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Paine had made note of the fact that England collected taxes from Jews, but that Jews were not allowed to vote because they were not “Christians,” it being assumed that Jews were not as fit, either intellectually or morally, to pass on questions of state as members of the “Church.” In Seventeen Hundred Seventy-one, in a letter to a local paper, he used the phrase, “The iniquity of taxation without representation,” referring to England’s treatment of the Quakers. About the same time he called attention to the fact that the Christian religion was built on the Judaic, and that the reputed founder of the established religion was a Jew and his mother a Jewess, and to deprive Jews of the right of full citizenship, simply because they did not take the same view of Jesus that others did, was a perversion of the natural rights of man. This expression, “the natural rights of man,” gave offense to a certain clergyman of Thetford, who replied that man had no natural rights, only privileges–all the rights he had were those granted by the Crown. Then followed a debate at the coffeehouse, followed by a rebuke from Paine’s superior officer in the Excise, ordering him to cease all political and religious controversy on penalty.

Paine felt the smart of the rebuke; he thought it was unjustifiable, in view of the fact that the excellence of his work for the Government had never been questioned. So he made a speech in a dissenting chapel explaining the situation. But explanations never explain, and his assertion that the honesty of his service had never been questioned was put out of commission the following week by the charge of smuggling. His name was dropped from the official payroll until his case could be tried, and a little later he was peremptorily discharged. The charge against him was not pressed–he was simply not wanted–and the statement by the head exciseman that a man working for the Government should not criticize the Government was pretty good logic, anyway. Paine, however, contended that all governments exist for the governed, and with the consent of the governed, and it is the duty of all good citizens to take an interest in their government, and if possible show where it can be strengthened and bettered.

It will thus be seen that Paine was forging reasons–his active brain was at work, and his sensitive spirit was writhing under a sense of personal injustice.

One of his critics–a clergyman–said that if Thomas Paine wished to preach sedition, there was plenty of room to do it outside of England. Paine followed the suggestion, and straightway sought out Franklin to ask him about going to America.

Every idea that Paine had expressed was held by Franklin and had been thought out at length. Franklin was thirty-one years older than Paine, and time had tempered his zeal, and beside that, his tongue was always well under control, and when he expressed heresy he seasoned it with a smile and a dash of wit that took the bitterness out of it. Not so Paine–he was an earnest soul, a little lacking in humor, without the adipose which is required for a diplomat.

Franklin’s letters of introduction show how he admired the man–what faith he had in him–and it is now believed that Franklin advanced him money, that he might come to America.

William Cobbett says:

As my Lord Grenville has introduced the name of Edmund Burke, suffer me, my Lord, to introduce the name of a man who put this Burke to shame, who drove him off the public stage to seek shelter in the pension-list, and who is now named fifty million times where the name of the pensioned Burke is mentioned once. The cause of the American Colonies was the cause of the English Constitution, which says that no man shall be taxed without his own consent. A little cause sometimes produces a great effect; an insult offered to a man of great talent and unconquerable perseverance has in many instances produced, in the long run, most tremendous effects; and it appears to me very clear that the inexcusable insults offered to Mr. Paine while he was in the Excise in England was the real cause of the Revolution in America; for, though the nature of the cause of America was such as I have before described it, though the principles were firm in the minds of the people of that country, still it was Mr. Paine, and Mr. Paine alone, who brought those principles into action.