common sense?
Painting by John Trumbull
Opinion by Ben Everidge for Thomas
It’s still a revolutionary idea …
Thomas Paine, an English-born Founding Father of America and a French Revolutionary friend of Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin, wrote what is considered to this day to be one of the most critical documents leading up to the American Revolution – the treatise, Common Sense.
Published in 1776, Paine strongly advocated as an anonymous “Englishman” that the fledgling United States embrace independence from Great Britain by rejecting the monarchy of King George III in favor of democracy. Paine offered disgusted American colonialists, alarmed at the threat of the King’s tyranny, a solution forward for living a life of liberty.
At a time when many colonialists hoped for reconciliation with Britain, Common Sense demonstrated the inevitability of separation from Great Britain by judging monarchy, especially hereditary monarchy, as a corrupt absurdity. Paine wrote, "thirst for absolute power is the natural disease of monarchy.”
In Paine’s view, a monarchy violated the laws of nature and human reason, and what he labeled as the "universal order of things," which began, he said, with God. Monarchy, Paine argued, was an institution of the devil.
He further said, “As the exalting one man so greatly above the rest cannot be justified on the equal rights of nature, so neither can it be defended on the authority of scripture; for the will of the Almighty as declared by Gideon and the prophet Samuel expressly disapproves of government by kings.”
Paine, therefore, pleaded with our forefathers, “for God’s sake, let us come to a final separation.” And the colonialists – the revolutionaries of America - did.
Rushing into the Modern Era
Fast forward to today, and the idea of a king lording over the United States of America is not as far-fetched as it might have seemed only a decade ago. Common sense as we have known it for some 250 years has been called into question by the 47th president of the United States.
The 47th president is trying with all the skills he has derived from a long career in business, entertainment, and politics to usurp the power of the people and instill that authority into a single, unitary body. Himself.
“Long live the king!”
Candidate and President Trump alike have a long and checkered past of advocating for dominion over the United States government, often supplementing that advocacy with violent rhetoric and a degree of absurdity benefiting a king, as Paine foreshadowed. It is folly to adopt the view that Mr. Trump is just joking.
“Except for day one … after that, I’m not a dictator.”
Trump has even described his cause as a “common sense revolution.” He said so in his record 99-minute Presidential Address to a joint session of Congress on March 4, 2025. But is the flurry of executive orders President Trump has signed in the six weeks since he returned to the White House “common sense”? Common sense as we have come to understand it since Thomas Paine first advanced the concept?
In his first weeks back in the Oval Office, that hallowed room at the center of American democracy, Donald Trump claimed many wrongs needed immediate correcting on what was once considered by majorities of Americans as things done right:
The preeminence of republican democracy over aristocracy, authoritarianism, and dictatorship.
The United States as the beacon of liberty and leader of the free world.
An adherence and respect for the Rule of Law.
The protection and advancement of our foreign allies.
Institutional integrity guarding our security, health, and prosperity.
Public service is an honorable profession and good for government.
In short order, Mr. Trump disparaged these concepts. He is advocating for initiatives that would undermine what we have regarded as “common sense” according to the revolution Americans fought two and a half centuries ago and which the north and south settled among themselves with horrific death and trauma as a result:
An Executive Branch that is the co-equal and not supreme to the Legislative and Judicial branches of American government as constitutionally provided by our Founding Fathers.
Rejecting the concept that “all men are created equal” and are “endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights.”
Abandoning the Rule of Law to ignore the judgment of American courts that cannot and will not enforce their decisions without the power of our police.
The sanctity of our veterans' service in times of war and peace.
The irrational embrace of dictators, despots, radicals, and anti-constitutionalists.
Paine warned us to remember that the king “is not to be trusted” and that the “thirst for absolute power is the natural disease of monarchy.” Paine also warned us to understand that “A long habit of not thinking a thing wrong gives it a superficial appearance of being right, and raises at first a formidable outcry in defense of custom. But the tumult soon subsides. Time makes more converts than reason.” In other words, as many times as Trump might yell from the rooftops that something is right, it does not make it right when we know it is wrong.
Said Paine: “As a long and violent abuse of power is generally the Means of calling the right of it in question …. And however our eyes may be dazzled by show, or our ears deceived by sound, however prejudice may warp our will or interest darken our understanding, the simple voice of nature and reason will say, it is right.
“It is the pride of kings,” Paine suggested, “which throws mankind into confusion.”
So, let us not be confused and let us again reject the rule of kings in America as well as their brethren, the aristocrats, oligarchs, authoritarians, dictators, and otherwise, who would deny us our liberty, our freedom, our Creator’s unalienable Rights.
“I draw my idea of the form of government from a principle in nature which no art can overturn, viz. that the more simple anything is, the less liable it is to be disordered, and the easier repaired when disordered ….”
Keeping It Simple
So, in the spirit of Thomas Paine and the “common sense” he advanced, let’s keep the task in front of us in governing forward simple to understand:
American democracy is our chosen form of government.
The three branches of our government are co-equal.
No man or woman is above the law.
The Rule of Law in America must be respected, followed, and enforced.
Integrity in public service and leadership is not to be violated.
Our institutions of justice will not be weaponized.
America’s allies deserve the reliance of our word, and our adversaries are assured the promise of our strength and defense of liberty.
Government in America will work efficiently and effectively for our citizens, not against them.
Our budgets will be balanced, our national debt better managed, and our taxes will be fair, flat, and equal to all.
Our borders will be secure, free markets protected, and neighborhoods safe.
Good-paying jobs, affordable housing and healthcare, and access to attainable education are the priorities - the primary mission - of our representatives in Congress and state capitals.
Our pioneering spirit and innovative endeavors are to be encouraged and incentivized.
Discrimination of any kind for any reason anywhere is intolerable.
These are the truths Americans treasure. This is the path forward that Americans seek and treasure. This is the common sense that Americans embrace and believe. Thomas Paine and 45 American presidents sought this on our behalf.
Presidential politics aside - regardless of whether we are Republican, Democrat, or Independent - this is and should be our expectation of what is common sense. The thirst of one for absolute power at the expense of the many must be rejected. Monarchy for Americans violates the laws of nature, human reason, and scripture.
Government by kings will not preserve liberty. It will not promote freedom. Democracy will die under a king or a dictator, and that is simply not the America we choose.