Francis Bowen (September 8, 1811 – January 22, 1890) was an American philosopher, writer, and educationalist. He was born in Charlestown, Massachusetts. He graduated at Harvard University in 1833, taught for two years at Phillips Exeter Academy, and from 1835 to 1839 was a tutor and instructor at Harvard. After several years of study in Europe, he settled in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and was editor and proprietor of the North American Review from 1843 to 1854. In 1850 he was appointed professor of history at Harvard; but his appointment was disapproved by the board of overseers on account of political opinions he had expressed in the North American Review concerning the Hungarian revolt of 1848. When Magyar leader Louis Kossuth toured Boston in 1850 he was feted and hosted by the Harvard elite. Bowen had angered Harvard president Jared Sparks, a former editor of the North American Review, with an article on the Hungarian revolution in the January 1850 issue of NAR in which he called Kossuth a would-be dictator. Bowen wrote that: "The war in Hungary… on the part of the Magyars, was neither a struggle for national independence, nor an attempt to establish a republic on the wreck of their ancient monarchical and aristocratic institutions. Hungary is the most aristocratic nation in Europe; ... The fourth resolution appended to the Declaration of Independ- ence [claims] the absolute supremacy of the Magyar race in the country which they conquered, and where they have been lords of the soil and the dominant nation for eight or nine centuries,... [and that] the government of the united countries, their possessions and dependencies, shall be conducted on the per- sonal responsibility, and under the obligation to render an account of all his acts, by Louis Kossuth.” In short, a tem- porary dictatorship was established, absolute power being confided...to a civilian, who was to exercise all the authority which, in a republican insurrection, is usually delegated to a legislative assembly." In 1853 his appointment as Alford professor of natural religion, moral philosophy and civil polity was approved, and he occupied the chair until 1889. In 1876 he was a member of the Federal commission appointed to consider currency reform, and wrote (5877) the minority report, in which he opposed the restoration of the double standard and the remonetization of silver. He died in Boston, Massachusetts, on the 22nd of January 1890. This article incorporates text from the Encyclopædia Britannica, Eleventh Edition, a publication now in the public domain.