Agrarian Justice

By Thomas Paine

Paine advocates the use of taxation to fund a universal old-age and disability pension, as well as a fixed sum to be paid to all citizens on reaching maturity.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Wilder Publications, Inc.
• Release date: Jun 15, 2014
• ISBN: 9781633840065

Thomas Paine

English-born Thomas Paine left behind hearth and home for adventures on the high seas at nineteen. Upon returning to shore, he became a tax officer, and it was this job that inspired him to write The Case of the Officers of Excise in 1772. Paine then immigrated to Philadelphia, and in 1776 he published Common Sense, a defense of American independence from England. After returning to Europe, Paine wrote his famous Rights of Man as a response to criticism of the French Revolution. He was subsequently labeled as an outlaw, leading him to flee to France where he joined the National Convention. However, in 1793 Paine was imprisoned, and during this time he wrote the first part of The Age of Reason, an anti-church text which would go on to be his most famous work. After his release, Paine returned to America where he passed away in 1809.

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Agrarian Justice

By Thomas Paine

A&D Books

Copyright © 2014 A&D Books

All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever.

Manufactured in the United States of America

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

ISBN 978-1-63384-006-5

Table of Contents

Author’s Inscription

Author’s English Preface

Agrarian Justice

Means by Which the Fund Is to Be Created

Means for Carrying the Proposed Plan into Execution, and to Render It at the Same Time Conducive to the Public Interest

Editor’s Notes

Editor’s notes prefacing the author’s inscription

Editor’s note’s prefacing the author’s English preface

Editor’s notes prefacing the main body

Author’s Inscription

(Editor's Notes follow)

To the Legislature and the Executive Directory of the French Republic

THE plan contained in this work is not adapted for any particular country alone: the principle on which it is based is general. But as the rights of man are a new study in this world, and one needing protection from priestly imposture, and the insolence of oppressions too long established, I have thought it right to place this little work under your safeguard.

When we reflect on the long and dense night in which France and all Europe have remained plunged by their governments and their priests, we must feel less surprise than grief at the bewilderment caused by the first burst of light that dispels the darkness. The eye accustomed to darkness can hardly bear at first the broad daylight. It is by usage the eye learns to see, and it is the same inpassing from any situation to its opposite.

As we have not at one instant renounced all our errors, we cannot at one stroke acquire knowledge of all our rights. France has had the honor of adding to the word Liberty that of Equality; and this word signifies essentially a principle that admits of no gradation in the things to which it applies. But equality is often misunderstood, often misapplied, and often violated.

Liberty and Property are words expressing all those of our possessions which are not of an intellectual nature. There are two kinds of property. Firstly, natural property, or that which comes to us from the Creator of the universe--such as the earth,air, water. Secondly, artificial or acquired property--theinvention of men.

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