The First American: The Life and Times of Benjamin Franklin (60 page)

If Franklin’s countenance had not made his contempt for the proprietors plain, these very words did, for not long after they reached their intended audience—Isaac Norris—they found their way to friends of the proprietors in Pennsylvania. From there they were relayed back to Thomas Penn, who denounced Franklin’s letter as “a most impudent paper and a vile misrepresentation of what passed.” Penn asserted that it was as unsafe for the people of Pennsylvania as for the proprietors to claim privileges not warranted by the king’s charter, and that it was only out of concern for the people that he had spoken as he had. He did “not exult at all on the occasion” and had given Franklin no just cause for offense—certainly no such offense as he had taken. “How Mr. Franklin looked I cannot tell,” Penn added. “My brother says like a malicious V. [villain], as he always does.” But patience had its limits. “From this time I will not have any conversation with him on any pretence.”

Franklin was angry to learn that his enemies were reading his mail, but despite some second thoughts on language he stood by his judgment. “I still see nothing in the letter but what was proper for me to write, as you ought to be acquainted with every thing that is of importance to your affairs,” he wrote to Joseph Galloway, who at this time was an important Franklin ally in the Assembly. “And it is of no small importance to know what sort of a man we have to deal with, and how base his principles. I might indeed have spared the comparison of Thomas to a
low jockey
who triumphed with insolence when a purchaser complained of being cheated in a horse, an expression the Dr. [Fothergill, who had told Franklin of Penn’s feelings about the letter] particularly remarked as harsh and unguarded. I might have left his conduct and sentiments to your reflections, and contented myself with a bare recital of what passed; but indignation extorted it from me, and I cannot yet say that I repent much of it.” If anything, Franklin took continued satisfaction. “It sticks in his liver, and e’en let him bear what he so well deserves.” Poor Richard could have told Thomas Penn what to expect. “By obtaining copies of our private correspondence, he has added another instance confirming the old adage, that listeners seldom hear any good of themselves.”

The bad feelings between Franklin and Thomas Penn certainly did nothing good for accommodation between the Assembly and the proprietors. In November 1758, after a delay of more than a year, the Penns finally delivered their response to Franklin’s original complaints. Ferdinand Paris placed the burden of obstruction on Franklin’s shoulders, although without deigning to name him; reaffirming his clients’ commitment to “that harmony which they most sincerely desire,” the Penns’ lawyer
lamented that the Assembly had not designated some “person of candour” as its representative to the discussions. Paris went on to assert that the members of the Assembly had not pointed out “clearly and distinctly any grievances they thought themselves under.”

Franklin could dismiss the lack-of-candor charge as ad hominem flummery; the assertion that he had failed to delineate Pennsylvania’s grievances rang hollow when the proprietors would not even respond to his general complaints. More troublesome was the crux of the proprietors’ argument: “The Charter (when read in its own language) gives the power to make laws to the Proprietary.” The role of the Assembly was to provide “advice and assent,” but the initiative rested with the proprietors. This was just the opposite of the view of Franklin and the Assembly, who judged the initiative in lawmaking to reside in the people, with the proprietors reduced to the advise-and-assent role.

The personal animus between Franklin and the Penns continued to obscure this essential political difference. Bypassing Franklin, Thomas and Richard Penn wrote directly to the Pennsylvania Assembly charging Franklin with “disrespect,” again aspersing his “candour,” and asserting that fruitful relations between Assembly and proprietors necessitated “a very different representation.” Franklin attacked the proprietors’ response as of a piece with all of their actions. “I need not point out to you the studied obscurity and uncertainty of their answer, nor the mean chicanery of their whole proceeding,” he wrote Isaac Norris. Franklin added, “Thus a final end is put to all farther negotiation between them and me.”

Yet this hardly ended the struggle between the people of Pennsylvania and the proprietors. To Franklin it simply suggested a change of venue. Form required his offering to resign as the Assembly’s agent. “The House will see that if they purpose to continue treating with the proprietors, it will be necessary to recall me and appoint another person or persons for that service, who are likely to be more acceptable or more pliant than I am, or, as the Proprietors express it, persons of candour.”

But he advised against this, suggesting instead the radical alternative of replacing rule by the Penns with rule by the Crown. “If the House, grown at length sensible of the danger to the liberties of the people necessarily arising from such growing power and property in one family with such principles, shall think it expedient to have the government and property in different hands, and for that purpose shall desire that the Crown would take the province into its immediate care, I believe that point might without much difficulty be carried, and our privileges preserved.” He added, “In that I think I could still do service.”

Not many years would pass before Franklin’s preference for Crown rule above propriety rule would appear hopelessly naïve. At the moment it reflected both his terminal contempt for Thomas Penn and his increasing enchantment with things British.

That his son
William shared his enchantment increased it the more. Before leaving Philadelphia, William had fallen in love. Elizabeth Graeme was the belle of the city—bright, vivacious, beautiful. Her father, Thomas Graeme, was wealthy and distinguished, a leading member of the proprietary party. This political connection bothered Franklin somewhat—and may have contributed to his invitation to William to accompany him to England. If so, the strategy worked, for merry London soon banished thoughts of Betsy. “The infinite variety of new objects, the continued noise and bustle in the streets, and the viewing such things as were esteemed most curious, engrossed all my attention,” he wrote Betsy, by way of explaining why he had not written earlier.

Whether or not Franklin had intended the relationship to end this way, he did not mourn its demise. Yet at times he must have wished that William had remained faithful to his lover across the sea. Just as Franklin himself had done in his own youth, William began consorting with the “low women” of London. And just as Franklin had done, William fathered a son out of wedlock. William Temple Franklin was born about 1760. His mother was as lost to history as William Franklin’s own mother.

A bastard child had not been convenient to Franklin three decades earlier, but he took it in. William made a different decision—perhaps from his own experience growing up a bastard and a stepchild. He put William Temple in a foster home and for some years disguised his connection to the boy. Franklin almost certainly felt inhibited from criticizing his son on this point; he paid the bills for his grandson and kept quiet.

Otherwise William’s life went according to plan. He entered the Middle Temple shortly after arrival in London; by the end of the following year he had completed his law studies and put on the gown of the barrister. Franklin’s pride in his son was matched by his appreciation of William’s usefulness. No lawyer himself, and a failed judge, Franklin valued William’s advice on the legal points of the dispute with the Penns.

William
joined his father on a journey to Scotland in the late summer and autumn of 1759. Edinburgh had asked to honor Franklin; upon arrival he was named a burgess and guild-brother of the city. Glasgow presented a similar award. St. Andrews bestowed the freedom of the burgh.

With continued repetition such notice would lose some of its appeal; for now each mark of esteem delighted him. Equally delightful were the friends Franklin made on this trip. Sir Alexander Dick and Lady Dick knew Franklin by reputation; on hearing of the Franklins’ visit they invited father and son to stay with them at Prestonfield, their manor near Edinburgh. Sir Alexander, like several of Franklin’s admirers, was a physician and more; at the time of Franklin’s visit, he was president of Edinburgh’s College of Physicians and a member of the Edinburgh Philosophical Society. He would help found the Royal Society of Edinburgh some years hence, but only after winning a gold medal for growing the best rhubarb in Britain.

Franklin charmed Sir Alexander and Lady Dick and the assorted guests they brought to meet the marvelous American. Franklin was in fine form, reciting one of his literary hoaxes, a blasphemous revision of the Bible, contending for religious toleration. The first verses of this chapter recounted how Abraham received a visitor, an old man bowed with age. Abraham offered him food and a place to sleep, only to be dismayed when the visitor failed to bless Abraham’s God. Annoyed, Abraham queried why he did not.

7. And the man answered and said, I do not worship the God thou speakest of; neither do I call upon his name; for I have made to myself a God, which abideth always in mine house, and provideth me with all things.

8. And Abraham’s zeal was kindled against the man; and he arose, and fell upon him, and drove him forth with blows into the wilderness.

9. And at midnight God called unto Abraham, saying, Abraham, where is thy stranger?

10. And Abraham answered and said, Lord, he would not worship thee; neither would he call upon thy name. Therefore have I driven him out from before my face into the wilderness.

11. And God said, Have I borne with him these hundred ninety and eight years, and nourished him, and clothed him, notwithstanding his rebellion against me, and couldst not thou, that art thyself a sinner, bear with him one night?

Lady Dick insisted that Franklin send her a copy of this “Parable Against Persecution,” as it came to be called; so also did Lord Kames, a Scottish jurist who had a reputation as a hanging judge but otherwise was a merry fellow. Franklin and William spent a few days with Kames and his family. While William conversed with the young people of the household, Franklin and Kames rode about the neighborhood on horseback, philosophizing about law, agriculture, mechanics, fish, religion, fireplaces, population growth, and history.

Upon returning to London, Franklin wrote Kames regretting that he and William had not had the company of the lord and his lady on the long journey south. “We could have beguiled the way by discoursing 1000 things that now we may never have an opportunity of considering together; for conversation warms the mind, enlivens the imagination, and is continually starting fresh game that is immediately pursued and taken.”

Retrieving a thread of their conversations, Franklin raised the critical issue of Canada. “No one can rejoice more sincerely than I do on the reduction of Canada; and this, not merely as I am a colonist, but as I am a Briton.”

And not merely a Briton, but a British imperialist—one with a vision grander than almost any found in Whitehall or Westminster.