By the time Benjamin Franklin set out to write his Autobiography, he was a renowned scientist, inventor, man of letters, politician, diplomat, and philosopher—the most famous American in the world, by far. But what exactly was an American in 1784? America had only just won its independence from Britain, and the project of building both the nation and its identity was just beginning.

We will examine the Autobiography as the first conscious statement of a distinctly American identity and political philosophy, illustrated through Franklin’s own eventful life, and try to understand the nature of the democratic promise Franklin saw in it. We will pay particular attention to Franklin’s accounts of education, commercial life, civic virtue, and democratic psychology.

Image: Benjamin West, American Commissioners of the Preliminary Peace Agreement with Great Britain, 1783-1784, London, England.

 

The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin with Rita Koganzon

This course takes place weekly on Tuesdays, via Zoom, from 6 PM to 8 PM ET. Fellows will receive a $150 stipend contingent upon participation in the course and completion of a brief response paper. All course materials will be provided.

Faculty

Rita Koganzon

She is an associate professor at the School of Civil Life and Leadership at UNC-Chapel Hill. Her research focuses on the themes of education, childhood, authority, and the family in historical and contemporary political thought. In addition to her research, she contributes book reviews and essays to the Hedgehog Review, National Affairs, The Point, and The Chronicle of Higher Education, among others.

Preview the Syllabus by Week/Session

Readings:

  • The Autobiography, pp. 3–49

Discussion Question:

  1. How would you describe Franklin’s social status at his birth? What factors affect it?
  2. What is Franklin’s education?
  3. In what ways is Franklin’s education constrained by the social and economic conditions in which he was raised?
  4. How does he compensate for or overcome these limitations?

Readings:

  • The Autobiography, pp. 49–68

Discussion Question:

  1. What sorts of difficulties does Franklin encounter when he returns from London and tries to establish himself and start his printing business in Philadelphia? Are these sorts of problems still around today for young people, or have we found ways around them?
  2. What obstacles does he face in getting married? How does he overcome them?
  3. How does Franklin actually start his business? Who helps him and how? What does he have to do to secure this help?
  4. What strategies does he employ in creating the public library and why does he select these strategies in particular?

 

Readings:

  • The Autobiography, pp. 68–90

Discussion Question:

  1. What is Franklin’s “arduous project of arriving at moral perfection”? Are the virtues that he sets out for himself comprehensive, or is he missing some things? What do his virtues aim at?
  2. What is Franklin’s attitude towards religion? Is he religious?
  3. What do you make of his method of perfecting himself? Would you try it? Is his “moral perfection” project serious?
  4. What is the relationship between Franklin’s private interests and motivations, and his public service?

 

Readings:

  • The Autobiography, pp. 91–125

Discussion Question:

  1. Why doesn’t Franklin’s idea of a “party of virtue” ever get off the ground? What reasons does he give and what are the real reasons that his reasons imply?
  2. What is the Junto? What does it achieve for Franklin, and for its other members, and how is it a kind of foundation for Franklin’s subsequent activities?
  3. How do Franklin’s youthful strategies for getting things done carry over into his political activity?
  4. What is the big problem with the Quakers, who govern Pennsylvania? What do we learn about political necessity from the various run-ins that Franklin has with strange sects like the Quakers and the Dunkers in these years? (We will also meet another sect, the Moravians, next week.)

 

Readings:

  • The Autobiography, pp. 125–65

Discussion Question:

  1. Why does General Braddock’s campaign fail, and what does its failure show us about the English by the 1760s?
  2. What does the controversy over Franklin’s electrical discoveries reveal about the growing divide between the Europeans and Americans?
  3. What is American about Franklin? He is often called a “self-made man” – what does that mean in his context? How does he respond to the conditions of colonial American life – its equality, freedom, and individualism – throughout his life?

 

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Adam J. White

Adam J. White is the Laurence H. Silberman Chair in Constitutional Governance and senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, where he focuses on the Supreme Court and the administrative state. Concurrently, he codirects the Antonin Scalia Law School’s C. Boyden Gray Center for the Study of the Administrative State.

Gary J. Schmitt

Gary J. Schmitt is a senior fellow in the Social, Cultural, and Constitutional Studies program at the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), where he studies issues related to the American presidency, the U.S. constitution and its principles, and American civic life.

Biography Image

Robert C. Bartlett

Robert C. Bartlett is the Behrakis Professor of Hellenic Political Studies at Boston College. His principal area of research is classical political philosophy, with particular attention to the thinkers of ancient Hellas, including Thucydides, Plato, and Aristotle. He is the co-translator of a new edition of Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics.