The Rights of Man

Paine returns to political philosophy, reviving familiar subjects while adding several important new arguments. The hereditary principle, the British constitution, and the mixture of the three forms of government have all appeared earlier in the book. Paine’s emphasis on representation, however, is new, at least in this context. 

Supporters of Britain’s hereditary and mixed government, such as Burke, often pointed to the impossibility of maintaining democracy on a national scale. According to Paine, however, “Mr. Burke is so little acquainted with constituent principles of government, that he confounds democracy and representation together” (118). Paine here echoes James Madison’s argument in Federalist 10, which proposes the possibility of extending the sphere of republican government indefinitely through the principle of representation. Likewise, Paine’s description of republicanism is new. Republicanism, according to Paine, is not a form of government but rather a system rooted in an understanding of government’s proper ends, which are “public affairs, or the public good; or, literally translated, the public thing” (119). In stressing that the true end of a republican system is advancing “the public good,” Paine once more reiterates his belief that legitimate government is conducted for the good of the many and not just the few.  

It is also significant that Paine singles out America as the world’s “only real republic in character and practice” (119). In Part 1, Paine showed a consistent inclination to describe the post-revolutionary American and French governments in similar terms. After the publication of Part 1 of Rights of Man and before the appearance of Part 2, however, France’s King Louis XVI began to show opposition to the direction of the French Revolution. In Part 2, therefore, Paine appears less interested in highlighting the specific structures of the new revolutionary governments, preferring to emphasize their similar republican purposes instead.