Paine when he returned to the US to spend his final years, was abandoned by many of his old friends because he had become too "controversial." Jim F. <<<<>>>>
t paine (much more forcefully and persuasively that t jefferson, and to an even lesser extent, b. franklin) endorsed notion of private property while seeing it as creation of community, thus, beholden to it in some sense... paine's disinction of property ownership as civil right accorded by society from permanent and inalienable natural right attached to human existence was basis for efforts to regulate inheritance and redistribute land (rarely successful with exception of mid-1780s rhode island, u.s. supreme court would rule land redistribution portion of 1930s new deal agricultural adjustment act unconstituonal)... michael hoover