Of Monarchy and Hereditary Succession
“‘Tis a form of government which the word of God bears testimony against, and blood will attend it.”
By Joshua Vissers, continued from Of the Origin and Design of Government in General.
A portrait of Thomas Paine by George Romney, 1793. Courtesy of the New York Public Library.
Thomas Paine pulled no punches when arguing against a monarchical government. In a land full of puritans and religious refugees, he went straight for the king’s jugular. Monarchy is a sin against God, he said, and had the Bible scriptures ready to back it up.
After defeating the Midianites in Judges, Chapter 8, the Israelites asked Gideon to become their king and pass the title down to his descendants. But Gideon not only declined, but pointed out they were wrong to offer it.
22 Then the men of Israel said unto Gideon, Rule thou over us, both thou, and thy son, and thy son's son also: for thou hast delivered us from the hand of Midian. 23 And Gideon said unto them, I will not rule over you, neither shall my son rule over you: the LORD shall rule over you.
As Paine pointed out, Gideon didn’t even thank them for offering the honor. He told them, point-blank, they were wrong and owed their allegiance to their God.
And God himself tried to warn the Israelites of the dangers of a king, too. When they asked for a king in 1 Samuel, Chapter 8, God spoke to them through Samuel:
11 …This will be the manner of the king that shall reign over you: He will take your sons, and appoint them for himself, for his chariots, and to be his horsemen; and some shall run before his chariots. 12 And he will appoint him captains over thousands, and captains over fifties; and will set them to ear his ground, and to reap his harvest, and to make his instruments of war, and instruments of his chariots. 13 And he will take your daughters to be confectionaries, and to be cooks, and to be bakers. 14 And he will take your fields, and your vineyards, and your oliveyards, even the best of them, and give them to his servants. 15 And he will take the tenth of your seed, and of your vineyards, and give to his officers, and to his servants. 16 And he will take your menservants, and your maidservants, and your goodliest young men, and your asses, and put them to his work. 17 He will take the tenth of your sheep: and ye shall be his servants. 18 And ye shall cry out in that day because of your king which ye shall have chosen you; and the LORD will not hear you in that day.
The words, while antiquated, seem to be clear. God won’t save you from the king you choose for yourself. Nonetheless, the Israelites persisted and Saul became their king, with disastrous results.
Paine goes on to explain that as bad as any monarchy might be, hereditary monarchy is even worse. How can someone grant another not only sovereignty over themselves, but of their future progeny?
“Because such an unwise, unjust, unnatural compact might (perhaps) in the next succession put them under the government of a rogue or a fool. ... yet it is one of those evils, which when once establish is not easily removed;”
Paine points out later in the chapter that if hereditary succession had a record of ensuring good and wise men became king, it would have “the seal of divine authority”. However, all too often, “it opens a door to the foolish, the wicked, and the improper…”.
All too frequently, he argues, monarchy paves the road for men who are poisoned by their own importance, disconnected from the world at large and ignorant of their people’s needs; stewards acting selfishly, shielded by a king too old or too young to have full responsibility for their kingship, will corrupt a kingdom; familial clashes play out on a national stage, with the lives of soldiers’ and peasants caught up in contests for power and wealth.
And kingship, Paine says, is rarely gotten by respectable means, either. He supposes that most monarchies originated as simply the biggest, meanest warlord who turned their forces to a kind of protection racket rather than continuing to raid and warmonger.
Paine finished his second chapter with a jab that, as the English system became more like a republic, the king became worse than useless.
“In England a king hath little more to do than to make war and give away places; which in plain terms, is to impoverish the nation and set it together by the ears. ... Of more worth is one honest man to society and in the sight of God, than all the crowned ruffians that ever lived.”
And there is Paine’s key argument; the common, honest man was more fit to rule than any “crowned ruffian”. The kingship is a position that is disfavored by God, likely ill-gotten, and prone to corruption within a generation, if not sooner.
It is little wonder that the colonists were dissatisfied with it.
This series will continue next week with Thomas Paine’s ‘Thoughts on the Present State of American Affairs’.
Read the entirety of “Common Sense” for free from the Internet Archive.