The idealistic veteran of the American Revolution wanted Poland to take the lead in freeing Europe’s serfs. By 1788 the winds of change that blasted through the United States and swirled around France were hovering over Poland. Just as America’s Founding Fathers left their farms to convene the Continental Congress in Philadelphia to cut ties with the British monarch, Polish and Lithuanian landlords left their farms to convene the Seym in Warsaw’s royal castle to cut ties with the Russian monarch.
