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The American |
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Thomas Jefferson, successor to Presidents George Washington and John Adams, is much more than a bronze image ensconced in a magnificent Memorial that overlooks the Potomac River Tidal Basin and the City of Washington in the District of Columbia, which he helped to plan and where he became the first President inaugurated in that location. Over the years, I’ve come to know different Jeffersons, and the more that I learn about this very complex individual, the more I am convinced that his place in such select company at the Capitol is most well-earned. The first version of Mr. Jefferson was learned in high school and, as might be expected, it was most superficial: 3rd President and author of the Declaration of Independence, to wit (required memorization): “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights, among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.” No parochial education would be complete without learning that Mr. Jefferson also declared that life itself, and the foundation of freedom, is not subject to the control of government, but a gift from the Almighty: “God who gave us life gave us liberty.” An undergraduate interest in American history exposed me to a deeper knowledge of this marvelous man, whose faction were called Republicans, though he was later claimed by (Andrew) Jacksonians to be the founder of the Democrat Party. Though an owner of slaves, Jefferson penned this stirring, prophetic statement: “Can the liberties of a nation be secure when we have removed a conviction that these liberties are the gift of God? Indeed I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just, that his justice cannot sleep forever. Commerce between master and slave is despotism.” Jefferson wrote in his autobiography, “Nothing is more certainly written in the book of fate than these people (slaves) are to be free.” The Jefferson that I learned in postgraduate law school was more of the academic, the legal scholar, and the expositor on facets of our constitutional experience. This was the Jefferson whose intellectual development was so strongly influenced by John Locke of England, with whom he shared abhorrence of government restraints on religious liberty and limitations on freedom of conscience. This is the Jefferson who strived for, and secured, such protections in the laws of Virginia, which served as a model when the Constitution was constructed. What is amazing is that this red-headed stranger remains at the center of discussions today on the constitution and the just powers of government. His vision and foresight, combined with that of other remarkable leaders of the era, enable us to enjoy the ‘life, liberty, and happiness’ which is the envy of the world. I’ve come to learn more of this almost mythological figure in the never-ending education of my adult years. There is the Revolutionary War Jefferson, content to remain in Washington’s powerful and protective shadow, yet who was willing to risk all his property and even his life during this bloody and brutal battle, the outcome of which was so uncertain. There is the Diplomat Jefferson, an American ambassador in Paris, whose cultural refinement enabled him to effectively represent the interests of an infant nation, and who witnessed the beginning of the French Revolution. There is also the Politician Jefferson, who sought to claim his place in the leadership of the emerging Republic, and served as Secretary of State in Washington’s first cabinet, then as vice-President to John Adams before ousting Adams and securing the Presidency in 1801. The historical evidence supports many perspectives, and invites continuing speculation as to whether the man in the monument was just a schemer, even though a dreamer, and whether he was a hypocrite who sired children of a slave mistress, while professing rhetoric about that despised institution. This is the all-too-human Jefferson, which, ironically, strengthens my appreciation of him. The Jefferson we continue to learn about had feet of clay, but he had wings of wonder that gave him intellectual flight beyond the historical moment in which he had been placed. The profundity of this far-sightedness is most evident in the Lewis & Clark Expedition (LCE), one of the great journeys of discovery in recorded history. The LCE would not have been undertaken but for Jefferson’s investment of prestige and influence to secure funding for the fortuitous Louisiana Purchase, over much opposition, and but for his willingness to use substantial additional political capital to gain approval of the LCE undertaking. The Purchase (covering the entire drainage basin of the Missouri River) extended the American empire to embrace portions of what would become fifteen (15) states, during a time when few, if any others, could even remotely comprehend how this would secure the future of the nation. This latest understanding of Jefferson, discovered with assistance from Stephen Ambrose, whose work, Undaunted Courage, gives wonderful insight, leads to the conclusion that this man was surely the most brilliant and diversely gifted of any person to have held the office of President. May his memory be ever secure in that fitful place.
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