The Founding Fathers strongly criticized Plato’s “Republic” (and for good reason)

“Socrates had reason indeed to complain of the misrepresentations of Plato; for in truth his dialogues are libels on Socrates.”

– Thomas Jefferson, in a letter to John Adams (5 July 1814)

I recently finished reading Plato’s “Republic” in the original Greek …

I recently finished reading Plato’s “Republic” in the original Greek. But I’m still not convinced by its arguments. Why? Among other things, because Plato advocated having a philosopher-king with absolute power. (But I’m getting ahead of myself here.) I have given my own response to these ideas in another post, so I will not spend much time giving my ideas here. Rather, I will here focus on some of the responses from our Founding Fathers. Specifically, John Adams and Thomas Jefferson both criticized Plato’s “Republic,” and so did one of the authors of the Federalist Papers. But in order to understand why they did so, I must first examine some of the arguments from “The Republic” itself – namely, the parts that the Founding Fathers most objected to. If you’ve already read my main post about Plato’s arguments, please feel free to skip this next paragraph.

Plato

… but I’m still not convinced by its arguments (which I briefly summarize here)

The Greek title of Plato’s “Republic” is ΠΟΛΙΤΕΙΑ (“Politeia”). It has many translations, including “constitution.” Nonetheless, it might be best translated as “political entity.” In English, the work is ironically known as “The Republic” – but by modern standards, this is something of a misnomer. His “political entity” is far different from what we would today consider a “republic.” James Madison defined a “republic” as “a government in which the scheme of representation takes place” (Source: Federalist No. 10). But this does not describe the “ideal” state of Plato. Rather (as mentioned earlier), Plato’s “ideal state” is led by a philosopher-king with absolute power. The philosopher-king is to rule for life. Plato reassures his readers that the philosopher-king will refrain from “abusing” his power, but does not provide any convincing reasons that his scheme will indeed prevent this from happening (something that a good system should be expected to do, in my opinion). The philosopher-king has power to determine the occupations that his individual subjects enter into, and also has power to censor any idea (political or otherwise) that he deems to be “dangerous” or “undesirable.” He also has absolute control over education for both the young and the old, and has power to arrange marriages between his subjects to promote “good breeding” – an idea now known as “eugenics.” These things have a tendency to make “The Republic” into something far less than an ideal state.

Plato

Frederick Douglass took a great risk by learning how to read

Note: This post quotes from Frederick Douglass’s memoir, where he recounts racist treatment that he received from various white men. Although he quotes their offensive language, this post has censored out the racial slurs, indicating only by brackets that the unfortunate “N-word” was the word used in the original quotations.

Before the Civil War, a young slave secretly took a great risk by learning how to read ...

Before the Civil War, a young slave secretly took a great risk by learning how to read. The young slave’s name was Frederick Douglass, and he would later become a tireless campaigner in the cause of black freedom. First he would campaign against slavery, and then he would campaign for civil rights. (But I’m getting ahead of myself.)

Frederick Douglass in the 1860s, long after his being held as a slave

Frederick Douglass would later recount this story in a famous memoir

After he had escaped to the North, Frederick Douglass would later write a memoir. It was simply entitled “Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave (Written By Himself).” This memoir was first published in 1845. In it, he describes his experiences as a slave, writing the most influential account ever given about American slavery. Most relevantly for our present subject, he recounts his secret undertaking to learn how to read, while under the domination of White Southerners. The writing speaks so well for itself that very little commentary will be needed to dramatize it, or put it into perspective.

Original edition of this memoir

Yes, Blackstone’s “Commentaries” influenced Abraham Lincoln (and here’s the proof)

“The election of 1834 came, and [Abraham Lincoln] was then elected to the Legislature [of Illinois] by the highest vote cast for any candidate. Major John T. Stuart, then in full practice of the law, was also elected. During the canvass, in a private conversation he encouraged [Abe to] study law. After the election [Abe] borrowed books of Stuart, took them home with him, and went at it in good earnest. He studied with nobody. He still mixed in the surveying to pay board and clothing bills. When the Legislature met, the law books were dropped, but were taken up again at the end of the session.”

– Abraham Lincoln’s “Autobiography Written for John L. Scripps” (circa June 1860), in which Lincoln strangely is referring to himself in the third person (as shown above)

There was an official campaign biography of Abraham Lincoln in 1860 …

Sir William Blackstone died nearly three decades before Abraham Lincoln was born. But Blackstone would nonetheless have an influence on the young Lincoln through one of his books, as many others have noted. In the year 1860, William Dean Howells wrote the “Life of Abraham Lincoln,” the official campaign biography of Abraham Lincoln (not to be confused with the above-quoted autobiography). This campaign biography was subject to revisions by Lincoln himself. Lincoln did indeed make some modifications whenever he deemed it necessary, but he did not alter the part about Blackstone that I’m going to quote here.

Sir William Blackstone

… which briefly talked about Lincoln’s legal education back in the 1830’s

The passage is about Lincoln’s legal education, which seems to have been gained sometime back in the 1830’s. Lincoln was in his twenties when getting this education. Thus, here is the portion of this biography about Lincoln’s reading of Sir William Blackstone:

William Dean Howells, author of this campaign biography of Lincoln

A review of “Gold, Hard Money, and Financial Gurus” (audiobook)

So I was recently listening to some additional presentations from an audio series about investment. This particular installment was called “Gold, Hard Money, and Financial Gurus.” I found out that it was actually two presentations: one about “Gold Bugs and Hard Money,” and one about “Financial Writers and Gurus.” Both were as interesting as I expected them to be, and brought back fond memories of my days as a business major.

A review of “William James, Charles Peirce, and American Pragmatism” (audiobook)

William James and Charles Sanders Peirce are two of the most influential philosophers to come out of the United States. They made contributions to a field called “philosophy of science,” which studies the proper foundation of scientific knowledge. Each of them had things to say about it, but their differences would later turn out to be quite substantial. Nonetheless, there is also significant overlap between them, which may be why they are still covered together in this audiobook. They were among the founders of a school called “pragmatism,” which was born in America in the 1870’s. Its influence would continue well beyond the deaths of these two remarkable men, who died within four years of each other in the early twentieth century.

John Adams praised James Harrington’s “The Commonwealth of Oceana”

“These are what are called revolution-principles. They are the principles of Aristotle and Plato, of Livy and Cicero, of Sydney, Harrington and Lock[e].—The principles of nature and eternal reason.—The principles on which the whole government over us, now stands.”

– John Adams (writing under the pen name of “Novanglus”), in a letter “To the Inhabitants of the Colony of Massachusetts-Bay, 23 January 1775”

John Adams was a great fan of the English political writer James Harrington

In 1656, the English political writer James Harrington wrote a book called “The Commonwealth of Oceana.” In this work, James Harrington advocated a republic, calling it the “ideal” form of government (or words to that effect). I should give a disclaimer that I have not read Harrington’s “Oceana,” and I don’t yet know how much I would agree with it. But it is clear that John Adams was a great fan of it. John Adams would later give great praise of both this book and its author. In 1775, Adams wrote a series of letters under the pen name of “Novanglus.” In one of these letters (the one quoted above), Adams credited Harrington with “revolution-principles.” But Adams also wrote another letter addressed “To the Inhabitants of the Colony of Massachusetts-Bay” (among others). One of them contains some more of his praise of James Harrington. Thus, I would like to quote from what John Adams said, to show how Harrington had an influence on the young John Adams.

James Harrington

A review of “Isaac Newton’s New Physics” (audiobook)

“If I have seen further it is by standing on the shoulders of giants.”

– Isaac Newton, in a letter to Robert Hooke on 5 February 1675

Sir Isaac Newton revolutionized how human beings see the world … and the universe. He may have been the most influential scientist of all time. It is said that Albert Einstein kept a picture of Newton on his “study wall,” alongside his other pictures of Michael Faraday and James Clerk Maxwell. But in Newton’s time, the word “scientist” did not exist yet, nor did the phrase “natural science.” Instead, the subject was described as “natural philosophy,” making Newton into a “natural philosopher.” In modern philosophical terms, Newton would be in the empirical tradition, although he showed the influence of some Continental Rationalists like René Descartes as well.