I was going to say that judicial review had been established, since it was a Democratic-Republican vs. Federalist issue, and Jefferson and Adams were on opposite sides, and then I realized: Marbury v. Madison. Not Jefferson or Adams, Madison. Ooops.
Maybe Benjamin Franklin in both categories. He was a crucial part of the independence movement and his actions as an ambassador played a part in bring France into the conflict. That virtually assured our success.
At the same time he essentially abandoned his family. He was estranged from his son because of plitical differences. He ignored his daughter who tried all of her life to get daddy to pay some heed to her. In the end she cared for him when he became infirm from old age. He left his wife at home while he dallied with the ladies in France.
I am confused, his common law wife, Deborah Read died in 1774. She chose not to go on any of the trips as she had a phobia of Ocean travel.
William* caused the estrangement far more than the father. He was a loyalist who despite much profit from his father’s connections, stood by the King and against Ben and his compatriots.
Ben left his entire estate to Sally (or Sarah). She acted as her father’s hostess during the war. He was there for her childhood.
It seems like your critisisms of Ben might be a little harsh and unjustified except for the dalliances. However, he did not live in France until after his wife’s death. His cheating on her must have occured in England. He briefly visited Paris in 1767.
Jim
- An illegitimate son that Ben did not need to acknowledge, who Ben secured the position of Governor for and that Ben did right by, raising him.
I’m a Franklin fan. (Although I love Adams even more.)
What’s Exit’s post reminded me of a story I heard on a Franklin biography for kids. (My parents played famous-person-biography tapes for us kids to listen to on long car trips.)
According to the tape, Franklin kept his family in Philadelphia during a smallpox outbreak when many other residents had fled to the country to avoid the disease. He had had the entire family inoculated against the disease except the baby, Francis, because he was too young.
The inoculations proved effective, but the baby caught smallpox. (The narrator on the tape explained solemnly that Francis was feverish and cried through the night, “but when morning came, the little head lay still.”)
I was very upset with Ben for not taking Francis out of Philadelphia. He probably figured that if the rest of the family was protected from smallpox, than Francis couldn’t possibly catch it. And Franklin’s courageous reliance on science was what made him a great forward thinker.
Still, thinking about little Francis makes me sad.
True, but what would you have him do? Turn traitor like his father? He was the Governor, after all.
Actually yes. He owed everything to his father. When his father asked him for support, he should have provided it. Why side with an unjust King against your own father. A man that did quite right by you. It was a betrayal.
The son had a hard choice to make, I condemn him for the choice. He should have thrown in his lot with the rebels. Many others tossed away their positions to join the rebellion.
Jim
So you would, at the urging of your aged Father, join a criminal and treasonous Cabal, led by Smugglers, Malcontents, and Banditti, against the rightful King and government? You would, to avoid betraying your father, instead betray your nation? You’d really put your family ahead of your country’s welfare?
The closest I can come to this.
If Bush declared Martial Law before the next election and extended his term indefinitely and my father was leading a criminal and treasonous Cabal, led by Smugglers, Malcontents, and Banditti, against the “rightful” President and government, I would indeed follow my Dad.
I think you sound like a Tory sirrah. Perhaps pistols at Noon would be appropriate? 
Ya know, it’s possible that the account of Franklin’s family affairs was written by an author who was out to prove that HE wasn’t going to heap a lot of praise on the Founders. Such things happen.
Well, I’ll stick up for Aaron Burr.
The fouders of our government are the most successfull ever. They didn’t like democracy, or mob rules types of goverment or any of the other types of governments around at the time.
They upped the value of personal rights and freedoms and put strict limits on the rights of the government.
We have been chipping away at those ideas to become more like everyone else ever since.
The ideas are definately old, but you have to respect the political ideas of the folks that kicked this whole adventure off.
They had personal experience with what they considered to be repression by the government. We haven’t and so many don’t value their rights as much as they do some safety that it is presumed will be gained by ceding a few of them.
It’s long been my view that every 10 years or so people should be required to go for three months to a camp. There they would be under the control of a sadistic drillmaster who has the whole power of the US government behind him.
But they quickly learned that making the central government too powerless was a mistake. That is why the Articles of Confederation were scrapped in favor of a Constitution giving the federal government more authority, and indeed supremacy within its purview.
Who’s declaring martial law and extending his term indefinately, though? Lord North? Would you follow him if, instead of doing that, the government passed a law exempting a company from paying a tax on goods? Lets say Congress passes a law saying, “From now on, Exxon-Mobile doesn’t have to pay any gasoline taxes”? That’s really worth going to the barricades for?
And, as the challenged party, I think it’s my right to set the conditions of the duel.