10/01/2025
Letter XIII
On the Benefits of Shared Prosperity
Fellow Citizens,
Among the surest proofs of the wisdom of our republican form is this: that the wealth of the nation is not secured by a few, but by the many; and that the strength of our common prosperity lies not in palaces, but in the cottages, the farms, the workshops, and the humble households of free men and women.
It is a grievous error of despots, ancient and modern, to suppose that prosperity may be hoarded by an elite, while the common people toil in misery. Such prosperity is but an illusion — fragile, corrupt, and doomed to collapse. For the wealth of the people is the wealth of the nation, and when the citizen is impoverished, the republic is imperiled.
Our forefathers knew this well. They staked their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor not upon a promise of riches for the few, but upon liberty and opportunity for all. They did not labor to cast off a king only to crown another, robed in dollars instead of diadems. Rather, they believed, as we must believe, that the blessings of liberty are best preserved when every man may reap the fruits of his labor, and when the doors of opportunity stand open to the humble as well as to the great.
What is prosperity, if not shared? For the farmer, it is a fair price for his crop and a market to sell it. For the craftsman, it is wages that reward his skill and a family that prospers from his toil. For the merchant, it is the safe exchange of goods and the trust of his customers. For the laborer, it is security that honest work will feed his children. For the republic, it is the combined strength of these pursuits, knitting together the fortunes of all into one mighty fabric.
Let us not be deceived by those who measure prosperity only in the splendor of their mansions, or in the swelling of their coffers, or in the endless pursuit of luxury. Such prosperity is no prosperity at all if the masses of our people are driven into penury, if the citizen cannot keep his home, if his wages cannot buy bread, if debt enslaves him, or if his children are denied the chance to rise. A gilded few cannot sustain a republic; but a sturdy, virtuous, and prosperous people can.
And mark this well: when prosperity is not shared, envy grows, division festers, and the foundations of society crack. It is no accident that republics fall when the gulf between the rulers and the ruled becomes a chasm. If wealth becomes the passport to office, if government bends to the will of the rich alone, then liberty itself is imperiled. For what is tyranny, if not the control of the many by the few?
Yet when prosperity is broad, when the citizen knows his toil will be rewarded, when his rights are secure, when he is free to rise according to merit and virtue — then the republic flourishes. Then there is harmony between classes, for each sees his fortune tied to the fortunes of his neighbor. Then innovation thrives, commerce expands, agriculture yields, and the arts advance. Then liberty takes root in the soul of every man, not merely in the parchment of laws.
Let us recall that in the Revolution itself, the cause of independence was not sustained by wealthy merchants alone, nor by planters of vast estates, but by farmers who left their plows, mechanics who left their shops, laborers who left their tools, and all who counted themselves citizens. The Revolution was won because prosperity, however humble, was shared in the desire for liberty. Each had a stake in the future, and therefore each was willing to fight for it.
So too must it be now. If our republic is to endure, then prosperity must be shared — not by confiscation, not by the envy of one class against another, but by liberty itself. By ensuring fair laws, by breaking the chains of crushing debt, by preserving free markets that reward toil and merit, and by protecting the right of every man and woman to keep the fruit of their labor, we shall guarantee that prosperity is not the privilege of the few, but the inheritance of the many.
For it is not enough to say that America is wealthy — America must be wealthy in citizens, not merely in corporations; wealthy in virtue, not merely in luxury; wealthy in industry, not merely in speculation. Only then will our liberty be secure.
I close, therefore, with this charge: let us preserve a republic where prosperity is not the trophy of the powerful, but the lifeblood of a free people. Let us secure not merely wealth, but shared wealth; not merely riches, but liberty sustained by virtue and opportunity.
I remain, in fidelity to the common prosperity of the Republic,
Civis Americanus
