Jefferson, Thomas

Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826) wanted to be remembered on his tombstone for three achievements: Author of the Declaration of American Independence, the Statute of Virginia for Religious Freedom, and Father of the University of Virginia. Thomas Jefferson accomplished so much more. He was a political philosopher, architect, musician, book collector, scientist, lawyer, horticulturist, diplomat, inventor, writer, and, of course, third President of the United States (1800–1808). Although the term “Renaissance man” was not coined until the nineteenth century, Jefferson has become, for many, its exemplar.

Having served his country over 50 years, Jefferson, in his early professional life, worked in local government as a magistrate, county lieutenant, and member of the House of Burgesses. During the Revolutionary era, he provided leadership as a member of the Continental Congress, was chosen in 1776 to draft the Declaration of Independence, served in the Virginia legislature until his election as governor in 1779, began to compile his “Notes on the State of Virginia,” and was a member of the Second Continental Congress from 1783 to 1784. He spent the next 5 years in France as commissioner, then minister, built strong diplomatic ties with the French, and witnessed the unfolding of the French Revolution. Upon his return to the United States, he served as secretary of state (1790–1793), where he tangled with the Federalist Alexander Hamilton. He retired for a time to Monticello, but returned to civil service in 1796 as John Adams's vice president. He served as president of the American Philosophical Society from 1797 to 1815, a learned society of accomplished scholars and scientists.

Thomas Jefferson was erudite, a man who constantly endeavored to satisfy his intellectual curiosities. His library contained more than 1,250 volumes; he was considered an expert in math, astronomy, anatomy, physics, mechanics, meteorology, architecture, and botany. In addition, he could read and write in Greek, Latin, French, Spanish, and Italian. He was the embodiment of education and lifelong curiosity for learning. Philosophically, he was both a man of his times (the Age of Enlightenment) and a visionary (evidence the Louisiana Purchase). Politically, Jefferson represented democratic republicanism, his presidency, in fact, the beginning of the Democratic Party. He favored a society based on small farmers rather than wealthy businessmen or merchants. In general, he stood for the common person and believed in limiting government power, with a military subject to civilian control, tax breaks for the middle class, and constant protection of civil liberties. Internationally, he supported the French and many ideals of the French Revolution, rather than the British, supported by the Federalists, such as Hamilton.

In the simple epitaph he wrote for his tombstone, Jefferson succinctly distilled his accomplishments and the essence of his political beliefs. The Declaration of Independence contains his philosophy of the principles needed to build and sustain a democracy founded on natural law and natural human rights. Jefferson's political philosophy was based on several traditions: Lockean concepts of democratic community, classical republicanism, Scottish moral sense philosophy, Christian ethics, and modern economic theory. These traditions supported his conceptions of freedom and liberty, democracy, equality, and rights. Freedom, “release from” oppressive restriction, and liberty, a right or “freedom to” (for example, “freedom to” [Page 531]participate in government), explicated in the Declaration of Independence, formed the foundation of his concept of democracy as small, local systems (wards) of participative citizen representation.

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