Thomas Paine is an enthusiastic supporter of the French Revolution, and had been granted, along with Alexander Hamilton, George Washington, Benjamin Franklin and others, honorary French citizenship.

Despite his inability to speak French, he has been elected to the National Convention, representing the district of Pas-de-Calais.

He had voted for the French Republic; but had argued against the execution of Louis XVI, saying that he should instead be exiled to the United States: firstly, because of the way royalist France had come to the aid of the American Revolution; and secondly because of a moral objection to capital punishment in general and to revenge killings in particular.

He participates in the Constitution Committee that drafts the Girondin constitutional project.