Benjamin Franklin famously remarked that, “Every civilized person has two homelands, and France is always one of them.” In his autobiography, Thomas Jefferson recalled his departure from France as follows: “I cannot leave this great and good country without expressing my sense of its preeminence of character among the nations of the earth.”

Considering the close ties that Franklin, Jefferson and many of the founders of our nation had with France and the pivotal role the French played in the formation of our nation, it is a paradox that so many modern Americans view France with rancor and resentment.

In the 2008 presidential campaign, Republicans criticized Massachusetts Senator Kerry for his fluency in French. At a time when “French fries” were re-named “freedom fries” as a political statement of antipathy for the French, the goal was to paint Kerry as “too French.” In the current Republican primary, a web ad released by Newt Gingrich's campaign titled “The French Connection,” compared Mitt Romney to other politicians from Massachusetts, including Kerry and former governor Michael Dukakis, also a former Democratic presidential nominee. In a parting shot, the voice in the ad explains: “Just like John Kerry, he speaks French too!”

When Benjamin Franklin went to France to secure military aid, he became our nation’s first ambassador. He lived in France for nine years and died five years after returning to America in 1785. It was France, not the United States that first mourned Franklin with the solemnity befitting a national icon.

French philosophical tradition also had a profound influence on the ideology behind the revolution and the American concept of government. Of particular importance were the ideas of Charles-Louis de Secondat, baron de La Brède et de Montesquieu, one of the most important social commentators of the Enlightenment. He is famous for his articulation of the theory of the separation of powers, taken for granted in modern times; but then a novel idea. He argued that despotism could best be prevented by a system in which different bodies exercised legislative, executive, and judicial power, and in which all those bodies were bound by the rule of law. This theory of the separation of powers had an enormous impact on the formulation of the constitution of the US.

From the outbreak of armed rebellion in 1775, the colonists enjoyed the support of many in France. French officers like the Marquis de Lafayette pledged their services, their personal wealth and their very lives in support of the revolution. While the French government proclaimed neutrality, France clandestinely supplied arms, uniforms and other military materiel to the American colonists.

The defeat of General Burgoyne at Saratoga in 1777 led to French recognition of the colonies in February 1778. Benjamin Franklin, who had gone to Paris as ambassador in 1776, was able to negotiate a “Treaty of Amity and Commerce” and a “Treaty of Alliance” with France.

And French military aid was a decisive factor in the American victory. In 1781, French troops under the command of Jean-Baptiste-Donatien de Vimeur count de Rochambeau marched south to Virginia where they joined the Continental forces under Washington and Lafayette. The British General, Charles Cornwallis, was encamped on the Yorktown peninsula and was counting on the British navy to evacuate his army. A French fleet under the command of Admiral DeGrasse intercepted and, after a ferocious battle that lasted days, defeated the British fleet and forced it to withdraw. The French navy landed heavy siege cannon and other supplies and trapped Cornwallis on the Yorktown peninsula. Besieged by a large and well-equipped French-American army, Cornwallis surrendered on October 19^th.

Rochambeau formulated the strategy that led to the greatest American victory of the war. He had orchestrated the presence and actions of the French fleet. French soldiers and sailors outnumbered the Americans four to one. Yorktown was, in essence, a French victory and one of its greatest gifts to our nation.

While the new nation embraced British military tradition through the War of 1812, the US Army, subsequently, adopted the French system of warfare known as the French Combat Method. It defined how American officers conceptualized the battlefield, how they organized their formations and their regulations, how they equipped their fighting forces, and how they created a process for learning from battlefield experiences.

In the 19th and 20th centuries, the colonial empire of France became the second-largest in the world behind the British Empire. But its greatest contributions were not defined by its military might and empire. In art, culture, philosophy, science, literature, music and government, the French have made significant, transformative contributions.

A French Revolution followed the American. The most enduring and influential part of the French constitution that was published in 1791was the “Declaration of the Rights of Man.”  It articulated the following ideals:



All people are born free with equal rights.

• All people are born free with equal rights.
• All citizens have the right to take part in electing representatives to make the laws of a nation.
• Every person should be free to speak, write, or print their opinions provided they do not abuse this privilege.
• Taxes paid should be commensurate with the wealth of the individual.
• Property rights are deemed inviolable.

The Declaration of the Rights of Man came to be regarded as the charter of democracy. The equality of all people in the eyes of the law is its essence. French support for the ideals of the American Revolution and French contributions to the concept of human rights, human liberty and social dignity, transformed humanity forever.