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Eloquent Arguments of Thomas Jefferson Still Resonate by Matthew Rodriguez July 4, 2004

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Eloquent Arguments of Thomas Jefferson Still Resonate by Matthew Rodriguez July 4, 2004 Eloquent Arguments of Thomas Jefferson Still Resonate by Matthew Rodriguez July 4, 2004 Seattle Times staff reporter "Thomas Jefferson survives," were the last words uttered by John Adams, unaware that his colleague had died hours earlier on July 4, 1826, 50 years after the Declaration of Independence was approved by the Continental Congress. But in a sense, Adams was right: 228 years after America declared its independence, Jefferson's legacy lives on in the Declaration of Independence, which has inspired numerous movements to- ward equality and has become, as one professor put it, an acid test of the American ideal. "From that moment on, Americans kept on testing themselves," said Paul Gilje, a history professor at the University of Oklahoma. "It is something which then dictates the rest of the course of Ameri- can history." The Declaration of Independence was written during a crucial time in the rebellion, a time when the ire of colonists had recently shifted from the king's subordinates to the king himself, according to Pauline Maier's book, "American Scripture." The Second Continental Congress, the federal legislature of the Thirteen Colonies and the body that edited and approved the Declaration of Independence, convened in 1775 after battles with the British at Lexington and Concord, Mass. While the fighting strengthened the most radical element of Congress, the delegates only gradually came to the momentous step of declaring independence. As the British army amassed, a Committee of Five was appointed to draft a document that would clearly state the colonists' intentions, Maier writes. The committee met once or twice, according to Adams' account, between June 11 and June 28, 1776, before turning their outline over to Jefferson, the lead draftsman, Maier said. Jefferson was selected because he was known as a writer, Maier said. Jefferson wrote the document quickly during a time when he had other assignments, Maier said. She said she imagines Jefferson sitting at his seat in the Continental Congress, making adjustments to the text here and there. Jefferson seemed to draw from several outside sources when drafting the declaration, including the works of English philosopher John Locke and George Mason's Virginia Declaration of Rights, Maier notes. Richard Johnson, a history professor at the University of Washington, points out that Jefferson's no- tion of overthrowing a ruler who has broken a social contract is a Lockian construct. But despite the influence, Johnson said, the style is decidedly Jefferson's. Johnson speculated that the declaration would have included more religious or historical context if, for instance, Adams had drafted it. "Jefferson, on the other hand, was more of an abstract thinker," Johnson said. "The preamble is highly philosophical." And this philosophical aspect, Johnson said, may account for why other independence movements have taken up the declaration as an inspiration, underscoring their own desires for freedom. Oppo- nents of slavery and advocates for women's suffrage later adopted the declaration as a rallying docu- ment, Maier writes. After the preamble follows a section known as the grievances. Jefferson was charged with compil- ing them into one document, said David Coon, a history professor at Washington State University. Those grievances against the crown included disruptions to colonial self-rule, attacks on civilians and deployment of foreign mercenaries, he said. “The king was the last tie holding the colonists to the empire," Coon said in an e-mail. "To sever that tie would complete separation and accomplish independence." Congress made several changes to Jefferson's work, including an overhaul of the grievances, Maier said. She said Congress left the preamble largely intact, but Jefferson was humiliated by all of the changes and fired off several letters to friends, bemoaning the alterations. But Maier sees Congress' work as a fine example of group editing, which made the declaration into a distinguished document. "This is a document that had to be read publicly," she said in a phone conversation. "They took out overstatements. They took out statements that were incorrect." But she adds that "those [paragraphs] that we've come to revere the most, Congress changed the least." On July 2, 1776, Congress voted for independence, and it worked until July 4 as a Committee of the Whole to edit the declaration, Maier writes. Soon, the declaration was read to American soldiers. In her book, Maier quotes one American soldier, Joseph Barton, for whom the declaration cleared up any doubt about allegiance. "For my part, I have been at a great stand; I could hardly own the King and fight against him at the same time; but now these matters are cleared up," Barton wrote. "Heart and hand shall move together." Downloaded from SeattleTimes.com on July 4, 2004 URL: http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/cgi-bin/ PrintStory.pl? document_id=2001971724&zsection_id=268448413&slug=declar04&date=20040704 Jefferson consoled for his "mangled" manuscript Thomas Jefferson sent copies of the Declaration of Independence to a few close friends, such as Richard Henry Lee (1732-1794), indicating the changes that had been made by Congress. Lee, replied: "I wish sin- cerely, as well for the honor of Congress, as for that of the States, that the Manuscript had not been mangled as it is. It is wonderful, and passing pitiful, that the rage of change should be so unhappily applied. However the Thing is in its nature so good, that no Cookery can spoil the Dish for the palates of Freemen." Duke University Hypertext Version http://www.duke.edu/eng169s2/group1/lex3/firstpge.htm THE FRAGMENT Fragment of the earliest known draft of the Declaration, June, 1776 This is the only surviving fragment of the earliest draft of the Declaration of Independence. This fragment demonstrates that Jefferson heavily edited his first draft of the Declaration of Independence before he prepared a fair copy that became the basis of "the original Rough draught." None of the deleted words and passages in this fragment appears in the "Rough draught," but all of the undeleted 148 words, including those careted and interlined, were cop- ied into the "Rough draught" in a clear form. http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/jefferson/images/vc48.jpg INFLUENTIAL PRECEDENTS Instructions to Virginia's Delegates to the first Continental Congress written by Thomas Jefferson in 1774 Thomas Jefferson, a delegate to the Virginia Convention from Albemarle County, drafted these instructions for the Virginia delegates to the first Continental Congress. Although considered too radical by the Virginia Convention, Jefferson's instructions were published by his friends in Williamsburg. His ideas and smooth, eloquent language contributed to his selection as drafts- man of the Declaration of Independence. This manuscript copy contains additional sections and lacks others present in the published version, A Summary View of the Rights of British America. Fairfax County Resolves, July 18, 1774 The Fairfax County Resolves were written by George Mason (1725-1792) and George Wash- ington (1732/33-1799) and adopted by a Fairfax County Convention chaired by Washington and called to protest Britain's harsh measures against Boston. The resolves are a clear state- ment of constitutional rights considered to be fundamental to Britain's American colonies. The Resolves call for a halt to trade with Great Britain, including an end to the importation of slaves. Jefferson tried unsuccessfully to include in the Declaration of Independence a condem- nation of British support of the slave trade. George Mason's Virginia Declaration of Rights The Virginia Declaration of Rights was drafted by George Mason and Thomas Ludwell Lee (1730-1778) and adopted unanimously in June 1776 during the Virginia Convention in Wil- liamsburg that propelled America to independence. It is one of the documents heavily relied on by Thomas Jefferson in drafting the Declaration of Independence. The Virginia Declaration of Rights can be seen as the fountain from which flowed the principles embodied in the Decla- ration of Independence, the Virginia Constitution, and the Bill of Rights. The document exhib- ited here is Mason's first draft to which Thomas Ludwell Lee added several clauses. Even a Thomas Jefferson's Draft of a Constitution for Virginia, predecessor of The Declaration Of Independence Immediately on learning that the Virginia Convention had called for independence on May 15, 1776, Jefferson, a Virginia delegate to the Continental Congress, wrote at least three drafts of a Virginia constitution. Jefferson's drafts are not only important for their influence on the Vir- ginia government, they are direct predecessors of the Declaration of Independence. Shown here is Jefferson's litany of governmental abuses by King George III as it appeared in his first draft. http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/jefferson/jeffdec.html Original Rough Draft of the Declaration Written in June 1776, Thomas Jefferson's draft of the Declaration of Independence, included eighty-six changes made later by John Adams (1735-1826), Benjamin Franklin 1706-1790), other members of the committee appointed to draft the document, and by Congress. The "original Rough draught" of the Declaration of Independence, one of the great milestones in American history, shows the evolution of the text from the initial composition draft by Jefferson to the final text adopted by Congress on the morning of July 4, 1776. At a later date perhaps in the nineteenth century, Jefferson indicated in the margins some but not all of the corrections suggested by Adams and Franklin. Late in life Jefferson endorsed this document: "Independence Declaration of original Rough draught." The "Declaration Committee," chaired by Thomas Jefferson On June 11, 1776, anticipating that the vote for independence would be favorable, Congress appointed a committee to draft a declaration: Thomas Jefferson of Virginia, Roger Sherman of Connecticut, Benjamin Franklin of Pennsylvania, Robert R.
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