The Paine dilemma

LUMINARIES of the American Revolution are much revered and endlessly biographied. But in the South reverence only goes so far when it comes to Thomas Paine. Paine, an Englishman who helped design the American revolution and wrote, in “The Rights of Man”, the best defence of the revolution in France, was a freethinker who scorned organised religion as well as kings: not a recipe for popularity in the Bible Belt.

Last year Lindsley Smith, an Arkansas legislator, tried to establish a Thomas Paine Day in her state. Forty-six lawmakers supported her (20 said no), but she needed 51 votes for her bill to pass, and 34 legislators did not vote at all—probably because they had no idea who Paine was. She will try again in January and, in the meantime, plans to educate Arkansans in general, and the state's politicians in particular, about what Paine did and why he should be honoured.

The push in Arkansas coincides with an effort to institute a Paine day in all 50 states before the 200th anniversary of his death next year. So far nine states have passed such resolutions, including Nebraska and Missouri. Virginia, the first, introduced its Paine day in 1998.

Paine proponents quote John Adams: “Without the pen of Paine, the sword of Washington would have been wielded in vain.” Paine did not argue merely for the ending of slavery and monarchy but for public education, animal rights, women's rights, a guaranteed minimum income and a pension for the elderly.

Unfortunately for his cause, he also held strongly anti-Christian opinions. Mark Wilensky, a Paine scholar, recommends that his present-day promoters should concentrate less on his later writings, which raise hackles, and more on his contribution to the struggle for independence. But Arkansas already honours a clutch of people with eyebrow-raising beliefs: Robert E. Lee, the commander of the Confederate army, Jefferson Davis, president of the Confederacy, Thomas Jefferson, who slept with his slaves—and Abraham Lincoln who, in his day, held opinions much less congenial to the South than Paine's ever were.