The Cause of America is the Cause of All Mankind

When I was 9 and 10 years old (4^th and 5^th grade), I was fascinated by the Revolutionary War.  I loved reading about it.  I have a vivid memory of finding a book with the complete list of battles in the Revolutionary War, and thinking that such information was unbelievably invaluable, the sort of thing that simply needed to be preserved for easy reference, I sat down and copied the whole list onto several sheets of paper (it’s a long list when you have the oversized handwriting of a 9 year old).  (Note for youngsters: this was in the pre-internet era, so Google was not yet your friend.)  I also, for reasons I cannot explain, was particularly excited when copying over said list to discover that there were two battles of Saratoga, the second one duly named “The Second Battle of Saratoga.”  (I suppose being unbelievably excited about finding this list was a pretty good indication of the type of career toward which I was heading—though interestingly enough, never once in my life—and I mean never—did someone say to me, “You should be a college professor.”)  I also have a vivid memory of excitedly discovering in the library a whole book devoted to Spies in the Revolutionary War.  This Revolutionary War thing you may have heard about was a Big Deal.

In the course of my reading about this War, I kept seeing references to a book by Thomas Paine entitled Common Sense.  It seems at this most exciting time of history, when people were saying really exciting things like “Give me liberty or give me death!” and “I regret I have but one life to give for my country!” that this book by Paine was electrifying.  In an era of exciting rhetoric, this seemed to be the most exciting book of all.  So, I decided that since reading about the Revolutionary War was about the most exciting type of reading there was, then reading the most exciting book from this most exciting time period would be the sort of thing that would send Young Jimmy Hartley into Paroxysms of Joy.

So, on my next voyage to the Public Library, I boldly marched up to the Front Desk, looked keenly into the eye of the librarian, an elderly woman (well, she seemed elderly to me, so that means she must have been somewhere between 40 and 100), and said in my most reverent, excited and undoubtedly slightly hesitant (after all, I was about to talk to The Librarian) voice, “Do you have a copy of Common Sense by Thomas Paine?”

The Librarian….scowled.  “Yes,” she said in a vaguely disapproving voice.  “It would be in the Adult section,” she added.  And right then I knew the “Adult” section was not the place Young Jimmy Hartley belonged.  The Adult section was obviously the place for books which young people like me really shouldn’t be reading.  The Librarian then told me to follow her and we went to the Adult section.  She found the book and gave it to me with that look that said, “Kid, you are never going to read this book.”  I checked it out, took it home.  It sat on my dresser for a bit.  I finally got up the courage to open it to the first page, looked at that page, but knowing I probably shouldn’t be reading this book, I never quite managed to convince myself to start it.  Two weeks later the book went back to the library.  Unread.

(I never again entered the adult section of that library.  Never.  We moved when I was 14, and (fear not) I have been to the adult sections of other libraries.  I also checked out adult paperbacks from that library because, you see, the paperbacks were in a rack that was near the checkout desk, so I didn’t actually have to enter the Adult section.)

For three and a half decades now, I have had this nagging feeling that I should read Common Sense.  But, I have never read it.  Was I really old enough yet?  Am I sure it would be a book I would like?  Maybe it was really boring.  Maybe that librarian was right that the book just wasn’t for me.

I finally read it—35 years after I first checked it out. 

It’s good.  It begins with an interesting distinction between “society” and “government,” a distinction about which many people still seem unaware.  It has a curious passage in which Paine seems to suggest that democracy, and not despotism, was the original form of government.  It has an early version of the argument that democracies do not go to war with one another.    It has some fun invective—those who oppose Paine’s preferred scheme of government “would have joined Lucifer in his revolt.”   Or this:  “Though I would carefully avoid giving unnecessary offence, yet I am inclined to believe, that all those who espouse the doctrine of reconciliation, may be included within the following descriptions. Interested men, who are not to be trusted; weak men who cannot see; prejudiced men who will not see; and a certain set of moderate men, who think better of the European world than it deserves; and this last class by an ill-judged deliberation, will be the cause of more calamities to this continent than all the other three.”  By the end I was ready to throw off the despotism of the English Crown.  And it did all seem like so much common sense. 

And I am greatly relieved to have read it.

(Speaking of Common Sense, Janet always accuses me of having none.  Well, at least she thinks of it as an accusation.  I have never been able to figure out why it isn’t praising someone  say they lack common sense.  Doesn’t that mean they have uncommon sense?  And surely uncommon sense is better than common sense, isn’t it?)

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