Tom Paine and Revolutionary America

by Eric Foner

Since its publication in 1976, Tom Paine and Revolutionary America has been recognized as a classic study of the career of the foremost political pamphleteer of the Age of Revolution, and a model of how to integrate the political, intellectual, and social history of the struggle for American independence.
Foner skillfully brings together an account of Paine's remarkable career with a careful examination of the social worlds within which he operated, in Great Britain, France, and especially the United States. He explores Paine's political and social ideas and the way he popularized them by pioneering a new form of political writing, using simple, direct language and addressing himself to a reading public far broader than previous writers had commanded. He shows which of Paine's views remained essentially fixed throughout his career, while directing attention to the ways his stance on social questions evolved under the pressure of events. This enduring work makes clear the tremendous impact Paine's writing exerted on the American Revolution, and suggests why he failed to have a similar impact during his career in revolutionary France. It also offers new insights into the nature and internal tensions of the republican outlook that helped to shape the Revolution.
In a new preface, Foner discusses the origins of this book and the influences of the 1960s and 1970s on its writing. He also looks at how Paine has been adopted by scholars and politicians of many stripes, and has even been called the patron saint of the Internet.

Genres: History, Biography, Nonfiction, American Revolution, American History, American, Politics

368 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1976

About the author

Eric Foner is DeWitt Clinton Professor of History at Columbia University, where he earned his B.A. and Ph.D. In his teaching and scholarship, Foner focuses on the Civil War and Reconstruction, slavery, and nineteenth-century America. His Reconstruction: America’s Unfinished Revolution, 1863–1877, won the Bancroft, Parkman, and Los Angeles Times Book prizes and remains the standard history of the period. His latest book published in 2010 is The Fiery Trial: Abraham Lincoln and American Slavery.

In 2006 Foner received the Presidential Award for Outstanding Teaching at Columbia University. He has served as president of the Organization of American Historians, the American Historical Association, and the Society of American Historians.

Reviews

[Tim · Rating 2 out of 5]

Focuses primarily on social and political situation in revolutionary Philadelphia. As such, it is an interesting commentary. It is not a very long book, but it did get tiring.

[Ainsley · Rating 3 out of 5]

Good, if you’re into early American economic debates (I am, sort of)

[Adrian Velasquez · Rating 3 out of 5]

Thomas Paine was a prominent figure of Revolutionary America. This book sums up the, life of one of the most quirky radicals of his time. Thomas Paine had a huge impact of early America, having written paper like Common Sense or The Crisis. After the war, he moved to France where he wrote papers like The Rights of Man, that stimulated the French Revolution, and The Age of Reason, his attack on the religion of his time. After The Age of Reason, Paine was hated. In old age he grew bitter and died being thought of as a success by few, and a failure by many.

In my opinion, this book was ok. I was never drawn into it like other books in the past have done to me. At times, the book ran dry with uninteresting facts and back story. On the other hand, it was somewhat interesting to learn more about a Revolutionary figure that I have studied in school before. All in all, I appreciated the information that I got out of it, but found it at times dry and boring.

When thinking of who to recommend this book to, the word patience comes to mind. Unless you are extremely interested in history, I would not see many kids reading this book. One would need lots of patience to get through the dull and even depressing (the end) part of the book. This book seems very centered towards adults and not children. Teenagers would most likely not appreciate this book in its fullest like they would when they're adults.

[Drew · Rating 5 out of 5]

A very good overview of the world that Paine inhabited. I think that some go into this book hoping for a biography and were disappointed, but I thoroughly enjoyed the dive into the political economy of Philadelphia and the class divisions that influenced the movement for a democratic Pennsylvania (which in turn influenced how Paine thought). And then, seeing how Paine's radical artisan base that sustained him and his ideology in America was changed by the wartime conditions and eventually repressed in the later French revolution was very interesting. I wish there was more that I could say, but it has been some time since I finished the book, all I can say is that if you want to look at Tom Paine AND Revolutionary America this is your book, but if you are looking for Tom Paine IN Revolutionary America, I am sure that you can find a personal biography that delves into Paine's life more and the economic and social conditions that shaped Paine's thought less.

[Bernard English · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not exactly a straight up biography of Paine, as one can tell from the title. And although the title says "America," Foner focuses especially on Philadelphia and Pennsylvania because that's where Paine first arrived from England and spent most of time in America. But his importance, as detailed by Foner,  goes way beyond his involvement with the American Revolution. He was already an activist in England, attacking monarchy and the non-existent British constitution. He was even one of only two foreign members of the French National Convention and as a result of his involvement with the revolution ended up in Luxembourg Prison for about a year. The other member, the German Cloots, was executed. And a Brit pushing the American revolution couldn't have been a safe venture either, had the colonists lost. 

Just the above few points show what a man of action Paine was--he took a stand at great personal risk to himself in places where he could be excused for not even going. On top of that, he was a very effective writer. Perhaps because of his non-aristocratic background, he wrote in a style which engaged the working classes, or as Foner more often calls them, artisans. Foner says he "literally transformed the political language" with his Common Sense which has been called "the most brilliant pamphlet written during the American Revolution, and one of the most brilliant pamphlets ever written in the English language" as quoted by Foner. His style was such that it was read by "all sorts of people."
Paine has strong views not only on political freedom and democracy but also on economics and finance, having written a "Dissertation on Government; the Affair of the Bank; and paper Money" in February 1786. He saw quite clearly the connection between paper money and inflation, even declaring that "any legislator who proposed a law for legal tender paper money should be sentenced to death." He was generally in favor of business and thought the "self-regulating market" far superior to the traditional "just price" theory, a holdover from the Middle Ages. He usually blamed the government for poverty and unemployment. As a revenue officer in Britain, Paine's personal experience helped him "to see into the numerous and various distresses which the weight of taxes even at that time of day occasioned" according to Foner.
Though die-hard free marketers are not so fond of central banks, Paine did support Robert Morris's bank of North America, justifying his stance by claiming the bank would be a "bulwark" against state issued paper money and that the bank would promote national development and internal improvements such as roads and bridges. This was part of Paine's "American republican empire" as Foner calls his vision.
Another milestone in Paine's career and I suppose in social theory is Paine's call for social welfare as introduced in the Rights of Man, Part Second. Foner says it's "as close to a welfare state as could be imagined in the eighteenth century." Therein he calls for progressive taxes and a system of social security enabling workers to retire at sixty, public jobs and unemployment relief for those who need it. Paine has a clear sense that the money could come from the savings available if the government "ceased conducting wars."
Finally, towards the end of his life, many shunned Paine due to his open deism, in his Age of Reason (the "Bible" of American deists, writes Foner), a subject which had previously been broached only among the educated and not so publicly. After a long absence, he arrived in America in 1802 to a "torrent of abuse from the Federalist press." The mixed feelings towards Paine are neatly shown by the resolution of one Jeffersonian party: "May his Rights of Man be handed down to our latest posterity, but may his Age of Reason never live to see the rising generation." Even Jefferson "gently severed their relationship." It's hard to believe that of all his anti-establishment writings it was criticism of the bible and Christianity which caused so many to turn away from Paine. He was, I suppose a political liability. Only six mourners attended his funeral, according to Foner.
But as Paine himself said, "a share in two revolutions is living to some purpose." I have no idea how to rank him in importance to the founding fathers but my gut feeling is that he was as important, and more importantly, as right on issues, as any of them. And in terms of taking personal risks, outdid all of them. Foner's book is a wonderful snippet of revolutionary America and of Thomas Paine.

[Brett Dulle · Rating 3 out of 5]

I have an old library copy of this book, and according to the spine this is a biography. If this is a biography, it is not a traditional or very in depth biography. This is really a history of a radical political movement in Philadelphia during the War of Independence. Thomas Paine is the center of the story, the figure who had connections with every strata of society in Philadelphia and whose influential pamphlet Common Sense, was widely read by citizens of every class background throughout the colonies. And while the book is focused on a history of the radical movement in Philadelphia, you do get coverage of the most important events in Paine's life and an analysis of his most influential works. The book is in fact bookended by two chapters which focus exclusively on Paine, one on his background in England before immigrating to America, and an epilogue on his return to Europe and eventual return to America. The book is well written and kept my interest while reading, however in the end it is a minor work. There is a good analysis of the various classes in Philadelphia and the development of a radical political agenda opposed to inherited wealth and in favor of a wide franchise. However there is no comparative component, no sense of how radical was Philadelphia's radical movement, and when Paine leaves America there is no real follow up on how those radical ideas were transformed or altered. We know that when he left for Europe the old political parties in Philadelphia were changing and later we are told that the radical state constitution of Pennsylvania that was adopted during the war was nurtured sometime in the 1790's but exactly how and why is not explained.Thus in the end I felt like I didn't get a through history of the radical movement or a good sense of why it was important. It is like Foner took an essay he wrote about Philadelphia's radical movement and thought head it out to book length by combining the essay with a biography of Thomas Paine. Still, I did think it was interesting and worthwhile read.

[Julio The Fox · Rating 4 out of 5]

Thomas Paine was the original American enfant terrible, upsetting everybody in the cause of liberty. A pamphleteer of genius, Paine resettled in America from England on the eve of the Revolution, made friends with Benjamin Franklin, wrote an article calling for the abolition of slavery his first time at Franklin's press, championed the rights of women, coined the phrase "The United States of America", quarreled with George Washington, went back to England where he was tried in abstentia for libel, fled to revolutionary France and got himself elected to the National Assembly, jailed by the Jacobins and expelled to the U.S. once more. Phew! Eric Foner concentrates on Tom Paine the champion of the American artisan class, pro-capitalist when it came to abolishing the last traces of a regulated economy, for instance fixed prices for products, and anti-capitalist when it came to opposing the rising merchant and planter magnates who dominated the Constitutional Convention of 1787. Paine was, in sum, the most radical figure America could produce before the birth of an industrial working class. Foner's writing is not always clear and precise as in his later RECONSTRUCTION, 1863-1877, but he does convince the reader the new United States could have pursued a more just society from the start.

[Jake · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a scholarly look at Paine and the times he lived in. It gives a thorough accounting of Philadelphia's political climate at the time of 'Common Sense' up to Paine's return to America at the end of his live and his anonymous death, after fighting for liberty his whole life. Dry but good.

[Jimmy Tarlau · Rating 3 out of 5]

I wouldn't call this a page turner. I found it interesting to read about Tom Paine's life from growing up in Britain, to his time in America, to his work in France (where ended up in jail). There is also a good deal about what Philadelphia was like in the revolutionary period. The problem is that the book is quite dry and it was some of a burden getting through it.

[Ian · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good social history, good biography, badly integrated.

Oh and blaming total lack of gendered analysis on the immaturity of the Women's History field in 1976, (as he did in the 2005 preface,) was pretty lame.

[Zac · Rating 4 out of 5]

A compelling history that should more thoroughly address the historiography of the debate on republicanism v liberalism in revolutionary America. Would recommend to those with a casual or professional interest in American history.

[Rusty · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good biography of the man behind "Common Sense."

[Daniel · Rating 4 out of 5]

An interesting assessment of Tom Paine, the fool.

[Mark Singer · Rating 5 out of 5]

Short but excellent work on the importance of Thomas Paine to the American Revolution.