FREE ESSAY ON THOMAS JEFFERSON

THOMAS JEFFERSON

THOMAS JEFFERSON
In the thick of party conflict in 1800, Thomas Jefferson wrote in a private letter, I
have sworn upon the altar of God eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the
mind of man. This powerful advocate of liberty was born in 1743 in Albermarle County,
Virginia, inheriting from his father, a planter and surveyor, some 5,000 acres of land,
and from his mother, a Randolph, high social standing. He studied at the College of
William and Mary, then read law. In 1772 he married Martha Wayles Skelton, a widow, and
took her to live in his partly constructed mountaintop home, Monticello. Freckled and
sandy-haired, rather tall and awkward, Jefferson was eloquent as a correspondent, but he
was no public speaker. In the Virginia House of Burgesses and the Continental Congress,
he contributed his pen rather than his voice to the patriot cause. As the silent member
of the Congress, Jefferson, at 33, drafted the Declaration of Independence. In years
following he labored to make its words a reality in Virginia. Most notably, he wrote a
bill establishing religious freedom, enacted in 1786. Jefferson succeeded Benjamin
Franklin as minister to France in 1785. His sympathy for the French Revolution led him
into conflict with Alexander Hamilton when Jefferson was Secretary of State in President
Washington's Cabinet. He resigned in 1793. Sharp political conflict developed, and two
separate parties, the Federalists and the Democratic-Republicans, began to form.
Jefferson gradually assumed leadership of the Republicans, who sympathized with the
revolutionary cause in France. Attacking Federalist policies, he opposed a strong
centralized Government and championed the rights of states. As a reluctant candidate for
President in 1796, Jefferson came within three votes of election. Through a flaw in the
Constitution, he became Vice President, although an opponent of President Adams. In 1800
the defect caused a more serious problem. Republican electors, attempting to name both a
President and a Vice President from their own party, cast a tie vote between Jefferson
and Aaron Burr. The House of Representatives settled the tie. Hamilton, disliking both
Jefferson and Burr, nevertheless urged Jefferson's election. When Jefferson assumed the
Presidency, the crisis in France had passed. He slashed Army and Navy expenditures, cut
the budget, eliminated the tax on whiskey so unpopular in the West, yet reduced the
national debt by a third. He also sent a naval squadron to fight the Barbary pirates, who
were harassing American commerce in the Mediterranean. Further, although the Constitution
made no provision for the acquisition of new land, Jefferson suppressed his qualms over
constitutionality when he had the opportunity to acquire the Louisiana Territory from
Napoleon in 1803. During Jefferson's second term, he was increasingly preoccupied with
keeping the Nation from involvement in the Napoleonic wars, though both England and
France interfered with the neutral rights of American merchantmen. Jefferson's attempted
solution, an embargo upon American shipping, worked badly and was unpopular. Jefferson
retired to Monticello to ponder such projects as his grand designs for the University of
Virginia. A French nobleman observed that he had placed his house and his mind on an
elevated situation, from which he might contemplate the universe. 
He died on July 4, 1826. 
Bibliography
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