Having thus far explored the various
intellectual, moral, and personal influences at play in John Dickinson’s Letter III, and discussed at length the
way some of them seem to mesh quite successfully while others appear utterly
contradictory, it might seem to be – how shall we say – gilding the lily to continue a further dissection of the
above-mentioned document. Yes, it may be just that, brevity being the soul of
wit, and so forth. But if my readers have learned anything about me at all, lo
these many months, it’s that I don’t feel there can ever be such a thing as too
many words set forth on a topic as rich and complex as the American Founding
Fathers. So I expect that they’ll forgive me for deciding one last time in this
present series to upend my cranium above the page in an attempt to shake lose
what thoughts remain about Letter III
and its estimable author.
Because
there are, I feel, several more things to learn from a reading of the third of
John Dickinson’s Letters from a Farmer in
Pennsylvania. In particular, there are elements of what Dickinson wrote in
an attempt to make clear his position on the emerging crisis between the
British government and the colonies that provide evidence as to some of his
philosophical inclinations which have not already been explored. Several
references that Dickinson put forward, for example, hint at an affinity for
classical references that would appear to place Letters from a Farmer in Pennsylvania in the realm of the “high
discourse” tradition of English political writing. This quite emphatically sets
Dickinson apart from other American political activists of the era who tended
toward the radical, such as Thomas Paine or Thomas Jefferson, and says a great
deal about how he viewed himself and his efforts within the larger sphere of
Anglo-American politics and philosophy. By the same token, remarks made by
Dickinson in Letter III about the
nature of Lockean social contract theory and its application to the American
colonial context provide clear evidence of how he differed from his
revolutionary colleagues in terms of philosophical outlook. By studying these
instances of Dickinson giving voice to some of his less obvious intellectual
preferences, it is possible to further pinpoint where exactly on the
ideological spectrum of the American Revolution the “Farmer in Pennsylvania”
sat, and in turn develop a broader, richer sense of just how many distinct
points of view the Founders held between them.
As
mentioned some weeks ago, the tone of John Dickinson’s Letters from a Farmer in Pennsylvania place them very much in league
with the collection of 144 missives published between 1720 and 1723 in the London Journal known collectively as Cato’s Letters. The work of Englishman
John Trenchard and Scotsman Thomas Gordon, both outspoken members of the
reformist Country Party in 18th-century Britain, the Letters were concisely argued attacks
against the perceived corruption of the government of George I following a
financially disastrous investment scheme. In exchange for a series of bribes
members of the government authorized a trade in early 1720 whereby holders of
British securities (i.e. the national debt) could trade them to the South Sea
Company in exchange for stock at a favorable rate of exchange. Because the
company had been granted a trade monopoly for South America it was expected
that its stock value would increase precipitously, thereby enticing
bond-holders to make the trade. Thereafter the high-interest government
securities that had been a constant drain on the Treasury would be redeemed,
and both parties involved in the transaction would be beneficiaries of a
financial windfall. For a time this seemed to work. In January 1720, South Sea
Company stocks traded at £128 per share; by May they had increased to £500, and
by June to a peak of £1050. Unfortunately this flurry of activity led to
widespread speculation in the shares of other companies, and in an attempt to
tamp down on runaway inflation the government passed the Bubble Act in June,
1720. This piece of legislation made all joint-stock companies that did not
possess a Royal Charter illegal, and quickly put a stop to the rampant trading
the South Sea Company’s success had encouraged. This had the unanticipated
knock-on effect of driving down the value of South Sea stock as well, and vast
sums of money were lost by some of Britain’s wealthiest and most influential
citizens.
In
view of this naked, and catastrophic, display of corruption and patronage,
Trenchard and Gordon took it upon themselves to give vent to the public
frustrations that resulted. After a dozen or so letters to that effect, the
pair thereafter dedicated themselves to holding forth on any number of topics
of public import, from incidents of contemporary significance (the threatened loss of recently-acquired Gibraltar) to general topics of universal application
(the value of free speech, loyalty, and liberty). Over the many, many entries
that followed the pair argued extensively and effectively for transparency in
government, freedom of expression, and the inviolable nature of individual
liberty, in the process deploying a raft of references to ancient Greek and
Roman philosophers as well as to more contemporary figures like English
republican theorist Algernon Sidney. Thereafter collected and reprinted, Cato’s Letters became a bestseller in
Britain, going through six editions as of 1755. Significant to the present
discussion, they also became a particular favorite of the North American
audience. The text of the Letters were
widely distributed in the Thirteen Colonies and were freely quoted in
newspapers, and bound editions found their way into roughly half the private
libraries on the continent. In homage, Cato became a common pseudonym for
authors of tracts from across the political spectrum, including those who
argued for and against the Revolution in the 1770s and the adoption of the
Constitution in the 1780s. John Dickinson appeared to wear the influence of Cato’s Letters in his own Letters from a Farmer in Pennsylvania,
both in the latter’s use of classical references and the importance they
attached to the ideal of disinterestedness.
Evidence of second tendency, of
declaring the importance of political disinterestedness, can be found
specifically in the second paragraph of Letter
III. Therein, after first declaring in the opening paragraph that the only
motives behind publishing his missives was, “a lively resentment of every
insult and injury offered to you,” he clarified for his readers just where he
stood in relation to the unfolding crisis between the colonies and the British
government. “I am no further concerned,” Dickinson wrote, “in anything
affecting America, than any one of you; and when liberty leaves it, I can quit
it much more conveniently than most of you [.]” This probably sounds a bit
strange coming from a man who claims to have the best interests of his
countrymen at heart – it certainly did to me on first blush – but statements
like this were meant to demonstrate a person’s impartiality, and therefore
their credibility. While it has since come to have the same meaning as
“uninterested,” the 18th-century connotation of “disinterested” was
something closer to non-partisan. To be disinterested was considered a
political virtue in an era that still demonized political parties and at least
paid lip service to ideals like public service and self-sacrifice. Cato’s Letters are chock-a-block with
references to disinterest as an ideal, and the nefarious influence of “the
moneyed interest in England” and, “the destructive interests of societies of
stock-jobbers, combined with publick plunderers [.]” Though Dickinson avoided
using such unambiguous terminology in Letter
III, the general sentiment he attempted to express falls under the same
general category.
When he wrote, “I am no further
concerned in anything affecting America, than any one of you,” he meant that he
was not, for instance, a member of any branch of any colonial government, or a
royal official of any kind, or the owner of a business that benefited directly
from British patronage or trade policy. His claimed impartially thus stemmed
from the fact that he was not bound to speak in favor of maintaining the
Anglo-American relationship by any fear of reprisal or financial loss. A
royally-appointed tax assessor could not say the same, nor could a merchant
with strong ties to London, or a Crown attorney. In 1767 Dickinson was little
more than a private citizen, and this fact he wanted to make clear. Lacking
formal ties to any organization, decision-making body or sovereign authority, he
believed that he possessed the ability to speak for the good of all rather than
some narrow and parochial financial or political interest. If he did happen to
speak favorably of the Crown, or Parliament, or of generally avoiding rash
action, it would thus have been the result of an objective assessment of what
was in the best interests of the colonial population rather than what would
benefit his position or his designs.
He had much the same sentiment in
mind when he added, “when liberty leaves it, I can quit it much more
conveniently than most of you.” The significance of this passage is somewhat
less obvious than the one that preceded it. Here Dickinson was attempting to
point to his personal wealth as a positive factor in his impartiality. Someone
who worked in a trade, like a farmer or an artisan, would naturally have felt
that the quality of their life was strongly tied to the economic and political
situation of the community in which their lived. Colonial trade and taxation,
both policy areas that the British Parliament had claimed exclusive
jurisdiction over, affected what most Americans were able to purchase in shops,
how much money they were able to save, and in turn the general quality of their
existence. Consequently, the average, workaday colonist might regard the
mounting disagreement between British America and Parliament as bad for
business and their life in turn, and thus seek a speedy remedy by whatever
means were most convenient. No matter if this led them to support
reconciliation or confrontation; whichever quickly reasserted the status quo
was preferable. As of 1767 Dickinson was an independently wealthy barrister
whose ability to live a comfortable life had little connection to the manner or
logic of colonial taxation. Free from such pedestrian considerations, and by
his own admission able to depart the colonies “more conveniently than most” if
matters took an unpleasant turn, he evidently felt himself capable of speaking
to more abstract concerns than the majority of his fellow colonists. Where they
might be swayed by thoughts of price and profit, and eventual privation, he
could consider loftier ideas, like truth, justice, and the laws of nature.
Patronising though this notion
might seem – and make no mistake, it does – it was very much in keeping with
the 18th-century ideals of public service and self-sacrifice that
characterized the writings of the Country Party reformers. It was their firm
belief that the administration of the British government was best left in the
hands of the landed gentry because of the unique qualities that group
possessed. As a species independently wealthy (in theory), they were the pawns
of no other faction, individual, or interest, and could thus be depended on to
make decisions based on an objective assessment of the greater good rather than
their own personal financial needs. At the same time, the fact of their wealth
made them both capable of engaging in public service and obligated to do so. Because
they were blessed with advantages well beyond most people’s dreams, it was felt
by members of the Country Party that the gentry were bound by a concomitant impulse
of social responsibility to put those advantages to good use. Their wealth in
turn allowed them to do this without sacrificing their comfort. John Dickinson,
born into one of the wealthiest families in colonial America, seemed to both
embody and personally support this conception of the link between wealth and
impartiality, privilege and service. This, again, placed him very much in the
same camp as purveyors of British “high discourse” political commentary like
Trenchard and Gordon, and Country Party founder Lord Bolingbroke, and a good
distance from "lowborn" activists like ideologue Thomas Paine and popular
satirist Benjamin Franklin.
Another indication of the
connection between Dickinson’s Letters
from a Farmer in Pennsylvania and the elevated, sober style of political
commentary utilized by early 18th-century British reformers can be
found in their common affection for, and use of, classical references. A
cursory examination of the aforementioned Cato’s
Letters reveals a particularly strong affinity for the same. Subjects under
discussion in that 144-part series include the titular Roman statesman Cato the
Younger, Julius Caesar and his assassin Brutus, ancient Persian king and
conquer of Egypt Cambyses II, and the nature of corruption in the Roman
Republic. Though Dickinson was not as absorbed as Trenchard and Gordon by the
lessons embodied in these ancient exemplars, going only so far as to
occasionally reference a classical figure or event in support of a broader
argument, that he felt comfortable at all dipping his toe into this
intellectual sphere is telling. Look, for example, to the ninth paragraph of Letter III. In it, Dickinson recalled
the ancient Spartans as a people worthy of emulation by his fellow colonists
because they were a, “brave and free people,” who were inspired by a, “happy
temperament of soul [.]” He then went on to quote Greco-Roman historian and
essayist Plutarch’s description of the Spartans, with the seeming intent of
drawing a comparison between the virtues therein described and those Dickinson
hoped his fellow colonists would embody.
In the sixteenth paragraph of Letter III, Dickinson made use of
another explicit reference to figures from classical antiquity when he
attempted to warn his fellow colonists against falling victim to the, “sway of
the Cleons and Clodiuses, the designing and detectable flatterers of the
prevailing passion [.]” Cleon, for the record, was an Athenian statesman who
held sway during the Peloponnesian War (431-404 BC) and was widely regarded as
a warmonger and a demagogue. Publius Clodius Pulcher, meanwhile, was a Roman
politician during the late Republic known for his radical populism. Dickinson’s
intent was accordingly to project an image of flattery and corruption as a
warning to the population of the colonies against what he believed would be the
inevitable result of allowing anger and resentment to cloud their collective
judgement. Give in to anger and inevitably fall prey to demagogues, essentially.
Of course, in order to absorb this message a person would need to know who
Cleon and Clodius were; the majority of the population of the Thirteen Colonies
in 1767 almost certainly did not.
That Dickinson was familiar with
the works of Plutarch, or the history of Athens or Ancient Rome, is not in the
least bit surprising. He was, after all, the recipient of a classical education
that emphasized the moral and rhetorical value of the great Greek and Roman
poets, historians, and playwrights of antiquity. And he was far from the only
one of the Founders to have been taught via this style of curriculum. What is
noteworthy about the appearance of this kind of classical knowledge in his
written political commentary, however, is how clearly it serves to
differentiate Dickinson’s work from that of his revolutionary contemporaries.
Consider, for instance, Thomas Jefferson and John Adams. Both received a
similar education to Dickinson, both were intimately familiar with the
classics, and both reportedly filled their private libraries with volumes by
men like Cicero, Ovid, Livy, Tacitus, Demosthenes, and Aristotle (among others),
almost certainly in the original Greek or Latin. In this sense, of belonging to
a particular social and intellectual class of men in 18th-century
Anglo-American world, they were cut from the same cloth as Dickinson himself.
Yet an examination of Jefferson’s A
Summary View of the Rights of British America (1774) and Adams’ Thoughts on Government (1776) reveal not
a single reference to any Ancient Greek or Roman figures or events. Though
there could be any number of reason for this, there would seem to be at least
one clear and undeniable consequence: portions of Dickinson’s Letter III required a degree of
classical knowledge to fully grasp, while no part of either Jefferson’s or
Adams’ aforementioned works asked the same of their audience. This important
because of what it says about Dickinson’s intended readership; that is, who he
wanted to reach, and why.
In many ways possessing a classical
education in the 18th century was like being able to speak a
language (besides Greek and Latin, of course) that was known only to a select
few. Possessing a strong familiarity with Plutarch’s Parallel Lives or Demosthenes’ public orations signified the
attainment of an elevated awareness of moral philosophy, history, and rhetoric,
and being able to utilize these sources in order to craft a convincing argument
signified one’s membership in a community of shared sentiment and means
(education being mainly the province of the wealthy). Trenchard and Gordon, in
this mold, knew that the average English person would not have the slightest
interest in their meditations on the corruption of the Roman political classes
in the late Republican era. It was not their intention to reach as wide an
audience as possible, but to communication to those few who could grasp the
source material that underpinned their reflections, and perhaps possessed the
means to respond in a meaningful way. Though, again, Dickinson’s Letter III contains relatively few
references to topics from classical antiquity, their modest inclusion
nonetheless speaks volumes as to who the titular Farmer from Pennsylvania was
trying to reach. By resorting in the arguments contained within Letter III to classical comparisons or
analogies Dickinson actively made it harder, if not impossible, for certain
people to read and understand what he was trying to say.
There are a number of potential reasons why
Dickinson nonetheless proceeded in this way.
He was, on the one hand, an 18th-century
gentleman, educated and socialized to behave, think, and communicate in a
certain way. He was, furthermore, a noted anglophile who attached particular
significance to English traditions, English history, and English political
thought. He may have intended, accordingly, to communicate to other gentlemen
in the language he knew they all shared, and in a manner very much in keeping
with the English political commentators with which he was surely familiar.
Jefferson and Adams were gentlemen too, though they managed to avoid relying on
some of the more esoteric elements of classical vocabulary when attempting to
communicate a political message to their fellow colonists. Perhaps this was
because the pair nurtured a self-image that was not quite so elevated above
them common man as their education wold indicate – though in Adams’ case this
seems unlikely. Or perhaps they chose to distance themselves from a mode of
thought and expression that had become distinctly associated in the American
mindset with a particular style of English political discourse. If this was the
case, if they felt a self-conscious impulse to appear to their readers less British
in tone and substance, then it is noteworthy indeed that their colleague
Dickinson felt no such need to “dress down” his rhetorical style.
That being said, it is perhaps
not all that surprising. As is hopefully clear by now, John Dickinson was, among
the pantheon of the Founding Fathers, something of an odd duck. He was a man of
conviction, sometimes to the point of stiffness; he as a pacifist whose moral
aversion of violence ran very deep; he was a lover of Britain, its people,
history, and culture. Though he shared with his revolutionary colleagues a
common grounding in the classics and the philosophical ideals of the European
Enlightenment, it seemed that the former traits most strongly defined his
character, outlook, and actions. If the style of commentary he favored in his Letters from a Farmer in Pennsylvania is
any indication, he regarded himself as a gentleman in the mold of the British
Country Party reformers whose works had been so warmly received by the colonial
American elite. Accordingly, he favored calm, measured debate to rash action,
abhorred corruption and tyranny, sought examples of proper or improper moral
behavior in the classical texts of Ancient Greece and Rome, and endeavored
always to maintain the traditions of British constitutionalism. Likely these
principles were favored by many among the Founding Generation, but few seemed
to hold to them as rigidly as John Dickinson of Poplar Hall.
And it’s this rigidity of
conviction that makes reading and attempting to understand Dickinson’s work,
like Letter III, such an interesting
endeavor. Whereas certain among the early revolutionaries, like Massachusetts
agitator Samuel Adams or Virginia rabble-rouser Patrick Henry, responded to
perceived British injustices with increasing vitriol, John Dickinson ever
maintained a mask of calm deliberation. Unwilling to be swept up in the anger
that events in the 1760s and 1770s seemed to breed so readily, he attempted
always to speak to the objective good, the reasonable, the just. While many in
the colonies began to question the legitimacy of the bond between Britain and
the Thirteen Colonies, Dickinson advised the need for peaceful petitions,
warned against the evils that accompany blind anger, and preached loyalty to
the royal regime that had for so long been the attendant of American
prosperity. Truly, there seems not a trace of cynicism in Dickinson’s fervent
calls for even-handedness and even-tempers, yet there appears a hint of
thinly-veiled desperation.
Because the American Revolution was
more than just a philosophical disagreement that could be solved if men of good
conscience sat in the same room and exchanged obscure Latin quotations. The
ideas at its root were, and are, fundamental to human existence: liberty,
justice, authority, and community. Consequently the Revolution could not very
long remain a debate about taxes or political representation. Dickinson’s
contemporaries seemed to sense this, and responded accordingly. Men like
Jefferson and Adams spoke plainly, of politics, and economics, and the
inalienable rights of a free people. Their assessments tended towards the
pragmatic; they began to speak not of avoiding war but of limiting its
destructive effects. And they acknowledged that the relationship between
Britain and America had run its course. Yet there was John Dickinson, clinging
to a very British ideal of gentlemanly behavior, and an accompanying sense of
decorum, loyalty, and morality that was quickly becoming outmoded.
And this too it what makes him such an
intriguing figure. In spite his often fundamental disagreements with other
members of the Founding Generation, he shared their essential dedication to
public service and self-sacrifice. Few of the Founders compromised more than
did Dickinson; few were forced to bend their ideals or silence their
convictions to a greater extent in order to see through to the end their
nation’s troubled birth. He was not a Loyalist, though it may have been easier for
him if he had been. He believed, as did his cohorts, that the rights of man
were inherent and irrepressible. He had not been willing to fight for those
rights, or at least dreaded the thought of sending others to die for them. But
his dedication to the great causes of the Revolution – to life, liberty, and
the pursuit of happiness – forced him to confront a great many things that he
was not comfortable with. For that reason alone his is worthy of admiration,
study, and contemplation. He was, after all, one the first to speak against the
abuses of a distant government and call for unity among those who had the most
to lose. And he was also one of the last to admit that the defenders of
American liberty were no better than their oppressors.
Anyway, that’s how I see it. Take a look for yourself:
Letter from a Farmer in Pennsylvania III by John Dickenson: http://oll.libertyfund.org/titles/690
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