Image above and transcript below from the original letter at the Library of Congress

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New Rochelle (N.Y) Sep 30 ’05

Dear Sir

I write you this letter entirely on my own account, and I begin it without ceremony.

In the year 84 or 5 a motion was made in the legislature of Virginia for making an acknowledgement to me for voluntary services during the revolution. The bill, as I am informed, for that purpose, passed two readings and was lost on the third reading by three votes. The acknowledgement proposed to be given was a tract of land, called, as I have been told, the secretary’s tract, which I suppose is since disposed of, but I wish the matter to be brought over again and I think it ought to be.

After the State of Rhode Island had refused complying with the five per cent duty recommended by Congress and the State of Virginia had repealed the Act she had passed to grant it, I saw no possibility of going on otherwise than by authorizing Congress to make laws for the Union in all cases that were to extend equally over all the states, and I wrote to Chancellor Livingston, minister for foreign affairs, and Robert Morris minister of finance in the winter of 81-2 on the subject. The proposal in the letter, was, to add a continental legislature to Congress. The Idea took with them at once. But as this would be called encreasing the power of Congress, and as I intended taking up the subject when I should see the Country wrong enough to be put right, it was best, on that account, to leave it to the States individually to make me what acknowledgement they pleased, and it was on this ground that the state of New York made me a present of a farm worth at that time about a thousand pound (York currency) and the state of Pennsylvania voted me five hundred pounds, but the state of Virginia having negatived the grant she had proposed to make me, on the recommendation of Genl Washington, the matter went no further with any of the States.

I suggest another Idea, which is, that as only two of the states have made me any acknowledgement, that Congress take up the subject for the whole (I suppose the two States who have made me an acknowledgement will not object to this) and grant me a tract of land that I can make something of. Had it not been for the economy and extreme frugality with which I have lived I should at this time of life be in an unpleasant situation. But I wish you to be assured that whatever event this proposal may take it will make no alteration in my principles or my conduct. I have been a volunteer to the world for thirty years without taking profits from anything I have published in America or in Europe. I have relinquished all profits that those publications might come cheap among the people for whom they were intended.

Yours in friendship

Thomas Paine

P. S. If any further explanation be wanted I will communicate it

From the original pamphlet of 1805.

To the Citizens of Pennsylvania on the Proposal for Calling a Convention

I resided in the capital of your State (Philadelphia) in the “time that tried men’s souls,” and all my political writings, during the Revolutionary War, were written in that city, it seems natural for me to look back to the place of my political and literary birth, and feel an interest for its happiness. Removed as I now am from the place, and detached from everything of personal party, I address this token to you on the ground of principle, and in remembrance of former times and friendships.

The subject now before you is the call of a Convention to examine and, if necessary, to reform the constitution of the state; or to speak in the correct language of constitutional order, to propose written articles of reform to be accepted or rejected by the people by vote, in the room of those now existing, that shall be judged improper or defective. There cannot be, on the ground of reason, any objection to this; because if no reform or alteration is necessary, the sense of the country will permit none to be made; and if necessary, it will be made because it ought to be made. Until, therefore, the sense of the country can be collected, and made known by a convention elected for that purpose, all opposition to the call of a convention not only passes for nothing, but serves to create a suspicion that the opposers are conscious that the Constitution will not bear an examination.

The constitution formed by the convention of 1776, of which Benjamin Franklin (the greatest and most useful man America has yet produced) was president, had many good points in it which were overthrown by the Convention of 1790, under the pretense of making the constitution conformable to that of the United States; as if the forms and periods of election for a territory extensive as that of the United States is, could become a rule for a single state.

The principal defect in the constitution of 1776, was, that it was subject in practice, to too much precipitancy, but the ground work of that constitution was good. The present constitution appears to me to be clogged with inconsistencies of a hazardous tendency, as a supposed remedy against a precipitancy that might not happen. Investing any individual, by whatever name or official title he may be called, with a negative over the formation of the laws, is copied from the English government, without ever perceiving the inconsistency and absurdity of it, when applied to the representative system, or understanding the origin of it in England.

The present form of government in England and all those things called prerogatives of the Crown, of which this negative power is one, was established by conquest and not by compact. Their origin was the conquest of England by the Normans under William of Normandy, surnamed the Conqueror, in 1066, and the genealogy of its kings takes its date from him. He is the first of the list. — There is no historical certainty of the time when parliaments began; but be the time when it may, they began by what are called grants or charters from the Norman conqueror or his successors to certain towns, and to counties, to elect members to meet and serve in parliament (1) subject to his controul; and the custom still continues with the king of England calling the parliament my parliament;” that is a parliament originating from his authority and over which he holds controul in right of himself, derived from that conquest. It is from this assumed right, derived from conquest, and not from any constitutional right by compact, that kings of England hold a negative over the formation of the laws; and they hold this for the purpose of preventing any being enacted that might abridge, invade, or in any way affect or diminish what they claim to be their hereditary or family rights and prerogatives, derived originally from the conquest of the country. (2) This is the origin of the king of England’s negative. It is a badge of disgrace which his parliaments are obliged to wear, and to which they are abject enough to submit.

But what has this case to do with a legislature chosen by freemen on their own authority, in right of themselves? Or in what manner does a person stiled governor or chief magistrate, resemble a conqueror subjugating a country, as William of Normandy subjugated England, and saying to it you shall have no laws but what I please? The negativing power in a country like America, is of that kind, that a wise man would not choose to be embarrassed with it, and a man fond of using it will be overthrown by it. It is not difficult to see that when Mr. M’Kean negatived the arbitration act he was induced to it as a lawyer, for the benefit of the profession, and not as a magistrate for the benefit of the people; for it is the office of a chief magistrate to compose differences and prevent law suits. If the people chuse to have arbitration instead of law suits, why should they not have them? It is a matter that concerns them as individuals and not as a state or community; and is not a proper case for a governor to interfere in, for it is not a state or government concern; nor does it concern the peace thereof, otherwise than to make it more peaceable by making it less contentious.

This negativing power in the hands of an individual ought to be constitutionally abolished. It is a dangerous power. There is no prescribing rules for the use of it. It is discretionary and arbitrary; and the will and temper of the person at any time possessing it, is its only rule.

There must have been great want of reflection in the convention that admitted it into the constitution. Would that convention have put the constitution it had formed (whether good or bad) in the power of any individual to negative? It would not. It would have treated such a proposal with disdain. Why then did it put the legislatures thereafter to be chosen, and all the laws in that predicament? Had that Convention, or the law members thereof, known the origin of the negativing power used by kings of England, from whence they copied it, they must have seen the inconsistency of introducing it into an American constitution. We are not a conquered people; we know no conqueror; and the negativing power used by kings in England is for the defence of the personal and family prerogative of the successors of the conqueror against the parliament and the people. What is all this to us? We know no prerogatives but what belong to the sovereignty of ourselves.

At the time this constitution was formed, there was a great departure from the principles of the revolution, among those who then assumed the lead, and the country was grossly imposed upon. This accounts for some inconsistencies that are to be found in the present constitution, among which is the negativing power inconsistently copied from England. While the exercise of the power over the state remained dormant it remained unnoticed; but the instant it began to be active it began to alarm; and the exercise of it against the rights of the people to settle their private pecuniary differences by the peaceable mode of arbitration, without the interference of lawyers, and the expence of tediousness of courts of law, has brought its existence to a crisis.

Arbitration is of more importance to society than courts of law, and ought to have precedence of them in all cases of pecuniary concerns between individuals or parties of them. Who are better qualified than merchants to settle disputes between merchants, or who better than farmers to settle disputes between farmers? And the same for every other description of men. What do lawyers or courts of law know of these matters? They devote themselves to forms rather than to principles; and the merits of the case become obscure and lost in a labyrinth of verbal perplexities. — We do not hear of lawyers going to law with each other, tho’ they could do it cheaper than other people — which shows they have no opinion of it for themselves.

The principle and rule of arbitration ought to be constitutionally established. The honest sense of a country collected in convention will find out how to do this without the interference of lawyers who may be hired to advocate any side of any cause; for the case is, the practice of the bar is become a species of prostitution that ought to be controuled. It lives by encouraging the injustice it pretends to redress.

Courts in which law is practiced are of two kinds. The one for criminal cases; the other for civil cases; or cases between individuals respecting property of any kind or the value thereof. I know not what may be the numerical proportion of these two classes of cases to each other; but that the civil cases are far more numerous than the criminal cases I make no doubt of. Whether they be ten, twenty, thirty or forty to one, or more, I leave to those who live in the state, or in the several counties thereof, to determine.

But be the proportion what it may, the expence to the public of supporting a judiciary for both will be in some relative degree according to the number of cases the one bears to the other; yet it is only one of the that the public, as a public, have any concern with.

The criminal cases, being breaches of the peace, are consequently under the cognizance of the government of the state, and the expence of supporting the courts thereof belongs to the public, because the preservation of the peace is a public concern.

But civil cases, that is, cases of private property between individuals, belong wholly to the individuals themselves; and all that government has consistently to do in the matter, is to establish the process by which the parties concerned shall proceed and bring the matter to decision themselves, by referring it to impartial and judicious men of the neighbourhood, of their own chusing. — This is by far the most convenient, as to time and place, and the cheapest method to them; for it is bringing justice home to their own doors without the chicanery of law and lawyers. — Every case ought to be determined on its own merits, without the farce of what are called precedents, or reports of cases; because, in the first place, it often happens that the decision upon the case brought as a precedent is bad and ought to be shunned instead of imitated; and, in the second place, because there are no two cases perfectly alike in all their circumstances, and therefore the one cannot become a rule of decision for the other. It is justice and good judgment that preside by right in a court of arbitration. It is forms, quoted precedents, and contrivances for delay and expense to the parties, that govern the proceedings of a court of law.

By establishing arbitrations in the room of courts of law for the adjustment of private cases, the public will be eased of a great part of the expence of the present judiciary establishment: for certainly such a host of judges, associate judges, presidents of circuits, clerks and criers of courts, as are at present supported at the public expence will not then be necessary. There are, perhaps, more of them than there are criminals to try in the space of a year. — Arbitration will lessen the sphere of patronage, and it is not improbable that this was one of the private reasons for negativing the arbitration act; but public economy, and the convenience and ease of the individuals, ought to have outweighed all such considerations. The present Administration of the United States has struck off a long list of useless officers and economised the public expenditures, and it is better to make a precedent of this than to imitate its forms and long periods of election which require reform themselves.

A great part of the people of Pennsylvania make a principle of not going to law, and others avoid it from prudential reasons; yet all those people are taxed to support a judiciary to which they never resort, which is as inconsistent and unjust as it is in England to make the Quakers pay tithes to support the Episcopal Church. Arbitration will put an end to this imposition.

Another complaint against the constitution of Pennsylvania is the great quantity of patronage annexed to the office of governor.

Patronage has a natural tendency to encrease the public expence by the temptation it leads to (unless in the hands of a wise man like Franklin) multiply offices within the gift or appointment of that patronage. John Adams, in his administration, went upon the plan of encreasing offices and officers. He expected by thus encreasing his patronage, and making numerous appointments, that he should attach a numerous train of adherents to him who would support his measures and his future election. He copied this from the corrupt system of England; and he closed his midnight labours by appointing sixteen new unnecessary judges, at an expence to the public of thirty-two thousand dollars annually. John counted only on one side of the case. He forgot that where there was one man to be benefited by an appointment, that all the rest had to pay the cost of it; and that by attaching the one to him by patronage, he run the risk of losing the many by disgust, and such was the consequence; and such will ever be the consequence in a free country, where men reason for themselves and from themselves, and not from the dictates of others.

The less quantity of patronage a man is incumbered with, the safer he stands. He cannot please every body by the use of it; and he will have to refuse, and consequently to displease, a greater number than he can please. Mr. Jefferson gained more friends by dismissing a long train of officers, than John Adams did by appointing them. Like a wise man, Mr. Jefferson dismantled himself of patronage.

The constitution of New York, tho’ like all the rest it has its defects, arising from want of experience in the representative system of government at the time it was formed, has provided much better, in this case, than the constitution of Pennsylvania has done. The appointments in New York are made by a council of appointment composed of the governor and a certain number of members of the senate taken from different parts of the state. By this means they have among them a personal knowledge of whomsoever they appoint. The governor has one vote but no negative. I do not hear complaints of the abuse of this kind of patronage.

The constitution of Pennsylvania, instead of being an improvement in the representative system of government, is a departure from the principles of it. It is a copy in miniature of the government of England, established at the conquest of that country by William of Normandy. I have shewn this in part in the case of the king’s negative, and I shall shew it more fully as I go on. This brings me to speak of the senate.

The complaint respecting the senate is the length of its duration, being four years. The sage Franklin has said, “Where annual election ends tyranny begins:” and no man was a better judge of human nature than Franklin, nor has any man in our time exceeded him in the principles of honor and honesty.

When a man ceases to be accountable to those who elected him, and with whose public affairs he is entrusted, he ceases to be their representative, and is put in a condition of being their despot. He becomes the representative of nobody but himself. “I am elected, says he, for four years; you cannot turn me out, neither am I responsible to you in the mean time. All that you have to do with me is to pay me.” — The conduct of the Pennsylvania Senate in 1800, respecting the choice of electors for the presidency of the United States, shews the impropriety and danger of such an establishment. The manner of choosing electors ought to be fixed in the constitution, and not be left to the caprice of contention. It is a matter equally as important, and concerns the rights and interests of the people as much as the election of members for the state Legislature, and in some instances much more. By the conduct of the senate at that time the people were deprived of their right of suffrage, and the State lost its consequence in the union. It had but one vote. The other fourteen were paired off by compromise. Seven and seven. If the people had chosen the electors, which they had a right to do, for the electors were to represent them and not to represent the senate; the state would have had fifteen votes which would have counted.

The senate is an imitation of what is called the house of lords in England, and which Chesterfield, who was a member of it, and therefore knew it, calls it “the hospital of incurables.” The senate in Pennsylvania is not quite an hospital of incurables, but it took almost four years to bring it to a state of convalescence.

Before we imitate any thing, we ought to examine whether it be worth imitating, and had this been done by the convention at that time, they would have seen that the model from which their mimic imitation was made, was no better than unprofitable and disgraceful lumber.

There was no such thing in England as what is called the house of lords, until the conquest of that country by the Normans under William the conqueror, and like the king’s negative over the laws, it is a badge of disgrace upon the country; for it is the effect and evidence of its having been reduced to unconditional submission.

William having made the conquest, dispossessed the owners of their lands, and divided those lands among the chiefs of the plundering army he brought with him, and from hence arose what is called the house of LORDS. Daniel de Foe, in his historical satire, entitled, “The true-born Englishman,” has very concisely given the origin and character of this house, as follows:

The great invading Norman let them know

What conquerors, in after times, might do;

To every musqueteer he brought to town,

He gave the lands that never were his own —

He cantoned out the country to his men,

And every soldier was a denizen;

No parliament his army could disband,

He raised no money, for he paid in land.

The rascals, thus enriched, he called them Lords,

To please their upstart pride with new made words

And doome-day book his tyranny records;

Some shew the sword, the bow, and some the spear,

Which their great ancestor, forsooth, did wear;

But who the hero was, no man can tell,

Whether a colonel or a corporal;

The silent record blushes to reveal

Their undescended dark original;

Great ancestors of yesterday, they shew,

And Lords, whose fathers were — the Lord knows who!

This is the disgraceful origin of what is called the house of lords in England, and it still retains some tokens of the plundering baseness of its origin. The swindler Dundas was lately made a lord, and is now called noble lord! Why do they not give him his proper title, and call him noble swindler! for he swindled by wholesale. But it is probable he will escape punishment; for Blackstone, in his commentary on the laws, recites an act of parliament passed in 1550, and not since repealed, that extends what is called the benefit of clergy, that is, exemption from punishment for all clerical offences to all lords and peers of the realm, who could not read, as well as those who could, and also for “the crimes of house-breaking, highway-robbing, horse-stealing and robbing of churches. This is consistent with the original establishment of the house of lords, for it was originally composed of robbers. This is aristocracy. This is one of the pillars of John Adams’s “stupendous fabric of human invention.” A privilege for house breaking, highway robbing, horse stealing and robbing of churches! John Adams knew but little of the origin and practice of the government of England. As to constitution it has none.

The Pennsylvania convention of 1776 copied nothing from the English government. It formed a constitution on the basis of honesty. The defect, as I have already said of that constitution, was the precipitancy to which the legislatures might be subject in enacting laws. All the members of that legislature established by the constitution, sat in one chamber and debated in one body, and thus subjected them to precipitancy. But this precipitancy was provided against, but not effectually. The constitution ordered that the laws, before being finally enacted, should be published for public consideration. But as no given time was fixed for that consideration, nor any means for collecting its effect, nor were there then any public news papers in the state but what were printed in Philadelphia, the provision did not reach the intention of it, and thus a good and wise intention sank into mere form, which is generally the case when the means are not adequate to the end.

The ground work, however, of that constitution was good, and deserves to be resorted to. — Every thing that Franklin was concerned in producing merits attention. He was the wise and benevolent friend of man. Riches and honors made no alternation in his principles or his manners.

The constitution of ’76 was conformable to the Declaration of Independence and the declaration of rights, which the present constitution is not; for it makes artificial distinctions among men in the right of suffrage, which the principles of equity know nothing of; neither is it consistent with sound policy. We every day see the rich becoming poor and those who were poor before becoming rich. Riches, therefore, having no stability, cannot and ought not to be made a criterion of rights. Man is man in every condition of life, and the varieties of fortune and misfortune are open to all.

Had the number of representatives in the legislature, established by that constitution, been encreased, and instead of their sitting together in one chamber and debating and voting all at one time, to have divided by lot into two equal parts and sat in separate chambers, the advantage would have been, that one half by not being entangled in the first debate, nor having committed itself by voting, would be silently possessed of the arguments, for and against, of the former part and be in a calm condition to review the whole. And instead of one chamber, or one house, or by whatever name they may be called, negativing the vote of the other, which is now the case, and which admits of inconsistencies even to absurdities, to have added the votes of both chambers together, and the majority of the whole to be the final decision. There would be reason in this, but there is none in the present mode. The instance that occurred in the Pennsylvania senate in the year 1800 on the bill for choosing electors, where a small majority in that house controuled and negatived a large majority in the other house, shews the absurdity of such a division of legislative power.

To know if any theory or position be true or rational, in practice, the method is, to carry it to its greatest extent; if it be not true upon the whole, or be absurd, it is so in all its parts however small. For instance,

If one house consists of two hundred members and the other fifty, which is about the proportion they are in some of the states, and if a proposed law be carried on the affirmative in the larger house with only one dissenting voice, and be negatived in the smaller house by a majority of one, the event will be, that twenty-seven controul and govern two hundred and twenty-three, which is too absurd even for argument, and totally inconsistent with the principles of representative government, which know no difference in the value and importance of its members but what arises from their virtues and talents, and not at all from the name of the house or chamber they sit in.

As the practice of a smaller number negativing a greater is not founded in reason we must look for its origin in some other cause.

The Americans have copied it from England, and it was brought into England by the Norman conqueror, and is derived from the ancient French practice of voting by ORDERS, of which they counted three; the clergy (that is, Roman catholic clergy) the noblesse (those who had titles) and the tiers etat, or third estate,(3) which included all who were not of the two former orders, and which in England are called the commons, or common people, and the house in which they are represented is from thence called the house of commons.

The case with the conqueror was, in order to complete and secure the conquest he had made, and hold the country in subjection, he cantoned it out among the chiefs of his army, to whom he gave castles and whom he dubbed with the title of lords as is before shewn. These being dependent on the conqueror, and having a united interest with him, became the defenders of his measures, and the guardians of his assumed prerogative against the people; and when the house called the commons house of parliament began by grants and charters from the conqueror and his successors, these lords claiming to be a distinct ORDER from the commons, though smaller in number, held a controuling, or negativing vote over them, and from hence arose the irrational practice of a smaller number negativing a greater.

But what are these things to us, or why should we imitate them? We have but one ORDER in America, and that of the highest degree, the ORDER OF SOVEREIGNTY, and of this ORDER every citizen is a member of his own personal right. Why then have we descended to the base imitation of inferior things? By the event of the revolution we were put in a condition of thinking originally. The history of past ages shew scarcely any thing to us but instances of tyranny and antiquated absurdities. We have copied some of them and experienced the folly of them.

Another subject of complaint in Pennsylvania is the judiciary, and this appears to require a thorough reform. Arbitration will of itself reform a great part, but much will remain to require amendment.

The courts of law still continue to go on, as to practice, in the same manner as when the state was a British colony. They have not yet arrived at the dignity of independence. They hobble along by the stilts and crutches of English and antiquated precedents. Their pleadings are made up of cases and reports from English law books; many of which are tyrannical, and all of them now foreign to us. Our courts require to be domesticated, for as they are at present conducted, they are a dishonor to the national sovereignty. Every case in America ought to be determined on its own merits, according to American laws, and all reference to foreign adjudications prohibited. The introduction of them into American courts serves only to waste time, embarrass causes, and perplex juries. This reform alone will reduce cases to a narrow compass easily understood.

The terms used in courts of law, in sheriff’s sales, and on several other occasions in writs, and other legal proceedings, require reform. Many of those terms are Latin, and others French. The Latin terms were brought into Britain by the Romans, who spoke Latin, and who continued in Britain between four and five hundred years, from the first invasion of it by Julius Caesar, fifty-two years before the christian era. The French terms were brought by the Normans when they conquered England in 1066, as I have before shewn, and whose language was French.

These terms being still used in English law courts, shew the origin of those courts, and are evidence of the country having been under foreign jurisdiction. But they serve to mystify, by not being generally understood, and therefore they serve the purpose of what is called law, whose business is to perplex; and the courts in England put up with the disgrace of recording foreign jurisdiction and foreign conquest, for the sake of using terms which the clients and the public do not understand, and from thence to create the false belief that law is a learned science, and lawyers are learned men. The English pleaders, in order to keep up the farce of the profession, always compliment each other, though in contradiction, with the title of my learned brother. Two farmers or two merchants will settle cases by arbitration which lawyers cannot settle by law. Where then is the learning of the law, or what is it good for?

It is here necessary to distinguish between lawyer’s law, and legislative law. Legislative law is the law of the land enacted by our own legislators chosen by the people for that purpose. Lawyer’s law is a mass of opinions and decisions, many of them contradictory to each other, which courts and lawyers have instituted themselves, and is chiefly made up of law-reports of cases taken from English law books. — The case of every man ought to be tried by the laws of his own country which he knows, and not by opinions and authorities from other countries, of which he may know nothing. A lawyer in pleading, will talk several hours about law, but it is lawyer’s law, and not legislative law, that he means.

The whole of the judiciary needs reform. It is very loosely appointed in most of the states, and also in the general government. The case, I suppose, has been, that the judiciary department in a constitution has been left to the lawyers, who might be in a convention, to form, and they have taken care to leave it loose. To say, that a judge shall hold his office during good behaviour, is saying nothing; for the term good behaviour, has neither a legal nor a moral definition. In the common acceptation of the term it refers rather to a style of manners, than to principles, and may be applied to signify different and contradictory things. A child of good behaviour, a judge of good behaviour, a soldier of good behaviour in the field, and a dancing master of good behaviour in his school, cannot be the same good behaviour. What then is the good behaviour of a judge?

Many circumstances in the conduct and character of a man may render him unfit to hold the office of a judge, yet not amount to cause of impeachment, which always supposes the commission of some known crime. Judges ought to be held to their duty by continual responsibility, instead of which the constitution releases them from all responsibility except by impeachment, from which, by the loose, undefined establishment of the judiciary, there is always a hole to creep out. In annual elections for legislators, every legislator is responsible every year, and no good reason can be given why those entrusted with the execution of the laws should not be as responsible, at stated periods, as those entrusted with the power of enacting them.

Releasing the judges from responsibility is in imitation of an act of the English parliament for rendering the judges so far independent of what is called the crown as not to be removable by it. The case is, that judges in England are appointed by the crown, and are paid out of the king’s civil list, as being his representatives when sitting in court; and in all prosecutions for treason and criminal offences, the king is the prosecutor. It was therefore reasonable that the judge, before whom a man was to be tried, should not be dependent for the tenure of his office on the will of the prosecutor. But this is no reason that in a government founded on the representative system, a judge should not be responsible, and also removable by some constitutional mode, without the tedious and expensive formality of impeachment. We remove or turn out presidents, governors, senators and representatives without this formality. Why then are judges, who are generally lawyers, privileged with duration? It is, I suppose, because lawyers have had the formation of the judiciary part of the constitution.

The term, “contempt of court,” which has caused some agitation in Pennsylvania, is also copied from England; and in that country it means contempt of the king’s authority or prerogative in court, because the judges appear there as his representatives, and are stiled in their commissions, when they open a court, “his majesty the king’s justices.“

This, now, undefined thing, called contempt of court, is derived from the Norman Conquest of England, as is shewn by the French form of words used in England, with which proclamation for silence “on pain of imprisonment,” begins, “Oyez, Oyez, Oyez.” (4) This shews it to be of Norman origin. It is, however, a species of despotism; for contempt of court is now anything a court imperiously pleases to call so and then it inflicts punishment as by prerogative without trial, as in Passmore’s case, which has a good deal agitated the public mind. This practice requires to be constitutionally regulated, but not by lawyers.

Much yet remains to be done in the improvement of constitutions. The Pennsylvania convention, when it meets, will be possessed of advantages which those that preceded it were not. The ensuing convention will have two constitutions before them; that of ’76, and that of ’90, each of which continued about fourteen years. I know no material objection against the Constitution of ’76, except, that in practice, it might be subject to precipitancy; but this can be easily and effectually remedied as the annexed essay, respecting “constitutions, governments and charters” will shew. But there have been many and great objections and complaints against the present constitution and the practice upon it, arising from the improper and unequal distribution it makes of power.

The circumstance that occurred in the Pennsylvania senate in the year 1800, on the bill passed by the house of representatives for choosing electors, justifies Franklin’s opinion, which he gave by request of the convention of ’76, of which he was president, respecting the propriety or impropriety of two houses negativing each other. “It appears to me, said he, like putting one horse before a cart and the other behind it, and whipping them both. If the horses are of equal strength, the wheels of the cart, like the wheels of government, will stand still; and if the horses are strong enough, the cart will be torn to pieces.” It was only the moderation of good sense of the country, which did not engage in the dispute raised by the senate, that prevented Pennsylvania from being torn to pieces by commotion.

Inequality of rights has been the cause of all the disturbances, insurrections and civil wars that ever happened in any country, in any age of mankind. It was the cause of the American Revolution, when the English Parliament sat itself up to bind America in all cases whatsoever, and to reduce her to unconditional submission. It was the cause of the French Revolution, and also of the civil wars in England, in the time of Charles and Cromwell, when the house of commons voted the house of lords useless.

The fundamental principle in representative government, is, that the majority governs; and as it will be always happening that a man may be in the minority on one question, and in the majority on another, he obeys by the same principle that he rules. But when there are two houses of unequal numbers, and the smaller number negativing the greater, it is the minority that governs which is contrary to the principle. This was the case in Pennsylvania in 1800.

America has the high honor and happiness of being the first nation that gave to the world the example of forming written constitutions by conventions elected expressly for the purpose, and of improving them by the same procedure, as time and experience shall shew necessary. Government in other nations, vainly calling themselves civilized, has been established by bloodshed. — Not a drop of blood has been shed in the United States in consequence of establishing constitutions and governments by her own peaceful system. — The silent vote, or the simple yea or nay, is more powerful than the bayonet, and decides the strength of numbers without a blow.

I have now, citizens of Pennsylvania, presented you in good will with a collection of thoughts and historical references condensed into a small compass that they may circulate the more conveniently. They are applicable to the subject before you, that of calling a convention, in the progress and completion of which I wish you success and happiness, and the honor of shewing a profitable example to the states around you and to the world.

Yours in friendship,

THOMAS PAINE.

New-Rochelle, New York.

Footnotes:

French for “hear ye, hear ye, hear ye.”

Parliament is a French word, brought into England by the Normans. It comes from the French verb parler — to speak.

When a king of England (for they are not an English race of kings) negatives an act passed by the parliament, he does it in the Norman or French language, which was the language of the conquest the literal translation of which is, the king will advise himself of it. It is the only instance of a king of England speaking French in parliament; and shews the origin of the negative.

The practice of voting by orders in France whenever the states general met, continued until the late revolution. It was the present Abbe Sieves who made the motion, in what was afterwards called the national assembly, for abolishing the vote by orders, and established the rational practice of deciding by a majority of numbers.

From the original letter at the Historical Society of Pennsylvania.

N. Rochelle July 31 ’05

Citizen

I received yours of the 26 Inst. in answer to mine of the 19th. I see that Cheetham has left out the part respecting Hamilton and Mrs. Reynolds but for my own part I wish it had been in. Had the story never been publicly told I would not have been the first to tell it; but Hamilton has told it himself and therefore it was no secret, but my motive in introducing it was because it was applicable to the subject I was upon, and to shew the revilers of Mr. Jefferson that while they are affecting a morality of horror at an unproved and unfounded story about Mr. Jefferson they had better look at home, and give vent to the horror, if they had any at a real case of their own Dagon and his Delilah of a thousand dollars. It was not introduced to expose Hamilton for Hamilton had exposed himself, and that from a bad motive, a disregard of private character. “I do not (said Hamilton to Mrs. Harris), “I do not care a damn about my private character. It is my public character only that I care about.” The man who is a good public character from craft, and not from moral principle, if such a character can be called good, is not much to be depended on. Cheetham might as well have put the part in, as put in the reasons for which he left it out. Those reasons leave people at liberty to suspect that the part suppressed related to some new discovered criminality in Hamilton, worse than the old story.

I am glad that Palmer and Foster have got together. It will greatly help the cause on. I enclose a letter I received a few days since from Groton in Connecticut. The letter is well written and with a good deal of sincere enthusiasm. The publication of it would do good but there is an impropriety in publishing a man’s name to a private letter. You may shew the letter to Palmer and Foster. It is very likely they may know the writer, as Groton is about five or six miles from Stonington where Mr. Foster lived, and where, I believe, Mr. Palmer has some relations. As there is not an expression in the letter that renders it unfit for publication provided the name be omitted, or the initials J__ C__ be put in the room of it, I, for one, agree to the publication of it. It will serve to give confidence to those who are not strong enough in the true faith to throw off the mask of hypocrisy, as is the case in Connecticut, and there is no one vice that is more destructive to morals than this yanky-town vice, hypocrisy, is. – If the concluding paragraph be omitted, and the address at the top be in the plain style as I have put it, it will lose the appearance of a private letter. I have put out the word Sir in three or four places. Cheetham can have no reasonable objection against publishing it. It is a letter without offence, and he has some atonement to make for what was in his paper the winter before last, about the “mischievous writings of Thomas Paine.” If you give the letter to Cheetham, I wish him to return it to you after he has used it, or you to call for it.

I am glad you have seen Mr. Barret; but it is very extraordinary that you had not seen him before, for certainly a man in business is always to be found though he may not be always at home the first time. Your former letter might have been interpreted to signify that he kept out of sight, for you had called at least a dozen times.

It is certainly best that Mrs. Bonneville go into some family as a teacher, for she has not the least talent of managing affairs for herself. She may send Bebee up to me, I will take care of him for his own sake and his fathers, but this is all I have to say.

Remember me to my much respected friend Carver and tell him I am sure we shall succeed if we hold on. We have already silenced the clamour of the priests. They act now as if they would say, let us alone and we will let alone — You do not tell me if the Prospect goes on. As Carver will want hay he may have it of me, and pay when it suits him; but I expect he will take a ride up some Saturday afternoon and then he can chuse for himself.

I am master of an empty house or nearly so. I have six chairs and a table, a straw-bed, a feather-bed and a bag of straw for Thomas, a tea kettle, an Iron pot, an Iron baking pan, a frying pan, a gridiron, cups, saucers, plates and dishes, knives and forks, two candle sticks and a pair of snuffers. — I have a pair of fine oxen and an ox-cart, a good horse, a chair, and a one-horse cart, a cow, and a sow and 9 pigs. When you come you must take such fare as you meet with, for I live upon Tea, milk, fruit pies, plain dumplings, and a piece of meat when I get it; but I live with that retirement and quiet that suit me. Mrs. Bonneville was an encumbrance upon me all the while she was here, for she would not do anything, not even make an apple-dumpling for her own Children. – If you can make yourself up a straw bed, I can let you have blankets and you will have no occasion to go over to the Tavern to sleep. –

As I do not see any federal papers, except by accident, I know not if they have attempted any remarks, or criticisms on my 8th letter, the piece on Constitutions, Governments and Charters, the two numbers on Turner’s letter, and also the piece to Hulbert. As to anonymous paragraphs it is not worth noticing them. I consider the generality of such Editors only as a part of their press and let them pass.

I want to come to Morrisana, and it is probable I may come on to N. Y. but I wish you to answer this letter first.

Yours in friendship

Thomas Paine

Another Callender — THOMAS TURNER OF VIRGINIA — No. I

from the American Citizen, July 23 & 24, 1805.

Federalism and blackguardism are synonimous terms. A man of Virginia who signs himself Thomas Turner (if any body knows him) has written a letter to some nobody or other in Massachusetts (if any body knows such a person) for the purpose of defaming Mr. Jefferson. The letter has been published in that repository of filth, the Repertory, printed somewhere in the federal purlieus of Yanky town.

As I sometimes amuse myself with dissecting impostors and hypocrites and putting the parts together again in their proper form, I have thrown away an hour or two, having nothing else at that time to do, in examining the component parts of this putrid production of Thomas Turner.

There is not a worse character in life than that of a mischief-making black hearted man. It is a disposition that leads to every thing that disturbs the peace of society. It works under ground like a mole, and having thrown up its little mole-hills of dirt, blows them with its pestifrous breath into mountains. This is evidently the character of this co-partner of Callender, Thomas Turner. Who he is the Lord knows, for his name is not known in the list of patriots. If one may hazard a guess at him from the jaundiced complexion of his letter, and the circumstances of the case, he is some petty-fogging attorney like that hypocritical dabbler in dirt Hulbert, of Sheffield, Massachusetts, and that they are correspondents, or in other words, two skunks who stink in concert; for Hulbert’s speech, and Turner’s letter are alike.

I will now examine the charges he brings in his letter against Mr. Jefferson, and shew, that while they prove the vile disposition of the writer, they amount to nothing against Mr. Jefferson, but on the contrary add to the opinion the public have of his integrity. The first charge is as follows:

“At the time Petersburgh (Virginia) was occupied by the British troops under the command of the generals Phillips and Arnold,” (observe, reader, the qualified toryism of the man, for it is by little inadvertencies that great scoundrels are first discovered). “At the time, says he, Petersburgh was occupied by the British troops under the command of the GENERALS PHILLIPS AND ARNOLD.” A man who had the proper feelings of an American would have said, “at the time Petersburgh was occupied by the enemy under the command of the British general Phillips and the traitor Arnold;” but this did not suit Turner’s creed; “Mr. Jefferson, says he, who was then Governor of the state, did participate in the partial consternation (it was undoubtedly partial, for the tories were not in any consternation about it), and did abandon the seat of government.” This is the first charge.

Now, if the circumstances of the times, of which Mr. Jefferson was himself the Judge, and not this runagate, rendered it proper for him, as Governor of the state, to remove from Richmond he did what was his duty to do, and in so doing he did right. In the year ’76 Congress sat at Philadelphia, and according to Turner’s phrase and inference Philadelphia was then the seat of government, and Congress ought not to have abandoned it. — But when the enemy penetrated the Jersies and approached towards the Delaware, Congress removed to Baltimore; the next year they removed to Lancaster, and from thence to York-Town, in Pennsylvania. It is nonsense to talk about a seat of government when a county is invaded. The seat of government then is wherever government sit. Perhaps in a village; perhaps in a farm house; perhaps in a barn; perhaps, in the open air. — Pray how much does Pitt and Dundas give this ignoramus for making a public fool of himself?

Turner’s second charge is of the same character with his first; malignant and impotent. — “The sequel, says he, of Mr. Jefferson’s conduct after the assembly returned to Charlotteville, and on the approach of Col. Tarlton to that place, (so then the Assembly also had abandoned Richmond) stands attested by thousands of witnesses and can never be forgotten by those of his country-men who respect the character of a firm and virtuous public officer, and who abhor that of a dastardly traitor to the trust reposed in him.” On reading this terrible introductory passage of alarm one would expect that some most enormous crime was to be announced, nothing less than that governor Jefferson, like Gen. Arnold, had come over to the enemy. No such thing, but directly the contrary. “Mr. Jefferson’s retreat (says Turner) or rather flight from Monticello (Mr. Jefferson’s residence in Virginia) on the information that Tarlton had penetrated the country, and was advancing to Charlotteville; was effected with such hurried abruptness as to produce a fall from his horse and a dislocation of the shoulder.” (Now if any one was a traitor in this affair it must have been the horse for having thrown his rider and dislocated his shoulder, that the forces who were after him might be able to come up with him.) In this situation (continues Turner, that is, with his shoulder dislocated) “Mr. Jefferson proceeded about 60 miles south to the county of Bedford whence he forwarded his resignation to the Assembly, who had, in the mean time, removed to Staunton (so the Assembly has also retreated) and who thereupon, that is, on Mr. Jefferson’s resignation, elected General Nelson Governor.” Turner having told this most wonderful tale concludes it by assuring his brother skunk of Massachusetts, that “these circumstances are substantially and literally true.”

Now, would any one but a half-witted malignant torified Paltroon, one who has not sense enough to know how to do mischief, have told this story for the purpose of defaming Mr. Jefferson, when even from his own manner of telling it, it shews Mr. Jefferson’s patriotism and integrity. The state of Virginia being then invaded, it was most proper that a military man should be at the head of its affairs, and Mr. Jefferson had never made the study and use of arms his profession; and besides this, the dislocation of his shoulder had rendered him unfit for any thing of active life. In this state of things he did what an honest patriot ought to do, that is, make room for another person by sending in his resignation — a mere skunk, such as Turner has proved himself to be, would have acted a different part. He would have gone over to the “British troops,” or if he could not do this, would have shut himself up in his chamber, or kept his bed, done nothing, continued drawing his salary as Governor in the mean time, and perhaps charged the state with the surgeon’s bill, on the plea that he received his injury in the public service of his country and ought to have a pension settled on him for life, and if they did not do this he would join Gen. Arnold and make Virginia smart for it. Thus much for Turner’s second charge.

His third charge relates to some pecuniary assistance Mr. Jefferson gave to Callender in his distress. The charge is introduced by the following preamble.

“Mr. Jefferson’s encouragement of Callender and his rewarding that miscreant for the blackest effusions of the blackest calumny that ever escaped the envenomed pen of a villain, are circumstances, as well known in Richmond, and as capable of positive proof, as is the circumstances of his having delivered an inaugural speech or any thing else of the most public notoriety.” This paragraph is in the highest stile of envenomed blackguardism; and it is first necessary to know to what publication of Callender Turner applies this language, for it is by knowing this, that we come at the political character of Turner and of the gang to which he belongs.

Callender began his career in this country by publishing a work on the atrocities of the English system of government, and the ruinous measures copied from thence and adopted in this country during the wretched administration of John Adams. The work has some merit both as to matter and composition; but it has no merit with a tory nor with any conspirator concerned in the treasonable project of bringing over a foreign royal blackguard to be king of America. It is to this work of Callender that Turner applies his abuse. We now know what Turner is.

As to Callender, the case is, that under the character of a distressed patriot of some talents, though he turned out to be a scoundrel, afterwards, he made his case known to Mr. Jefferson who assisted him, according to Turner’s account, with fifty dollars at one time, and fifty more afterwards. All this is to Mr. Jefferson’s credit. But such miscreants as Turner, viewing every thing through the perverting fog of toryism, make good, evil; and evil, good; for the work that Callender was then publishing was against toryism. Turner, as if in proving the public spirited benevolence of Mr. Jefferson was proving something against him, assures us, fool-like, that it is true, and appeals to Mr. Davis of Richmond as evidence that Mr. Jefferson did actually assist Callender, that is, when he was publishing his work against toryism, with an hundred dollars.

(This is most probably the same Davis, for birds of a feather will flock together, that circulated a forgery done by Donald Frazer, a Scotch school-master in William Street, N. York, and entitled “The Recantation of Thomas Payne.” The case is concisely as follows: — Mr. Paine was not in America when it was done, and Frazer hearing after Mr. Paine’s return that he intended to prosecute him for the forgery, put on a face of brass and went to Mr. P. last winter at New-York to make his confession which he did in the following manner, several persons being present: — “Sir, said Frazer, I came over to this country in the war to fight the rebels; but I was put in prison; and when I got out, wanting something to do, I set up for a fencing master; but a Frenchman came and set up against me, and he soon shewed that I was no fencing master. Then, sir, I turned Clergyman and set out to preach, but there were others that out-preached me and I had to give up preaching. After several adventures I became a School-master; at last a lucky thought came in my head to turn author, and write your Recantation; and I got more money by it than I did by preaching and fencing, for I cleared between seventy and eighty dollars. — The work had not much sale in New-York for the people soon knew it was not yours. But I sent four hundred copies to my friend Davis in Virginia, and he sold them all as your genuine work.”) If Turner’s Davis is the same as Donald Frazer’s Davis, there is a pretty gang of them.

This much for Turner’s third charge. — The baseness of this man consists in a villainous misrepresentation of every circumstance he relates. Mr. Jefferson’s quitting Richmond, when the state was invaded (for the legislature also quitted it) and his quitting afterwards his own house (for the legislature at the same time quitted Charlotteville) are stated by this man as crimes; whereas they were necessary precautions to preserve the official papers and orders of the government from falling into the hands of the enemy; and Mr. Jefferson’s resignation of the office of Governor after the dislocation of his shoulder, to make room for General Nelson, was disinterested patriotism. The assistance also given to Callender, at the time it was done, and for the purpose for which it was done, that of enabling him to get out his work against toryism, was a praise worthy act — Callender afterwards turned a scoundrel and then expiated his crime by drowning himself; and the world, Turner, will be rid of another scoundrel if thou wilt go and do so likewise.

No. II

In the former number I showed the villainous misrepresentations of this co-partner of Callender, Thomas Turner of Virginia, in the three first calumnious charges he brings in his letter, against Mr. Jefferson. Before I proceed further I will make some remarks respecting that letter.

In the first place it does not appear that Turner supposed his letter would be published or that he intended it should. He wrote it to set somebody else on; for he says in the conclusion of his letter, “If you (the person to whom it was written) find occasion you are at liberty to make use of my name in this business (that is in the business of blackguarding Mr. Jefferson) but if not necessary I have no particular inclination to appear in it.” The inference from this is, you may use my name verbally, by word of mouth, but not publish my letter.

The letter, as far as circumstances justify the conjecture, was written to that hypocritical imposter Hulbert, of Sheffield in Massachusetts, for Hulbert’s speech in the legislature of that once respectable state is a detail of all the blackguardism in this letter. The person, however, to whom it was written is evidently the person who sent it for publication in the Repertory. He speaks of himself in the first person, the self-important pronoun I, but without letting the reader know who I is, and he introduces the letter with a preface of his own, beginning with the following sentence — “The various charges which have been advanced against Mr. Jefferson, and which, from a complete conviction of their truth I pledged myself to support, instead of silencing the head-strong advocates of the distinguished profligate (the writer of this deserves to have his head broke) have produced nothing but a torrent of personal abuse.” He has good luck that it did not produce a personal horse-whipping.

We find by this doleful confession that Hulbert’s unprincipled speech and infamous abuse of Mr. Jefferson has recoiled upon himself, and that to lessen the severity of the stroke he turns traitor to his prompter, Turner, and publishes his letter, which he calls a communication from Thomas Turner, Esq. of Virginia, “A gentleman of very respectable character and whose veracity will not be questioned.” It would make even a surly Diogenes laugh to hear two scoundrels vouching for each other’s veracity. I now return to an examination of Turner’s letter.

Turner’s fourth calumny is a tale about Mrs. Walker, who, if now living, must be upwards of sixty years of age; a tale, of which the public knows no fact, and is possessed of no evidence. The tale, however, is badly told, and swelled with such improbabilities as to render it distortedly ridiculous like a mite in a microscope. We have heard of a ten years siege of Troy; but who ever heard of a ten years siege to seduce? — and what is equally as wonderful, that a woman should keep it a secret ten years. “Ten years (says Turner and then repeats it in capitals) TEN YEARS, was Mr. Jefferson repeatedly and assiduously making attempts which were as repeatedly and with horror repelled.” There could not be much horror in the case or it would have killed any woman in less than a tenth part of that time.

Neither will it be easy to find any ten years of Mr. Jefferson’s life that could be thus devoted. It could not be within the last thirty years; for he drew up the Declaration of Independence in ’76 and Congress was then at Philadelphia. He was Governor of Virginia when it was invaded, and Turner himself has shewn he had then no stationary residence and had quitted his own plantation. After the war he went as minister to France; returned about the year eighty eight and was secretary of state at Philadelphia. When John Adams was President Mr. Jefferson was Vice-President at Washington and since that time President. Where, then, is this ten years to be placed? If liars ought to have good memories, manufacturers of Romance ought at least to consul possibilities.

But, says Turner, I have seen the original correspondence between Mr. Walker and Mr. Jefferson. Perhaps what he saw, if he saw any, was as original and as genuine as the forged recantation of Thomas Paine. But admitting it to be what he calls it, what does his seeing it amount to? He has not given a single verbatim extract from it, which he certainly would have done if he had seen it, and if the correspondence had contained what he insinuates. Instead of this, he makes Mr. Jefferson express a sentiment that is highly honourable, for he makes him to say (I suppose he means in a letter to Mr. Walker) that “he shall never cease to revere and attest the purity of Mrs. Walter’s character.” This, though malignantly intended by Turner, redounds to Mr. Jefferson’s honour; for there is not a case in the social circle of life in which a man appears more a man, or more a man of honour, than when he vindicates the reputation of a woman unjustly accused or censured on his account. But Turner seems to have no other idea of a woman than as an animal, and to be insensible and incapable of that chaste and sentimental respect a man may conceive for a woman on account of her virtues and excellencies. He must therefore be unfit to be trusted with the society of any woman of character. This story, hackneyed as it is, has the appearance of being fabricated from some trifling circumstance, or some mistake, or to have originated in some family dispute with which the public has no concern, and all that we discover by it, is the malignant, unjust and hateful spite of faction. The story will never lose Mr. Jefferson a friend, or a vote; but the malicious misrepresentations with which it is told may gain him many.

As a general rule, we may take it for granted, and that with as few exceptions as any general rule will admit of, that private character is the foundation of public character, and that where public character is uniformly honourable and upright, and that for a great length of time, the private character will be found the same. The country has had experience of Mr. Jefferson for thirty years in the various situations of member of Congress, foreign minister, secretary of state, vice-president, and President, in all which the breath of detraction has not dared to approach him. With this public testimony of fact in his favour the villainous detraction of private individual libellers recoil on themselves.

Turner comes next to another tale, a tale about a black, or rather, he says, a mulatto Sally, for he seems not to know which it is, nor any thing about it; but he says “it is unquestionably true,” and as he might say this of any story however false, it serves to shew that he would say something if he could.

Turner’s last calumny is about some money that Mr. Jefferson, when he commenced the practice of the law, borrowed on bond of a Mr. Gabriel Jones. Turner does not tell us the sum, but I have somewhere seen it stated to be fifty pounds, Virginia currency, about one hundred and sixty seven dollars (no great bond, for it looks more like usury than friendship). This debt, Turner says, Mr. Jefferson paid in paper money; “I think, says Turner, in the year 1779.” Perhaps it was in ’78, or ’77, or ’76. “Mr. Jones, says Turner, indignant at such treatment, and appreciating the transaction by its merits, enclosed the bond to Mr. Jefferson accompanied with the paper money tendered and such remarks as the nature of the case was calculated to suggest.” (Turner does not tell us what those remarks were, which shew he knows nothing about them, or if he does know, that it does not suit his purpose to tell them.) “The consequence,” says Turner, “was, a full discharge of the debt in specie.“

This is stated as a charge against Mr. Jefferson; whereas it is one of the most honorable instances that can be produced, and I believe the only one, of the payment of a debt at that time, and the friends of Mr. Jefferson are highly gratified that the maliciousness of his enemies has made it known. This Thomas Turner must be some stupid upstart that knows nothing of the times he writes about. Continental paper money was then a legal tender, and were tender of it made for a debt due and the tender refused, the debt was cancelled and could not be recovered by law. Mr. Jefferson did not avail himself of the law, though thousands did, but paid the debt in specie, even after his bond was returned, and when no law could compel him to pay it in any kind of money — Thus much for the sixth and last calumny of Thomas Turner of Virginia, the stupid correspondent of Hulbert, the hypocritical legislator of Sheffield, in Massachusetts.

I have now gone, calmly and deliberately through all the charges and calumnies raised against Mr. Jefferson; but I have not done it for the purpose of defending him. I have done it to expose the baseness of the federal faction, and to hold it up to public detestation. Mr. Jefferson’s conduct needs no defense. He has heard, with undisturbed composure, the ravings of this unprincipled faction, and resting his character on its own merits the public voice of his country has rewarded him with honor.

It is, perhaps, a bold sentiment but it is a true one, that a just man, when attached, should not defend himself. His conduct will do it for him, and Time will put his detractors under his feet.

A SPARK FROM THE ALTAR OF ’76.

End of the second, and last, number for the present.

To John Fellows July 9, 1805

NEW ROCHELLE,

CITIZEN :

I inclose you two pieces for Cheetham’s paper, which I wish you to give to him yourself. He may publish one No. in one daily paper, and the other number in the next daily paper, and then both in his country paper. There has been a great deal of anonymous abuse thrown out in the federal papers against Mr. Jefferson, but until some names could be got hold of it was fighting the air to take any notice of them. We have now got hold of two names, your townsman Hulbert, the hypocritical Infidel of Sheffield, and Thomas Turner of Virginia, his correspondent. I have already given Hulbert a blasting with my name to it, because he made use of my name in his speech in the Massachusetts] legislature. Turner has not given me the same cause in the letter he wrote (and evidently) to Hulbert, and which Hulbert (for it could be no other person), has published in the Repertory to vindicate himself. Turner has detailed his charges against Mr. Jefferson, and I have taken them up one by one, which is the first time the opportunity has offered for doing it; for before this it was promiscuous abuse. I have not signed it either with my name or signature (Common Sense) because I found myself obliged, in order to make such scoundrels feel a little smart, to go somewhat out of my usual manner of writing, but there are some sentiments and some expressions that will be supposed to be in my style, and I have no objection to that supposition, but I do not wish Mr. Jefferson to be obliged to know it is from me.

Since receiving your letter, which contained no direct information of anything I wrote to you about, I have written myself to Mr. Barrett accompanied with a piece for the editor of the Baltimore Evening Post, who is an acquaintance of his, but I have received no answer from Mr. B., neither has the piece been published in the Evening Post. I will be obliged to you to call on him and to inform me about it. You did not tell me if you called upon Foster; but at any rate do not delay the enclosed. I do not trouble you with any messages or compliments, for you never deliver any.

Yours in friendship.

THOMAS PAINE.