author of the declaration of independence

#Author of the declaration of independence drivers#

Samuel Johnson’s mortifying question, 'How is it that we hear the loudest yelps for liberty from the drivers of Negroes?' He was a spendthrift, always deeply in debt. If you hate slavery and the terrible things it did to human beings, it is difficult to regard Jefferson as great. Jefferson surely knew slavery was wrong, but he didn’t have the courage to lead the way to emancipation. He spent much of his life in intellectual pursuits in which he excelled and not enough in leading his fellow Americans toward great goals by example. He once tried to bribe a hostile reporter. Thomas Jefferson did not achieve greatness in his personal life. He was a racist, incapable of rising above the thought of his time and place, and willing to profit from slave labor.įew of us entirely escape our times and places. He did not believe that all were created equal. 'He was a slaveholder.' More than half the large audience applauded. 'You are in Madison, being paid by the citizens of Wisconsin to teach their children American political thought, and you leave out Tom Jefferson?' She had dropped Thomas Jefferson’s writings from the required reading list.

I remarked to her that when I began teaching I had required students to read five or six books each semester, but I had cut that back to three or four or else the students would drop my course. The History Club there asked me to participate in a panel discussion on 'Political Correctness and the University.' The professor seated next to me taught American political thought. In 1996 I was a visiting professor at the University of Wisconsin. Let’s begin with Thomas Jefferson, because it is he who wrote the words that inspired subsequent generations to make the heroic sacrifices that transformed the words 'All men are created equal' into reality. These men, the founding fathers and brothers, established a system of government that, after much struggle, and the terrible violence of the Civil War, and the civil rights movement led by black Americans, did lead to legal freedom for all Americans and movement toward equality. They failed to rise above their time and place, though Washington (but not Jefferson) freed his slaves. There are others who believe that some of these men are unworthy of our attention because they owned slaves, Washington, Jefferson, Clark among them, but not Adams. Americans in great numbers are rediscovering their founding fathers in such best-selling books as Joseph Ellis’ Founding Brothers, David McCullough’s John Adams and my own Undaunted Courage, about Lewis and Clark.

Author of the declaration of independence