Thomas Paine, answered from the texts and cited to the page.
Both charges assume the letter was written out of temper, so take the temper first. I do not deny it. The note I sent Washington on leaving prison was not written in very good temper, but it was just such a letter as his conduct appeared to me to merit, and everything on his part since has served to confirm that opinion.1 A man may be angry and right.
I said in the open letter that errors or caprices of the temper can be pardoned and forgotten, but a cold deliberate crime of the heart is not to be washed away.2 The question is whether the charge rests on facts or on injury, and the facts are these. I was imprisoned as a foreigner born in England, while a citizen of America. Washington had a duty to inform himself of that.
He should have told somebody to enquire into the case of Mr. Paine and see if anything could be done. He did not so much as that, and his silence was interpreted by Robespierre as connivance at my imprisonment, which would have been fatal to me had Robespierre lived a few weeks longer.3 That is a statement about what a President owed a citizen who had served America with as much zeal and disinterestedness as he had himself.3
It is not a complaint about my feelings. Then Morris. While he was Minister in France he was either an emissary of the British ministry and the coalesced powers or gave strong reasons to suspect it. His letters had fallen into the hands of the Committee of Public Safety, and had he not got off when he did, he would have been arrested.4 Genet in America was rash at worst, but Morris was rash, imprudent and treacherous together, and Washington wrote to him at the very moment of recalling him that he retained the same esteem and friendship as before.4
A republican judges his chief magistrate by whom he trusts abroad. That is a republican's question, not a prisoner's grudge. Jay's mission was the same case again. Washington authorized it to be made known to the French government, as a confidential matter, that Jay's authority was restricted to demanding the western posts and indemnity for captured cargoes.
He knew that was untrue, and he refused the Representatives the instructions for fear the contradiction would detect his want of integrity.5 I was a member of the Convention and had the means of knowing what I state.5 I add what I wrote to a friend: America is falling into disesteem, her neutral friends speak of her as having no stable character, and the Executive is too much on the plan of European courts, with Washington too fond of playing the old courtier.6
A government contrived in a dark chamber is the thing I crossed the Atlantic to oppose. As to my conduct in the Convention, my ten months in the Luxembourg were the consequence of the principles I held, not their refutation, and I did not write the letter to quarrel with the Revolution. I wrote it to say that the principle, the representative system, open dealing, and no courts, was being betrayed in the one country that had a right to practise it.
The Revolution was right in its principle and he said so when the whole of England was being taught to hate it. He sat in the Convention, voted for the Republic, voted against the death of the King because a republic does not begin by killing a man it has already beaten and because France needed America's friend alive, and was imprisoned for it by the faction that killed him.
Washington, to whom he had dedicated the Rights of Man, left him in prison for ten months and never asked after him; he wrote to say so, and that the President's reputation was a vapour. He was angry and he was right to be. The Terror was the crime of men, not of the principle, and the principle survived them.78910
That this letter was not written in very good temper, is very evident; but it was just such a letter as his conduct appeared to me to merit, and every thing on his part since has served to confirm that opinion.The Writings of Thomas Paine Vol 3, 1791-1804
Errors or caprices of the temper can be pardoned and forgotten; but a cold deliberate crime of the heart, such as Mr. Washington is capable of acting, is not to be washed away.The Writings of Thomas Paine Vol 3, 1791-1804
He ought to have said to somebody - enquire into the case of Mr. Paine and see if there is anything we can do for him; but Mr. Washington has not as so much as done this and his not doing it has been interpreted by Robespierre into connivance at my imprisonment and would have been fatal to me if had he lived but a few weeks longer.Letters 1772-1808 Not in Conway
Some letters of his had fallen into the hands of the Committee of Public Safety, and enquiry was making after him.The Writings of Thomas Paine Vol 3, 1791-1804
Mr. Washington should recollect that I was a member of the Convention, and had the means of knowing what I here stateThe Writings of Thomas Paine Vol 3, 1791-1804
It is too much on the plan of European Courts and Mr. Washington appears to be to[o] fond of playing the old Courtier.Letters 1772-1808 Not in Conway
On the contrary, I assure you, it has caused me some disquietude. I am sorry you have given me cause to do it; for, as I have always remembered your former friendship with pleasure, I suffer a loss by your depriving me of that sentiment.The Writings of Thomas Paine Vol 3, 1791-1804
I know that nature is ingenious in cures, but seeing that at the end of the year I am becoming worse instead of better, I do not entertain much hopes of being able to return to America. I have however the consolation of having held up long enough to finish the Second Part of the Age of Reason and a small piece entitled Dissertations on the First Principles of Government.Letters 1772-1808 Not in Conway
I had constantly been opposed to every thing which was of the nature or of the appearance of violence; but as I had always done it in a manner that shewed it to be a principle founded in my heart, and not a political manouvre, it precluded the pretence of accusing me. I was reached, however, under another pretence.The Writings of Thomas Paine Vol 3, 1791-1804
They were answered by the then President Vadier, who has since absconded, that *I was born in England*, and it was signified to them, by some of the Committee of *General Surety*, to whom they were referred (I have been told it was Billaud Varennes,) that their reclamation of me was only the act of individuals, without any authority from the American government.The Writings of Thomas Paine Vol 3, 1791-1804
The years that his admirers would rather pass over and his enemies never let him forget; the texts show a man who voted against the killing, was nearly killed, and would not pretend to gratitude he did not feel.