The Problem with Jefferson
I apologize to our readers for my prolonged absence. My presidential-biography project continued apace this summer -- mostly -- but I was remiss in my writing duties.
My next subject was Thomas Jefferson. Despite the many books written about him, I’m not certain anyone has successfully distilled the man’s character in a one-volume biography. The best attempt is Joseph Ellis’s American Sphinx, though Mr. Ellis is too quick to lend credence to the suspicion that Jefferson had relations with Sally Hemings. (We know it was a Jefferson male, but whether it was that Jefferson male -- and not, say, his roving-eyed brother -- is unclear.)
Over the summer, I read all six volumes of Dumas Malone’s work, Jefferson and His Time. I don’t recommend the experience. The first and sixth installments were interesting, but I find that multi-volume biographies suffer an inability to distinguish what’s truly important in their subjects’ lives. I also read Kevin J. Hayes’s The Road to Monticello, which bored me to tears, and Andrew Burstein and Nancy Isenberg’s study Madison and Jefferson, which wasn’t half bad.
Perhaps the reason it’s hard to find a good biography of Jefferson is that it’s hard to get a good grasp on him. When I interviewed David McCullough for the Wall Street Journal a few months back, he told me the more he learned about Jefferson, the more he disliked him. For instance, McCullough recounted how Jefferson enlisted the services of the unscrupulous scribbler James T. Callender to attack John Adams during the campaign of 1800. (Callender later betrayed Jefferson and spread the Hemings rumors.)
Malone, on the other hand, thought highly of Jefferson because he never wrote unsigned editorials against his political opponents. (I side with McCullough here: Jefferson got others to do his dirty work for him.)
The conventional take on Jefferson’s presidency is that he talked a good game about small government, but once in office, he maintained the giant apparatus that George Washington and John Adams had constructed. Prof. Gordon Wood takes another view, to which I subscribe: Jefferson gave the office a more populist flavor, ending the monarchical-sounding weekly levees and sending his State of the Union address in writing to the House of Representatives. He also repealed the hated whiskey tax, ending all internal taxes imposed by the federal government at the time. And he made serious progress in paying off the national debt.
Where Jefferson failed, I think -- and here I go back to the conventional wisdom -- was in his treatment of the conflict with Great Britain, which ultimately led to the War of 1812. By skimping on the Navy and implementing a disastrous embargo, he left the country weaker than it should have been.
I hope to restart my weekly schedule, and next week, we’ll discuss James Madison. Although I read about him almost nine months ago, I recently acquired a copy of Rick Brookhiser’s new biography, and I plan to give our readers a sneak peak before the book comes out in October.
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Comments:
Aug '11
Re: The Problem with Jefferson
I'm not a history guy. I'm trying to learn more. Thank you for the reviews.
Your comment about Jefferson "leaving the country weaker than it should've been": are you saying this only in the context of the war (which I don't know much about), or are you referring to Jefferson's presidency as whole?
Jefferson, as much as he talked about sticking with the Constitution and being a small gov't president, did purchase Louisiana. But I think that the Louisiana purchase left the country much, much better off, as a whole.
Also, have you've read Christopher Hitchen's biography of Jefferson? I'd like to read it.
Mar '11
Re: The Problem with Jefferson
This is the second time that I've run into Mr. Callender this morning. I've just started reading Undaunted Courage: Meriwether Lewis, Thomas Jefferson, and the Opening of the American West by Stephen Ambrose, which gives an abbreviated description of Callender's, um, craft. Describing John Adams as "a hideous hermaphroditical character which has neither the force and firmness of a man, nor the gentleness and sensibility of a woman" is a trifle rough, unless you're Joe McGinnis.
Jul '10
Re: The Problem with Jefferson
It sharply reminds me of Gore Vidal's Burr describing George Washington as having a woman's breasts. Clearly Vidal had an ear for the slurs of the day. Now, of course, any man described in such a way would instantly be shunted toward a Democrat candidacy at some level.
Re: The Problem with Jefferson
Hi, Goldgeller,
Thanks for reading. Yes, I'm saying this in the context of the war. With an inadequate Navy and a damaged economy, the U.S. was not in the best position to take on the British empire.
I haven't read Hitchens's biography, but an NRO colleague of mine recommends it.
Jan '11
Re: The Problem with Jefferson
For more on Jefferson's relations with Callender, and on Callender himself, told in fact-based fiction, see William Safire's novel "Scandalmonger."
Re: The Problem with Jefferson
Ah, youth; ah, Harvard! If you were a middle-aged Dartmouth man, you would never even have attempted all six volumes of Dumas Malone.
Edited on September 26, 2011 at 5:05amRe: The Problem with Jefferson
Btw, I see that you omit from your commentary here any mention of the Louisiana Purchase. In his History of the Jefferson Administration, Henry Adams devotes several long chapters to the problem the Purchase posed: more or less everyone understood that it was unconstitutional--or, at the very least, extraconstitutional--and Jefferson and Congress went through elaborate intellectual contortions to avoid saying so. (I once asked Richard Epstein whether the Purchase was indeed unconstitutional, prompting the only one-word answer I have ever received from Richard: "Probably.")
Your take, Brian?
Re: The Problem with Jefferson
Peter- Out of nothing but sheer luck, a couple of days ago I stumbled upon the same exact thing you are asking.
If I remember correctly the defense from Madison (and Jefferson) was that it was a treaty.
I just Googled it and in fact it was signed into law as the "Louisiana Purchase Treaty."
From James Madison's Wikipedia page (I hope using this as a source isn't taboo- if you click the link there are two sources cited):
Hope I'm not saying anything too egregious (or obvious) here!
Re: The Problem with Jefferson
One fact about Sally Hemings I'd never heard until recently was that she was the half-sister of Thomas Jefferson's late wife, Martha Wayles Skelton (whom Jefferson was completely enchanted by and devoted to, and whose death he mourned for a great length of time). This doesn't make it any more or less likely that Thomas Jefferson had relations with Hemings, but if he did, one can't help but wonder if it was because she reminded him of his beloved wife.
Aug '11
Re: The Problem with Jefferson
Brian Bolduc: Hi, Goldgeller,
Thanks for reading. Yes, I'm saying this in the context of the war. With an inadequate Navy and a damaged economy, the U.S. was not in the best position to take on the British empire.
I haven't read Hitchens's biography, but an NRO colleague of mine recommends it. · Sep 25 at 11:22am
Thanks for the clarification and the response. I'll have to check into a lot of the books.