[CondoleezzaProtege]

Washington’s reputation grew more glowing with time while Paine remained an outcast in the republic his collaboration with Washington had helped bring about. Paine’s later years were marked by poverty, alcoholism and neglect: Only six locals attended his funeral in New Rochelle in 1809. “One by one most of his old friends and acquaintances had deserted him,” Robert G. Ingersoll, a popular orator of the era, subsequently proclaimed. “Even those who loved their enemies hated him, their friend—the friend of the whole world—with all their hearts.”

[reed13k]

This part is incorrect.

“Paine would not return to the United States until nearly a decade later, after Jefferson was elected president and the Republican Party was in ascendancy.”

The Republican Party was formed in the 1850s...no?

[colorado tanker]

American politics became very complex as a result of the French Revolution. Factions aligned themselves a pro-Revolution or Anglophile as the politics suited them.

Just one example, Google the Citizen Genet Affair.

Poor ol' Tom didn't foresee the dark and violent turn the Revolution would take or the landmines it created in American politics.

[mass55th]

Watched a short British documentary series called "The Bloody Past of a Tiny Town." It's about the history of the town of Lewes, England.

I didn't know until I watched the program that Thomas Paine had lived for 6 years in the English town of Lewes, and it is said Lewes is where he formed his political views.There's a Thomas Paine Society UK, the house he lived in, in Lewes is a historical site, and there's also a statue of him in Lewes.

[rlmorel]

Eh. I appreciate what Paine did with “Common Sense”, and it is true he may have “saved the revolution”, but he didn’t put Washington on his “high horse”.

[Interesting Times]

Ping.

[Political Junkie Too]

I read a letter of Paine's from 1807 that is on display at the Thomas Paine House in New Rochelle, NY. In this letter, Paine pleads with Vice-President George Clinton to testify on his behalf to a local election board that refused to allow Paine to vote, claiming that he was not a citizen.

Paine wrote:

---

"As it is a new generation that has risen up since the declaration of independence, they know nothing of what political state of the country was at the time the pamphlet Common Sense appeared; and besides this there are but few of the old standards left, and none that I know of in this city."

---

-PJ

[farming pharmer]

British authorities indicted Paine for seditious libel, a hanging offense...

Can you imagine the number of public hangings today for that same offense?

Great post by the way. I love reading the histories of these characters and what eventually became of them. It's very sobering.

[PGalt]

Interesting. Thanks for posting. History/education BUMP!

[Verginius Rufus]

Paine foolishly had his vitriolic letter denouncing Washington published--that may have been the last straw. Even Jefferson felt unable to offer him a job when he was President.

Gouverneur Morris was the younger half-brother of Lewis Morris (a Signer of the Declaration of Independence) and a member of one of the wealthiest families in New York. Gouverneur was his mother's maiden name. He was a signer of the Constitution and is credited with the actual phrasing of the document. No wonder he did not feel inspired to rescue Paine from prison.

Paine, as a member of the Convention, voted in favor of sparing the life of Louis XVI because of his help to the United States during the Revolutionary War.

[WashingtonSource]

I’m not sure I trust this website’s version of history.

[CondoleezzaProtege]

Ping. See above or click link:

http://freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/3742438/posts