More data we need you but the problem is getting worse at a nine Year Experience but if it is and i invite you to a rally tomorrow morning at 10 00 collagen for nonprofit housing is meeting and sure the mayor with the to meet you i invite you all to move the city for word the council is committed. Thank you use heard it here. [applause] he patriarchs about Thomas Jefferson. They start now on booktv. Miss gordon reed won the National Book award and the Pulitzer Prize for her first book [inaudible conversations] good afternoon welcome to the festival and the nonfiction but critic davidd is an honor to be here i have then to a lot of these there are few that are is inviting. Se me . A few housekeeping announcements please keep your phones quiet. There are surveys to complete a negative piece of a gift card is spent on you books will be at the bookk signing area right after the presentation so with that said lets get started it is hard to imagine a better pairing of doctors to discuss Thomas Jefferson as professor of medical from having san monticello after publishing 2,008 in the Thomas Jefferson professor. Son [laughter] and end with the empire of imagination with those ideas contradictionor the nation and one of the things is is not an attack or defense is actions were linked ended does so to focus on those actions of monticello as you so places can it is my pleasure to introduce annette gordonreed and peter onuf. [applause] great to be here with my a good friend she didnt know we would be good be good friebe will tell the story . These are for historianss to collaborate one person would do one chapter then another person does anotherec but we wanted but voice which was interesting because when i first encountered him i expected should do him to be an enemy. Et 1995 i wrote a manuscript of jefferson and having so i was looking for people who would be appointed to what i i was saying which basically was historians ted given short to that story and they had misplayed the evidence in those in opposition but to listen to people whoo would be a post and theyre likely to be opposed to this i asked if he would read thet t. Manuscript and to my surprise he liked it and weat have been friends ever since i didnt think we would write a book but it thereje was us sign that i said wewe should do the projecte no, no. Together to keep it in mys life. I dont do people. For m i am the idea guy. Professor at i had to say somethings about jefferson as carlosings a accused me but the idea of doing a biography is the last thing i could imagine i was a bit taken aback when i was invited to do this and that was one of the best things that has ever happened to me because i care about real people to daybed dead people were not terribly interesting to me. [laughter] am i to start off we will spend first 20 minutes on the title then five minutes on the book you may wonder about the title we could take that jeffersonian go to find out how many really loved him you would think he would call themselves Something Else cemetery is quotation marks are of the book so where does the patriarchy business come from . One is to unpack that announces the ambition for the first time in decades we city for seven decades because because that is the ditch of hypocrisy you dont want to talk about him anymore or a think he says seriously in and him biography and history it is not a value or vestas person someone who has done important things to help Shape Society no question jefferson has done that so we want to talk about why he is an interesting individualon t so we take it from the most blessed of the patriarchs that was one of the the schuyler sisters the people who are on the soundtrack the only people who get to see that evidently but is peopl hamiltons sisterinlaw and jefferson writes her in paris after he is about to leave he is resigned to the washington cabinet indigos some to lick his wounds. He talks about is fairly which is very important to allow him everything works out as planned he would be most blast of the patriarchs so we love that phrase because this is jefferson talking about himself he is is this phrase a couple of years later said he really does mean it is not a oneoff that it is a bit jarring as someone who has absolute power over everyoneolur but is for the common man how does he think of himselfthe so we set up the book and a fashion that tries to explain him. We set up the second is paul traveler and the third as be examined other aspects that were important to him. Third is with jeffersons religious life for all of it is interesting but one of the interesting parts is how he thought of himself as a christian so that structure of the book goes back to the notion of patriarch. We begin with that idea but we take Jefferson Hall where he imagines himself he always complained about political life and how miserable a was so for him paul was a sacred place the whole reason he was in politics to protect his home. It w we take jefferson as seriously as a kid throw the book but one thing we cannot take seriously is his protesting we didnt have that terminology at the time of that miserable vocationat mise first all he was not home that much but more importantly whole that the heart of the political vision it was in theart of his opposite but the very reason for politics so one thing it means where the word patriarch comes in and not only his white family father knew best especially in thisfat be collaboration and there was something to jefferson in many men in his day those that thought that Patriarchal Authority was natural and the teachers design there had to be a captain of the ship the head of the household that is the key term because our is organized by the household and economic unit as well as the site of the faction in domesticity that used to be like that. So jefferson is not embarrassed but to be embarrass about be blessed that he can do things for those of his power and to see himself as a benevolent stew word this opens the uh the discussion from saying from the beginning he sees himself is not embarrassed that he is the slaveholders. Exactly to see if he is wrestling with this i of an order of slaves. No. Nk he did not do that. No. Was comfortable with the he didn notion and eventually slavery would die. Things would e and we dont think that way that the line to progress here to the left door to the right we actually believed thinking just as there wasas scientific progress withus politics as progress as well. So he could rest easy in this world and as they talk about how france changes as the patriarch who was responsible to see the bad side of it but he also thinks of himself of responsibilities these arepower you ar the people that i have exercised responsibility well understand it is problematic now that we cannot accept for those who as rebelled but thats how he sees themselves to be kidded that bond appellate to be enslaved person when he dies his grandson says hell a person who knows what helife, my says is the enslaved demand who understands what he says to psycho leave others can understand their kids and with some up on his palo Ben Jefferson and closes his eyes soon after and dies at person he life was the enslaved this is the institution he is pemfortable win as the amendment he believes it is against the amendment we are looking backwards and understand to do that but that was a way to feel comfortable in thiss institution we keep looking at contradictions those are our issues not his. To make sense the empire of the imagination to suggest there is a tension of the entanglement and jeffersons called for in that situation and so did every be amended to slavery because he announces slavery is a radical in justice and i must be rated. A the likelihood the wheel of fortune would turn if there was said just god that wouldul have been but he is not in that sense hiding get from the short term to the long term this is where in light mitt aids to be better understood the idea of lightoo spreading this was the image that was very popular how it was the dawning of the age of reason slovenly and men and women who could discern patterns in nature to make sense of what the creator intended so there is the ultimate intention that all men would be treated equal freedom for all the peopled of the world he sees the enslaved people as a captive nation even when he lives with his slaves intimately. How do we get to a point that those nations could be separated so enslaved people could be free agent independent people . Here is the key thing that points to a fundamental problem with the we call democracy of republican government. Majority rules is the major principle but jeffersons and mightnt we feel and light and with these glaring lights. When we turn those lights on will you feel your moral responsibilities and what needs to be done and to rectify this is the way it we find profoundly offensive by separation. With the creation of the independent black people somewhere else ripping apart those intimate arrangements from the plantation households and he believes said you. But were not it virginia. Ould. [laughter] is. Than he did believe that. Because they dont have that made ocean. And idealistically a a multiracial society. That there has to be emancipation white people would never give up there prejudices black people will never forgive the whites but there has to be a whites separation and they could be in the separate nation to come together this is the source of the problem James Madison or monroe they did not have a belief that you could have the one country together because homeless important to jefferson in that homand then out to the nation how can you say were all one people if we arehow cany not . Everybody as one less on the table for him. In people laugh at that it we have had some version of a cold hand hot war withh happened after reconstruction the conflicts that have taken place among africanamericans this is not been easy thing. As not b and that was so much better if then born in 1743 we so that people who have these than beliefs even though the off holocaust or what should have taught us we are stillau in a ditch in the area so to the good points but me as realistic as possible. You may think it is about race and slavery but it is not. Race and sla the race in in slavery ares nott foundational and doesnt have a life independent even the misconception that type of family together is predicated in a society to explorer jeffersons life at home we take it is key to the most fundamental moments of america and the American Revolution following him t through his career that we try to make sense of historylo and as has been suggested that for him, the ideal republic was a family a family is any among thosesed is generations when you take of the organic terms you get a much thicker and richer sense of attachment that can access all. This is what we aspire to yet fundamentally at odds as they organize themselves as nations in the state of war. Gan, that is a nice place to finish you may have faced this is where a biography should go because most are boring talk about jeffersons obsession with music. Int in doing this is upsetting now but that is not the point of this chapter we think every chapter resonates. And it was called the favorite passion of his soul fo he sang for people for their enjoyment playing the music, he was a violinist for t en there was the passion and that was a part of it that satisfied him spiritually but also to mirror what he thought life should be like everybody playing theirhe thougl part, harmony was incredibly, important to him how he used music as a metaphor very often in his life to give advice to his daughter he talks of a in terms of musec this is something that is central to him that we should bring into the mix in early donau that as the part of his life religion is another point of view that we talk about jefferson as a christian and his own version of christianity. We had a little bit of argument about that. Creature is this 11 of the few times we disagree certain things you believe. She had never met a unitarian. [laughter] i always ask how do you know, . Ask [laughter] how do so we had a mild dispute but it came to the point of connection in collaboration that i was offended him by suggesting if he believed a single issue were not a question that i realized to say to my to make that type of judgment . There was a council and a discussion what goes in and what comes out that was not my place he described itself as a christian and he believed to was a follower of jesus he did not believe in the divinity of christ and jesus was a powerful teacher if he followed his follow his beliefs thee better that is why he caught criticism on jefferson bible so i had to take care much morebi seriously to the whole chapter on this section and to talk about jefferson that we think he has beenk misunderstood the people thinking it was an atheist and he wasnt or a smaller groupings he is evangelical christian and. [laughter] too late to of the bornagain. [laughter] that is of a big part of it to take music and religion so we ended to talk about him a raise he was not talked about before we have talked long enough lung and then we were supposed to. [inaudible] i am totally fascinated with them trying to figure how their intimate relations are . How far do historians want to go . Getting ready for bed she rolls up his socks or the kids . Nd we dont describe that. That is as far as i can go a because there is a limit of any type of evidence that we have. And all you know, it did take place over a long period of time because you cant put words in their mouth. You can judge the actionsut people ask me all the time did they love each other . You can know that. I could say that i am certain he was attached to her because itll the they have a sexual interest in 2438 years if his name was joe smith nobody would have talked about it because he is jefferson i take fat out of that hat. [laughter] see what i have to put up with . But now you understand. [laughter] [inaudible] so letters between jefferson and his daughter . That they felt very strongly about the young lady who was a servant but now we know was the mistress so we have that kind of evidence we know the rest some type of the acceptance. We do know from otherssion and love. Abutters between the daughter and a family that sally having said that they were special. Amily the people who dont know sally having some of there was also a jeffersons wifes father you can tell by the way he treats the entire family she is part of all web of the relationships clearly the six people are separate and different because theyre connected to his wife is in just somebody but it is a connection by the way he treats sally having said that she is different. Yes there is more to it is much more complicated it isnt the stereotypical symbolic relationship or even the most common that most of these is rape any time you put it then in control of the bodies of women that is what you will have spent heterosexual menp, g and women working in living together like bad in a a household things can happen states can act like it ist is bizarre if it wasnt jefferson not symbolic people would say so what and move on but he means a lot to people so the relationship has to mean something to them as well. But to even ask a question because we have anf idea of love of bond supposed to be in a perfect marriage and a perfect relationship i use the word love of rise of the talking about jeffersons politics these are connections of affection that bring citizens and family members together with the crucial poea because sallyly happenings would never be a part of his family he might have and did have affection for her but we should not eat confuse that with love. Cry will push back. O 08 because i know it is agonistic but i do believe with fiction writers that there are some things that go throughout the world you understand what it means to feel connected to someone is it clear to me we are understand jealousy and hate what is the only thing we say could have existed in the past in the same way we recognize haiti and jealousy as the same but this is not . I think talking about family and though wall. People cannot govern themselves according to what i the law says. So because africanamerican people did not have legal families they did not have love . I know you would never say that i know you would never say that. But it is complicated and why this is a hard notion because we have an understanding of families that she cannot be a parlor understa wife she cannot be family in that way but we dont know really thats it. I agree. I feel like we do know based on the first book that she just didnt appear out of the sky she was nine years old when he sat for the first time. Now known go. Hen he he did not send for her. When she nine years old . Jefferson is in paris he wants the younger daughter brought to him and he asks for a careful to negro woman to bring her over soa isabellas 20 years old at the time they dont send is a bill they send sally said he was not expecting selfie to show up in paris summit she was 14 when she got there and 15 when she leaves. He doesnt send for her the person that was supposed to come and go back the only thing we can speculate in the do suggest it would noten make sense to send a 14 yearold back on the ship by herself with sailors so she ran the house . Now worth a randolph was the most important person in jeffersons life without question and a lot of what happens to sally comings and her children is influenced by that relationship martha is the key in his life his eldest daughter from his first wife. It does feel like it was written by one person. Which one . Ur colla [laughter] i will get sentimental. Ause. Is the result of all of that and i think we could identify up to 70 of it as originally, but to what is gratifying to the collaborator, and i am a serial collaborator though im not going to do it anymore, dont worry, that you do achieve the unity of voice and its more reflective of the unity ofnity o purpose, that is we wanted to do this thing with jefferson and we brought different strengths and we spoke to each other metaphorically speaking. Thats blended into the voice in this book. Mechanically, one of us wouln draft the section and give it to another person and another would read write stuff and leave it the same. But thats how you do it and there are points at which youufn dont know who did what and that is the editor wanted us to have one voice. Doing on one task or another pen does another chapter and you can kind of see the theme. I wrote a book with my brother and he is even harder th understand. I want to talk here a little bit more about the vision of the abolition of slavery. You talked about this notion of the separation into that isnt so much how it would come about of the s if the status quo came about. But David Jefferson or anybody else in his generation, a specific thing im interestedbo in, did they envision thatpe somehow this could come about peacefully, did they h