SOURCE: "Thomas Paine's Political Theories," in Political Science Quarterly, Vol. XIV, No. 3, September, 1899, pp. 389-403.

In the essay that follows, Merriam outlines the basic tenets of Paine's political thought, defining at length his concepts of human nature and government. Merriam contends that Paine viewed government as a necessary evil, tolerable only in a democratic form.

The political theories of Thomas Paine were struck off in the course of a career that extended over the revolutionary quarter of the eighteenth century and persistently followed the storm centre of the revolutionary movement.¹ In January, 1776, he issued his famous pamphlet Common Sense—the strongest plea that was made for American independence; in the same year appeared The Forester's Letters—Paine's side of a controversy with Dr. William Smith, of Philadelphia; from 1776 to 1783 appeared thirteen letters under the heading of The American Crisis, and in 1786 the Dissertations on Government, the Affairs of...