Tony's comments (member since Mar 18, 2009)

Tony's comments from the History of the American Revolution group.

Hi Jeffrey.
I'm currently half-way through Benjamin Franklin by Edmund S. Morgan. It's my first full treatment of Franklin, as some of the other books I've read on the Revolution thus far only dedicate a chapter or two to him (Ellis' Founding Brothers and Wood's Revolutionary Characters). You may find Morgan's work interesting since Franklin spent a good bit of time in Britain in the 1760's & 70's working "behind the scenes" trying to strike a balance between Parliament's right to govern and the colonies' right to resist. Franklin loved Britain, and he long envisioned a powerful Anglo-American empire of equals, with America being the future center of that empire. The book covers the British perspective of the Revolution to the extent that it examines Franklin's interactions with key players on both sides, in his struggle to make corrections and right the wrongs. So you may find it insightful.

Just wanted to briefly share this analysis from Gordon S. Wood, since I just started reading "Revolutionary Characters: What Made the Founders Different".

Page 35:
To be sure, he was conventionally liberal on matters of religion ("being no bigot myself to any mode of worship"), and though he went to church regularly to keep up decorum, he was not an emotionally religious person. He rarely mentioned Christ in his writings, and he usually referred to God as "the great disposer of human events." But Washington had no dislike of the clergy, or of organized Christianity as Jefferson did. He would never have said, as Jefferson did, that "our civil rights have no dependence on our religious opinions, any more than our opinions on physics or geometry." He came to believe devoutly that God or Devine Providence was looking after man's affairs, including his participation in the Revolutionary War. He was also convinced, as he declared in his Farewell Address, that religion was an indispensable prop for both morality and republican government.

Although this sheds little light on the question of the Valley Forge Prayer (and we know that the Farewell Address was written mostly by Hamilton, who revised much of Madison's 1792 draft, all with Washington's approval of course), I found it interesting nonetheless.

Revolutionary Characters What Made the Founders Different