Thomas Paine

Although Morris did much to restore his reputation in 1780 and 1781 the credit for obtaining these critical loans to "organize" the Bank of North America for approval by Congress in December 1781 should go to Henry or John Laurens and Thomas Paine more than to Robert Morris. Common Sense was so influential that John Adams said "Without the pen of the author of Common Sense the sword of Washington would have been raised in vain. Rosenfeld concludes that the phenomenal appeal of his pamphlet resulted from his synthesis of popular and elite elements in the independence movement.

Consequently the Montagnards especially Robespierre regarded him as an enemy. In December 1793 he was arrested and imprisoned in Paris then released in 1794. His principal contributions were the powerful widely read pamphlet Common Sense (1776) the all-time best-selling American book that advocated colonial America's independence from the Kingdom of Great Britain and The American Crisis (1776–83) a pro-revolutionary pamphlet series.