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The guiding principle of this book is the conviction that science is an important part of history, that the history of science can illuminate some of the central aspects of American history. As is often the case, this book is the product of a line of research that originally was centered on a seemingly unrelated topic, namely the different kinds of interactions that have occurred between the physical and biological sciences and the social sciences. One of the principal fruits of that research has been a volume edited by me on The Natural Sciences and the Social Sciences: Some Critical and Historical Perspectives (Dordrecht/Boston/London: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 1994); my own chapters have been printed separately under the title Interactions: Some Contacts between the Natural Sciences and the Social Sciences (Cambridge/London: MIT Press, 1994), and in the Italian as Scienze della Natura e Scienze Sociali (Rome/Bari: Editori Laterza, 1993).
The social sciences treated in the above works were primarily economics and sociology, with some consideration given to theories of the state. Again and again in my research, however, I came upon examples of the ways in which political thought and even the course of political action either were determined by a scientific vector or drew on science as a source of models or of metaphors and analogies. In particular, I found that in the eighteenth century, the Age of Reason, when science was esteemed as the highest expression of human reason, the sciences served as a font of analogies and metaphors as well as a means of transferring to the realms of political discourse some reflections of the value system of the sciences. Thus James Harrington, who a century later was to become an influential figure in the political thought of the American Founding Fathers, drew on the works of the pioneer physiologist William Harvey in proposing his system of government.
For many years I have been fascinated by what I detected to be Newtonian echoes in the Declaration of Independence, a topic I have discussed again and again with the students in my graduate seminar. My researches led me to an appreciation of Jefferson’s command of the technical aspects of Newtonian science and mathematics, a feature of Jefferson’s thought that goes far deeper than the customary levels of discussion, which are limited to his allegiance to some form of “Newtonianism” or his admiration for Newton. In the end I came to recognize that science was a feature of consequence in his political thought and action.
I have studied the scientific thought of Benjamin Franklin for many decades and have long been aware of the way in which Franklin’s theory of demography influenced his political ideas. It was thus an easy step to consider science in relation to his political career. Ever since graduate days, I have been troubled by the alleged Newtonianism of the Constitution and have sought in vain for evidence that any part of the Constitution was a conscious or unconscious imitation of Newtonian science. In the end I discovered the source of this allegation in the writings of Woodrow Wilson. As can be seen in Chapter 5, in large measure Wilson’s presentation—like those of the scholars who have repeated his argument—is based on a fundamental misunderstanding of what the science of the Principia is. My study of science in relation to the Constitution led me by a direct path to the thought of James Madison. The subject of John Adams’s use of the sciences in a political context was an unexpected bonus. I was also delighted to find how the sciences were used by others of that age, such as James Wilson and Thomas Pownall.
Again and again, in the course of writing this book, I stood in awe as I faced the massive literature concerning the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, and as I took cognizance of the great body of scholarly writings and textual editions relating to the careers and thought of Franklin and Jefferson, to say nothing of the growing scholarship relating to works of Adams and Madison. I had to ask myself the question recorded by Merrill Peterson in his biography of Jefferson. “In the course of the work,” he wrote, “I have sometimes been asked, in tones ranging from curiosity to dismay, if anything important remained to be said about Jefferson.” In my own case, I had to ask myself an additional question: whether an outsider who was not a specialist in American political thought, American intellectual history, or American diplomatic or social history could add anything of consequence to the monument of established scholarship and interpretation. This very question, however, defined my mission.
A historian of science, trained in a discipline quite distinct from that of most American historians, cannot help but bring to the subjects of this book a point of view that differs from those that are current in the historical literature. One example will suffice. Countless scholars, graduate students, and ordinary readers have gone through Jefferson’s book, Notes on the State o/Virginia (1787), but no one to my knowledge has noticed that Jefferson made use of an exact statement from Newton’s Principia, a seemingly unlikely source for a book whose subject is primarily natural history. This experience emboldened me to believe that only someone trained in Newtonian science would recognize echoes of Newton’s Principia in the Declaration of Independence.
One of the points made in the opening chapter, and repeated again both explicitly and by implication, is that concentration on issues related to science introduces new viewpoints into our understanding of our history. For example, the themes of Washington’s Farewell Address at the end of his presidency are well known. All readers will be aware that the main point made by Washington was to warn against entangling foreign alliances. Some will know that another major theme is the importance of preserving the Union. But few indeed will be aware that Washington also strongly advised his fellow Americans to support “the diffusion of knowledge,” using a phrase that may be familiar in the statement of purpose of our first national scientific institution, “. . . for the increase and diffusion of knowledge.”
One of the positions taken in the following pages is that scientific issues were related to the political thought and also the political action of our Founding Fathers, primarily Jefferson, Franklin, Adams, and Madison. I argue that Franklin’s enormous scientific reputation was a factor in his later diplomatic career. But did his fellow Americans consider his scientific eminence as an important part of his credentials for diplomacy? When Franklin was sent by the Congress, along with Samuel Chase and Charles Carroll, to attempt to win over the Canadians to the American cause, his name was put before the others in a reversal of alphabetical order. Chase was designated “Samuel Chase Esquire, one of the delegates of the colony of Maryland,” while Carroll was referred to as “Charles Carroll of Carrollton in the said colony of Maryland,” but Franklin was named “Benjamin Franklin, Member of the Royal Academy of Sciences at Paris, FRS, &c. &c. one of the delegates of the province of Pennsylvania.” His honorary degrees and title of “Doctor” were placed in a secondary position as part of the “et cetera,” but stress was put on his having been elected a member of the two most prestigious scientific societies in the world, the Paris Académie Royale des Sciences and the Royal Society of London. He was, in fact, the only person in the New World who could claim membership in both societies. No other could claim that honor until a century had passed, when Louis Agassiz became a member of these two societies.
My thinking about the various aspects of colonial American history, the history of ideas, and the development of political thought, which are discussed in this book, has been influenced by the work of many scholars. Primary among them are Bernard Bailyn, Edmund Sears Morgan, Merrill Peterson, and J. G. A. Pocock. Among some notable others are Douglass Adair, Carl Becker, Adrienne Koch, Pauline Maier, Richard B. Morris, and Gordon S. Wood.
I am happy to acknowledge with deep gratitude the support of the research for this book by the Richard Lounsbery Foundation. Its founding director and president, Mr. Alan McHenry, was a warm and sympathetic supporter of my work. An unusual man of many talents, Alan McHenry became a true friend of all the scholars and scientists who were sponsored by the Lounsbery Foundation. One of the joys of my years of support by the Lounsbery Foundation was to become a friend of Alan McHenry.
In the preparation of this work I have profited by the research assistance of many students, foremost among them Katharine Downes and Amory Downes. Meredith St. Sauveur produced typescripts from almost undecipherable longhand versions and from tapes. Above all, I have profited from the research assistance of Julia Budenz, who has worked closely with me on every phase of the research and writing and whose critical comments and suggestions have been of the greatest value. I have also greatly profited from the research assistance and critical readings of drafts of chapters by Professor Elaine Storella of Framingham State College (Massachusetts). I have been constantly encouraged and stimulated by the concern of my publisher, Ed Barber.
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For the paperback edition I have corrected a few minor errors and I have altered the discussion of Adams’s use of Newton’s second law and his dismissal of the atomic-molecular hypothesis.