The Many Faces of Benjamin Franklin
But when he finally abandoned all hope of reconciliation, no founder became more zealous in support of separation, and none worked harder to achieve it. If anything, history (largely because it listened too much to John Adams, who deeply envied and resented Franklin and the adoration the French showered upon him) has vastly understated the importance of what Franklin, an old man with many physical afflictions, accomplished for the struggling nation. He secured from the French not only direct military aid but also the financial support that would keep the Continental Army fighting. And he secured international recognition for the fledgling nation even as he helped negotiate favorable terms of peace.
Compromise. At home, his influence was just as vital. Though many of his ideas for a new and stronger constitution were too democratic for his more republican compatriots--he favored a weak executive and a unicameral house--he was the spirit of compromise, quietly nudging the process along when it looked as though fiery political antagonists would bring it to a halt. And for Franklin, compromise was no easy ideal. He had to swallow hard to accept the continued existence of slavery, which he knew (though a former slave owner himself) was a blight upon the republic and which he brilliantly attacked in one of his last literary efforts, a withering satire entitled "Sidi Mehemet on the Slave Trade."
It is a curious thing about Franklin, as Isaacson emphasizes when he reflects back on the man whose life and mind he explored for more than a decade: He was the most brilliant and accomplished of the founders, but he eschewed their latent and overt elitism, their abiding wariness about the people in general. "The most interesting thing was how resolutely he pushed for middle-class values and virtues to be the basis for American society, rather than the elitist values pushed by Jefferson and Adams," says Isaacson.
Morgan echoes and elaborates that judgment: "Franklin was the most democratic in thinking that government shouldn't be run by the wisest but instead by the ordinary people. He realized you may not always get the wisest decisions that way, but he was willing to submit to the judgment of the majority."
It wasn't simply blind faith. He believed that the public could be made gentler, wiser, and, in the long run, amenable to doing the right thing. He believed so because he had devoted his life--successfully, he thought--to making the various publics he served do just that. The democratic venture would not have continued unless other Americans had come along to share Franklin's faith and dedication.
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