This Day in History: Sir Thomas More was executed for treason against King Henry VIII of England on this day in 1535. During the reign of Henry VIII, it is estimated that between 57,000 and 72,000 English subjects lost their heads.
Thomas More is known for more than that though. He famously wrote an influential Communist book called UTOPIA. Utopia is a work of fiction that depicts a fictional island society and its religious, social, and political customs.
In More’s Utopia, “men live all the time under everyone’s eyes.” "Citizens shunned individuality. All dressed in bland, simple garments and disdained ostentations like jewelry and other finery. Gold had so little appeal that it was used for making chamberpots. All persons ate their meals in large groups in common halls. Communistic Utopia had no money or private property." [Daniel Hager]
Slavery is a feature of Utopian life and it is reported that every household has two slaves. The slaves are either from other countries (prisoners of war) or people condemned to die, poor people or criminals.
Other significant innovations of Utopia include: a welfare state with free hospitals, euthanasia permissible by the state, priests being allowed to marry, divorce permitted, premarital sex punished by a lifetime of enforced celibacy and adultery being punished by enslavement. Meals are taken in community dining halls and the job of feeding the population is given to a different household in turn. Although all are fed the same, Raphael explains that the old and the administrators are given the best of the food. Travel on the island is only permitted with an internal passport and any people found without a passport are, on a first occasion, returned in disgrace, but after a second offence they are placed in slavery. In addition, there are no lawyers and the law is made deliberately simple, as all should understand it and not leave people in any doubt of what is right and wrong.
Privacy is not regarded as freedom in Utopia; taverns and places for private gatherings are non-existent for the effect of keeping all men in full view, so that they are obliged to behave well.
In "Indian Givers: How the Indians of the Americas Transformed the World," Jack Weatherford asserts that native American societies played an inspirational role for More's writing. For example, indigenous Americans, although referred to as "noble savages" in many circles, showed the possibility of living in social harmony [with nature] and prosperity without the rule a king...". The early British and French settlers in the 1500 and 1600s were relatively shocked to see how the native Americans moved around so freely across the untamed land, not beholden by debt, "lack of magistrates, forced services, riches, poverty or inheritance".
Utopia inspired many socialists, but Karl Kautsky pointed out that "perplexed" historians and economists often saw the name Utopia (which means "no place") as "a subtle hint by More that he himself regarded his communism as an impracticable dream."
The title of the book has since eclipsed More's original story and the term is now commonly used to describe an idyllic, imaginary society.
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