<P> Cato was used as a pseudonym by the Reverend Dr. William Smith, the most influential preacher in Philadelphia, in a series of essays arguing against American independence in the Pennsylvania Gazette published April 1776 . </P> <P> Cato was later appropriated as a pseudonym in a series of letters to the New York Journal in 1787 and 1788 opposing James Madison's views and urging against ratification of the United States Constitution . Many historians attribute these letters to George Clinton, though their authorship has not been definitively proven . These letters are unrelated to the Trenchard and Gordon letters . </P> <P> These letters also provided inspiration and ideals for the American Revolutionary generation . The essays were distributed widely across the Thirteen Colonies, and frequently quoted in newspapers from Boston to Savannah, Georgia . Renowned historian Clinton Rossiter stated "no one can spend any time on the newspapers, library inventories, and pamphlets of colonial America without realizing that Cato's Letters rather than John Locke's Civil Government was the most popular, quotable, esteemed source for political ideas in the colonial period ." </P> <P> The Cato Institute, a Washington, D.C., think tank founded by Edward H. Crane in 1977, takes its name from Cato's Letters . </P>

What was the big idea of cato's letter