A question

John Adams, Robespierre, Burke, Richard Price, and Pius VI all agreed there was something wrong with the public atheism of the philosophes that were behind the French Revolution. Adams and Richard Price were friends. Richard Price was the leader of the radical dissenters in England, who were very supportive of the French Revolution. Burke was a Whig, who eventually became known as a leading "Conservative." Pius VI was the Pope, of course, who eventually was imprisoned by the revolutionaries themselves, and he died in exile.

From the standpoint of philosophical worldview, Adams, Robespierre, Price, and Burke all shared common assumptions about human nature and religion. Why, then, would they end up being percieved as "opposites" in modern politics?

A question

John Adams, Robespierre, Burke, Richard Price, and Pius VI all agreed there was something wrong with the public atheism of the philosophes that were behind the French Revolution. Adams and Richard Price were friends. Richard Price was the leader of the radical dissenters in England, who were very supportive of the French Revolution. Burke was a Whig, who eventually became known as a leading "Conservative." Pius VI was the Pope, of course, who eventually was imprisoned by the revolutionaries themselves, and he died in exile.

From the standpoint of philosophical worldview, Adams, Robespierre, Price, and Burke all shared common assumptions about human nature and religion. Why, then, would they end up being percieved as "opposites" in modern politics?

A Revoir to the Lords

Yesterday, in the New York Times:

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/08/world/europe/08britain.html?_r=1&hp&oref=slogin

England is considering subjecting the House of Lords to elections. From the standpoint of our research over the last month, this is the institution that Adams thought was essential to a balance of powers in the UK, along with the monarch. If England makes the House of Lords based on election, will it mean that the ideals of the French Revolution have overtaken England, in the end? Was the opposition of Adams for nothing?

Conservatism and Sexual Revolution

Previous comments from previous posts, which are very insightful, have led me to take a second look at an aspect of Adams's biography, his arrival to France for the first time as a diplomat.

The biographer, Shaw, explains that Adams was struck by how forthright a bourgeois French lady was about physical intimacy. He also described certain delights that took place in the theater.

What Shaw indicates, is that Adams was ambiguous about this situation. He describes in his letters how much he delighted in these situations. He never seemed to fully repent of them, though, he did not like what he saw in the libertine behavior of Franklin in Paris.

At the same time, he never seemed to speak of in his letters the moral decadence of France leading up to the Revolution. Voltaire and his associates were clearly engaged in a campaign to subvert French morals. The story of Adams on his arrival to France seems to indicate that Adams was ambiguous about France. He did not seem to identify this as part of the problem leading up to the French Revolution. He saw it more as one that involved a lack of knowledge about political institutions.

Is there a blindness here? In other letters, Adams seems aware of the need for a moral order to uphold any constitution. Though, he does not seem to be concerned about the ambiguous at best moral order in France on his arrival. In his critiques of the revolution, he tends to emphasize more the political failings, not the failings of the moral life of France.

Progressivism and the French Revolution

I have before me a book titled "The Progressive Revolution." I have not read it yet, but just the back cover tells us that the dichotomy that was set up during the french revolution persists in the US to this day. The book says that it want to examine the revolution known as progressivism. IT opposes itself to this revolution. The counterrevolution is a return to natural rights, limited government, separation of powers, and constitutionalism. The revolution is committed to progressivism, centralization, unlimited government, and direct democracy.

This mirrors the general positions leading up to and during the French Revolution. John Adams saw himself on the side of the Anglomanes, who advocated bicameralism and constitutional checks and balances. Jefferson saw himself more on the side of the Gallomanes, who advocated a national, unified, central legislature as the center of power.

These debates persist.

Rival Political Scientists: Adams and Condorcet

In 1787 and 1788, Condorcet and Adams would prove themselves to be rivals in attempting to influence the overall orientation of the coming revolution. One author has identified them as two Newtonian physicists arguing over the best way to turn government into a science. Condorcet used the method of strict mathematics. Adams employed weights and measures. Condorcet sought to replace history and philosophy with the science of enlightenment. Adams thought that history and philosophy led man to the science of enlightenment. Condorcet, along with Turgot, took one powerful national legislature to be the ideal form of government to replace a powerful king. Adams thought such a legislature would be given over too readily to the interests of the wealthy and the powerful. Better, he thought, to grant something like a senate or house of lords to the powerful and wealthy, so that their influence could be felt and then checked (Thompson, 368-375).

Two Letters

Consider these two letters:

Adams to Jefferson, January 31, 1796 (259)
“I consider all Reasoning upon French Affairs of little moment. The Fates must determine hereafter as they have done heretofore. Reasoning has been all lost. Passion, Prejudice, Interest, Necessity has governed and will govern; and a Century must roll away before any permanent and quiet System will be established. An Amelioration of human affairs I hope and believe will be the result, but You and I must look down from the Battlements of Heaven if We ever have the Pleasure of Seeing it.

TJ to JA, Sep 4th 1823
"The spirit of the Spaniard and his deadly and eternal hatred to the Frenchman, gives me much confidence that he will never submit, but finally defeat this atrocious violation of the laws of god and man under which he is suffering; and the wisdom and firmness of the Cortes afford reasonable hope that the nation will settle down in a temperate representative government, with an executive properly subordinated to that. Portugal, Italy, Prussia, Germany, Greece will follow suit. You and I shall look down from another world on these glorious achievements to man, which will add to the joys of heaven."

Could Jefferson in 1823 have had in mind Adams's letter from 1796, indicating to Adams that the French Revolution did not slow down the progress of representative government in the way that Adams had predicted in 1796?

Stoking Revolution, in France, in Iran

I know that this is almost a re-statement of a previous entry, but I have re-worked the paragraphs. The story that is told here might be very relevant for our own times, as we face a potential US attack on Iran. If we understand the current Iran to be analogous to France in 1787, the current US to be analogous to England in 1787, and current Europe as analogous to the US in 1787, we can perhaps sympathize with Jefferson's position. In addition, we can take pause when considering our own situation. Our country might be doing things in the international sphere so as to radicalize Iran, making her look to be the kind of country we should fight. Whereas, if we were to leaver her alone or engage her diplomatically, many of the democratic changes that we claim to hope for, might happen anyway (as they were happening in France).

And so due to the French political situation, it seems to be the case that Jefferson, during the summer of 1787, remained silent about the book translation project, and while he probably did not block the project, he probably did not fight to get the book translated and published either. One aspect of the problem had to do with the political situation of France and how Jefferson saw the French experiment in relation to the ideal as compared to the English Constitution in relation to that ideal. The second aspect of the problem had to do with what Jefferson saw to be the larger political situation in Europe, and where Britain and the soon-to-be United States of America stood in relation to that larger situation.

As Jefferson wrote to Adams in the summer and Fall of 1787, he described mobs gathering in the streets of Paris. They hissed at the nobles. The King was perceived as being aloof, as he was drinking wine rather than addressing the problems of the nation. While Jefferson did not make direct attacks on Adams’s book, his letters to Adams indicate that he was aware of the ideas in Adams’s book, and that he was, perhaps, trying to draw attention to what he saw to be a more refined view of the problem of Constitutions and society. Jefferson thought that a revolution had already taken place in France, a revolution that outstripped any revolution in England: “I think that in the course of three months the royal authority has lost, and the rights of the nation gained, as much ground, by a revolution of public opinion only, as England gained in all her civil wars under the Stuarts” (Paris, August 30, 1787. Jefferson to Adams, 196-197). Jefferson did not think that the ground gained by the nation would ever be lost.

Jefferson continued this theme in a second letter sent in September in which He explained to Adams the principles of good government: “the first principle of good government is certainly a distribution of it’s powers into executive, judiciary, and legislative, and a subdivision of the latter into two or three branches.” He admitted that the English constitution was better than previous constitutions, but that it was only better in relation to this standard (Jefferson to Adams, Paris, Sept 28 1787).

As Jefferson pondered the progress made in constitution-building, he also was aware of the difficulty of building an advanced constitution, given a complex political situation. And so, he discussed the Constitution of France and England in the light of events in Europe. In August he indicated that at the same time that France was undergoing her revolution, Jefferson feared that London and Berlin might have been pining for a war against France.

France did not want such a war, and France would look for ways to change Europe rather than submit to the aggression of the English and the Prussians. France, he predicted, would change all of Europe, making it conform to her laws, rather than submit to the yoke of England (Paris, August 30, 1787. Jefferson to Adams, 196-197). In his second letter, Jefferson indicated that the French clearly saw England as her enemy, and was making diplomatic efforts to unite Russia and Austria against England (Jefferson to Adams, Paris, Sept 28 1787).

Jefferson then commented on the situation in Holland, which he thought showed that it was better to never have hereditary offices. Overall, Jefferson hoped that the nations of Europe would be able to chasten England, if only a little. He feared that a conflict was coming with England, and that the nations of Europe were hesitating before confronting her. Jefferson hoped that, in this coming conflict, America would be able to remain neutral. He feared that the English, or rather the King, would force America to take the side of the English. Jefferson thought that common sense would lead the English to leave America neutral, and so she would not.

In this letter of Jefferson to Adams, we can see the beginning of what would come to be divergent views between Jefferson and Adams over the emphases necessary to keep America closest to the ideal constitution, given the coming war in Europe. Jefferson and Adams agreed on the desirability of revolution for France. They also agreed that the best kind of Constitution involved a balancing of three powers. Their disagreements were more matters of emphasis than principle. Jefferson, from his letter to Adams, thought that the popular branch should keep a legislative power.

Adams thought it should keep a diplomatic power. Jefferson admitted that the British Constitution was better than most Constitutions, but it was very imperfect in relation to the ideal. If the French were to change their constitution, they should look to change it with respect to the ideal, not with respect to the British Constitution. The English Constitution was a compromise, given the historical circumstances, with respect to this standard. France might have already outstripped England in achieving rights to bring about this standard. By implication, it would be foolish to propose the British model for a society which was on the verge of better adhering to the ideal standard than the British compromise. A book like Adams’s, if widely distributed, might confuse the French population as to real gains that had been made in France in 1787.

In addition, Jefferson thought that to extol the English government too much might be dangerous with respect to foreign policy, and how foreign policy could affect the internal order of the soon to be United States. The English seemed to be on the verge of a war against France and come combination of other European states. To extol England at a time such as this might lead Americans to think that they were allies of the British, and to drag Americans into the war alongside the British against the other nations of Europe. This policy, Jefferson thought, would be potentially harmful to the young democracy in the US. It could also lead the US to see Britain as the standard of government, rather than the ideal that was currently being established, one of a balance of powers between the three branches of government, with the principle of representation being popular sovereignty.

This strain would only be exacerbated by the coming of the French Revolution. And, in a way, England’s bellicosity from even before the Revolution might have been partly responsible for the radical turn taken by the Revolutionaries during the revolution. Jefferson thought a great war was about to take place in Europe, and that the United States should stay out of the war. He was convinced that the end result of the war will be progress in the art of free government, furthering the advances made in the British and American revolutions, as well as the revolution in public opinion that was happening in France. In a European war, England would attempt to draw the United States into a conflict to defend aristocratic constitutions, which Jefferson, overall, did not think upheld the standard of free governments.

Adams, it seems, did not respond to the statements of Jefferson about balance of powers between the three branches. He was, overall, ambiguous about America’s relationship with England. He was ambiguous about the question of whether the United States should commit to helping England or not in the upcoming conflict. Instead, he admitted that only “Force, Power, and Strength” would restrain some nations. He thought that not England, but that Europe would try to draw America into its conflicts, and he hoped that the United States would come out richer for it, in the end (Adams to Jefferson, Grovenor Square, October 9, 1787).

Bicameralism and Unicameralism Debated for the Coming Revolution

Adams disagreed with the proponents of a unicameral legislature, especially Turgot and Condorcet. Eventually, Kant will defend the ideas of Condorcet. He thought that such a political theory would lead to disaster. Adams responded to Turgot’s ideas in his Defense of the Constitutions of the Government of the United States, which he published in 1787. After the French Revolution began, Adams continued his attack on the idea of unicameral legislatures. In 1790 he published Discourses on Davila with a view critiquing what he viewed to be the ominous developments of Revolutionary France. Thomas Paine joined the debate in 1791 with his publication of The Rights of Man. By accident, an essay by Jefferson introduced the American edition of Paine’s Rights of Man listing Adams’s book Davila among the “political heresies” of the American Regime. This essay, along with Paine’s work, led to an intensely partisan competition in the United States between pro-English and pro-French factions during the 1790s (Thompson, 1996, 364-365).

The debate that erupted in the United States following the publication of Discourses on Davila and then Thomas Paine’s Rights of Man was a coming to the surface of tensions that were already present when Adams published A Defence of the Constitutions … of America in 1787. When Jefferson received the book, he invited Adams to reconsider his idea that Congress was a diplomatic and not a legislative assembly. Jefferson said that he feared the book would be poorly translated, and so he found a good translator. After securing the translator, he left on a wine-tasting tour which he had been planning.
(It is just as likely that the French blocked the book, and that TJ told this to JA).

Jefferson, as late as November, indicated that the book was being translated. It seems, however that Philip Mazzei, an associate of Jefferson, Adams, and the book publisher, blocked translation and publication of the book in the final days before printing. In part, this had to do with the politics of France at the time. France was in the midst of a debate between the Anglomanes, those who desired a bicameral legislature with the King and a senate-like aristocratic body checking the popular branch, and the Gallomanes, those who preferred a unicameral popular legislature with predominant power over the other estates in French society. Mazzei and Condorcet were on the side of the Gallomanes. They perceived that Adams was among the potential leaders of the Anglomanes. Mazzei was able to publish a pamphlet by Stevens instead of Adams’s book. Even though this pamphlet also advocated a bicameral legislature, Mazzei was able to insert another 200 pages in which he critiqued Anglomane theory and twisted the arguments of Stevens so as to support the Gallomane position.

Jefferson and Adams met in person January or February of 1788. By that time, there would be no publication of Adams’s book. While we do not have any direct evidence as to the content of that meeting between Jefferson and Adams, we can imagine that the topic of the book translation was brought up. We could hypothesize that both Jefferson and Adams knew of the debate raging in France, and how individuals with more influence than Jefferson could block the publication of Adams’s book. Jefferson admitted to Adams initially that even finding someone to translate it properly would be difficult. Perhaps he realized that what Mazzei and his associates had done to Stevens, they would have done to Adams. Whatever the circumstances in February and January of 1788, it does not seem from the correspondence that at that time Adams was upset about the book not being published.

But, a few years later, in 1791, Thomas Paine published his pamphlet The Rights of Man. In the first edition that Paine published he included an introductory essay by Jefferson critiquing Adams’ Discourses as containing ideas that were “political heresy.” Jefferson did not want these comments to be published, and yet, they were. Nevertheless, they caused indignation in the mind of Adams and they began a firestorm in American politics that raged throughout the 1790s. This storm included many events that divided the democratic republicans against the federalists during the political debates of the 1790s.

This short history about Adams and Jefferson before and in the early days of the French Revolution reveals to us that Adams, on the whole, was becoming more pessimistic about the goodness of human nature. He was also becoming more pessimistic about the possibility of humans, short of institutional checks, of reaching a good end in political life. Humans are too dominated by envy and a love for money. For this reason, Adams was skeptical of those theorists who believed that a unicameral legislature could adequately check the passions of men. He expressed his fears in books and writings. He hoped his friend Jefferson would help him translate his ideas into French.

Jefferson, who was also friends with the same people that Adams critiqued, remained slightly more optimistic about human nature and what kind of political institutions human nature could support. In addition, perhaps he saw that the real disagreement between he and Adams was not one of principle. Instead, it was one of what emphasis was necessary given the historical circumstances of the time. Stevens, the supposed opponent whose tract was published instead of Adams’s book, advocated bicameral legislatures.

Jefferson also was not an opponent of bicameralism. But Jefferson feared that the United States, and perhaps France as well in the opening days of the Revolution, risked falling into the English system, which was proving itself to be an obstacle rather than a proponent of true political development. Jefferson thought that, given the historical circumstances, what needed strengthening and support in the 1790s was the popular branch. It would not make sense in the early days of the Republic to put too great an emphasis on institutions such as the Senate or Presidency, so as to make them like the House of Lords or the King in England.

In addition, Jefferson thought that too much attachment to England might actually limit the healthy development of the American system, as England would further involve the United States in European conflicts. England was also pressuring the French in such a way so as to antagonize the tensions already present in French society.

Jefferson was not overly enthusiastic about the excesses of the French Revolution. He admitted, in a way, that Robsepierre ended the popular part of the Revolution. Nevertheless, he did not see US involvement in European wars, entering on the side of England, as healthy for the US. Adams perhaps failed to fully understand the checks and balances that were part of the Constitution. In addition, he failed to appreciate the possibility that the Constitution and the Institutions that it established did educate the citizens of the United States to acquire political habits that would support the constitution over time. Or, perhaps he understood this, but, given this affection for England and position in England, his statements could easily be bent by the Gallomanes in France to attack the Anglomanes and to advance the Gallomane position.

Debating Revolution

As I am delving deeper into the Adams-Jefferson controversy that surrounded the French Revolution, it seems to me that the dispute came down to this, Adams perhaps overstated his case when he argued that an either aristocratic or moneyed class would always be influential in society.

In overstating his case, his opponents were able to present him as a defender of English Constitution. In France, this was important as the Revolution approached, because the Revolutionaries, to give themselves a reason to revolt, had to distance themselves from the English model.

Neither Adams nor Jefferson opposed the idea of revolution. They were in agreement as to the kind of society they wanted to see emerge. They disagreed, in the end, over how to bring about the transition.

Adams Skeptical about the French Revolution

By late 1788 and early 1789 Jefferson sees even more advances being made in the political life in France. He sees an orderly revolution in the works, perhaps similar to the events leading up to the signing of the Magna Carta in England. He observed that the third estate won the right to convene periodically, to register laws, and to propose amendments. “Thus a change in their constitution is, I think, certain: and the life of the present king or the minority of his heir will give time to confirm it” (Jefferson to Adams, December 5th 1788, 231-232). Jefferson is confident that the constitutional changes will remain firm in France. January sees more healthy changes, the power of taxing based on consent, accountability of ministers, the regular meeting of the estates, a degree of liberty to the press, and that these rights were to be fixed in a written document (Jefferson to Adams, January 14th 1789, 235-236).

Adams did not respond directly to these observations that Jefferson made. Perhaps this can be explained by what was probably his reservations or skepticism about the political movements in France coming to a happy end. This silence of Adams indicates that the disagreement about the nature and meaning of the French Revolution would be what would eventually lead to the strains in their friendship. These strains would eventually find themselves reflected in American institutions. By the late 1780s, public intellectuals, expecting a revolution to begin in France, began writing books about the American constitution and preparing to write a new Constitution for France. Turgot and Mably in France and Godwin in England wrote essays or books critiquing America for installing a constitution that allowed for three branches at the Federal level and also divided power between the federal and state level. The French critics were more enamored with the idea of a country with a single parliament and centralized federal power (Thompson, 1996, 364).

Jefferson, Adams, and War

In 1787, Jefferson argued very clearly that the United States should stay out of European affairs. He saw a war coming in europe between Engalnd and France. He saw that, over time, France and the other nations of Europe would have their own internal revolutions that would bring about republican governments in those societies. What he feared was being dragged into a European war on the side of England, and to end up defending a government that was, to some degree, behind the times. Jefferson advocated neutrality. Adams was ambiguous. His response to Jefferson was that Force and power will prevail, and that America will come out richer in the end. By implication, he was open to an alliance wtih England. This ambiguity on the part of Adams helped forge one of the first major poliltical divides in the United States.

We face a similar problem now, how should the United States see itself in the Middle East? Only now, we have become what Engalnd was in the 1780s. We should learn from the wisdom of Jefferson. If we were to leave the Middle East alone, the nations there, over time, would develop republican forms of government, including Iran and Israel. Otherwise, we risk fighting wars, expanding the Empire, and destroying our way of life.

Below, is a summary that explains the previous two paragraphs.

Before 1789, we see Jefferson and Adams exchanging impressions on the events in Paris, the upcoming revolution, and their hopes and fears for its final outcome. By 1785 Jefferson was in Paris to negotiate on behalf of the United States a treaty with France on commerce. Adams was in London for a similar purpose. Within the context of negotiating this treaty, Adams and Jefferson began what became a life-long conversation about France and the French Revolution. To begin, Jefferson and Adams both sense that great changes are about to take place in the country. Jefferson notes its poverty. He also notes that the situation in Paris was growing more tumultuous over the summer of 1785. The government, which was actually fairly moderate, was putting more people in jail, especially those who were infiltrating France with radical ideas that were coming from England and the German states. He also notes the hostility that the French Court was expressing to English ideas. As an example, he observed how the Queen refused to weak clothing made from English wool (Cappon, 20-100).

By 1787, the unrest seemed to have grown. Jefferson over the summer of 1787, lots of mobs were gathering in the streets of Paris. The mobs hissed at the nobles when they saw them. The King was perceived as being aloof, as he was drinking wine rather than addressing the problems of the nation. But, Jefferson thinks that a revolution had already taken place in France, a revolution that outstripped any revolution in England: “I think that in the course of three months the royal authority has lost, and the rights of the nation gained, as much ground, by a revolution of public opinion only, as England gained in all her civil wars under the Stuarts” (Paris, August 30. 1787. Jefferson to Adams, 196-197). Jefferson does not think that the ground gained by the nation will ever be lost. At the same time, Jefferson feared that London and Berlin might have been pining for a war against France. France did not want such a war, and France would look for ways to change Europe rather than submit to the aggression of the English and the Prussians. France, he predicted, would change all of Europe, making it conform to her laws.

Jefferson indicates that the French clearly saw England as her enemy, and was making diplomatic efforts to unite Russia and Austria against England (Jefferson to Adams, Paris, Sept 28 1787). In this letter, Jefferson explains to Adams the principles of good government, and how the affairs of Europe represent a potential threat to the American system of government. Jefferson says that “the first principle of good government is certainly a distribution of it’s powers into executive, judiciary, and legislative, and a subdivision of the latter into two or three branches.” He admits that the English constitution is better than previous constitutions, but that it is only better in relation to this standard. Jefferson then comments on the situation in Holland, which he thinks shows that it is better to never have hereditary offices. Overall, Jefferson hopes that the nations of Europe will be able to chasten England, if only a little. He fears that a conflict is coming with England, and that the nations of Europe are hesitating before confronting England. Jefferson hopes that, in this coming conflict, America will be able to remain neutral. He fears that the English, or rather the King, will force America to take the side of the English. Jefferson thinks that common sense would lead the English to leave America neutral, and so she would not.

In this letter of Jefferson to Adams, we can see the beginning of the strain in the friendship between the two men. This strain would only be exacerbated by the coming of the French Revolution. Jefferson thinks a great war is about to take place in Europe, and that the United States should stay out of the war. He is convinced that the end result of the war will be progress in the art of free government, furthering the advances made in the British and American revolutions, as well as the revolution in public opinion that was happening in France. In a European war, England would attempt to draw the United States into a conflict to defend aristocratic constitutions, which Jefferson, overall, did not think upheld the standard of free governments.

Adams was ambiguous about America’s relationship with England. He is ambiguous about the question of whether the United States should commit to helping England or not in the upcoming conflict. Instead, he admits that only “Force, Power, and Strength” will restrain some nations. He agrees that Europe will try to draw America into its conflicts, and he hopes that the United States will come out richer for it, in the end (Adams to Jefferson, Grovenor Square, October 9, 1787).

Rivers of Blood

Reflecting on the French Revolution, and the disagreements between Adams and Jefferson during the 1790s, Jefferson indicates that at the heart of a disagreement was whether, in that time, the popular branch needed strengthening or whether the aristocratic and executive branch needed strengthening. Adams sided with the aristocrats, Jefferson with the popular branch. This is a conflict that has occurred throughout history.

Jefferson indicates that both are committed to free government, and that, in the end rivers of blood will flow before free government will be brought about.

Adams, in the end, says that he contemplates the rivers of blood with melancholy, impliciitly admitting he sees no other way.

This is worth thinking about. Is it really necessary that rivers of blood must flow to bring about just and free societies? Why were Adams and Jefferson unable to see another possibility? In the end, their political philosophies were both too materialistic to admit the possibility of union, republicanism, and freedom coming about any other way than by rivers of blood. They lacked a robust and prinicpled moral system. Adams at least knew that such a system was necessary, but he himself failed to articulate it.

This is all the more significant now, as the US is ready to make rivers of blood flow in the Middle East, and the most that the opponents of such activity can do is look on in melancholy.

The Constitution was the Creed, We Never Got the Catechism

According to John Adams, the American Constitution needed a catechism to explain how we should live it out:

The idea that a moral social and political culture was necessary to maintain the Constitution is an idea that Adams held before the French Revolution began. Adams thought that the Congress needed write a political and moral catechism that would be taught in American schools. Adams asked Abbé Mably to write this catechism. Mably declined the offer, arguing that it would be better for Adams and the people in the US Congress to write and publish such a catechism (The information on the Catechism is in “John Adams on the Abbé de Mably.” More Books: The Bulletin of the Boston Public Library. Volume VIII April 1933. 125-145). This catechism was to explain the principal parts of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, with a view to explaining the kind of personal and social life that was necessary for each person to live and maintain in order to live the political truths contained in our founding creeds.

Despite this early rejection by Mably, and despite such a catechism never being written, Adams never lost his concern for the political culture that he thought was necessary to support the American creed. And so, in his letters to Jefferson, Adams expressed concerns about the negative effects that Rousseau’s philosophy might have on the interpretation of the American Constitution. If we were to extrapolate from his comments to Mably, political philosophy is the catechism of the Constitution. If Rousseau’s philosophy were to become the catechism of the Constitution, it would distort and ruin the Constitution over time because it would not adequately explain the Constitution and the institutions that it established.

Adams saw Rousseau’s political philosophy as informing the movements of the French Revolution. He feared the growing influence that the writings of Rousseau were having on young American intellectuals. He thought that if the intellectuals interpreted the Constitution through the lens of a Rousseauean philosophy, it would be the end of the Constitution and the institutions that it established. There are certain cultural ideas that need to be maintained in order to uphold the constitution and the institutions it established. Rousseau’s philosophy tended toward the breakdown of these ideals.

Money, Pleasure, Power

I really appreciate the comments that were posted yesterday. I would like to use today's entry to speak about the "theoretical lens" throught which I am operating. It is not Aristotle, but Plato. Aristotle is interested in classifying the mechanics of revolution. Plato is a nice introduction to Aristotle as Plato provides us with the psychology of revolution.

Plato recognized that the most formative part of a regime consisted of the leaders of the regime. The leaders are those who by their position and their character impress their way of life on the rest of society. The leaders do not necessarily do this by force of arms. They do it by example. They do it by breathing a spirit into the institutions and into the laws that in turn forms the souls of the men and women of a society. The leaders are not merely the political leaders. They are the men and women who make up the literary elite, the generals in the army, business leaders, the leaders of Hollywood, and journalists. Seen another way, the leaders are those who shape the univeristy, the news services, culture, music, business, the military, and politics. If we want to know the future of a society, all we have to do is study the souls of the leaders.

In Book VIII of the Republic Socrates outlines the character of each regime and how regimes progress, one to the next. Each regime can be understood according to the desire that dominates in that regime. To better help us understand each regime, he gives us the example of a family. In a honor-based family, the father tries to live in such a way that he never compromisos his honor. So, he resists committing injustices and doing anything that might compromise his dignity as a father and a leader of the family. Because he has this position, he does not always make the money that he could make. Also, he will sometime or many times in his life suffer injustice rather than commit one, apparently losing the respect of, or at least risking a lack of understanding from his wife and children

The wife of the honor based man, not out of malice and perhaps not always consciously, complains to her children that their family lacks things. At this moment, the seed of oligarchy is planted in the soul of the son of the honor-based man. The son becomes committed to making money so that he can buy the things his father never had and so that he can buy the respect and dignity his father did not get when his father suffered injustice. The son, rather than letting the desire for honor dominate in his soul, now turns his soul over to pursuing money. Thus, his soul becomes oligarchic.

The oligarch gives in to the passion of money-making in an unrestrained way. He also ends up living a fairly comfortable life. Now, the children of the oligarch, not at first out of malice and perhaps not fully conscious of what they are doing, look at their father and they say, “you have followed the passion for money-making in an unrestrained way. Why can we follow our other passions in an unrestrained way?” And so, the seed of democracy is planted in the souls of the children of the oligarch. These children start to explore and experience the pleasures of alcohol, the desire for procreation, to the point of becoming lotus eaters. They see that the best society would be a society that provides for equality, or that gives equal access to all the passions. The best society is one that is multi-colored. In this kind of society, or in a democracy, all the passions are given free reign. No one passion is regarded as different or better than any other passion.

Some of the children of the oligarch, though democrats when they are young, themselves become oligarchs when they are older. They want to buy honor and respect. Thus begins the war or competition between democracy and oligarchy. But this war over time favors the democrats. They have a much larger natural constituency, whereas the oligarchs greatest appeal is to the money makers. So, over time, the democratic passion takes hold of a society.

Now, among the passions, there is also the lust for cruelty and violence. And in a democratic society, that passion has equal access to the society along with all the other passions. Thus enters the demagogue. The demagogue or sophist knows how to appeal to the passions of men so as to gain power for himself. And so, in becoming elected, he can promise all sorts of things to the democrats which will appeal to their passions. In fact, one of the ways he gets elected is by promising the democrats that he will put an end to the oligarchs.

The ultimate demagogue is also a father killer. He will convince the democratic and oligarchic children that they have to kill their honor-loving father in order to be free from the rules or limits that he lives and that if they applied to their lives would make them suffer because it would require them to restrain their passions, whichever passion it is to which they currently let rule in their soul.

Once the demagogue comes to power, he starts killing off the group or groups that brought him to power. Do not forget, it is the desire for power that dominates in his soul. Eventually, he kills off the democrats, and the tyrant rules in a society. The poets, philosophers, musicians and other flatterers start to flatter the tyrant, because they depend on him now for their existence. One might say that democracy can also be tyrannical in this sense, poets and academics often end up flattering those who provide for their existence and subsistence.

This is the picture, or order of regimes, within which we can understand the progression of the French Revolution, as well as the contest that takes place between the democrats, such as Mary Wollstonecraft, and the oligarchs, such as Burke and Adams. It is also a nice way of beginning to understand what is the paradigm of modern politics, the struggle between the conservatives (oligarchs) and democrats. Neither side is fullly attached to reason and logos, and so they are immersed in a struggle between falsehoods.

John Adams, Lover of Aristocracy

I have re-read my notes on John Adams and the French Revolution. He thinks that there will always be an aristocracy in society, the question is, on what will this Aristocracy be based?

In the Old regime, it was based on land and birth. He thinks that in the United States, it will be based on talent, genius, and merit. He fears that anyone who is blind to the fact of aristocracy will fail to see and check the aristocracy of wealth, or oligarchy. Over time, the wealthy are able to insinuate themselves into and control the political system.

This is why Putin has governed the way he has over the past eight years and why the US is trying to demonize him. Putin has expelled from Russian society or put in jail the oligarchs who were in the process of taking over Russia throughout the 1990s. For this, he is being demonized by the West. He is being demonized by the West, especially because the US is effectively run by the aristocrats of wealth, who control both parties, the media, the music industry, and sports. Any country that opposes this oligarchy is percieved as an enemy.

Finally, Adams was perhaps unwilling to disuss what seems to accompany oligarchs and revolutionaries, the unleashing of the lust for pleasure which results in the lust for power. The children of oligarchs tend to be democrats, which means equal access to all the passions. Democrats become blind to the demagogue, who appeals to the passions as a way of installing himself as a brutal tyrant.

The passions always present themselves as liberators, but when they rule in the soul, they rule with despotic tyranny.

Adams, Jefferson, and Revolution

After dealing with Pius VI, I am turning to the figures that my book will deal with before Pius VI, specifically, John Adams, Mary Wollstonecraft, Immanuel Kant, and Edmund Burke. The French Revolution had a great impact not only on the presidency of John Adams, but also on his literary career and his friendships. Perhaps more than any other, the friendship between Adams and Jefferson was most affected by the ideas, events, and effects of the French Revolution.

In 1812, John Adams sent a letter to Thomas Jefferson, along with some homespun, in the hopes of rekindling a correspondence that the two men broke off due to events surrounding the election of 1800. A mutual friend suggested to Adams that he try to renew the friendship. Adams began the correspondence partly to lure Jefferson into a dialogue about the history of their relationship. At the very least, he hoped that he and Jefferson could explain themselves to each other.

Adams wanted to discover why their intellectual relationship and friendship soured over the years. Adams and Jefferson were friends and among the more radical members of the group that signed the Declaration of Independence in 1776. Despite this fact, by 1800 they found themselves on opposite sides of the political debates plaguing the country. The presidential campaign, Adams’ loss to Jefferson, and much else broke all communication between the two great founders and led to Adams’ retreat from public life.

Among the topics that Adams sensed were potential causes for their break-up, was each man’s reaction to and interpretation of the events and aftermath of the French Revolution. This led to disagreement over what the French Revolution and its philosophy meant for the United States, and what was the purpose in general of revolution for a culture and society. Adams was critical of the French Revolution before, during, and after it happened. That is to say, before the French Revolution he was critical of the political theorists that he thought were behind it. During the French Revolution, he was immersed in political efforts to prevent the United States from becoming another revolutionary France. After the French Revolution, he feared revolutionary philosophy and practices influencing the United States and ruining its government.

Agents of Influence in Poland and the US 02

Just a quick follow up before I go on vacation until January 17th. Yes, the young are the most susceptible to ideologies. They feel more accutely the suffering of their time, and they are looking for something to put their hope in. They are also often stuck between the pleasures of Sodom and following the path of virtue. Those who get stuck in this way end up like a deer in the headlights, with frozen minds and frozen hearts.

Finally, as a commentor noted, only a small number of priests or people go along with false ideologies. During the French Revolution, 4 out of 300 Bishops bolted from the Church. The vast majority of French Catholics remained loyal to Rome by dying rather than denying their faith.

Jansenism

Am reading these days about Jansenism. It might be that secularized Jansenism had not a little to do with the origins of the French Revolution. As the 17th Century wanes into the 18th Century, Jansensists developed a legalistic culture of protest against authority, using all sorts of "democratic" and legalistic mechanisms to avoid obedience to the Pope and to thwart the King. The Jansenists were also looking for a sort of redemptive act that would give real physical expression to the invisible Church, which was being held in bondage by the visible Church and the King.

I know from previous research that Voltaire thought that the Jansenists would he useful allies for a time in paving the way to Revoltuion. He realized that they shared his hatred of the King and authority. Voltaire, at the same time, disliked the Jansenist. His brother got involved in some "signs and wonders" that took place in a Jansenist cemetary in the 1720s. Voltaire took this to be a sign that all Christians were interested in hokey signs and wonders. He also thought that they could be easily duped.

The Revolution Comes to Venezuela

Anyone who has looked at this blog before and is aware of the situation of religious freedom in China, could probably see that the Chinese are following a model of Church State relations that was set in France during the French Revolution. The Revolutionaries decided that the State would for all practical purposes turn the Catholic Church into the French Church and that the State would control that Church.

Now, it appears that the Chinese are not alone. The example that we see from the French Revolution is making its way to Venezuela. It actually might be more of the example set by England and the States of Northern Europe during the Reformation. It is, in the end, the nefarious ideas of Marsilius of Padua and William Ockham at work.

Here is the link: http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,238015,00.html