Benjamin Franklin; Self-Revealed, Volume 2 (of 2): A Biographical and Critical Study Based Mainly on his own WritingsBruce, Wiliam Cabell
History
Benjamin Franklin; Self-Revealed, Volume 2 (of 2): A Biographical and Critical Study Based Mainly on his own Writings
Bruce, Wiliam Cabell
Franklin, Benjamin, 1706-1790
In a subsequent letter to his son in 1768, Franklin again indulges the same
day dream, and again reaches the conclusion that such a union would be the
best for the whole, and that, though particular parts might find particular
disadvantages in it, they would find greater advantages in the security
arising to every part from the increased strength of the whole. But such a
union, he concluded, was not likely to take place, while the nature of the
existing relation was so little understood on both sides of the water, and
sentiments concerning it remained so widely different.
Nothing, therefore, remained for Franklin to do except to fall back upon
this relation and to make the best of it, to insist that the only
constitutional tie between England and the Colonies was the King, and that
Parliament had no more right to tax America than to tax Hanover, though the
legislative assemblies of the colonies would always be ready in the future
as they had been in the past to honor the requisitions for pecuniary aids
made upon them by the King, through his Secretary of State; to combat the
political and economic dogmas and the national prejudices which stood in
the way of the full recognition by England of the fact that her true
interest was to be found in the liberal treatment of the Colonies; to warn
the Colonies that their connection with England was attended with too many
obligations and advantages to be hastily or prematurely forfeited by rash
resentments, so long as there was any definite prospect of their appeal to
English self-interest and good-feeling not proving in vain; and finally to
couple the warning with the suggestion that they should unceasingly keep up
the assertion of their just rights, and be prepared, all else failing, to
maintain them with an unabated military spirit. It was not to be expected
of a man so conservative and constant in nature, and bound to England by so
many strong and endearing associations, that he should wage a solitary
combat for American rights on English soil before he or any man had reason
to know how bitterly the Stamp Act would be returned upon the head of
Parliament by America, but never, after the temper of his countrymen in
regard to it, was made manifest to him, were his elbows again out of touch
with those of his compatriots in America. To their assistance and to the
assistance as well of the great body of wise and generous Englishmen, who
loved liberty too much at home to begrudge it to Englishmen in America, he
brought his every resource, his scientific fame, his social gifts, his
personal popularity, his knowledge of the world and the levers by which it
is moved, the sane, searching mind, too full of light for bigotry,
superstition, or confusion, the pen that enlisted satirical point as
readily as grave dissertation in the service of instruction. It cannot be
doubted that his exertions should be reckoned among the potent influences
that secured the repeal of the Stamp Act.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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