(It is most fitting to open my Presidential series proper, with a magnificent non-President, one of America’s greatest men who ever lived, and also controversial to the bone, Ben Franklin.)
Benjamin Franklin (1706-1790), perhaps, the most remarkable and versatile man in all American history, represents not only her genius, but her enterprising spirit as well. My special entry for him is, therefore, very appropriately titled America’s Renaissance Man. A surprisingly controversial, and by no means universally admired man, he is a figure of huge interest, and his persona ought to have been much better studied not just from the angle of his official biographical details, but also in terms of his psychology, as a truly exceptional individual.
Alas, being excluded from the official presidential roster, as a “non-President,” the historical poll of America’s Greatest Presidents Ever lets him fall through the cracks of this last vestige of American historical education. I am not saying, of course, that today’s America does not know who he was, but from my personal experience in this country, he is far less known than Washington or Lincoln and at least a dozen far less deserving American Presidents and celebrities of the more recent generations. I see the cause of this relative cultural ignorance in that, despite his established place among the top five greatest Americans (and some rankings even place him in the top three), he is otherwise ineligible for a specific Presidential mention, and the special consideration that goes with it.
But, on the other hand, the ghost of Ben Franklin and the national American Mnemosyne with him, must be forever grateful to Walt Disney’s Amos the Mouse, who was really the one who had taught Franklin all those great things the man had become famous for, and by telling that story to the kindergarten world kept the name of his protégé better known than many others who did not have the good fortune to be exposed in a children’s cartoon.
Getting now to my personal experience with Ben Franklin, I was fortunate enough to be raised in the Soviet Union, where, in my day, Franklin’s name used to be very well known, as one of the pillars of our Western Civilization. (I don’t know about the situation there today, but I hope that the culture-clastic madness of the 1990’s has by now somewhat receded.) As for me, Franklin was actually one of those many reasons why I had always admired America and had rejected the grotesque, although otherwise often pretty accurate (and occasionally, even understated!) “excesses” of the old Soviet anti-American propaganda.
Here was a true American patriot and a benefactor of humanity, whose public service reached beyond his general recognition as one of the most important Founding Fathers of the nation, to “practical details,” including the establishment of such modern necessities of community life, as a fire company and a public library. As a former book collector and a perennial book lover, I appreciate this last achievement of his above all others, but, for the sake of a fuller record, his other triumphs ought to be mentioned as well, such as the establishment of an intercolonial postal service, an academy, a hospital, and even an insurance company! Many of these innovations were the first of their kind in all North America. Moreover, as a great scientist in his own right (even if some jealous detractors have questioned his genius), he is known as the inventor of the Franklin stove, of the lightning rod, and of bifocal glasses, among many other things.
Franklin’s detractors have also pointed, with opprobrium, to his bold enterprising spirit and to certain rather questionable elements of his posthumous autobiography and even to the character of Poor Richard Saunders (Franklin’s pseudonym in Poor Richard’s Almanac), to produce a repelling portrait of him as a… capitalist, in the worst sense of the word. Of such nature was the unpleasant attack on him from none other than the D. H. Lawrence, while the estimable Max Weber (see my notes on him in the Contradiction section) also used his person to typify the least attractive traits of contemporary capitalism, in his Protestant Ethic.
So what? I ask, for he was also a thief and a smuggler and what-not and all for the best of causes, which was of course the betterment of his newly emerging country! Who can ask for more from a patriot and a nation’s father. As for his being a “capitalist,” I have to speak about this, having been explicitly negative toward this particular trait of character before.
In the light of my thinking on the subject of capitalism, drawing a sharp distinction between the two types of capitalism: productive and financial, I would disagree, should anyone try to attribute the sins of the latter to the former. Franklin was most certainly a productive capitalist. And if, in the process of making his country great and prosperous, he managed to put a few extra dollars into his pocket, I have no qualms about it. Unlike many other Founding Fathers, he was not a man of a large inherited wealth; in fact, he was quite proud of his working class roots. In other words, he was a working man, and whatever he took for himself, he was well worth it.
Once on this subject, let me clarify one fine nuance. Although I object to the basic principle of greed in the ideology of capitalism, whatever such “ethics” may be discovered in Franklin’s character, they are all to be substantially mitigated by his great public service, and to this combination I can have no objection within the person of one exceptional individual, although collectively (that is, unexceptionally!), this combination is much harder to tolerate in any society, without the healthy counterbalance of socialist consciousness, which is needed to remedy the human propensity, if left unchecked, for excesses and corruption. In other words, it is not a particular individual with capitalist propensities that defines a capitalist society, but a particular society as a whole, with all that it entails.
Thus, the reader may well see my point with regard to Ben Franklin, which in general terms runs throughout my book. He was an exceptional man, and even if his many foibles were indeed true, I have a weakness for exceptionality. Quod licet Jovi, non licet bovi, as my mantra goes.
So that my unabashedly positive attitude toward Franklin, first and foremost, as a symbol of the American ideal, is highlighted in the conclusion of this entry, here is a little argument to authority, in the shape of his characterization by Thomas Jefferson in a Letter to Samuel Smith, 1798:
"The greatest man and ornament of the age and country, in which he lived."
Jefferson’s concise summation of Benjamin Franklin’s role in American history is eminently fitting to close my Franklin entry.
Benjamin Franklin (1706-1790), perhaps, the most remarkable and versatile man in all American history, represents not only her genius, but her enterprising spirit as well. My special entry for him is, therefore, very appropriately titled America’s Renaissance Man. A surprisingly controversial, and by no means universally admired man, he is a figure of huge interest, and his persona ought to have been much better studied not just from the angle of his official biographical details, but also in terms of his psychology, as a truly exceptional individual.
Alas, being excluded from the official presidential roster, as a “non-President,” the historical poll of America’s Greatest Presidents Ever lets him fall through the cracks of this last vestige of American historical education. I am not saying, of course, that today’s America does not know who he was, but from my personal experience in this country, he is far less known than Washington or Lincoln and at least a dozen far less deserving American Presidents and celebrities of the more recent generations. I see the cause of this relative cultural ignorance in that, despite his established place among the top five greatest Americans (and some rankings even place him in the top three), he is otherwise ineligible for a specific Presidential mention, and the special consideration that goes with it.
But, on the other hand, the ghost of Ben Franklin and the national American Mnemosyne with him, must be forever grateful to Walt Disney’s Amos the Mouse, who was really the one who had taught Franklin all those great things the man had become famous for, and by telling that story to the kindergarten world kept the name of his protégé better known than many others who did not have the good fortune to be exposed in a children’s cartoon.
Getting now to my personal experience with Ben Franklin, I was fortunate enough to be raised in the Soviet Union, where, in my day, Franklin’s name used to be very well known, as one of the pillars of our Western Civilization. (I don’t know about the situation there today, but I hope that the culture-clastic madness of the 1990’s has by now somewhat receded.) As for me, Franklin was actually one of those many reasons why I had always admired America and had rejected the grotesque, although otherwise often pretty accurate (and occasionally, even understated!) “excesses” of the old Soviet anti-American propaganda.
Here was a true American patriot and a benefactor of humanity, whose public service reached beyond his general recognition as one of the most important Founding Fathers of the nation, to “practical details,” including the establishment of such modern necessities of community life, as a fire company and a public library. As a former book collector and a perennial book lover, I appreciate this last achievement of his above all others, but, for the sake of a fuller record, his other triumphs ought to be mentioned as well, such as the establishment of an intercolonial postal service, an academy, a hospital, and even an insurance company! Many of these innovations were the first of their kind in all North America. Moreover, as a great scientist in his own right (even if some jealous detractors have questioned his genius), he is known as the inventor of the Franklin stove, of the lightning rod, and of bifocal glasses, among many other things.
Franklin’s detractors have also pointed, with opprobrium, to his bold enterprising spirit and to certain rather questionable elements of his posthumous autobiography and even to the character of Poor Richard Saunders (Franklin’s pseudonym in Poor Richard’s Almanac), to produce a repelling portrait of him as a… capitalist, in the worst sense of the word. Of such nature was the unpleasant attack on him from none other than the D. H. Lawrence, while the estimable Max Weber (see my notes on him in the Contradiction section) also used his person to typify the least attractive traits of contemporary capitalism, in his Protestant Ethic.
So what? I ask, for he was also a thief and a smuggler and what-not and all for the best of causes, which was of course the betterment of his newly emerging country! Who can ask for more from a patriot and a nation’s father. As for his being a “capitalist,” I have to speak about this, having been explicitly negative toward this particular trait of character before.
In the light of my thinking on the subject of capitalism, drawing a sharp distinction between the two types of capitalism: productive and financial, I would disagree, should anyone try to attribute the sins of the latter to the former. Franklin was most certainly a productive capitalist. And if, in the process of making his country great and prosperous, he managed to put a few extra dollars into his pocket, I have no qualms about it. Unlike many other Founding Fathers, he was not a man of a large inherited wealth; in fact, he was quite proud of his working class roots. In other words, he was a working man, and whatever he took for himself, he was well worth it.
Once on this subject, let me clarify one fine nuance. Although I object to the basic principle of greed in the ideology of capitalism, whatever such “ethics” may be discovered in Franklin’s character, they are all to be substantially mitigated by his great public service, and to this combination I can have no objection within the person of one exceptional individual, although collectively (that is, unexceptionally!), this combination is much harder to tolerate in any society, without the healthy counterbalance of socialist consciousness, which is needed to remedy the human propensity, if left unchecked, for excesses and corruption. In other words, it is not a particular individual with capitalist propensities that defines a capitalist society, but a particular society as a whole, with all that it entails.
Thus, the reader may well see my point with regard to Ben Franklin, which in general terms runs throughout my book. He was an exceptional man, and even if his many foibles were indeed true, I have a weakness for exceptionality. Quod licet Jovi, non licet bovi, as my mantra goes.
So that my unabashedly positive attitude toward Franklin, first and foremost, as a symbol of the American ideal, is highlighted in the conclusion of this entry, here is a little argument to authority, in the shape of his characterization by Thomas Jefferson in a Letter to Samuel Smith, 1798:
"The greatest man and ornament of the age and country, in which he lived."
Jefferson’s concise summation of Benjamin Franklin’s role in American history is eminently fitting to close my Franklin entry.
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