Benjamin Franklin will be immortal in the records of Freedom and Philosophy …

  It will be remembered that every success which he obtained in his important negociations [in France] was applauded and celebrated … all over France as so many crowns conferred on genius and virtue.

  Even then the sentiment of our rights existed in the bottom of our souls …

  At last the hour of the French has arrived;—we love to think that the citizens of the United States have not regarded with indifference our first steps towards liberty …

  We hope they will learn with interest the funeral homage which we have rendered to the Nestor of America.

  SIEYES, President.1637

  The U.S. Senate responds coldly to the message! U.S. Senator from Pennsylvania William Maclay writes today in his journal:

  A letter from the National Assembly of France, on the death of Franklin, was communicated from them and received [by the Senate] with coldness that was truly amazing. I can not help painting to myself the disappointment that awaits the French patriots … anticipating the complimentary echoes of our answers, when we, cold as clay, care not a fig for them, Franklin or freedom. We deserve—what do we deserve? To be d—–d!1638

  Thomas Jefferson:

  On the death of Dr. Franklin, the King & Convention of France went into mourning. So did the House of Reps. of the U.S.: the Senate refused. I proposed to General Washington that the executive department should wear mourning; he declined it …1639

  Wednesday, March 16, 1791. Today, Tom Paine’s extraordinary book The Rights of Man (Part One) appears in the bookstalls of England.1640 Excerpts:

  As it was impossible to separate the military events which took place in America from the principles of the American Revolution, the publication of those events in France necessarily connected themselves with the principles which produced them. Many of the facts were in themselves principles; such as the declaration of American independence and the treaty of alliance between France and America which recognized the natural right of man and justified resistance to oppression. The then Minister of France, Count Vergennes was not the friend of America … Count Vergennes was the personal and social friend of Dr. Franklin; and the Doctor had obtained, by his sensible gracefulness, a sort of influence over him …

  The situation of Dr. Franklin as Minister from America to France should be taken into the chain of circumstances … He was not the diplomatist of a court, but of a MAN. His character as a philosopher had been long established, and his circle of society in France was universal.

  Count Vergennes resisted for a considerable time the publication in France of the American [state] Constitutions, translated into the French language; but even in this he was obliged to give way to public opinion and a sort of propriety in admitting to appear what he had undertaken to defend. The American [state] Constitutions were to liberty what a grammar is to language: they define its parts of speech and practically construct them into syntax …

  When the war closed a vast reinforcement to the cause of liberty spread itself over France by the return of the French officers and soldiers [from America] …

  [French Finance Minister] M. Necker was displaced in May, 1781 … [T]he revenue of France … was become unequal to the expenditure … because the expenses [with the cost of helping the Americans] had increased; and this was the circumstance which the nation laid hold of to bring forward a revolution.1641

  [O]ne of the first works of the [French] National Assembly … published a Declaration of the Rights of Man …

  I. Men are born, and always continue, free and equal …

  II. The end of all political associations is the preservation of the natural and imprescriptible rights of man …

  III. The nation is essentially the source of all sovereignty …1642

  The two modes of government which prevail in the world are first, government by election and representation: Secondly, government by hereditary succession. The former is generally known by the name of republic; the latter by that of monarchy and aristocracy.

  Those two distinct and opposite forms erect themselves on the two distinct and opposite bases of Reason and Ignorance …

  [W]e have next to consider … that species of government which is called mixed government … A mixed government is an imperfect everything, cementing and soldering the discordant parts together … In mixed governments there is no responsibility: the parts cover each other till responsibility is lost … In this rotary motion, responsibility if thrown off from the parts, and from the whole …

  But in a well constituted republic … [t]he parts are not foreigners to each other, like democracy, aristocracy, and monarchy …1643

  Tuesday, April 26, 1791. Today, in Philadelphia, Thomas Jefferson sends a copy of Tom Paine’s Rights of Man to Jonathan Smith of Philadelphia, whose brother plans to publish an American edition of Paine’s work. Jefferson also sends Smith an accompanying note:

  Th: Jefferson presents his compliments … [H]e sends him Mr. Paine’s pamphlet. He is extremely pleased to find it will be reprinted here, and that something is at length to be publicly said against the political heresies which have sprung up among us. He has no doubt our citizens will rally a second time round the standard of Common Sense.1644

  In the end, Benny Bache will publish the first American edition of Tom Paine’s Rights of Man in the Aurora’s printshop.1645 To Thomas Jefferson’s surprise, however, Benny will choose to include Jefferson’s note. Thomas Jefferson:

  I thought no more of this … till the pamphlet appeared, to my astonishment with my note at the head of it … [By “political heresies”] I had in view certainly the doctrines of Davila. I tell the writer [John Adams] freely that he is a heretic, but certainly never meant to step into a public newspaper with that in my mouth …1646

  George Washington’s secretary, Tobias Lear, reports John Adams’ reaction to Tom Paine’s book:

  After a little hesitation, [Mr. Adams] laid his hand upon his breast, and said in a very solemn manner, “I detest that book and its tendency from the bottom of my heart.”1647

  Wednesday, April 27, 1791. Today, the Gazette of the United States publishes the last of Vice President Adams’ “Discourses on Davila”:

  Mankind had tried all possible experiment of elections of governors and senates … but they had almost unanimously been convinced that hereditary succession was attended with fewer evils than frequent elections. This is the true answer, and the only one, as I believe …

  Many are outraged at Adams’ monarchical and aristocratical preaching. John Adams:

  The rage and fury of the Jacobinical journals against these discourses [on Davila] increased as they proceeded, intimidated the printer, John Fenno, and convinced me that to proceed would do more hurt than good.1648

  No more “Discourses on Davila” will appear. Thomas Jefferson:

  Mr. Adams had originally been a republican. The glare of royalty and nobility, during his mission to England, had made him believe their fascination a necessary ingredient in government, and Shays’ rebellion, not sufficiently understood where he then was, seemed to prove that the absence of want and oppression was not a sufficient guarantee of order. His book on the American constitutions, having made known his political bias, he was taken up by the monarchical federalists in his absence, and, on his return to the U.S., he was by them made to believe that the general disposition of our citizens was favorable to monarchy. He here wrote his Davila, as a supplement to the former work …1649

  June, 1791. In Paris, Tom Paine writes the Marquis de Condorcet, Paris’ leading representative in the Constitu
ent Assembly:

  Being the citizen of a land that recognizes no majesty but that of the people, no government except that of its own representatives, and no sovereignty except that of the laws, I tender you my services in helping forward the success of those principles which honor a nation and contribute to the advancement of the entire world; and I tend them not only because my country is bound to yours by the ties of friendship and gratitude, but because I venerate the moral and political character of those who have taken part in the present enterprise …1650

  Wednesday, July 20, 1791. Today, in Philadelphia, the eighth of eleven newspaper articles anonymously signed “Publicola” appears in the Gazette of the United States (as well as other newspapers throughout the United States). These articles challenge Tom Paine’s Rights of Man and depreciate Paine’s vision of democracy. Everyone assumes “Publicola” is John Adams (resuming the heresies of his “Discourses on Davila”), but his son, John Quincy Adams, has been writing the “Publicola” articles (presumably with his father’s help). From today’s “Publicola”:

  VIII … Mr. Paine has undertaken to compare the English and French constitutions, upon the article of representation. He has of course admired the latter, and censured the former … To attempt to govern a nation like this, under the form of democracy, to pretend to establish over such beings a government which according to Rousseau is calculated only for a republic of Gods, and which requires the continual exercise of virtues beyond the reach of human infirmity, even in its best state; it may possibly be among the dreams of Mr. PAINE, but is what even the [French] National Assembly have not ventured to do …1651

  Saturday, September 27, 1791. Today, in proof of the inviolability of France’s new religious freedom, the Constituent Assembly removes all reservations upon Jews becoming citizens.1652

  Tuesday, September 30, 1791. Today, in Paris, the French Constituent Assembly adjourns. The French Constitution of 1791 is now operative and calls for a single-chamber French Legislative Assembly with the power to override any royal veto.1653

  Friday, October 7, 1791. Today, La Rochefoucauld addresses the new French Legislative Assembly on its single-chamber structure:

  Your most important debt perhaps is to justify your predecessors in the bold resolution they have taken for the nation in confiding the lawmaking authority to a single body. Franklin is the first to have proposed it and the citizens of Pennsylvania listened to his voice—but since that time … the powerful influences of ancient habits—have made them return to the complications of the British system of government. The National Constituent Assembly has seized upon this great idea; it has seen, moreover, in its adoption the inestimable advantage of cementing the principles of equality …1654

  Thursday, December 15, 1791. Today, almost three years after America adopted its new U.S. Constitution, more than two years after America inaugurated its first president, and a year and a half after France adopted Thomas Jefferson and the Marquis de Lafayette’s “Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen,” America finally ratifies ten amendments to its new Constitution. These we call the “Bill of Rights.” From the first five:

  FIRST ARTICLE: Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

  SECOND ARTICLE: A well regulated Militia being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.

  THIRD ARTICLE: No soldier shall, in time of peace be quartered in any house without the consent of the Owner, nor in time of war, but in a manner to be prescribed by law.

  FOURTH ARTICLE: The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause …

  FIFTH ARTICLE: No person … shall be … deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law …

  Thomas Jefferson:

  [M]y objection to the constitution was that it wanted a bill of rights, securing freedom of religion, freedom of the press, freedom from standing armies, trial by jury and a constant Habeas corpus act. Colo [nel] Hamilton’s was that it wanted a king and house of lords. The sense of America has approved my objection and added the bill of rights, not the king and lords.1655

  The Bill of Rights responds to many Americans, like Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin, who fear the federal government’s drift toward monarchy. The First Article prohibits the government from establishing a state church or restricting the free expression of ideas. The Second Article discourages the government from replacing citizen militias with a government army to hold the people in fear. The Third, Fourth, and Fifth Articles prohibit the government from wrongly intruding, through an army or otherwise, on the lives and property of the people.

  Thursday, February 9, 1792. Today, in London, Thomas Paine finishes Part Two of his Rights of Man, inscribing it to the Marquis de Lafayette “in Gratitude for your services to my beloved America.” Excerpts:

  With respect to the organization of the legislative power, … [i]n America, it is generally composed of two houses. In France it consists of but one …

  The objections against two houses are … [t]hat two houses arbitrarily checking or controlling each other is inconsistent; because it cannot be proved, on principles of just representation, that either should be wiser or better than the other. They may check in the wrong as well as in the right …1656

  I proceed in the next place to aristocracy.

  What is called the [British] House of Peers [Lords] … amounts to a combination of persons in one common interest. No reason can be given why a house of legislation should be composed entirely of men whose occupation consists in letting landed property than why it should be composed of those who hire, or of brewers, or bakers, or any other separate class of men …

  The only use to be made of this power (and which it has always made) is to ward off taxes from itself and throw the burden upon such articles of consumption by which itself would be least affected …

  Men of small or moderate estates are more injured by the taxes being thrown on articles of consumption than they are eased by warding it from landed property … They consume more of the productive taxable articles in proportion to their property than those of large estates …1657

  It has been customary to call the Crown the executive power, and the custom has continued, though the reason has ceased …

  [I]t is the laws that govern, and not the man.1658

  Saturday, June 16, 1792. Today, from the United States, Thomas Jefferson, now U.S. Secretary of State, writes the Marquis de Lafayette:

  Behold you then, my dear friend, at the head of a great army, establishing the liberties of your country against a foreign enemy … While you are exterminating the monster aristocracy, and pulling out the teeth and fangs of its associate, monarchy, a contrary tendency is discovered in some here. A sect has shewn itself among us who declare they espoused our new constitution … only as a step to an English constitution, the only thing good and sufficient in itself in their eye...1659

  Tuesday, June 19, 1792. Today, from the United States, U.S. Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson writes Tom Paine:

  I received with great pleasure the present of your pamphlets [six copies of Part Two of The Rights of Man] … Would you believe it possible that in this country there should be high and important characters who need your lessons in republicanism, and who do not heed them? It is but too true that we have a sect preaching up and panting after an English constitution of King, lords, and commons and whose heads are itching for crowns, coronets and mitres …1660

  Wednesday, September 19, 1792. Today, no longer safe from the British monarch in his native England, Tom Paine returns to Paris.1661 He is a popular figure in France. The Marquis de Condorcet has p
ublished Tom Paine’s views on a well-constituted government in the June–July issue of Chronique du Mois,1662 and, though Paine is not a French citizen, he has been chosen by four departments (districts) of France to represent them at the French National Convention (which opens in two days). As I write in my history,

  Thomas Paine, whose illustrious writings so much promoted the cause of freedom in the American revolution, and in his development of the deformity of the English government, had been elected by four departments, L’Aisne, L’Oise, Puy de Domme, and Pays de Calais; he chose the latter.1663

  Thursday, September 20, 1792. Today, at Valmy in France, the French army—singing “Ça Ira” (the song of the French Revolution which honors Benjamin Franklin and the American Revolution)—marches to a great victory over the Austrian and Prussian armies, which have entered France at the invitation of the French king. By inviting foreign armies to subdue his own people and to crush their democratic revolution, French King Louis XVI has sealed his fate.1664

  Saturday, September 22, 1792. Today, the French National Convention unanimously votes to end the monarchy in France, and today Tom Paine writes,

  You have before this time heard that the National Convention met punctual to the day appointed. The Members verified their powers on the 20th and met in Convention the 21st ult. The first business done was to abolish the bagatelle of Royalty which was decreed unanimously. This day, the Convention will appoint a Committee of Constitution to consist of nine Members who are to bring in a plan of the new Constitution. Affairs are turning round fast …1665