Thomas Jefferson Essay, Research Paper
THOMAS JEFFERSON
BY: JUSTIN BRICKLEY
In the midst of party struggle in 1800, Thomas Jefferson wrote in a private missive, & # 8220 ; I have sworn upon the communion table of God ageless ill will against every signifier of dictatorship over the head of man. & # 8221 ; This powerful advocator of autonomy was born in 1743 in Albermarle County, Virginia, inheriting from his male parent, a plantation owner and surveyor, some 5,000 estates of land, and from his female parent, a Randolph, high societal standing. He studied at the College of William and Mary, so read jurisprudence. In 1772 he married Martha Wayles Skelton, a widow, and took her to populate in his partially constructed mountaintop place, Monticello. Freckled and sandy-haired, instead tall and awkward, Jefferson was facile as a letter writer, but he was no public talker. In the Virginia House of Burgesses and the Continental Congress, he contributed his pen instead than his voice to the nationalist cause. As the & # 8220 ; soundless member & # 8221 ; of the Congress, Jefferson, at 33, drafted the Declaration of Independence. In old ages following he labored to do its words a world in Virginia. Most notably, he wrote a measure set uping spiritual freedom, enacted in 1786. Jefferson succeeded Benjamin Franklin as curate to France in 1785. His understanding for the Gallic Revolution led him into struggle with Alexander Hamilton when Jefferson was Secretary of State in President Washington & # 8217 ; s Cabinet. He resigned in 1793. Sharp political struggle developed, and two separate parties, the Federalists and the Democratic-Republicans, began to organize. Jefferson bit by bit assumed leading of the Republicans, who sympathized with the radical cause in France. Attacking Federalist policies, he opposed a strong centralised Government
and championed the rights of provinces. As a loath campaigner for President in 1796, Jefferson came within three ballots of election. Through a defect in the Constitution, he became Vice President, although an opposition of President Adams. In 1800 the defect caused a more serious job. Republican voters, trying to call both a President and a Vice President from their ain party, cast a tie ballot between Jefferson and Aaron Burr. The House of Representatives settled the tie. Hamilton, disliking both Jefferson and Burr, however urged Jefferson’s election. When Jefferson assumed the Presidency, the crisis in France had passed. He slashed Army and Navy outgos, cut the budget, eliminated the revenue enhancement on whisky so unpopular in the West, yet reduced the national debt by a 3rd. He besides sent a naval squadron to contend the Barbary plagiarists, who were hassling American commercialism in the Mediterranean. Further, although the Constitution made no proviso for the acquisition of new land, Jefferson suppressed his scruple over constitutionality when he had the chance to get the Louisiana Territory from Napoleon in 1803. During Jefferson’s 2nd term, he was progressively preoccupied with maintaining the State from engagement in the Napoleonic wars, though both England and France interfered with the impersonal rights of American bottoms. Jefferson’s attempted solution, an trade stoppage upon American transportation, worked severely and was unpopular. Jefferson retired to Monticello to chew over such undertakings as his expansive designs for the University of Virginia. A Gallic Lord observed that he had placed his house and his head “on an elevated state of affairs, from which he might contemplate the universe.”
He died on July 4, 1826.
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