Special miniseries of six lectures entitled great president ial lives. This series is particularly attractive for two main reasons. The first being its timeliness. As we face a president ial Election Year and prepare for it, it will be an insight that all of us can benefit from. The second is the speaker himself, our esteemed umw professor of ameritas of history william b. Crawley who had completed 50 years on the faculty. Hes contributed in inpneumonnu ways. But its for his excellence in teaching that hes best known to thousands of our students who have come through our halls. Hes received our institutions highest honors in teaching both from his colleagues and from his students. Many of whom through the years have voted him as the faculty member who has made the greatest impact upon their lives. Dr. Crawley has become a true icon of this community. It is with great pleasure that i introduce Professor William b. Crawley who draws on his 50 years of teaching political history has truly learned and shared so much of his knowledge and will be sharing it again with us today as he looks at the life of one of six highly interesting and sometimes controversial president s. Like many modern day president s, none is so straight forward as the story may recall or the history may have told us. Dr. Crawley will you please share with us now. Focusing on one of the increasing controversial president s, Thomas Jefferson. Let me begin with something of a disclaimer. Whenever ive spoken on jefferson, im reminded of a predominant historian i once heard who said that he never fully trusted that. Having spent four years in graduate school in charlottesville. Jefferson himself was quite proud of that institution, specific directing that the words, father of the university, the only one one of only three accomplishments that should constitute his epithet. Certainly too, the university has its been proud of its founder treating his memory that president taft once said after delivering a lecture that people still talk of mr. Jefferson as though he was in the next room and might overhear them. Well, i trust my association was not render me incompetent. For one thing, personally, im not much given to hero worship and ive always believed that my goal should not be to indoctrinate but to enlighter and not to demonize my subjects. With that said, the truth is that Thomas Jefferson has held a place and to many the highest place within the pantheon of american political heroes. Among the nations founders, he possessed the widest range of talents and produced the most diverse accomplishments. Hes been regarded as the most intellectual of them. John f. Kennedy when offering a dinner toast to a group at the white house said they constituted the most extraordinary collection of talent and Human Knowledge that has ever been gathered together at the white house. With the possible exception of when jefferson dined alone. It was the eloquent voice that jefferson gave to american democracy that made him so revered, including this, all men are created equal and are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable lives, among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, the very core of the american creed. Accordingly, one historian has claimed that, quote, no figure in our past has embodied so much of our heritage and so many of our hopes and it is for that reason that some years ago near the end of the 20th century and the end of the millennium, it was suggested that Thomas Jefferson was the most significant person on the planet for the last 1,000 years. The argument for jefferson is that history is essentially the history of the human mind of ideas. Jefferson was preeminently, the mind of the revolution that succeeded. It resulted in the birth of the first modern nation that saved the world from tyranny. Jefferson expressed the american ideal, government of limited, delegated and enumerated powers. He expressed it in elegant phrases but also how he lived. Regarding his own legacy, jefferson himself once employed his friend and president ial successor James Madison to, quote, take care of me when dead. For the most part, historians shared the popular view of jefferson as being beyond reproach. And clearly his career would seem to have justified that reputation. Lets take a quick look at jeffersons career, very, very briefly. When he was born on april 13th, 1743, his father was a farmer who became a successful planter. He joined the upper class by maryi marrying jane randolph. He was studied law and he himself became a successful and wellknown lawyer in virginia. He was imposing an appearance standing over 6 feet tall, unusual for that day, and with red hair. Oddly for a public figure, he was shy and avoided public appearances whenever possible. He was elected to the state legislature which was in the house of burgesses which he owned 2500 acres of land and a substantial number of slaves. He married a young widow where he increased his number of slaves. He was cast into deep depression by the death of his wife in 1782. He never remarried. He became known as a supporter of independence from britain and the coauthor of the declaration of independence along with benjamin frankly and john adams. He served in congress in the mid 1780s. In 1785 he replaced Benjamin Franklin as minister to france. It was significant, during that time he became Close Friends with lafayette and wrote the notes on the state of virginia about which more later. He returned to america at the end of 1789 and was appointed secretary of state by george washington. In 1797 he became Vice President having finished a close second behind his rival, john adams in the contest for the presidency. He was elected president in 1800. The greatest accomplishment of his administration was perhaps the acquisition of louisiana from france in 1803. He was easily reelect today a second term but that term proved to be troubled by developments in europe as napoleon rose to power. After leaving the presidency, he retired and concerned himself with establishing the university of virginia which was founded in 1819. Finally, by strange quirk of fate and i think this must be the most extraordinary coincidence that i could ever recall reading about, both jefferson and john adams died on july 4th, 1826 during the celebration of the 50th anniversary of the declaration of independence. And you probably have heard this, allegedly adams last words were, jefferson lives but he did not. He had died earlier that day. Well, as this very brief biographical sketch indicates, these were great accomplishments, no doubt. But as i alluded to earlier, they have been recently overshadowed by a different interpretation, a more negative interpretation that has risen among the latest of jefferson scholars. The reason for this decline in his reputation is not hard to find. These writers have focused major attention on that area of jeffersons life, that by modern standards is the least attractive and the most vulnerable and that is his views on slavery and race. Perhaps it was predictable that this would happen in an america that in the wake of the Civil Rights Movement became much more keenly aware of racial injustice. When that happened, jeffersons stature. The heel of oppression that he ground into the backs of his slaves. And so weve reached the point in the debate where one of his most predominant biographers declared in the multiracial american future, jefferson will not be revered. His flaws are beyond redemption. The sound you hear is the crashing of a reputation. Well, how valid is such a position . Thats the basic question i want to address during the reminder of my comments today and i want to do it in the following way. First, to examine briefly jeffersons theories on race and slavey. The second to look at his actions both public and private regarding slavery, and finally in light of recent criticism, to suggest a summary evaluation of jefferson and his proper place in history with particular regard to slavery and race. Lets look first then at jeffersons thought concerning race and slavery and look at what he actually had to say on those issues. Its somewhat surprising how little jefferson actually wrote on anything given his highly intellectual nature. Much of what we know of his thought comes mainly from his letters and from the longest of his published works, the aforementioned notes on the state of virginia which was published in france in 1875. Even the notes are far from a polished systematic statement of his views. Its clear that he did not intend for it to be published at all. He wrote in response to a request from a french official while he was in paris as the american minister and he did so with the intention of it being read by a select group. Basically french intellectuals. He was trying to explain the government, the economy and the social structure of his native virginia. The book, however, was pirated and it became public. So eventually jefferson owned up to it, albeit without enthusiasm and with some embarrassment. Had jefferson had his way, the only book he ever wrote would not have been published and his opinions on slavery would not have become Public Knowledge during his lifetime. Now the point is that jefferson did not write extensively on many subjects. But for purposes of our talk today, maybe unfortunately for his place in history, jefferson did leave a fairly large amount of information regarding his views on africanamericans in general and on slavery in particular. What do these writings reveal about his thinking. It might be well to begin with one historian has called his central dilemma and that was that he, quote, hated slavery but thought negroes inferior to whites, end of quote. This was a serious dichotomy and it caused a great deal of intellectual suffering just as it has caused modern scholars to pause with the modern jefferson. He hated slavery but thought blacks inferior to whites. This was a difficult position. On the one hand it can be said theres no indication that any of his works that jefferson felt slavery to be right. And yet at the same time, on the other hand, theres every reason to believe that jefferson did not indeed believe blacks to be equal to whites, notwithstanding his famous words about all men are created equal. What is the evidence in jeffersons writing to think that he did not approve of slavery. Its evident that he took no pride in owning slaves. He tended to regard them as a burden rather than a blessing. He seemed to not have liked the word slave itself and used the word servant and he felt that the slaves must have been miserable and he referred to slavery as, quote, a hideous evil. And yet even though its clear that jefferson did not believe the condition of the slaves to be desirable, it was not the primary reason why he disliked slavery. The main reason which he expressed from opposing slavery was the harmful effect that it had on white society. In other words, his main attack was not against the cruelty of the system against blacks, but what he believed to be the injustice of the system to whites. How can that be . This is the way he explained it in his notes on virginia, this is a quote now, there must be an unhappy influence on our people, produced by the existence of slavery among us. The commerce between master and slave is a perpetual exercise of the unremitting dispotism and degrading submissions on the other. Our children see this and learn to imitate it. For man is an imitative animal. With the morals of the people, their industry also is destroyed. For in a warm climate, no man will labor for himself who can make another labor for him. End quote. In other words, slavery was bad training for democracy. Now, opponents of slavery had been concerned with the effect of institution upon slave owners. Jefferson was not the first nor the last to express such a view. But with jefferson it seems to be almost his only concern. As one of his biographers puts it, jefferson went to his grave convinced that slavery was detrimental to the white community. Jefferson was concerned with what we might call the internal effect on society. At the same time, however, as i noted earlier, it was clear he believed the black race to be inferior. From his notes there can be little doubted on this point. And it was on this point that most scholars today have criticized him. In his notes, jefferson addresses himself to what he called, quote, the real distinction nature has made, end quote, between the races. He considers not only the physical but the mental and even moral differences as well. As to the physical, its clear that jefferson was predisposed against blacks. Their color seemed to offend him. He wrote at one point disparaging, quote, that eternal monotony, that unremovable veil of black that covers all of their emotions. Hes quite clear he unquestionably believed them to be inferior to whites. It appears to me that in memory, theyre equal to the whites but in reason, much inferior. Nor did he believe they had any talent. Whenever he was confronted with claims of superior work by a black authors and poets such as works of the black female poet, jefferson remained highly skeptical to put it mildly. It might be assumed that he would tribute soattribute some shortcomings to the lack of opportunity, to which the environment that africanamericans were forced to live. But that was not the case. Said he, quote, its not their condition but nature which has produced this distinction between the two races. In short, jeffersons fundamental attitude on the issue of race seems to be summed up in the frequently quoted passage from his notes on virginia in which he says, i advance it as a suspicion only, that the blacks, whether a distinct race or made distinct by time and circumstance are inferior to the whites in body and mind. As i noted earlier, jefferson also addressed himself not only to the physical and mental attributes but also to what he called moral sense of the africanamericans. In this respect, he argued that blacks were equal to whites. Moreover, he argued that if there were any shortcomings on the part of blacks, such a deficiency should be attributed to environment. He gave the example, if a slave stole from the master, such an act he said, quote, must be ascribed to their situation. If it occurred, it was fully understandable, quote, the man, he said, in whose favor no laws of property exist, probably feels himself less bound to respect those laws made in favor of others, end quote. And therefore he asked rhetorically, justifiably take a little from one who has taken everything from him. So much for jeffersons theories, what were his actions regarding slavery . Lets look first at his public actions and then well get to his private behavior such as we know of it. At the risk of oversimplification, it might be said that jeffersons public involvement went from that of outspoken opposition to quiet opposition, to that of despair, resignation, near the end of his life. Earlier in his career, for example, there were indications that he certainly had qualms about slavery and in particular, the slave trade. As early as 1774, he blamed the British Government and george iii in particular prohibiting the slave trade. Two years later, he drafted a virginia constitution which stated flatly, no person coming into virginia will be held in slavery under any pretext whatever. Unfortunately, that draft of the state constitution was not adopted. With regard to outright abolition, jefferson was much more cautious. In 1784 he moved to what might have been potentially the most important antislavery action of his career. It was in that year that he sponsored a bill before the Virginia Legislature which would have granted freedom to all slaves, all blacks born after the package ssage of that act. Obviously it could have made a dramatic difference. But when the bill went before the legislature for final action, the following year, 1785, jefferson withdraw his support for it because he claimed he had, quote, found that the public mind would not yet bear the proposition, end quote. He found out it was unpopular with the voters. This action shows us two aspects of his views towards emancipation. It was significant that he with drew his proposal for the reason he did, the public mind would not yet bear it. He was a politician and he had to be concerned with Public Opinion. The second revelation of this episode is that jeffersons proposal for emancipation included a provision which would have required the removal of all freed slaves. They should be colonized to such place as the circumstances of the time should render most proper, end quote. This demand for deportation was one of the real constants in jeffersons actions with regard to slavery. He simply wanted all freed blacks to be sent to the west indies or to africa or anywhere outside of the United States. Why was this . The answer is that he simply seemed not to believe that the races could live together side by side in harmonious equality. And he explained why he felt this way as follows. Deep rooted prejudices by the whites, 10,000 recollections by the blacks of the injuries they have sustained. The real distinction which nature has made and many other circumstances will divide us and produce convulsions which will probably never end but in the extermination of the one race or the other. Pretty strong words. At the end of his life, he was 77, in his unfinished autobiography he reiterated this view. He noted he had concluded that it was certain that the two races, equally free cannot live under the same government. In view of such statements, quote, the entire body of jeffersons writings he never considered the consideration of coexistence and until his death he saw colonialization as the only alternative to slavery. As another critical historian put it, nothing is more certain than the Thomas Jefferson did not intend black people to be free in america, freedom and blackness were incompatible in america, free blacks were to be banished. Well, most of what i have talked about so far deals with his attempts regarding slavery at the state level. But he was a National Figure as well and was involved with the slavery issue at that level as well. The most important of his National Actions came during the period of the articles of confederation that is before the current constitution went into effect. During that time, jefferson devised a bill known as the ordinance of 1784. This piece of legislation, if passed, would have had a potentially great impact because it would have prohibited the extension of slavery into any of the western territories of the United States after 1800. Again, it would have made a