Speaker 1: Before he declared he was going to be for independence,
Speaker 1: Franklin wanted to have a meeting with his son, William,
Speaker 1: who's the royal governor of New Jersey by this point.
Speaker 1: And Franklin goes and they meet in a manor house
Speaker 1: halfway in between Philadelphia and where William was in New Jersey,
Speaker 1: and they have a very long and tough night. And
Speaker 1: Benjamin Franklin tells William he's going to be on the
Speaker 1: side of the revolution and that William should resign his governorship.
Speaker 1: And William doesn't, And I think he was dismayed that
Speaker 1: his son had not only become a royal governor and
Speaker 1: a loyalist, but was loving the persh of power. And
Speaker 1: it's a riff that never gets repaired.
Speaker 2: In many ways, Benjamin Franklin was an unlikely revolutionary. Franklin
Speaker 2: was someone who always tried to mend fences rather than
Speaker 2: tear them down. Through his work as an experimental scientist,
Speaker 2: a writer, and a businessman. He was always problem solving,
Speaker 2: looking for the most practical solution. But his pension for
Speaker 2: compromise was challenged during the Revolution when his adopted hometown
Speaker 2: of Philadelphia became a hotbed of anti colonial fervor still,
Speaker 2: Franklin was a man of his times, ready to meet
Speaker 2: the moment. But what's surprising is how much of the
Speaker 2: work he did on behalf of America was actually done abroad.
Speaker 2: In this episode of On Benjamin Franklin, Walter Isaacson paints
Speaker 2: the picture of Franklin the diplomat and how his genius
Speaker 2: as a statesman may be one of his most underappreciated.
Speaker 2: Let's talk about a bit of Franklin and his early
Speaker 2: work as a founding father. When does Franklin move from
Speaker 2: being this civic minded businessman hanging out with the Leather
Speaker 2: Apron Club to really diving into politics.
Speaker 1: When he retires in his early forties and gets interested
Speaker 1: in science, he also gets interested in politics in a
Speaker 1: larger scale. He believes that we have to all work
Speaker 1: together in the various colonies to stave off threats, and
Speaker 1: so he takes that notion of civic associations applies it
Speaker 1: on a more colonial level, helping fund George Washington and
Speaker 1: others fighting the French and Indian War. And so Franklin
Speaker 1: is trying to work out a system where instead of
Speaker 1: just voluntary associations, we now have to tax ourselves we
Speaker 1: now have to govern ourselves. He was a leader in
Speaker 1: the Colonial Assembly in Pennsylvania and of the faction that
Speaker 1: was trying to oppose the Penn family because the different
Speaker 1: colonies had different ways of governance. Some were crown colonies
Speaker 1: directly ruled by the king, but some were proprietors like
Speaker 1: the Penn family, who had the right to govern Pennsylvania
Speaker 1: to some extent. They had a charter, and it was
Speaker 1: unclear whether they could tax the people in Pennsylvania and
Speaker 1: refuse to pay taxes themselves, which is indeed what was happening,
Speaker 1: And so that gets him involved in the things that
Speaker 1: lead us to a revolution, whether it's the import duties,
Speaker 1: the stamp, taxation without representation. But Franklin's first mission is
Speaker 1: simply to loosen the power of the Penn family.
Speaker 2: Franklin gets selected by the Assembly to represent Pennsylvania in
Speaker 2: London as their agent to the Crown, and he's animated
Speaker 2: by the challenge, but he's also excited by the energy
Speaker 2: of this bustling city.
Speaker 1: Although Philadelphia in the seventeen fifties was the largest city
Speaker 1: in America, it had only twenty three thousand inhabitants. It
Speaker 1: was just a few dusty streets in a market street,
Speaker 1: whereas London was thirty times the size, with a quarter
Speaker 1: of a million inhabitants and growing really fast. London was
Speaker 1: the largest city in Europe and second only to Beijing
Speaker 1: in the world. But it was cramped, It was dirty,
Speaker 1: It was filled with disease and prostitutes in clime. More importantly,
Speaker 1: it was stratified into an upper class of titled aristocrats
Speaker 1: and a lower class of impoverished workers. What Franklin does,
Speaker 1: as he did in America, was gravitate to what was
Speaker 1: becoming a burgeoning middle class, a middle class of tradesmen
Speaker 1: and artisans. When he gets back to London for the
Speaker 1: first time, he goes back to the print shop where
Speaker 1: he worked as a young printer, and he buys beer
Speaker 1: for everybody there, the fashionable aristocrats in London, there were
Speaker 1: growing up a lot of clubs such as Whites and
Speaker 1: Brooks and Boodles. Franklin didn't feel comfortable there, but there
Speaker 1: was for the burgeoning new class of writers and journalists
Speaker 1: and professionals and intellectuals. There were coffee shops which provided
Speaker 1: newspapers and tables where you could sit all afternoon with
Speaker 1: friends and discuss current events, and that's where Franklin gravitated, certainly,
Speaker 1: both with his middle class and intellectual friends, but also
Speaker 1: people cared about politics. Lark barklay Hume had created an
Speaker 1: enlightenment mindset that you saw in London and also in Paris,
Speaker 1: and not surprisingly those become the two cities Franklin loves
Speaker 1: the most besides Philadelphia. Now there were those who were
Speaker 1: more disposed to American rights, and Franklin becomes close to
Speaker 1: a lot of them, especially the Whigs. But there are
Speaker 1: those in a governing party who consider him dangerous, as
Speaker 1: indeed he was to their control.
Speaker 2: And so there's this class of people who are clearly
Speaker 2: suspicious of Ben Franklin. Does he have to be careful
Speaker 2: about what he says or.
Speaker 1: Does Franklin understood the new media age of his time
Speaker 1: and how there could be scandals and people could write
Speaker 1: scoreless things. And in the seventeen sixties he writes a
Speaker 1: letter to his daughter and says, your slightest indiscretions will
Speaker 1: be magnified into crimes in order to sensibly wound and
Speaker 1: afflict me. In other words, he had become such a celebrity.
Speaker 1: He knew that his enemies would be publishing stories about
Speaker 1: his family as a way to take him down.
Speaker 2: And that's even something that you might not realize today
Speaker 2: if you think of Franklin as how famous he was
Speaker 2: for his scientific experiments and famous as a founder, but
Speaker 2: that if you're going to be that famous, you will
Speaker 2: also generate enemies.
Speaker 1: Franklin tried very hard not to generate enemies. This was
Speaker 1: a very passionate period that I'm leading up to a revolution,
Speaker 1: of course, and whether it was the Penn family or
Speaker 1: there was a family of Lee's up in Massachusetts, he
Speaker 1: developed enemies of people who either were loyal to the
Speaker 1: crown or were loyal to the proprietors. And he tended
Speaker 1: his reputation very well. But when he did make enemies,
Speaker 1: they were pretty strong enemies.
Speaker 2: Now did he have revolutionary notions at that time.
Speaker 1: Franklin was very much a believer in the beauty of
Speaker 1: the British Empire. He was very loyal to the concept
Speaker 1: of Americans and people in England all being part of
Speaker 1: this great empire. He called it a noble vase, and
Speaker 1: once it got broken, it wouldn't be put back together.
Speaker 1: So as the colonial agent in London, his first mission
Speaker 1: is trying to prevent a revolution. Near the end, he
Speaker 1: comes up with the plan that the colonial assemblies are
Speaker 1: just like Parliament. They're all subject to the king, but
Speaker 1: they make their own taxes and do their own governance.
Speaker 1: And it's sort of what we now have in the Commonwealth.
Speaker 1: Had his plan succeeded, the US would be like Canada.
Speaker 1: He got very close and had the Whig state and
Speaker 1: power in England. He may have been able to work
Speaker 1: out this Commonwealth relationship, but he gets humiliated by the ministers.
Speaker 2: There describe a little bit how that humiliation came about.
Speaker 1: At one point when he keeps presenting petitions to the ministers,
Speaker 1: he gets embroiled in controversy over leaking some letters, which
Speaker 1: he did. But the most important thing is he gets
Speaker 1: called before a hearing of Parliament in what's called the cockpit.
Speaker 1: He's wearing this velvet coat and he gets prosecuted and
Speaker 1: he doesn't say a word as they keep attacking him
Speaker 1: and attacking him. And this is the beginning of his
Speaker 1: realization that no, this is not going to work. And
Speaker 1: the interesting thing is that years later, when he ends
Speaker 1: up at the end of the revolution negotiating both the
Speaker 1: alliance with France and then the peace treaty with England.
Speaker 1: When he signs it, he puts that same coat back
Speaker 1: on and he gusks why, and he says to give
Speaker 1: it a little revenge because he remembers that day in
Speaker 1: the cockpit.
Speaker 2: So it feels like he's still learning as a diplomat
Speaker 2: right now, still figuring out how to maneuver in this
Speaker 2: new position.
Speaker 1: Right One of Franklin's problems as an agent in England
Speaker 1: is he was too accommodat and he tried too hard
Speaker 1: to get a solution. He hasn't fervently fought the Stamp Act,
Speaker 1: and when it gets back to America, there's a backlash,
Speaker 1: so he has to scramble, and in a way that
Speaker 1: pushes him towards the side of becoming more revolutionary because
Speaker 1: he realizes that he's lost touch with the anti taxation,
Speaker 1: anti British sentiments that had welled up in America.
Speaker 2: But in a way he quickly finds his footing because
Speaker 2: he actually prints one of the more incendiary pamphlets.
Speaker 1: Yeah. One of the great spurs to revolution in early
Speaker 1: seventeen seventy six was an anonymous pamphlet called Common Sense.
Speaker 1: It turned out it was written by Thomas Paine, but
Speaker 1: people didn't know that it was anonymous, and some people
Speaker 1: thought that Franklin had written it. It's a huge success.
Speaker 1: I think it'd sold more than one hundred thousand copies.
Speaker 1: Even though Franklin wasn't the author, he had an indirect
Speaker 1: hand in it because he was the one who had
Speaker 1: helped bring Thomas Payne over from England as a cheeky
Speaker 1: young hope to be printer and helped get Common Sense published.
Speaker 1: So Franklin is bequeathing to a new generation that notion
Speaker 1: of being a pamphleteer being published, and that helps bring
Speaker 1: us closer to revolution.
Speaker 2: More on that right, after a quick break, let's talk
Speaker 2: about the revolution. When the first shots were fired in
Speaker 2: April seventeen seventy five, Benjamin Franklin wasn't back from London yet.
Speaker 2: He arrives just a few weeks later. What's this scene like.
Speaker 1: In seventeen seventy five, about half the people in the
Speaker 1: colonies built loyal to the crown, in about half were
Speaker 1: starting to well up with a sense that we were
Speaker 1: going to have a revolution. When he finally returns to Philadelphia,
Speaker 1: he's greeted by cheering throngs, but there's a question will
Speaker 1: he really cast his lot on the side of revolution.
Speaker 2: Did the fact that Franklin's son was a real governor
Speaker 2: and that he broke with him over independence, did that
Speaker 2: lend Franklin more credibility among the revolutionaries or did it
Speaker 2: end up casting suspicion on him that he might still
Speaker 2: have royal inclinations.
Speaker 1: Yeah, well, Franklin's rivals and enemies treated him with some suspicion.
Speaker 1: But one thing that happens is George Washington ends up
Speaker 1: finally winning in New Jersey and William is arrested, and
Speaker 1: it becomes a question whether Benjamin Franklin will earne urge
Speaker 1: that his son be parolled or whatever. And no, he doesn't.
Speaker 1: He lets his son be arrested and imprisoned in Connecticut.
Speaker 1: And I think it's because Benjamin Franklin wanted to make
Speaker 1: it clear he didn't have divided loyalties. His new loyalties
Speaker 1: were with the new country and not with his son,
Speaker 1: the royal governor.
Speaker 2: And so in seventeen seventy six, as a full fledged revolutionary,
Speaker 2: Benjamin Franklin joins the Continental Congress.
Speaker 1: One of the things that happens is the Continental Congress
Speaker 1: decides if we're going to have a revolution for independence,
Speaker 1: we have to write a declaration explaining why we're doing this.
Speaker 1: And so the Continental Congress appoints a committee may have
Speaker 1: been the last time Congress appointed a great committee. But
Speaker 1: on it are Benjamin Franklin, of course, Thomas Jefferson, and
Speaker 1: John Adams. And Jefferson gets to write the first draft,
Speaker 1: even though he's like really young, I think thirty one
Speaker 1: or so, because he's the best writer, he's more passionate,
Speaker 1: and he sends it to Franklin for editing, and it's
Speaker 1: a wonderful letter, he writes. They're all living in Philadelphia
Speaker 1: with the Congress's meeting. He said, with the good doctor
Speaker 1: Franklin and all of his wisdom, look over this document
Speaker 1: and see what improvements it can make. And it's like
Speaker 1: people are really nice to editors back then. And you
Speaker 1: see one of the most amazing documents in American history.
Speaker 1: It's not just the declaration, but the first draft of
Speaker 1: the declaration that's in the Library of Congress. And you
Speaker 1: look at the most famous, most brilliant sentence ever written
Speaker 1: by human hand, the one that begins, we hold these truths,
Speaker 1: And there's Jefferson's first draft, we hold these truths to
Speaker 1: be sacred. And Franklin, with the dark black backslashes a
Speaker 1: printer he uses to cross something out, takes it out
Speaker 1: and writes self evident, and he explains we're trying to
Speaker 1: create a new type of nation in which our rights
Speaker 1: come not from the dictates of religion, but from rationality
Speaker 1: and reason. And the sentence goes on, and there's John
Speaker 1: Adams's handwriting when they say endowed by their creator with
Speaker 1: certain inalienable rights. So just in the writing of one
Speaker 1: half of one sentence, you can see our founders doing
Speaker 1: this balance between the role of divine providence and the
Speaker 1: role of rationality and reason in securing our rights as
Speaker 1: individuals and our governance as a nation.
Speaker 2: I feel you can also see there all of what
Speaker 2: you've already discussed about Franklin's inclination towards collaboration and compromise
Speaker 2: happening around that document.
Speaker 1: Right. What Franklin realizes is that they're balances you have
Speaker 1: to put in, And even in that part of a sentence,
Speaker 1: you have a balance. It's not all divine right gives
Speaker 1: us this, and it's not all just pure rationality. There's
Speaker 1: a certain balance that we strike. When we're figuring out
Speaker 1: our role as a nation.
Speaker 2: Let's talk about self evident because I want to make
Speaker 2: sure we don't gloss over that. The importance of self evident, right,
Speaker 2: What was the significance of the phrase.
Speaker 1: When Jefferson writes we hold these truths to be sacred,
Speaker 1: and then Franklin edits it to be self evident. He's
Speaker 1: partly talking about the role of rationality, but he also
Speaker 1: got that phrase from his close friend David Hume, the
Speaker 1: world's greatest philosopher at the time. Franklin actually stayed at
Speaker 1: the home of David Hume. You know, he met Adam Smith.
Speaker 1: He read The Wealth of Nations before it was published.
Speaker 1: So Franklin has soaked all this up. And David Hume
Speaker 1: had come up with this idea that there were certain
Speaker 1: truths that were just self evident.
Speaker 2: And the issue with sacred was I mean, I don't
Speaker 2: know how much she explicated this then or leader, but
Speaker 2: would the issue with sacred be that anyone could make
Speaker 2: a claim on sacred if it had a religious tinge
Speaker 2: to it.
Speaker 1: Most governments up until that point derive their authority from
Speaker 1: an appeal to divinity, the divine right of kings, being
Speaker 1: the most famous example, and the grace of God explained
Speaker 1: where the power came from. There was something totally new
Speaker 1: that was beginning with the Declaration and culminates with the Constitution,
Speaker 1: which is, no, the power is not divinely given. It's
Speaker 1: something that comes from we the people. And I think
Speaker 1: Franklin was saying, we don't want to premise our basic
Speaker 1: beliefs that all men have created equal, they're endowed with
Speaker 1: certain inalienable rights. We don't want to premise this on
Speaker 1: coming from theology. No, it comes from certain evident truth.
Speaker 2: And then we get this moment, this most famous moment
Speaker 2: of John Hancock saying there must be no pulling in
Speaker 2: different ways.
Speaker 1: When they're signing the declaration. John Hancock of course does
Speaker 1: it with the famous flourish and he says, we must
Speaker 1: not all go our separate ways. We have to hang together.
Speaker 1: And Franklin, that's the theme of his life, that we
Speaker 1: have to all intertwine, we have to all hold hands,
Speaker 1: and he says a famous funny line, which is, yes,
Speaker 1: we all must hang together, or surely we'll all hang separately.
Speaker 1: And so this notion of working collegially and in tandem
Speaker 1: to assert our rights that begins with the Declaration then
Speaker 1: culminates with the Constitution.
Speaker 2: There was one smaller moment that just really struck me
Speaker 2: in the way that Franklin shows up and influences so
Speaker 2: many different aspects of American life. And it's that don't
Speaker 2: tread on Me flag that he also happens to be
Speaker 2: the person who saw that flag and brought it in
Speaker 2: to be more official flag of the revolution.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it was part of Franklin's genius of sort of
Speaker 1: knowing how to visually convey information, How a Join or
Speaker 1: Die cartoon of a snake being cut up, how these
Speaker 1: visual things can have an impact.
Speaker 2: He loved a snake. He's got the snake in Join
Speaker 2: or Die. There's the don't tread on Me snake, and
Speaker 2: he has all philosophy about why the snake is the
Speaker 2: right symbol. It doesn't strike first.
Speaker 1: But when it strikes, it strikes, yes, right exactly. Another
Speaker 1: snake that's interesting that we have to deal with today
Speaker 1: is one of Franklin's sort of friends but occasional opponents,
Speaker 1: the guy named Albert Gary, who didn't really believe in
Speaker 1: a pure democracy. He felt that the rabble shouldn't be
Speaker 1: allowed to rule too much. And among other things, that
Speaker 1: he creates as his congressional district that looks like a snake,
Speaker 1: and it gets called a gary Man. Nowadays we pronounced
Speaker 1: it Jerry Mander based on Albert Gary doing that snake
Speaker 1: like district, and Franklin thought that was a bit appalling.
Speaker 2: One snake that he didn't care for. Ye, So after
Speaker 2: the Declaration of Independence, I feel like he could have
Speaker 2: hung up his spurs. He's in his seventies by this point.
Speaker 2: He keeps taking on assignments to go places and do things,
Speaker 2: no matter the danger.
Speaker 1: I mean, he's hitting seventy, which is back then considered
Speaker 1: retirement age. Yeah. But they give him another mission, which
Speaker 1: is we just declared a revolution and we needed the munitions,
Speaker 1: we needed the navy, and so they send Franklin off
Speaker 1: to France to try to form an alliance in which
Speaker 1: the French would come in on outside on the revolution. Yeah.
Speaker 2: You describe it as the most dangerous, complex and fascinating
Speaker 2: of all of his public missions.
Speaker 1: It's a very treacherous voyage, especially during wartime. But Franklin
Speaker 1: both out of a sense of duty, but also I
Speaker 1: think as a personal sense of venture, wanting to be relevant.
Speaker 1: He's there sailing across the ocean, pushing himself in a
Speaker 1: somewhat courageous way, when he could have been sitting back
Speaker 1: at home in his new house that he had built
Speaker 1: in Philadelphia.
Speaker 2: After the break, we dive into Franklin's adventures in France
Speaker 2: and how the savvy diplomat charmed the nation in between
Speaker 2: playing chess with his mistresses. On December third, seventeen seventy six,
Speaker 2: Ben Franklin arrives in France with an enormous diplomatic challenge
Speaker 2: ahead of him. He's come to woo the French to
Speaker 2: get them to support the American side, because, like the
Speaker 2: other founding fathers, he knows that without France's help, the
Speaker 2: revolutionaries have no chance of winning the war.
Speaker 1: It is very difficult to get France in on our
Speaker 1: side in the revolution. I mean to put it mildly.
Speaker 1: The King of France wasn't so much in favor of
Speaker 1: revolutions against royal rule. But France has its own interests,
Speaker 1: and Franklin is brilliant at both playing to the national
Speaker 1: interests of France and the national ideals. So he gets
Speaker 1: to France and he plays this balance of power game,
Speaker 1: saying France and Spain. The Bourbon pac Nations, along with
Speaker 1: the Netherlands, have for more than four hundred years been
Speaker 1: fighting off and on with England, and if they come
Speaker 1: in with us on our side in the revolution is
Speaker 1: going to help the balance of power. It will help
Speaker 1: them keep the colonies like in the Caribbean, etc. But
Speaker 1: he also plays an idealistic game when he gets there.
Speaker 1: He has a printing press and he prints the documents
Speaker 1: coming out of America, like the Declaration of Independence or
Speaker 1: the rights of Virginia. And he realizes that in France
Speaker 1: is welling up this notion of liberty, equality for and
Speaker 1: he wants to play to that as well.
Speaker 2: But as we mentioned in an earlier episode, when Benjamin
Speaker 2: Franklin gets to France, he's a bit of a rock star.
Speaker 2: He's older and widowed by now, but he's a celebrity.
Speaker 2: Crowds are waiting at the docks to catch a glimpse
Speaker 2: of the guy who invented the lightning rod. He's carried
Speaker 2: to the steps of the Academy of Sciences in Paris
Speaker 2: to hug Voltaire, and he's dressed in a ridiculous fashion
Speaker 2: with a specific purpose in mind.
Speaker 1: When Franklin gets to France. He continues to portray himself
Speaker 1: in ways that'll be useful, and he knows that the
Speaker 1: French of red Rousseau perhaps wants to do often, and
Speaker 1: they worship the backwoods philosopher as a natural man. And
Speaker 1: so Franklin gets to France and he wears instead of
Speaker 1: a wig, he wears this backwoods fur cap. And so
Speaker 1: soon in Paris the women are wearing cafus a la Franklin.
Speaker 1: I mean, their hair do is done as if it's
Speaker 1: a wool cap. And he just totally wins over the
Speaker 1: French people, which he realizes, besides playing to his vanity,
Speaker 1: helps him win over the French government, the French foreign
Speaker 1: minister and others. They know how popular America and Franklin is.
Speaker 2: Well, that's I mean, it's such a masterful pr move
Speaker 2: for him to portray himself as this sort of davy
Speaker 2: Crockett who's actually never been out on the frontier fighting
Speaker 2: the fight.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Franklin was not a backwoods natural wilderness philosopher. He
Speaker 1: had lived in the heart of Boston. He had lived
Speaker 1: on Market Street, and he had lived on Craven Street
Speaker 1: in London. He had barely been to the backwoods on
Speaker 1: one trip to Canada, where he's representing the Pennsylvania Assembly
Speaker 1: trying to figure out its defenses, he buys a fur
Speaker 1: cap and it certainly wins the French over.
Speaker 2: I want to talk about his life outside out of Paris,
Speaker 2: or in the suburbs of Paris. It's very striking.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's Posse, which is a suburb of Paris. It's
Speaker 1: a nice manor house. It's used as the American colonial
Speaker 1: or then the United States out posts there. So John
Speaker 1: Adams is there for a while when he's an agent.
Speaker 1: Jefferson of course comes over at some point, but it's
Speaker 1: weirdly a nest of spies. There's a guy Edward Bancroft
Speaker 1: who's working there who's a total spy on Franklin and
Speaker 1: reading his letters. But Franklin says, I've learned that even
Speaker 1: if my valet is a spy, to act the same way,
Speaker 1: because I'll just do things that I don't care if
Speaker 1: they get exposed, which wasn't totally good because Bancroft was
Speaker 1: effective at knowing what ships were going over. But Franklin
Speaker 1: just leads this fun life in Posse.
Speaker 2: He's a man who rejects pretension in all ways. When
Speaker 2: he's younger and throughout his life he represents the rejection
Speaker 2: of pretension, but also it seems like he likes a
Speaker 2: little bit of the high life.
Speaker 1: Well, I mean, it is true that all people who
Speaker 1: reject pretension so don't really mind having a good bottle
Speaker 1: of wine now and then, and certainly he was in
Speaker 1: that category. He loved Madeira, and yes he never puts
Speaker 1: on royal airs, but he does live pretty well, and
Speaker 1: of course he loves the adulation. He has two what
Speaker 1: he calls mistresses there and at this point, as I say,
Speaker 1: he's in his seventies, so they're not purely romantic, but
Speaker 1: Madame Brionn, Madame Haviltius, he's flirting with, he's having salons,
Speaker 1: he has them over so he loves leading the good
Speaker 1: life in Paris and even playing chess while he's in
Speaker 1: the bathtub with one of his mistresses. But he also
Speaker 1: makes fun about how his relationship won't get too far
Speaker 1: even though he dreams of it. That type of thing, and.
Speaker 2: Describe this environment as a state that he's living on.
Speaker 1: John Adams is also there, and they're a bit like
Speaker 1: oil and water. Franklin said he learned French by writing
Speaker 1: Bagatelles to his French girlfriends. Was John Adams learned French
Speaker 1: by memorizing funeral orations? And Adams think that Franklin's having
Speaker 1: too much fun with Madam Hillvisius and Madame Briawe and others.
Speaker 2: Yeah, there's a little bit of pearl clutching by John
Speaker 2: Adams when he arrives onto the scene.
Speaker 1: Oh. John Adams's rivalry was Franklin is the stuff of law.
Speaker 1: He's always very jealous. John Adams thought that he had
Speaker 1: written the Founding Document of America, which was a resolution
Speaker 1: earlier in seventeen seventy six to break away the assemblies
Speaker 1: from parliamentary power, and he's upset that Jefferson and then
Speaker 1: Franklin are given KREDI says, everybody's going to think it's
Speaker 1: just Franklin who's always doing the things. But he also
Speaker 1: comes to be a grudging admirer of Franklin.
Speaker 2: And how does Franklin mix this sort of social and
Speaker 2: political Like it seems like he's having fun, but there's
Speaker 2: a method to it.
Speaker 1: Yeah. I think that, especially his appearance with Voltaire when
Speaker 1: they hug on the steps of the Academy, or his
Speaker 1: way of being part of the salons, both of Paris
Speaker 1: and in Posse. He realizes, as others after him did,
Speaker 1: that having this Rakish cachet and a bit of celebrity
Speaker 1: gives him a certain power. He can't be ignored or
Speaker 1: declared persona non grado the way they did with John Adams.
Speaker 2: And is the rivalry between Adams and Franklin in this time?
Speaker 2: I mean, is there a way in which they're driving
Speaker 2: each other like they have different outlooks to a certain
Speaker 2: extent on how this diplomacy should be taking place. Adams
Speaker 2: doesn't always like how Franklin's doing it. But is it
Speaker 2: the combination of them that makes it happen or is
Speaker 2: Adam's kind of impediment to Franklin's plans?
Speaker 1: Early on, before the revolution was in full force, Adams
Speaker 1: and Franklin traveled together to go meet the commander of
Speaker 1: the British forces on Staten Island. And it's that scene
Speaker 1: where they have to share a bedroom and they argue
Speaker 1: about the common cold and the freshness of air. But
Speaker 1: they send Adams along because they think Franklin, just by
Speaker 1: his nature, is to accommodating. You send him there, you'll
Speaker 1: find some deal to be made. Whereas Adams is not
Speaker 1: a deal maker, and that continues all the way through
Speaker 1: the Great because Adams feels Franklin's too accommodating to the French.
Speaker 1: He gives away too much, he wants to be liked
Speaker 1: too much, and this is why the French like Franklin.
Speaker 1: They don't like Adams, but it's useful for them to
Speaker 1: be there. And then the next round is when they
Speaker 1: have to negotiate the treaty that ends the war, the
Speaker 1: treaty with England, and once again Adams it's a hard
Speaker 1: liner and Franklin's more willing to make a deal. So
Speaker 1: I guess that combination works well. And how is the
Speaker 1: communication happening?
Speaker 2: I mean, these days, no diplomat is operating anywhere in
Speaker 2: the world without constant communication with the people who have
Speaker 2: dispatched that diplomat there. But it takes a month to
Speaker 2: even get there. The letters are going to be slow.
Speaker 2: How much is Franklin freelancing and he can do whatever
Speaker 2: he wants versus he's tethered to the desires of the
Speaker 2: Continental Congress.
Speaker 1: That's why diplomacy was so much more important back then,
Speaker 1: because you couldn't have detailed instructions being cabled to you
Speaker 1: every hour, Yeah, to wait a month or so. And
Speaker 1: so when it comes to doing both the treaty of
Speaker 1: Alliance with France and then the treaty that ends in
Speaker 1: war with Britain, Franklin has quite a bit of leeway.
Speaker 1: And there are some disputes later where he may have
Speaker 1: conceded too much on fishing rights or something. But it
Speaker 1: was a time when diplomats had to figure out for themselves,
Speaker 1: being genius about how to get things done.
Speaker 2: So how does Franklin ultimately sway the French to join
Speaker 2: the war and pull off this.
Speaker 1: Feet At first Verjeon, who is a French foreign minister,
Speaker 1: and certainly the king resists it. They want to help
Speaker 1: America but not have to take blame for it. But
Speaker 1: then Franklin was more successful than he could have imagined,
Speaker 1: getting a full fledged treaty of alliance, and then even
Speaker 1: people like Lafayette being sent over, who becomes an indispensable commander.
Speaker 1: In addition to getting Lafayette to come over, of course,
Speaker 1: there's the famous John Paul Jones who becomes supplied by
Speaker 1: France and his ship is called the bon Homme Richard,
Speaker 1: and that's because it's named after poor Richard of Poor
Speaker 1: Richard's Almanac. I think that you rarely have seen in
Speaker 1: history a blending of idealism and realism that are twined
Speaker 1: together the way Franklin did, in other words, with his
Speaker 1: public diplomacy and public persona winning over the hearts and
Speaker 1: minds of a French people who believed in liberty and
Speaker 1: equality and fraternity. There have been other great diplomatic triumphs,
Speaker 1: but not ones that depended equally on both realism and idealism.
Speaker 2: So why was obtaining this French alliance so crucial? Without
Speaker 2: France we could not have won the revolution. They supply
Speaker 2: most of the munitions, the arms, the gunpowder, and then
Speaker 2: more importantly it's their navy which has blockaded the coast,
Speaker 2: so that you know, when Washington finally wins a few victories,
Speaker 2: they can't be reinforced. So by getting France in on
Speaker 2: our side, it basically made it possible for the United States.
Speaker 2: Says it was then calling itself to triumph militarily rather
Speaker 2: than come to a stalemate. But it does feel like
Speaker 2: there are many accounts of the Revolution and many accounts
Speaker 2: of the founding fathers, and Franklin can end up being
Speaker 2: a little bit pushed aside as this sort of compromiser maybe,
Speaker 2: or as the person on the sidelines who wasn't quite
Speaker 2: the action man that some of these other founders were.
Speaker 1: Franklin played the role of bringing people together, not being
Speaker 1: the point person, not being Samuel Adams or being the
Speaker 1: most aggressive person, but that role of pulling people together
Speaker 1: was essential. Is it going to create a democracy. It's
Speaker 1: not going to be driven by passionate leaders. It's going
Speaker 1: to be with the people trying to pull things together.
Speaker 2: When it comes to trying to create the treaty that
Speaker 2: they'll end the war, there's this question about whether it's
Speaker 2: going to be between the three nations or one emerging
Speaker 2: nation United States, France, and England, or it's going to
Speaker 2: be direct between the US and England. And that feels
Speaker 2: like another place where Franklin and Adams come into conflicts.
Speaker 2: And there's a question about Franklin being too accommodating.
Speaker 1: One of the agreements the United States had made with
Speaker 1: France and part of the Treaty of Alliance, was that
Speaker 1: it would not negotiate a totally separate peace with England
Speaker 1: without keeping France both informed and consulted. And Franklin is
Speaker 1: very good at keeping the French foreign minister in the
Speaker 1: loop on all the negotiations. Initially this is Verjon, the
Speaker 1: French foreign Minister, but at a certain point Franklin floats
Speaker 1: some ideas with his English friends. They come to an
Speaker 1: agreement of what the framework of a deal for peace
Speaker 1: would look like, and he hasn't fully consulted Verjon. So
Speaker 1: when the deal happens, the French are upset, the foreign
Speaker 1: minister's upset, and Franklin writes the most soothing diplomatic letter
Speaker 1: blaming it on himself, saying, yes, I'm so sorry, but
Speaker 1: our love for France and our gratitude whatever. And by
Speaker 1: the end of that discussion he has a temerity to
Speaker 1: ask for another loan from France, but he's been able
Speaker 1: to smooth it over with the French Foreign minister and
Speaker 1: the King.
Speaker 2: It almost feels like by that point he's again just
Speaker 2: deploying this public persona, both his ability to write, obviously,
Speaker 2: but also it's just you can't be mad at Franklin
Speaker 2: very long. He always seems to have a plan that
Speaker 2: he thinks can solve the dispute.
Speaker 1: Benjamin Franklin was the only one of the founders who
Speaker 1: is involved in all four of the great founding documents
Speaker 1: of America, the Declaration, the Treaty of Alliance with France,
Speaker 1: the Treaty that ends the War with Great Britain, and
Speaker 1: then the Constitution. Even though he's not seen as a
Speaker 1: George Washington, as indispensable or passionate the way Jefferson was,
Speaker 1: he was both the glue that held people together and
Speaker 1: the thread that tied our progress.
Speaker 2: In the final episode, we discussed ben Franklin's legacy, the
Speaker 2: scientific trick he used to keep the Constitutional Convention on track,
Speaker 2: and we hear about his personal ledger and the ways
Speaker 2: he tried to write his wrongs.
Speaker 1: Franklin always was in favor of compromise, but the big
Speaker 1: moral challenge in life is knowing when to compromise and
Speaker 1: when to stand true to principle. And he realizes that
Speaker 1: they shouldn't have compromised on the issue of slave.
Speaker 2: That's next week on Benjamin Franklin. This show is based
Speaker 2: on the writing and research of Walter Isaacson. So stood
Speaker 2: by me Evan Ratliffe, produced, mixed and sound designed by
Speaker 2: Anna Rubinova. Adam Bozarth is our consulting producer. Lizzie Jacobs
Speaker 2: is our editor Social media by Dara Potts. The show
Speaker 2: was engineered at CDM Sound Studios from iHeart Podcast. The
Speaker 2: executive producers are Katrina Norvell and Ali Perry. For Kalledyscope,
Speaker 2: it was executive produced by Mangeshtigaure with an assist from
Speaker 2: Oz Walishan Kostaslinos and Kate Osbourne. Special thanks to Amanda Urban,
Speaker 2: Bob Pittman, Connell Burn, Will Pearson, Nikki Etor, Kerry Lieberman,
Speaker 2: Nathan Otowski.
Speaker 1: And Ali Gavitt.
Speaker 2: And if you like podcasts about inventions what they mean
Speaker 2: for humanity, check out my other show, shell Game, about
Speaker 2: how it created an AI clone and said it loose
Speaker 2: on the world. It's a shell Game dot co. And
Speaker 2: for more shows from Kaleidoscope, be sure to visit Kaleidoscope
Speaker 2: dot NYC. Thanks so much for listening.