Thomas Paine’s 1776 pamphlet Common Sense argued for American independence during the founding era commemorated by America250.
Published anonymously in Philadelphia on January 10, 1776, the 47-page pamphlet attacked monarchy and made the case that the American colonies should break completely from Great Britain. Paine wrote in direct, accessible prose intended for ordinary colonists rather than only political specialists.
The pamphlet was widely circulated and frequently read aloud in taverns, meeting places, and homes. It helped make independence a more prominent subject in public debate, although historians distinguish its broad influence from the formal legal process by which Congress declared independence.
Readers sometimes confuse Common Sense with Paine’s later revolutionary pamphlet The Crisis, which began appearing in December 1776 and addressed the war’s hardships. Plain Truth was a loyalist response by James Chalmers, not Paine’s independence pamphlet. Common Sense was Paine’s earliest major American political success.