Thomas Jefferson- Nay or Yay?

[MantaRevan]

Thomas Jefferson is widely recognized as one of the most important figures in the founding of America, however one particular controversy surrounds him in that, as I'm sure we all know, he kept slaves. He was morally against slavery, but living in Virginia he was far too dependent on free labor to free his own. Many people don't like old' TJ because of this, but many people shrug it off as normal and expected.

What do you guys think? Thomas Jefferson- Yay or Nay?

 

[Dachs]

I disapprove of Thomas Jefferson partially on the grounds that yeah he was a slaveholder but mostly on the grounds that I strongly dislike maybe 99% of all UVA graduates.

He was the President, though, and he didn't have an obviously crap foreign policy, so I'm obliged to at least partially approve of him for those reasons.

 

[Bugfatty300]

Of course lots of founding fathers owned slaves including some of the more vocal abolitionists such as Franklin so I do think it's a little unfair to single Jefferson out. I think most of the US presidents right up to Grant were slave owners at one point or another.

 

[MantaRevan]

I disapprove of Thomas Jefferson partially on the grounds that yeah he was a slaveholder but mostly on the grounds that I strongly dislike maybe 99% of all UVA graduates.

He was the President, though, and he didn't have an obviously crap foreign policy, so I'm obliged to at least partially approve of him for those reasons.

....I went to UVA. But anyway, I respect him in the least for what he provided for a young nation.

 

[Dachs]

....I went to UVA.

I'm sorry, brah.

 

[MantaRevan]

I'm sorry, brah.

Naw, it's fine man. It doesn't really bother me.

 

[Tee Kay]

Neither, which is my answer for most historical figures.

 

[Lone Wolf]

Second neither.

 

[Cheezy the Wiz]

His house is cool and so is the yeoman republic.

 

[shortguy]

I disapprove of Thomas Jefferson partially on the grounds that yeah he was a slaveholder but mostly on the grounds that I strongly dislike maybe 99% of all UVA graduates.

Keep hatin', brah.

(Thomas Jefferson did some important stuff but won't go down as one of history's greatest saints. Or villains, for that matter. So he's basically in the pack somewhere with 98% of all historical figures.)

 

[Ajidica]

He is a dead rich white person who held slaves and was a terrorist leader.
What should I feel for him?

 

[Antilogic]

I agree much more with the President Jefferson than the political philosopher Jefferson. Fortunately for the US, he was a total sellout.

 

[Cutlass]

He did both good and bad. As a whole I'd probably approve of him 2/5 and disapprove 3/5

 

[IglooDame]

He did both good and bad. As a whole I'd probably approve of him 2/5 and disapprove 3/5

And flip those fractions around for me, I approve of more than half of what he did. A little too much of a Francophile, for starters. Fortunately when the guillotines started rolling out he recalibrated that particular preference.

 

[Kraznaya]

He did both good and bad. As a whole I'd probably approve of him 2/5 and disapprove 3/5

And flip those fractions around for me, I approve of more than half of what he did. A little too much of a Francophile, for starters. Fortunately when the guillotines started rolling out he recalibrated that particular preference.

oh man you guys are becoming chinese

 

[Traitorfish]

He gets points for head-butting with the Federalists, but loses a few more of them for the whole "owning human beings" and "ethnic cleansing" things. So that's an ultimate "no" from me, I'm afraid.

And flip those fractions around for me, I approve of more than half of what he did. A little too much of a Francophile, for starters. Fortunately when the guillotines started rolling out he recalibrated that particular preference.

Pity. Adams always struck me as around a foot taller than he needed to be.

 

[.Shane.]

Owning slaves during this era doesn't nullify his many incredible contributions.

As noted, we'd have to rethink a lot of the FF's if so.

Am I rite, brah?

 

[Traitorfish]

Owning slaves during this era doesn't nullify his many incredible contributions.

As noted, we'd have to rethink a lot of the FF's if so.

Why is that a prospect to be greeted with hesitancy?

 

[Antilogic]

He gets points for head-butting with the Federalists, but loses a few more of them for the whole "owning human beings" and "ethnic cleansing" things. So that's an ultimate "no" from me, I'm afraid.

In addition to this short list, I'd even dock him for some of his arguments with the Federalists. I think his ideas on democracy (specifically the pro-agrarian blind praise part) were poorly thought out and unfairly treated urban workers, lumping them in with bankers, merchants, and other quasi-aristocratic classes. I've always felt that constitutions are organizational documents that specify how decisions should be made and not specify the outcomes of the decisions, so the strict constitutionalism tends to grate on me a little. But that might also be a projection of people today who claim to be strict constitutionalists onto Jefferson.

And another, somewhat unrelated point: his behavior during the Adams presidency is nothing short of deplorable.

But it's not all bad: he has the Declaration going for him, and at least he realized the contradictions in slavery even if he didn't do jack to change it. So I guess that's a wash. I'm fairly glad he broke with his earlier opinion on the process by which treaties are negotiated and presented Louisiana as a fait accompli. Replacing the Library of Congress (and expanding it from being strictly legislative to include sciences, etc.) was a good move, as was promoting education through the university (I won't hold current UVA students against him ).

Overall, tough for me to evaluate.

 

[Cutlass]

Owning slaves during this era doesn't nullify his many incredible contributions.

As noted, we'd have to rethink a lot of the FF's if so.

Am I rite, brah?

Not really. They all deserve to have a great many points deducted for owning slaves. Now, to try and be fair, at least many of the FF generation of slaveholders recognized it as a wrong, or at least a bad. Even if they didn't have the moral balls to do something about it. Where the slavers of a couple of generations later lose even that and came to convince themselves that slavery was actually something good in all respects.

Where a Jefferson loses more points than a Washington on the issue of slavery is that his "states rights" and "strict construction of the Constitution" were not on general principles, but rather in the defense of slavery.

And that's where I would say that IglooDude is in the wrong in giving Jefferson more points than I would. Because you cannot separate Jefferson's defense of "liberty" from the defense of the liberty to own other human beings.