Common Sense

Common Sense is a historical primary source of 47-page pamphlet written by Thomas Paine in 1775–1776 advocating independence from the Great Britain to people in the Thirteen Colonies. Writing in clear and persuasive prose, Paine marshaled moral and political arguments to encourage common people in the Colonies to fight for egalitarian government. It was published anonymously on January 10, 1776, at the beginning of the American Revolution and became an immediate sensation.

Common Sense made public a persuasive and impassioned case for independence, which had not yet been given serious intellectual consideration. Paine connected independence with the common dissenting Protestant beliefs as a means to present a distinctly American political identity and structured Common Sense as if it were a sermon. Historian Gordon S. Wood described Common Sense as "the most incendiary and popular pamphlet of the entire revolutionary era."

Thomas Paine (1737–1809) wrote several books and pamphlets that greatly contributed to “delegitimizing” the claims to authority of the British state. Paine asserted that the “society in every state is a blessing, but the government, even in its best state, is but a necessary evil; in its worst state an intolerable one” and directed the reader to the discussion of the nature of rulers in the Bible. As to the particular claims of the British monarchy.