Summary Read our full plot summary and analysis of Common Sense, scene by scene break-downs, and more. Although not usually noted as an American Founding Father, Paine was its most adept propagandist. Common Sense is a pamphlet by Thomas Paine that was first published in 1775. His no-nonsense writing style proved persuasive. His views on independence were characterized by an anti-establishment, anti-religious fervor that was radical for its day.
He was to become Franklin unleashed, able to write the provocative phrases that Founding Fathers were at the time too politic to utter in public. Soon he was writing for a popular magazine, including an article on the barbarism of the slave trade that inspired the first meeting of abolitionists in Philadelphia. He immigrated to Philadelphia where he met up with Benjamin Franklin, and became a kind of adopted son to the American Founding Father. Born in 1737 in England, by 1774 he had lost his job and was separated from his wife. Paine’s revolutionary pamphlet was reflective of the man himself, a zealous apostle for the Age of Enlightenment who knew little stability in his own life. Paine’s eloquent, direct language spoke people’s unspoken thoughts no pamphlet had ever made such an impact on colonial opinion. It has been estimated that nearly half of the new nation either read it or had it read to them. Other articles where Common Sense is discussed: United States: The Continental Congress: of Thomas Paine’s irreverent pamphlet Common Sense abruptly shattered this hopeful complacency and put independence on the agenda.
Both the literate and the illiterate-who were read the piece in regular public gatherings-were convinced by the recently-arrived British immigrant that it was time for the colonies to break from the Crown. By the end of the year, up to 250,000 copies of the pamphlet were sold, the equivalent of 35 million today. Thomas Paine’s Common Sense presented the case for American independence in a way that spoke to the average person. January 10th, 1776, marked the publication of arguably the most influential piece of literature in all of American history.
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