"Ax to Grind"

[Fred Shapiro]

The OED states the following:

"to have axes to grind (orig. U.S. politics): to have private ends to
serve [in reference to a story told by Franklin]"

Can anyone supply any details as to where the Franklin story referred to
here is published?

Fred Shapiro


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Fred R. Shapiro                             Editor
Associate Librarian for Collections and     YALE DICTIONARY OF QUOTATIONS
  Access and Lecturer in Legal Research     Yale University Press,
Yale Law School                             forthcoming
e-mail: fred.shapiro at yale.edu               http://quotationdictionary.com
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