Everything Everywhere Daily: History, Science, Geography & More - John Dickinson: The Reluctant Revolutionary

Starting point is 00:00:00 He was one of the most influential political writers of the American Revolution, helped shape the argument against British taxation, drafted major documents for the Continental Congress, and helped create both of America's first two systems of government. Yet when the colonies decided to declare their independence, he refused to support it. And for that decision, he paid a steep price that can still be felt today. Learn more about John Dickinson, the reluctant revolutionary,

Starting point is 00:00:28 on this episode of Everything Everyman. daily. The first ever all-electric 2026 Subaru Trail Seeker is the EV for the trail obsessed. With up to 444 kilometers on a full charge and DC fast charging from 10 to 80% in about 30 minutes in ideal conditions. Plus, ample ground clearance and symmetrical all-wheel drive make the 2026 trail seeker the most capable EV Subaru has ever built. Test drive it at your local Subaru dealer or visit Subaru.ca. Welcome to the I Can't Sleep Podcast with Benjamin Boster. If you're tired of sleepless nights, you'll love the I Can't Sleep podcast.

Starting point is 00:01:31 I help quiet your mind by reading random articles from across the web to bore you to sleep with my soothing voice. Each episode provides enough interesting content to hold your attention, and then your mind lets you drift off. Find it wherever you get your podcasts. that's I Can't Sleep with Benjamin Boster. John Dickinson is one of the most misunderstood figures in American history. Our collective historical imagination often portrays him as a loyalist, a coward, or both. In the 2008 HBO miniseries John Adams, he's cast as the antagonist John Adams and as the object of Ben Franklin's tireless efforts to persuade him of the merits of independence.

Starting point is 00:02:32 But the myth of John Dickinson often contradicts. the historical reality of John Dickinson. One of the most common myths about Dickinson is that he was a loyalist, or someone who at least preferred continued British colonial control. Loyalism in the colonies before the revolution is probably more common than most people think. Some estimates place the number of loyalists at about one-fifth to one-third of the colonial population. Loyalists usually had distinct reasons for their beliefs. In many cases, they were recent emigrates from England, or worked in the colonial administration and were loyal to the crown.

Starting point is 00:03:08 In other instances, their profession, such as merchant or farmer, benefited from loyalty to the crown. Religious beliefs also prompted loyalist leanings. Members of the Church of England often remained loyal because the British monarch was the supreme head of the church. Religious groups such as Quakers, who embraced pacifism as a foundational principle, refused to participate in revolution or violence. Dickinson is often cast as a devout Quaker. which supposedly motivated his beliefs, but that conclusion isn't supported by the evidence. While Dickinson came from a Quaker household and upbringing, he was not active in the religious

Starting point is 00:03:45 community as an adult. His military service during and after the American Revolution contradicted Quaker values. In fact, less than a third of the signers of the Declaration of Independence actually served in the Continental Army, and Dickinson was one of the small minority who physically took up arms. Dickinson's loyalist tendencies came from the constitutional or legal nature of the act of revolution, as well as his deep admiration for the British political system and its safeguards. Dickinson and fellow Continental Congress obstructionist Edward Rutledge of South Carolina both fell into this category. Like Dickinson, Rutledge was deeply disenchanted with Britain's actions, but both believed that a sudden move

Starting point is 00:04:26 to independence would lead to internal anarchy under a reactionary government, driven by the feelings and whims of the mob. Dickinson's coalition was also aware of the mercantiless benefits of continued ties with Britain and feared losing them by relying on France. He wrote, We have many points of the utmost moment to settle with France, Canada, Acadia, and Cape Breton. What will content her? Barbury pirates, Spain, Portugal? Will she demand an exclusive trade as compensation or grant us protection against piratical states only for a share of our commerce? End quote. This reasoning exemplified Dickinson's intellectual approach. He acknowledged the widespread resentment

Starting point is 00:05:09 towards Britain, yet hesitated to leap recklessly into the unknown. He cautioned that an ill-prepared, financially unstable America might find itself vulnerable to France, potentially exchanging one colonial master for another, and facing a far more unpredictable relationship in the process. So casting Dickinson as a loyalist is not really accurate, especially considering his legacy of protesting against British policies before the Second Continental Congress. One factor that made his obstinence at Independence Hall so difficult for historians to reconcile was that a decade before the Declaration of Independence, Dickinson gave the American colonies their foundational legal argument against British overreach.

Starting point is 00:05:53 In 1767, the British government realized that the best way to raise revenue from the colonies without a vigorous campaign of noncompliance was to disguise its efforts, through an external tax or tariff. The British saw firsthand how angrily the colonists viewed direct taxes on things like stamps, so putting taxes on imported goods looked more like the regulation of foreign trade. Regrettable for sure, but unlikely to arouse the anger that the Stamp Act had. Dickinson saw right through the charade and responded with one of the most famous condemnations of British colonial policies. The humbly titled, Letters from a Farmer and a Farmer and

Starting point is 00:06:33 in Pennsylvania was an anonymous series of 12 essays that eviscerated British policies. His anonymity quickly disappeared and his fame spread throughout the colonies as the essays were published in papers from Massachusetts to Georgia. Dickinson's writing appealed to both the farmer reading an essay in a weekly paper as well as to intellectuals. Trained in England as a lawyer at the historic Middle Temple in London, Dickinson's argument was clear and concise. Great Britain had the constitutional authority to regulate late imperial trade, but had no legal right to levy taxes on the colonies to raise revenue without their consent. In Dickinson's mind, consent could only come from colonial representation

Starting point is 00:07:14 in the British House of Commons. On the subject of taxation, Dickinson's views were very clear when he wrote, quote, if they have a right to levy a tax on us of one penny, then they have the right to levy a tax of a million. For who can define that right? There is no line to be drawn between total liberty and total slavery, end quote. Dickinson did not invent a new idea or legal argument. His argument came from earlier English traditions. What he did do was unite the colonists under a coherent, legal, and motivational idea that had the legal clarity to arouse intellectuals and the plain language to rile up

Starting point is 00:07:54 the public. By framing the colonial argument around the constitutional invalidity of British measures, Dickinson's letters galvanized the colonies to unite behind non-importation agreements and organized boycotts. After the publication of the letter, Dickinson earned the nickname Penman of the Revolution. Dickinson was counted on to write everything from a song about the revolution called The Liberty Song to legal documents commissioned by the Continental Congress. However, his most famous writings were yet to come. Dickinson asked the president of the Continental Congress, John Hancock,

Starting point is 00:08:30 if he could write two documents in the summer of 1775, the Declaration of the Causes and Necessity of Taking Up Arms and the Olive Branch petition. Because fighting had started in the spring of 1775 at Lexington and Concord, the Declaration of the Causes and Necessity of Taking Up Arms was necessary to explain why colonial troops were an active armed conflict with the British. The Olive Branch petition was Dickinson's last-ditch effort at diplomacy. This document was unique in that it attempted to bypass Parliament entirely, whom the delegates viewed as corrupt and overreaching, and instead appealed directly to King George III as the father of his people. But when the king refused to even receive the document or its envoy,

Starting point is 00:09:17 it effectively silenced the moderate voice in the Continental Congress. The king's only response arrived in August of 1775 when he declared the colonies in open rebellion and outlined the actions of the Second Continental Congress as treasonous. Dickinson's insistence on reconciliation suddenly looked like political obstruction, and the momentum shifted decisively towards the radicals in the Continental Congress who wanted full independence. Despite these diplomatic failures, Dickinson continued to argue against declaring independence, enraging congressional radicals, and alienating fellow moderates who had once held him in the highest regard. Dickinson's arguments shifted to one of preparedness. He no longer argued that the

Starting point is 00:10:03 colonists could change British policies through boycotts or negotiations. Instead, he argued that the colonies were ill-prepared to take such a dramatic leap as independence. As the debate raged on for months and nearly all opposition to independence had vanished, he remained steadfastly opposed. On the evening of July 1st, 1776, in the debate leading up to the resolution, for Independence by Richard Henry Leah, Virginia. Dickinson gave perhaps his most impassioned plea to slow the process down. He said, quote, to escape from the protection we have in British rule by declaring independence would be like destroying a house before we've got another in winter with a small family. It is to brave the storm in a skiff made of paper, end quote. His arguments

Starting point is 00:10:51 were wrong, but at this point they seemed pedantic and repetitive. As the war, escalated and the British responded with more violence, his arguments no longer carried the same weight. Realizing the situation was inevitable. Dickinson nobly stepped aside and was absent from the vote on independence, allowing Pennsylvania to approve the measure and ensuring ratification, which required a unanimous vote. New York abstained because they hadn't gotten approval from their state legislature, but later voted for the measure on July 9th. Dickinson foreshadowed what lay ahead for him in public life after the signing of the Declaration of Independence when he said, quote, My conduct this day, I expect, will give the finishing stroke to my once too great and too

Starting point is 00:11:35 diminished popularity. But I had rather surrender that popularity than surrender the dictates of my conscience, end quote. Dickinson was one of only three delegates to the Second Continental Congress who did not sign the Declaration of Independence on principle. Practically overnight, the man who was once considered the voice of the voice of the revolution was ostracized. As the declaration traveled from town to town, read aloud to cheering crowds, the public dragged Dickinson's name through the mud. The damage to his reputation began when Pennsylvania revoked his seat in its congressional delegation. He was stripped of his leadership in the Pennsylvania militia, which was part of the Continental Army. Newspapers and pamphlets

Starting point is 00:12:18 branded him as a Tory sympathizer, and some even went so far as to call him a traitor. While his colonial neighbors held him in low regard, his standing in Britain wasn't much better, as he was still labeled a member of the rebellion. The British, though probably not out of any sort of calculated retaliation, destroyed two of his properties outside of Philadelphia and his farm in Delaware. Coupled with the money he actively gave to fund the rebellion and the Continental Army, he was now financially ruined. Perhaps the most damaging consequence for Dickinson was the one that he never lived

Starting point is 00:12:53 to see. Dickinson was effectively erased from the historical record. Had he not obstructed the work of Adams, Jefferson, and Franklin, and had he not delayed independence for as long as he did, he would have probably been front and center in John Trumbull's famous paintings depicting the founding fathers. He met every criteria of a founding father. He had profound writings. He had military service. He had personally funded the Continental Army. Like Washington, Jefferson, and Adams and Ben Franklin, his life followed an almost mythological story arc. But he also had a strong conscience, and for that, John Dickinson paid an extraordinary price. Yet, John Dickinson was determined to rebuild his legacy and prove his detractors wrong, to show that he wasn't a traitor. Despite being stripped of his

Starting point is 00:13:42 military rank, he continued to serve in the military, this time as a private in the Delaware militia, where he moved in December of 1776. Recognizing his legal brilliance, and service under fire, Delaware sent him back to the Continental Congress in 1779, where he signed the Articles of Confederation, the first national framework that he had drafted three years earlier. His public service continued when the Assembly elected him President of Delaware, where he promptly restored financial and political order, and he later did the same thing for the state of Pennsylvania. His story came full circle when he was chosen as a delegate to the Annapolis Convention, which was to addressed the limitations in the Articles of Confederation.

Starting point is 00:14:25 He was then awarded an even higher honor, selection to the Constitutional Convention, where his guidance and skill were instrumental in passing the Great Compromise, which led to the ratification of the United States Constitution. While he didn't join Alexander Hamilton, John Jay, and James Madison in writing the Federalist Papers, he did take up the cause for constitutional ratification through a series of widely read letters called the Fabius letters. Dickinson's consciousness also extended to the most glaring hypocrisy of America's founding. Having inherited several slaves upon his father's death, Dickinson became increasingly troubled by the practice. He became one of the few slaveholding

Starting point is 00:15:07 founders to grant his slave's freedom, becoming a vocal advocate for abolition in Delaware. John Dickinson never achieved the fame of George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, or Benjamin Franklin, in part because his most remembered decision was his refusal to support independence in 1776. Yet few founding fathers contributed so much to so many stages of the creation of the United States. He helped formulate the constitutional case against British taxation, drafted the Articles of Confederation, served in the Revolutionary Army, governed two states, and helped frame and defend the United States Constitution. Dickinson's career was defined less by opposition.

Starting point is 00:15:48 to change than by a belief that liberty depended on careful, balanced government. The man who hesitated at independence ultimately helped design the very political system that allowed it to endure. The executive producer of Everything Everywhere Daily is Charles Daniel. The associate producers are Austin Otkin and Cameron Kiefer. Research in writing for this episode was provided by Joel Hermanson. My big thanks go to everyone who supports the show over on Patreon. Your support helps make this podcast.

Starting point is 00:16:19 possible. And I also want to remind everyone about the community groups on Facebook and Discord, as this is where everything happens outside of the podcast. As always, if you leave a review on any of the major podcast apps, you too can have it run in the show.

Everything Everywhere Daily: History, Science, Geography & More - John Dickinson: The Reluctant Revolutionary

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