In a few days, the United States will celebrate the 233rd anniversary of the adoption of arguably one of the most important edits in the history of statecraft. Millions of Americans will think emotionally or reverently of famous words they probably don't realize might never have been.
The document in question, obviously, is the Declaration of Independence, and the edit comes from the preamble almost all American schoolchildren are still required to read more than a few times (if not memorize):
Most of those schoolchildren know that the author of the Declaration was Thomas Jefferson, but few know that he had help. The person who made the edit above, as noted in Walter Isaacson's excellent biography, was
Benjamin Franklin.
Isaacson's biography represents a pleasantly unique beast in the field of history books: it's accurate, well-argued and entertaining. As most people who suffered through history grad school can tell you, rarely does the really informative work and the really entertaining work intersect in a single book. Those selfsame grad-school survivors often wryly suggest it's the process of getting those degrees that tends to trample the joy out of history writing and reduce it to getting from point to point, from room to room in the citadel of argument, sealing off every chink in the walls, stopping up the drains and hoping the argument remains impregnable.
Isaacson, though, is a journalist by trade and thus doesn't seem to have the same need to create a hermetic text that anticipates all counterpoint. He clearly likes Franklin; he likes the process of writing about Franklin, and he wants you to like Franklin too. (It's certainly not hard.) Coupled with Isaacson's training in presenting facts in the most concise and universally accessible manner, the result is a remarkably breezy hike through 500 pages, 84 years of life and the critical decades of protest, revolution and federation that created this country.
Although only a relatively small portion of the book deals with the drafting of the Declaration, self-evidence proves to be a recurring theme throughout it. In terms of the Declaration itself, it's a powerful and momentous edit. While it's easy to argue that Jefferson did not mean to use the term "sacred" in a literal sense (Jefferson's anti-religious statements are fodder for a long and different discussion elsewhere; suffice to say that, in his original draft of the Declaration, he uses many poetical and metaphorical phrases, not meant to be taken literally, one of which is that Britain intends to "deluge [the colonies] in blood" ), Isaacson argues that Franklin's edit probably stems from his interest in empirical philosophy and its theory of "analytic truths" that can universally be arrived at through reason and explicit definition, irrespective of third-party validation.
Self-evidence also plays into Franklin's religiosity — or, really, his irreligiosity. After a childhood in Boston and adulthood among Anglicans, Quakers and charismatic Presbyterians, Franklin adopted ideas only piecemeal from what they proffered. That he could be predestined to be among the Elect with God seemed quite the opposite of self-evident, and having a personal relationship with God seemed insufficient to serve his fellow man. Instead, Franklin developed a kind of personal economy of Christian behavior.
While he only rarely attended church, he threw his free time into promoting the common weal for men of similar industry and good deeds. Franklin did not favor handouts, but in pursuit of the development of a robust middle class, he sought to aid those who were industrious, to form associations of mutual advancement, philosophical societies, universities, lending libraries and fire brigades. Franklin seemed to feel a spiritual obligation to do well by his fellow men wherever possible, and in this one can see a kind of impulse to make his goodness objectively measurable — that while he might not have a personal relationship based on an impassioned faith, he had a commitment to seeing that His good works be his own.
But probably the most enduring theme of self-evidence in Franklin's life is his commitment to journalism, specifically passive satire and argument. Here, Isaacson clearly has the most fun, celebrating a historical figure who once worked as a hack, grinding out news and commentary, responding to a regular audience and trying to appeal to a larger one. What set Franklin apart wasn't a gift for searing polemics or saccharine praise but a tendency to frame his own argument either so impishly or so non-threateningly that it brought his readers' or his opponents' own to the fore. There, in the heat of inveighing against satirical straw men or leading questions, they exposed their own self-contradictions or simple misapprehensions. In this way, Franklin managed to argue persuasively yet inoffensively, providing the forum for another person or persons to stumble upon their own self-evident truths. Franklin realized that a mid-argument epiphany brought on not by anger but by one's own reexamination is far easier to digest.
Franklin's playfulness shines through the whole of Isaacson's book. Like many recent histories written by journalists, Isaacson starts from a position of fondness for the subject, and the winning aspects of the subject naturally become the most winning aspects of the book. This is not to say that Isaacson's history is a middlebrow one, by any means. (Even the venerable Gordon Wood, with whom Isaacson's text sometimes disagrees, praises the book.) However, one reading for bold new scholarship or revisionism will not find much. Isaacson's goal seems to be to produce a readable synthesis on Franklin: to take all the extant texts and interpretations and find a compromise amongst them, a kind of essential Franklin. Given that Franklin is celebrated for his talents at compromise, this distinction shouldn't be taken as anything less than complimentary.
What results is a history via concession. Isaacson shows where one train of thought on Franklin can lead, then where another might go. In the process, he shows the common elements and seeks to resolve the differences toward a rational middle-ground. In a sense, Isaacson takes what evidence we have and tries to find in it the self-evident Franklin.
The document in question, obviously, is the Declaration of Independence, and the edit comes from the preamble almost all American schoolchildren are still required to read more than a few times (if not memorize):
We hold these truths to besacred and undeniableself-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.
Most of those schoolchildren know that the author of the Declaration was Thomas Jefferson, but few know that he had help. The person who made the edit above, as noted in Walter Isaacson's excellent biography, was
Isaacson's biography represents a pleasantly unique beast in the field of history books: it's accurate, well-argued and entertaining. As most people who suffered through history grad school can tell you, rarely does the really informative work and the really entertaining work intersect in a single book. Those selfsame grad-school survivors often wryly suggest it's the process of getting those degrees that tends to trample the joy out of history writing and reduce it to getting from point to point, from room to room in the citadel of argument, sealing off every chink in the walls, stopping up the drains and hoping the argument remains impregnable.
Isaacson, though, is a journalist by trade and thus doesn't seem to have the same need to create a hermetic text that anticipates all counterpoint. He clearly likes Franklin; he likes the process of writing about Franklin, and he wants you to like Franklin too. (It's certainly not hard.) Coupled with Isaacson's training in presenting facts in the most concise and universally accessible manner, the result is a remarkably breezy hike through 500 pages, 84 years of life and the critical decades of protest, revolution and federation that created this country.
Although only a relatively small portion of the book deals with the drafting of the Declaration, self-evidence proves to be a recurring theme throughout it. In terms of the Declaration itself, it's a powerful and momentous edit. While it's easy to argue that Jefferson did not mean to use the term "sacred" in a literal sense (Jefferson's anti-religious statements are fodder for a long and different discussion elsewhere; suffice to say that, in his original draft of the Declaration, he uses many poetical and metaphorical phrases, not meant to be taken literally, one of which is that Britain intends to "deluge [the colonies] in blood" ), Isaacson argues that Franklin's edit probably stems from his interest in empirical philosophy and its theory of "analytic truths" that can universally be arrived at through reason and explicit definition, irrespective of third-party validation.
Self-evidence also plays into Franklin's religiosity — or, really, his irreligiosity. After a childhood in Boston and adulthood among Anglicans, Quakers and charismatic Presbyterians, Franklin adopted ideas only piecemeal from what they proffered. That he could be predestined to be among the Elect with God seemed quite the opposite of self-evident, and having a personal relationship with God seemed insufficient to serve his fellow man. Instead, Franklin developed a kind of personal economy of Christian behavior.
While he only rarely attended church, he threw his free time into promoting the common weal for men of similar industry and good deeds. Franklin did not favor handouts, but in pursuit of the development of a robust middle class, he sought to aid those who were industrious, to form associations of mutual advancement, philosophical societies, universities, lending libraries and fire brigades. Franklin seemed to feel a spiritual obligation to do well by his fellow men wherever possible, and in this one can see a kind of impulse to make his goodness objectively measurable — that while he might not have a personal relationship based on an impassioned faith, he had a commitment to seeing that His good works be his own.
But probably the most enduring theme of self-evidence in Franklin's life is his commitment to journalism, specifically passive satire and argument. Here, Isaacson clearly has the most fun, celebrating a historical figure who once worked as a hack, grinding out news and commentary, responding to a regular audience and trying to appeal to a larger one. What set Franklin apart wasn't a gift for searing polemics or saccharine praise but a tendency to frame his own argument either so impishly or so non-threateningly that it brought his readers' or his opponents' own to the fore. There, in the heat of inveighing against satirical straw men or leading questions, they exposed their own self-contradictions or simple misapprehensions. In this way, Franklin managed to argue persuasively yet inoffensively, providing the forum for another person or persons to stumble upon their own self-evident truths. Franklin realized that a mid-argument epiphany brought on not by anger but by one's own reexamination is far easier to digest.
Franklin's playfulness shines through the whole of Isaacson's book. Like many recent histories written by journalists, Isaacson starts from a position of fondness for the subject, and the winning aspects of the subject naturally become the most winning aspects of the book. This is not to say that Isaacson's history is a middlebrow one, by any means. (Even the venerable Gordon Wood, with whom Isaacson's text sometimes disagrees, praises the book.) However, one reading for bold new scholarship or revisionism will not find much. Isaacson's goal seems to be to produce a readable synthesis on Franklin: to take all the extant texts and interpretations and find a compromise amongst them, a kind of essential Franklin. Given that Franklin is celebrated for his talents at compromise, this distinction shouldn't be taken as anything less than complimentary.
What results is a history via concession. Isaacson shows where one train of thought on Franklin can lead, then where another might go. In the process, he shows the common elements and seeks to resolve the differences toward a rational middle-ground. In a sense, Isaacson takes what evidence we have and tries to find in it the self-evident Franklin.
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