NOTES

ABBREVIATIONS USED

Anas        The Complete Anas of Thomas Jefferson, ed. Frank B. Sawvel

APE, I        Gil Troy, Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr., and Fred L. Israel, eds. History of American Presidential Elections, 1789–2008. 4th ed. Vol. 1, 1789–1868.

EOL        Gordon S. Wood, Empire of Liberty: A History of the Early Republic, 1789–1815

FB        Thomas Jefferson’s Farm Book: With Commentary and Relevant Extracts from Other Writings, ed. Edwin Morris Betts

GB        Thomas Jefferson’s Garden Book 1766–1824: With Relevant Extracts from His Other Writings, ed. Edwin Morris Betts

Henry Adams, History        Henry Adams, History of the United States of America During the Administrations of Thomas Jefferson

Jefferson,Writings        Thomas Jefferson, Writings, ed. Merrill D. Peterson (Library of America)

JHT, I–VI        Dumas Malone, Jefferson and His Time

LOC        Library of Congress

MB, I–II        Jefferson’s Memorandum Books: Accounts, with Legal Records and Miscellany, 1767–1826, ed. James A. Bear, Jr., and Lucia C. Stanton

Parton,Life        James Parton, Life of Thomas Jefferson

PTJ, I–XXXVIII        The Papers of Thomas Jefferson

PTJRS, I–VIII        The Papers of Thomas Jefferson. Retirement Series

Randall, Jefferson, I–III        Henry S. Randall, The Life of Thomas Jefferson

TDLTJ        Sarah N. Randolph, The Domestic Life of Thomas Jefferson

TJ        Thomas Jefferson

TJF        The Thomas Jefferson Foundation

VTM        Merrill D. Peterson, Visitors to Monticello

EPIGRAPHS

“A FEW BROAD STROKES” Henry Adams, History, 188.

“I THINK THIS IS THE MOST EXTRAORDINARY” John F. Kennedy, “Remarks at a Dinner Honoring Nobel Prize Winners of the Western Hemisphere,” April 29, 1962. Online, by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project. http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=8623 (accessed 2012).

PROLOGUE · THE WORLD’S BEST HOPE

HE WOKE AT FIRST LIGHTTJ to Vine Utley, March 21, 1819, LOC. Extract published at Papers of Thomas Jefferson Retirement Series Digital Archive, www.monticello.org/familyletters (accessed 2011). “But whether I retire to bed early or late, I rise with the sun,” he wrote Utley. (Ibid.) “He said in his last illness that the sun had not caught him in bed for fifty years,” grandson Thomas Jefferson Randolph recalled to the biographer Henry S. Randall. (Randall, Jefferson, III, 675.) Visiting Monticello in December 1824, when Jefferson was eighty-one, Daniel Webster wrote: “Mr. Jefferson rises in the morning as soon as he can see the hands of his clock, which is directly opposite his bed, and examines his thermometer immediately, as he keeps a regular meteorological diary.” (VTM, 98.)

LEAN AND LOOSE-LIMBEDMargaret Bayard Smith thought him “tall and slender.” (The First Forty Years of Washington Society in the Family Letters of Margaret Bayard Smith, ed. Gaillard Hunt [New York, 1965], 80.) In 1760, Jefferson was, James Parton wrote, “tall, raw-boned, freckled, and sandy-haired.… With his large feet and hands, his thick wrists, and prominent cheek-bones and chin, he could not have been accounted handsome or graceful. He is described, however, as a fresh, bright, healthy-looking youth, as straight as a gun-barrel, sinewy and strong, with that alertness of movement which comes of early familiarity with saddle, gun, canoe, minuet, and contra-dance.… His teeth, too, were perfect.… His eyes, which were of hazel-gray, were beaming and expressive; and his demeanor gave assurance of a gentle heart, and a sympathetic, inquisitive mind.” (Parton, Life, 1.) For a collection of contemporary accounts of Jefferson’s physical appearance and demeanor, see TJF, “Physical Descriptions of Jefferson,” http://www.monticello.org/site/research-and-collections/physical-descriptions-jefferson (accessed 2011). “This sandy face, with hazel eyes and sunny aspect; this loose, shackling person; this rambling and often brilliant conversation, belonged to the controlling influences of American history, more necessary to the story than three-fourths of the official papers, which only hid the truth,” wrote Henry Adams, the unflinching but sometimes appreciative historian of the Jefferson presidency. “Jefferson’s personality during these eight years appeared to be the government, and impressed itself, like that of Bonaparte, although by a different process, on the mind of the nation.” (Henry Adams, History, 127.)

CONRAD AND MCMUNN’S Allen C. Clark, “Daniel Rapine, the Second Mayor,” Records of the Columbia Historical Society 25 (1923), 198. See also MB, II, 1032.

A BASIN OF COLD WATER PTJRS, VIII, 544. “I have for 50 years bathed my feet in cold water every morning … and having been remarkably exempt from colds (not having had one in every 7 years of my life on an average) I have supposed it might be ascribed to that practice,” Jefferson wrote James Maury. “When we see two facts accompanying one another for a long time, we are apt to suppose them related as cause and effect.” (Ibid.) See also Gordon Jones and James A. Bear, “Thomas Jefferson’s Medical History,” unpublished manuscript, Jefferson Library. Jones and Bear attributed Jefferson’s habit to a reading of Sir John Floyer’s popular book Psychrolousia: Or, the History of Cold Bathing; Jefferson owned a 1706 edition of the work. (Ibid.) For details on Floyer, see D. D. Gibbs, “Sir John Floyer, M.D. (1649–1734),” British Medical Journal 1, no. 5638 (1969): 242–45.

WORE A GROOVESusan R. Stein, “Notes on Jefferson’s Bed Chamber,” memorandum to author, November 10, 2011. Stein is Richard Gilder Senior Curator and Vice President of Museum Programs, Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello. The groove is on the side of Jefferson’s bed facing the fireplace. (Author observation.)

SIX FOOT TWO AND A HALFJames A. Bear, Jr., ed., Jefferson at Monticello (Charlottesville, Va., 1967). According to Edmund Bacon, a Monticello overseer, “Mr. Jefferson was six feet two and a half inches high, well proportioned, and straight as a gun barrel.” (Ibid.)

HIS SANDY HAIR Parton, Life, 1.

FRECKLED SKINIbid.

WRINKLING A BITTDLTJ, 337.

ALTERNATELY DESCRIBED AS BLUE, HAZEL, OR BROWNTJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/research-and-collections/eye-color (accessed 2012).

HE HAD GREAT TEETHParton, Life, 1. “His teeth, too, were perfect,” reported Parton. Writing in 1824, Daniel Webster observed: “His mouth is well formed and still filled with teeth; it is strongly compressed, bearing an expression of contentment and benevolence.” (VTM, 97.)

MUDDY AVENUES AND SCATTERED BUILDINGSRecords of the Columbia Historical Society 25, 198–99. Federalist lawmaker James A. Bayard of Delaware wrote this to Andrew Bayard on January 8, 1801: “We have the name of a city [Washington], but nothing else. The [North] wing of the Capitol which is finished is a beautiful building. The President’s House is also extremely elegant. Besides these objects you have nothing to admire but the beauties of nature. There is a great want of Society, especially female.” A week later, Albert Gallatin wrote to his wife, Hannah Gallatin: “Our local situation is far from being pleasant, or even convenient. Around the Capitol are 7 or 8 boarding houses, one tailor, one shoemaker, one printer, a washing woman, a grocery shop, a pamphlets and stationery shop, a small dry goods shop, and an oyster house. This makes the whole of the Federal City as connected with the Capitol.” (Ibid.)

SECLUDED INSIDEPTJ, XXXII, 513. In a note dated January 27, 1801, Jefferson, who, as vice president, served as the presiding officer of the Senate, wrote that he was “at home always when not in [the] Senate.” (Ibid.)

WITH STABLES FOR SIXTY HORSES Washington National Intelligencer, January 30, 1801. An advertisement for the boardinghouse read: “Have opened houses of entertainment in the range of buildings formerly occupied by Mr. Law, about two hundred paces from the Capitol, in New Jersey Avenue, leading from thence to the Eastern Branch. They are spacious and convenient, one of which is designed for stage passengers and travelers, the other for the accommodation of boarders. There is stableage sufficient for 60 horses. They hope to merit public patronage.” (Ibid.)

TWO HUNDRED PACES AWAYIbid.

A VICIOUS ELECTION See James Roger Sharp, The Deadlocked Election of 1800: Jefferson, Burr, and the Union in the Balance (Lawrence, Kan., 2010); Susan Dunn, Jefferson’s Second Revolution: The Election Crisis of 1800 and the Triumph of Republicanism (Boston, 2004); John Ferling, Adams vs. Jefferson: The Tumultuous Election of 1800(New York, 2004); James Horn, Jan Ellen Lewis, and Peter S. Onuf, eds., The Revolution of 1800: Democracy, Race, and the New Republic (Charlottesville, Va., 2002); APE, 49–78. Henry Adams, The Life of Albert Gallatin (LaVergne, Tenn., 2009), 232–66, tells the story from the perspective of a crucial Jefferson ally.

HAD RECEIVED THE SAME NUMBER OF ELECTORAL VOTES The potential problem for a tie had been clear from the first presidential election, in 1789. The practice was for a few electors to “throw away” a few votes for the vice presidential candidate to a candidate who had no chance of winning, thus giving the presidential candidate the most votes. “The votes were unanimous with respect to General Washington, as appears to have been the case in each of the States,” James Madison had told Jefferson, who was then in France. “The secondary votes were given, among the Federal members, chiefly to Mr. J. Adams, one or two being thrown away in order to prevent a possible competition for the Presidency.” (PTJ, XV, 5.) Things had not gone so smoothly this time, hence the crisis.

“WORN DOWN HERE” PTJ, XXXII, 556–57. The letter, to his daughter Martha Jefferson Randolph, known as Patsy, was written from Washington on February 5, 1801.

“THE THEME OF ALL CONVERSATION” Ibid., 263.

“THE CRISISIS MOMENTOUS” Washington Federalist, February 12, 1801. The paper also wrote: “We waited all yesterday in the hourly expectation of being able to announce to our anxious countrymen the result of the presidential election, but it remains to this moment undecided and the happiness of five millions of people awfully suspended in the balance!” (Ibid.)

“FUN AND HONOR AND PROFIT” EOL, 280.

BE MADE PRESIDENTNancy Isenberg, Fallen Founder: The Life of Aaron Burr (New York, 2008), 196–220.

HAD “HEARD A MEMBER OF CONGRESS LAMENT” Anas, 206.

“A DESIRE TO PROMOTE … DIVISION” Ibid., 466.

A RUMOR THAT JOHN MARSHALL JHT, III, 495.

HAD JUST BEEN NAMED CHIEF JUSTICEKathryn Turner, “The Appointment of Chief Justice Marshall,” William and Mary Quarterly, 3d ser., 17 (1960): 143–63.

“IF THE UNION COULD BE BROKEN” PTJ, XXXII, 404. For McKean on the overall crisis, see ibid., 432–36.

WAS TOLD THAT TWENTY-TWO THOUSAND MENJames Roger Sharp, American Politics in the Early Republic: The New Nation in Crisis (New Haven, Conn., 1993), 269.

WERE “PREPARED TO TAKE UP ARMS” Ibid. Others worried that Hamilton would take advantage of the uncertainty. “An army … with Alexander Hamilton at their head could get possession of forts, arsenals, stores and arms in a short time,” one Pennsylvania Republican told Jefferson. (PTJ, XXXII, 485.) Jefferson himself told James Madison that any “legislative usurpation would be resisted by arms.” (PTJ, XXXIII, 16.)

AFTER A SNOWSTORM STRUCK WASHINGTONDiary of Gouverneur Morris, February 1801, LOC. It snowed on February 11 and again on the 13th; Jefferson was chosen on February 17. (Ibid.)

THE THIRTY-SIXTH BALLOTPTJ, XXXII, 578.

FOR THIRTY-SIX OF THE FORTY YEARSAs noted in the text, aside from Jefferson himself, James Madison, James Monroe, Andrew Jackson, and Martin Van Buren considered themselves part of the Jeffersonian tradition. John Quincy Adams, the sixth president, is the exception. For excellent overviews of the years between 1800 and 1840, see EOL;Daniel Walker Howe, What Hath God Wrought: The Transformation of America, 1815–1848 (New York, 2007); and Sean Wilentz, The Rise of American Democracy: Jefferson to Lincoln (New York, 2005).

JEFFERSON SOUGHT, ACQUIRED, AND WIELDED POWERMy contention is that Jefferson was at heart a politician—a politician with a wide-ranging philosophical mind and oft-expressed principles, to be sure, but still a politician. See, for instance, Bernard Bailyn, To Begin the World Anew: The Genius and Ambiguities of the American Founders (New York, 2003), 37–59. Bailyn concluded:

So it was Jefferson—simultaneously a radical utopian idealist and a hardheaded, adroit, at times cunning politician; a rhetorician, whose elegant phrases had propulsive power, and a no-nonsense administrator—who, above all others, was fated to confront the ambiguities of the Enlightenment program. He had caught a vision, as a precocious leader of the American Revolution, of a comprehensive Enlightenment ideal, a glimpse of what a wholly enlightened world might be, and strove to make it real, discovering as he did so the intractable dilemmas. Repeatedly he saw a pure vision, conceptualized and verbalized it brilliantly, and then struggled to relate it to reality, shifting, twisting, maneuvering backward and forward as he did so. (Ibid., 47.)

“THE WORLD’S BEST HOPE” PTJ, XXXIII, 149.

“WHATEVER THEY CAN, THEY WILL” PTJRS, VIII, 32.

“MR. JEFFERSON WAS AS TALL” Bear, Jefferson at Monticello, 11.

JEFFERSON “WAS LIKE A FINE HORSE” Ibid., 71.

NOTING THE TEMPERATURE EACH DAYSee, for instance, MB, I, 771. “My method is to make two observations a day, the one as early as possible in the morning, the other from 3 to 4 o’clock, because I have found 4 o’clock the hottest and daylight the coldest point of the 24 hours,” he wrote Thomas Mann Randolph, Jr., his son-in-law, on April 18, 1790. “I state them in an ivory pocket book … and copy them out once a week.” (Ibid.)

A TINY, IVORY-LEAVED NOTEBOOKMB, I, xvii. The typical contents of Jefferson’s pockets are illustrated in William L. Beiswanger and others, eds., Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello (Chapel Hill, N.C., 2001), 65. The book notes that the items included an English pocketknife, key ring and trunk key, gold toothpick, goose quill toothpick, ivory rule, watch fob, steel pocket scissors, and a red-leather pocketbook. (Ibid.)

HE DROVE HIS HORSES HARD AND FASTJames A. Bear, Jr., ed., Jefferson at Monticello (Charlottesville, Va., 1967), 5.

HIS “ALMIGHTY PHYSICIAN” PTJ, VIII, 43.

DRANK NO HARD LIQUOR BUT LOVED WINERandall, Jefferson, III, 450. Isaac Jefferson “never heard of his being disguised in drink.” (Bear, Jefferson at Monticello, 13.)

GIFTS OF HAVANA CIGARSPTJRS, I, 466.

DUMBWAITERS AND HIDDEN MECHANISMSBeiswanger and others, Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello, 53.

HIS OWN VERSION OF THE GOSPELSThomas Jefferson, The Jefferson Bible: The Life and Morals of Jesus of Nazareth (Boston, 1989). In the afterword to this edition, Jaroslav Pelikan wrote: “There has certainly never been a shortage of boldness in the history of biblical scholarship during the past two centuries, but for sheer audacity Thomas Jefferson’s two redactions of the Gospels stand out even in that company.” (Ibid., 149.)

PALLADIAN PLANS FOR MONTICELLOBeiswanger and others, Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello, 2–33. A book of Palladio’s that belonged to Jefferson emerged in the collections of Washington University in St. Louis in 2011, which I was generously allowed to see.

THE ROMAN-INSPIRED CAPITOL OF VIRGINIASusan R. Stein, The Worlds of Thomas Jefferson at Monticello (New York, 1993), 19–20.

PATRON OF PASTATJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/research-and-collections/macaroni (accessed 2012).

RECIPE FOR ICE CREAMMarie Kimball, Thomas Jefferson’s Cook Book (Charlottesville, Va., 1976), 2–3. See also TJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/research-and-collections/ice-cream (accessed 2012).

THE PERFECT DRESSING FOR HIS SALADSTJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/house-and-gardens/thomas-jeffersons-favorite-vegetables (accessed 2011). “Salad oil was a perennial obsession for Jefferson. He referred to the olive as ‘the richest gift of heaven,’ and ‘the most interesting plant in existence.’ When he found domestic olive oil imperfect and imported olive oil too expensive, Jefferson turned to the possibilities of oil extracted from sesame seed or benne (Sesamum orientale).” (Ibid.)

HE KEPT SHEPHERD DOGSMB, I, 745. See also PTJ, XXIX, 26–27.

HE KNEW LATIN, GREEK, FRENCHTJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/research-and-collections/languages-jefferson-spoke-or-read.

ADMIRED THE LETTERS OF MADAME DE SÉVIGNÉ TJ to Ellen Wayles Randolph, March 14, 1808, Coolidge Collection of Thomas Jefferson Manuscripts, Massachusetts Historical Society. “Among my books which are gone to Monticello, is a copy of Madame de Sevigné’s letters, which being the finest models of easy letter writing you must read.” (Ibid.)

MADAME DE STAËL’SCorinne, or Italy Hannah Thornton to TJ, January 15, 1808, Coolidge Collection of Thomas Jefferson Manuscripts, Massachusetts Historical Society. “Mrs. Thornton’s Compliments to the President of the U.S, and having heard that he possesses a copy of Made. Stäel’s celebrated Novel ‘Corinne’ and not being able to procure it elsewhere at present, hopes he will excuse the liberty she takes in requesting the favor of a perusal of it, if disengaged,” she wrote. (Ibid.)

A COLLECTION OF WHAT A GUEST CALLED “REGAL SCANDAL” PTJRS, VIII, 240.

A DIAMOND NECKLACE AND MARIE-ANTOINETTE Simon Schama, Citizens: A Chronicle of the French Revolution (New York, 1990), 203–10.

AMID CHARGES THAT HE HAD ALLOWED HIS MISTRESSPhilip Harling, “The Duke of York Affair (1809) and the Complexities of War-Time Patriotism,” The Historical Journal 39, no. 4 (December 1996): 963–84.

“WITH A SATISFACTION” PTJRS, VIII, 240.

A GUEST AT A COUNTRY INNTDLTJ, 38.

“TO SEE THE STANDARD OF REASON” PTJ, X, 604.

“WHAT IS PRACTICABLE MUST OFTEN CONTROL” Jefferson, Writings, 1101.

“THE HABITS OF THE GOVERNED” Ibid.

THE DEBATE AND THE DIVISION Jefferson has tended to be depicted in what I believe to be an overly harsh light in recent years, often portrayed as, at best, a mystery and, at worst, a cynical politician. In an illuminating essay, Gordon S. Wood explored the distorting dynamic of excessive celebration and excessive condemnation. “We seriously err in canonizing and making symbols of historical figures who cannot and should not be ripped out of their own time and place,” Wood wrote. “By turning Jefferson into the kind of transcendent moral hero that no authentic historically situated human being could ever be, we leave ourselves demoralized by the time-bound weaknesses of this eighteenth-century slaveholder.” (Wood, “The Ghosts of Monticello” in Sally Hemings and Thomas Jefferson: History, Memory, and Civic Culture, ed. Jan Ellen Lewis and Peter S. Onuf [Charlottesville, Va., 1999], 29.) For influential recent portraits of Jefferson, see, for instance, Joseph J. Ellis, American Sphinx: The Character of Thomas Jefferson (New York, 1997); David McCullough, John Adams (New York, 2001); Ron Chernow, Alexander Hamilton (New York, 2004); and Chernow, Washington: A Life (New York, 2010).

“IT IS A CHARMING THING” Ibid., xxxviii, 20. The letter was written to Ann Cary, Thomas Jefferson, and Ellen Wayles Randolph from Washington on March 2, 1802.

LEADING SOME PEOPLE TO BELIEVE Joseph J. Ellis, American Creation: Triumphs and Tragedies at the Founding of the Republic (New York, 2007), 168. Ellis quotes John Adams’s grandson Charles Francis Adams, who observed: “More ardent in his imagination than his affections, he did not always speak exactly as he felt towards friends and enemies. As a consequence, he has left hanging over a part of his public life a vapor of duplicity, or, to say the least, of indiscretion, the presence of which is generally felt more than it is seen.” (Ibid.)

CALLING ON SAMUEL HARRISON SMITHMargaret Bayard Smith, First Forty Years, 6.

THE CHILD OF A FEDERALIST FAMILY Ibid., vi. Margaret Bayard Smith was born in 1778; her father was Colonel John Bayard, a Pennsylvania statesman and member of the Continental Congress. Her family included James A. Bayard, a Federalist lawmaker and diplomat from Delaware, who was to play a noted role in Jefferson’s election to the presidency in February 1801. (Ibid.)

FOUND HERSELF “SOMEWHAT CHECKED” Ibid., 6.

THE STRANGER ASSUMED “A FREE AND EASY” Ibid., 6–7.

SHE DID NOT KNOWIbid., 7.

AT THIS POINT THE DOOR TO THE PARLOR OPENEDIbid.

“AND IS THIS THE VIOLENT DEMOCRAT” Ibid., 5–6.

TAKING HIS LEAVE Ibid., 8.

A GRIEF THAT LED HIM TO THOUGHTS OF SUICIDERandall, Jefferson, I, 382. See also Parton, Life, 265–66, and JHT, I, 396–97.

PROMISED HIS DYING WIFEParton, Life, 265.

A DECADES-LONG LIAISON WITH SALLY HEMINGSAnnette Gordon-Reed has done by far the finest work on this subject; my debt to her is incalculable. See Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings: An American Controversy (Charlottesville, Va., 1997) and the monumental work The Hemingses of Monticello: An American Family (New York, 2008). See also the findings in the Report of the Research Committee on Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings, TJF, January 2000, http://www.monticello.org/site/plantation-and-slavery/report-research-committee-thomas-jefferson-and-sally-hemings (accessed 2012); Lewis and Onuf, Sally Hemings and Thomas Jefferson; and Catherine Kerrison, “Sally Hemings,” in Cogliano, ed., A Companion to Thomas Jefferson, 284–300. For a contrary view, see William G. Hyland, Jr., In Defense of Thomas Jefferson: The Sally Hemings Sex Scandal (New York, 2009), and Daniel Barton, The Jefferson Lies: Exposing the Myths You’ve Always Believed About Thomas Jefferson (Nashville, Tenn., 2012), 1–30.

The 1998 DNA finding that a male in the Jefferson line had fathered at least one of Sally Hemings’s children led to a scholarly reevaluation of the entire question of the Jefferson-Hemings connection. The then-president of the Thomas Jefferson Foundation, Daniel P. Jordan, charged a committee with the task of examining the issue. “Although paternity cannot be established with absolute certainty, our evaluation of the best evidence available suggests the strong likelihood that Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings had a relationship over time that led to the birth of one, and perhaps all, of the known children of Sally Hemings,” Jordan wrote when the committee’s report was published in 2000. “We recognize that honorable people can disagree on this subject, as indeed they have for over two hundred years. Further, we know that the historical record has gaps that perhaps can never be filled and mysteries that can never by fully resolved.”

I agree with Jordan and with the committee. (One member dissented and wrote a minority report, which is available at TJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/plantation-and-slavery/report-research-committee-thomas-jefferson-and-sally-hemings.) In my view, there is convincing biographical evidence that Jefferson was a man of appetite who appreciated order, and that the ability to carry on a long-term liaison with his late wife’s enslaved half sister under circumstances he could largely control would have suited him.

Dissenters have pointed to Jefferson’s younger brother Randolph Jefferson as a candidate for paternity, a possibility that would fit with the DNA finding. Isaac Jefferson, the Monticello slave who left his recollections, reported that Randolph Jefferson “used to come out among black people, play the fiddle and dance half the night.” As the committee pointed out, however, Isaac Jefferson left Monticello in 1797, which means “his reference probably predates that year, and most likely refers to the 1780s, the period that is the subject of the majority of his recollections.”

To those who continue to argue that there was no relationship between Sally Hemings and Thomas Jefferson, I am taking the liberty of quoting at length the “Assessment of Possible Paternity of Other Jeffersons” from the Report of the Research Committee on Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings:

One reaction to the DNA study of Jefferson and Hemings descendants has been the accurate observation that the test results only prove that a Jefferson fathered the last of Sally Hemings’s children—not that Thomas Jefferson himself was the father. In order to investigate this possibility, Monticello researchers reviewed Thomas Jefferson’s papers as well as Jefferson family genealogies to determine the identities and whereabouts of other male members of his family.

Sally Hemings’s confirmed times of conception extend from early December of 1794 through mid-September of 1807. During these eighteen years at least twenty-five adult male descendants of Jefferson’s grandfather Thomas Jefferson (1677–1731) lived in Virginia: his younger brother Randolph and five of his sons, as well as one son and eighteen grandsons of his uncle Field Jefferson. Of this total, most were living in the Southside region—over a hundred miles from Monticello—and do not figure in Jefferson’s correspondence or his memoranda.

There remained eight out of the twenty-five for whom age and proximity warranted further documentary investigation. These include Randolph Jefferson and his five sons (Isham, Thomas, Jr., Field, Robert, and Lilburne) as well as two grandsons of Field Jefferson (George and John Garland Jefferson). While each of these individuals had some interaction with Thomas Jefferson and spent some time at or in the vicinity of Monticello, most had no documented presence at Monticello during the times when Sally Hemings conceived her children. Several of them were at Monticello when Thomas Jefferson was absent (Sally Hemings is not known to have conceived in his absences). Randolph Jefferson’s sons Thomas, in 1800, and Robert Lewis, in 1807, may well have been at Monticello during the conception periods of Harriet and Eston Hemings. Randolph Jefferson was invited to Monticello during the period of Eston Hemings’s conception, but it is not known that he actually made the visit.

The committee concludes that convincing evidence does not exist for the hypothesis that another male Jefferson was the father of Sally Hemings’s children. In almost two hundred years since the issue first became public, no other Jefferson has ever been referred to as the father; denials of Thomas Jefferson’s paternity named the Carr nephews. Furthermore, evidence of the sort of sustained presence necessary to have resulted in the creation of a family of six children is entirely lacking, and even those who denied a relationship never suggested Sally Hemings’s children had more than one father. Finally, the historical evidence for Thomas Jefferson’s paternity of Eston Hemings and his known siblings overwhelmingly outweighs that for any other Jefferson.

Readers who do wish to examine the issue in detail will find TJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/plantation-and-slavery/report-research-committee-thomas-jefferson-and-sally-hemings (accessed 2011–12) to be invaluable.

ONE THAT OPENED IN 1764 PTJRS, IV, 599. Jefferson believed March 1764 marked the “dawn of the revolution.”

LIVED AND GOVERNED IN A FIFTY YEARS’ WARTo Jefferson, the conflict ran from 1764 (ibid.) to the end of the War of 1812 in 1815. Louise Burnham Dunbar, A Study of ‘Monarchical’ Tendencies in the United States from 1776 to 1801 (New York, 1970), details American attitudes toward monarchy and the handful of attempts that were made to move the young nation in the direction of hereditary or lifetime power. George C. Herring, From Colony to Superpower: U.S. Foreign Relations Since 1776 (New York, 2008), 11–133, covers America’s relations with the world generally, but the story of U.S.-British tensions is at center stage. Also illuminating are Robert Middlekauff, The Glorious Cause: The American Revolution, 1763–1789 (New York, 2005); Alan Taylor, The Civil War of 1812: American Citizens, British Subjects, Irish Rebels, and Indian Allies (New York, 2010); and Edmund S. Morgan, The Birth of the Republic, 1763–89 (Chicago, 1977). Bernard Bailyn, The Ideological Origins of the American Revolution (Cambridge, Mass., 1992), is a landmark work on the role of deeply held notions of liberty and of the pervasiveness of conspiracy.

Several related issues must be explored in order to describe and assess the idea of a Fifty Years’ War. One question is the pervasive paranoia at the time, something that has been the subject of scholarly debate since Bernard Bailyn did his study of pamphlets in the revolutionary era and Richard Hofstadter laid out his vision of “the paranoid style.” (Hofstadter, The Paranoid Style in American Politics[Cambridge, Mass., 1996].) A seminal paper is John R. Howe, Jr., “Republican Thought and Political Violence of the 1790s” American Quarterly 19 no. 2 (Summer, 1967): 147–65. Howe contends that the political climate in the 1790s was so emotional and overheated that “stereotypes stood in the place of reality.” (Ibid., 150.) He attributes this climate to the intensity of the Founders’ awareness of the fragility of republicanism and the failure of previous experiments, an awareness of the immensity of their historical moment followed by a profound anxiety about the decline of virtue, which was, of course, to be the glue of their free society. Under pressure, Howe argues, the Americans of the time could become deranged.

Gordon S. Wood, for one, disagrees. He has written that the paranoia and conspiracy theories were actually the rational thoughts of rational men, really reflected by the dominant currents of the era. Men of the Enlightenment assumed that history was a course of events in which men could cause effects—that they were agents in control of their fates. This meant that when something happened, someone was behind it. Wood gives Jefferson more credit than many scholars for his fears of a monarchical plot. In her 1922 study, Louise Burnham Dunbar held that there were indeed monarchical plots seriously considered, but that the American people by and large were antimonarchical.

A second key question is how one defines monarchism and republicanism. What the Federalists wanted was what John Adams described a little too openly as a “monarchical republic” (EOL, 82)—modeled on England’s system but without the “corruption,” that is, the blurring of branches, which occurred because crown ministers were members of Parliament. (Wood, The Idea of America: Reflections on the Birth of the United States [New York: 2011], 182.) They wanted a strong federal government where citizens owe fealty to the nation over the states, with a strong centralized economy and a powerful army that could challenge the European monarchies on their level. Certainly from the start George Washington and John Adams drew on the iconography of a monarchy, and the Federalists who defended the Constitution did so because of their disillusionment with the idea of a confederacy and fears of the excesses of democracy. They had a sense of themselves as working within an English tradition, hence Jefferson’s Anglophobia. Wood points out that, being from the West Indies, Hamilton did not have loyalty to a state. (EOL, 90.) Hamilton very consciously modeled the financial system on that of Britain. The monarchy debate also plays into Jefferson’s role in the battles over the judiciary, since that was the branch most easily seen as a fortress against democracy and the source of permanent establishment.

“PLANTING A NEW WORLD” TJ to John Page, March 18, 1803, American Antiquarian Society, Worcester, Mass.

“IT WAS INCUMBENT” Ibid.

“THE CIRCUMSTANCES OF OUR COUNTRY” Margaret Bayard Smith, First Forty Years, 81.

IT WAS A “BOLD AND DOUBTFUL ELECTION” TJ to Roger C. Weightman, June 24, 1826, LOC. Extract published at Papers of Thomas Jefferson Retirement Series Digital Archive, www.monticello.org/familyletters (accessed 2011). This was very nearly the last letter of his life, a message sent to the Washington organizers of celebrations to mark the fiftieth anniversary of the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1826. Jefferson, in fact, wrote two additional letters after this one, both about business matters, including arranging for the payment of duties on a shipment of wine. See J. Jefferson Looney, “Thomas Jefferson’s Last Letter,” The Virginia Magazine of History and Biography112, no. 2 (2004): 178–84.

ONE · A FORTUNATE SON

“THE POLITICAL OR PUBLIC CHARACTER” Gerald W. Mullin, Flight and Rebellion: Slave Resistance in Eighteenth-Century Virginia (New York, 1972), 8.

“IT IS THE STRONG IN BODY” TDLTJ, 20.

THE KIND OF MAN PEOPLE NOTICEDI have drawn on several sources for my discussion of Peter Jefferson. See TDLTJ, 17–26; JHT, I, 9–33; Randall, Jefferson, I, 5–18; and Parton, Life, 9–10.

WHAT BECAME ALBEMARLE COUNTYThe county was founded in 1744. For an overview, see John Hammond Moore, Albemarle, Jefferson’s County, 1727–1976 (Charlottesville, Va., 1976), 1–67, which covers the period from the second quarter of the eighteenth century through the Revolution. See also S. Edward Ayres, “Albemarle County, Virginia, 1744–1770: An Economic, Political, and Social Analysis,” Magazine of Albemarle County History 25 (1966–67): 37–72. JHT, I, 435–39, discusses Peter Jefferson’s lands, slaves, and estate. For a sense of Virginia as a whole, see Michael A. McDonnell, “Jefferson’s Virginia,” in Cogliano, ed., A Companion to Thomas Jefferson,16–31.

AFTER THE LONDON PARISHTDLTJ, 22.

THE WILDERNESS OF THE MID-ATLANTICAlan Taylor, American Colonies (New York, 2002), 117–37, tells the story of Virginia from 1570 to 1650; 138–57 carry the account forward to 1750 in the “Chesapeake Colonies.” For more background on the formation of the planter culture of Virginia and of the larger Chesapeake region, Daniel K. Richter, Before the Revolution: America’s Ancient Pasts(Cambridge, Mass., 2011), is excellent, especially 187–211; 346–368 are illuminating on slavery. See also Norman K. Risjord, Jefferson’s America, 1760–1815, 3d ed. (Lanham, Md., 2010), 1–33, for a portrait of America in 1760; April Lee Hatfield, Atlantic Virginia: Intercolonial Relations in the Seventeenth Century (Philadelphia, 2003); James Horn, Adapting to a New World: English Society in the Seventeenth-Century Chesapeake (Chapel Hill, N.C., 1994); and Edmund S. Morgan, American Slavery, American Freedom: The Ordeal of Colonial Virginia (New York, 1975). For a discussion of Anglican influences, see Daniel J. Boorstin, “The Church of England in Colonial Virginia,” in The American Past in Perspective, vol. I, To 1877, ed. Trevor Colbourn and James T. Patterson (Boston, 1970), 33–43. For details on Bacon’s Rebellion, see Wilcomb E. Washburn, The Governor and the Rebel: A History of Bacon’s Rebellion in Virginia (Chapel Hill, N.C., 1957), and Anthony S. Parent, Jr., Foul Means: The Formation of a Slave Society in Virginia, 1660–1740 (Chapel Hill, N.C., 2003).

BORN ON APRIL 13, 1743 Randall, Jefferson, I, 11. The April 13 date is according to the New Style calendar.

ONCE SINGLEHANDEDLY PULLED DOWNIbid., 13.

UPRIGHTED TWO HUGE HOGSHEADSIbid.

A SUPERLATIVE AND SENTIMENTAL LIGHTJefferson, Writings, 3–4.

“THE TRADITION IN MY FATHER’S FAMILY” Ibid. The recollections are in an autobiography Jefferson wrote between January 6, 1821, and July 29, 1821. (Ibid., 3, 101.) He ended his narrative with his arrival in New York to become secretary of state in 1790.

THE ANCIENT ROOTSI believe the best work on the pre-Monticello Jeffersons can be found in the scholarship of Susan Kern, who was enormously helpful to me and to whom I owe a great debt. In both her dissertation on the subject and in her resulting book The Jeffersons at Shadwell (New Haven, Conn., 2010), Kern paints a remarkably detailed portrait of the lives of Thomas Jefferson’s ancestors and particularly of his parents, Peter and Jane Jefferson. The results of her archaeological work and analysis of Shadwell, she wrote, “demands reinterpretation of historians’ characterizations of Peter Jefferson, Jane Randolph Jefferson, and Thomas Jefferson’s boyhood experience. The material provisions of the plantation suggest that Peter and Jane Jefferson fashioned a world wholly familiar to Virginia’s elite.” (Ibid., 5.)

AT AGE TEN, THOMAS“Memoir of Thomas Jefferson Randolph,” Edgehill-Randolph Papers, Collection 1397, Box 11, University of Virginia.

“FINDING A WILD TURKEY” Ibid.

THE FAMILY HAD IMMIGRATED TO VIRGINIA TDLTJ, 20.

LISTED AMONG THE DELEGATESIbid.

THE FUTURE PRESIDENT’S GREAT-GRANDFATHER Kern, Jeffersons at Shadwell, 292–93. See also JHT, I, 7.

THE DAUGHTER OF A JUSTICE Kern, Jeffersons at Shadwell, 293.

SPECULATED IN LAND AT YORKTOWN Ibid.

HE DIED ABOUT 1698 Ibid.

HE KEPT A GOOD HOUSEIbid.

A DINNER OF ROAST BEEF AND PERSICOIbid.

BORN IN CHESTERFIELD COUNTYIbid., xiii, 18.

WITH JOSHUA FRYJefferson, Writings, 3.

“MY FATHER’S EDUCATION” Ibid.

PETER JEFFERSON BECAME A COLONELEdgar C. Hickish, “Peter Jefferson, Gentleman,” unpublished manuscript, Thomas Jefferson Foundation.

PROVED HIMSELF A HEROTDLTJ, 19–20. See also Randall, Jefferson, I, 13–14. Arthur T. McClinton and others, The Fairfax Line: A Historic Landmark (Edinburg, Va., 1990), includes an account by the surveyor Thomas Lewis of the September 10, 1746, to February 24, 1747, expedition to map “the southwest line of Thomas Lord Fairfax’s princely domain in Virginia.” Peter Jefferson was said to have been at one point “very indisposed.” (Ibid., 44.)

FOUGHT OFF “THE ATTACKS” TDLTJ, 20.

“NEVER WEARIED OF DWELLING” Ibid., 19.

VIRGINIA’S LEADING FAMILYRandall, Jefferson, I, 7–10. See also Kern, Jeffersons at Shadwell, 17–19; Jonathan Daniels, The Randolphs of Virginia (Garden City, N.Y., 1972); Clifford Dowdey, The Virginia Dynasties: The Emergence of “King” Carter and the Golden Age (Boston, 1969); and H. J. Eckenrode, The Randolphs: The Story of a Virginia Family (Indianapolis, 1946).

IN 1739, HE WED JANE RANDOLPHTDLTJ, 18.

ISHAM RANDOLPHJHT, I, 13–17.

BORN IN LONDON IN 1721 Ibid., 13. See also Kern, Jeffersons at Shadwell, 44.

DUNGENESS IN GOOCHLAND COUNTYKern, Jeffersons at Shadwell, 19.

WALLED GARDENSIbid.

TRACED ITS COLONIAL ORIGINSDaniels, Randolphs of Virginia, 17–18.

THRIVED IN VIRGINIAIbid.

HOME TO ENGLAND IN 1669 Ibid., 18.

PREVAILED ON A YOUNG NEPHEW, WILLIAMIbid., 17. Daniels wrote: “Almost certainly William came to Virginia at the behest—or with the encouragement—of his Uncle Henry Randolph.” (Ibid.)

AT SOME POINT BETWEEN 1669 AND 1674 Ibid., 17. William Cabell Bruce, John Randolph of Roanoke 1773–1833: A Biography Based Largely on New Material (New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1922), however, says that he specifically came over about 1673 at around age 24 (Ibid., I, 9.)

TAKING HIS UNCLE’S PLACE Daniels, Randolphs of Virginia, 18.

AN ALLY OF LORD BERKELEYIbid., 24.

SHIPPING, RAISING TOBACCO, AND SLAVE TRADING Ibid., 27.

FAMILY SEAT ON TURKEY ISLANDBruce, John Randolph of Roanoke, I, 10.

DESCRIBED AS “A SPLENDID MANSION” Ibid.

MARY ISHAM RANDOLPH Daniels, Randolphs of Virginia, 23.

“ARE SO NUMEROUS THAT THEY ARE OBLIGED” Ibid., 32–33.

A CAPTAIN AND A MERCHANT Ibid., 40–42. See also Kern, Jeffersons at Shadwell, 44, and Virginia Scharff, The Women Jefferson Loved (New York, 2010), 3–4.

A “PRETTY SORT OF WOMAN” Scharff, Women Jefferson Loved, 3.

“A VERY GENTLE” Randall, Jefferson, I, 10. The merchant, Peter Collinson, also warned that such Virginians were liable to “look perhaps more at a man’s outside than his inside,” advising his correspondent, the botanist John Bartram, to “pray go very clean, neat and handsomely dressed to Virginia.” (Ibid.)

“THE POWERFUL SCOTCH EARLS” Ibid., 7. Jefferson was always skeptical about the value of such claims to nobility. His mother’s family, he wrote, “trace their pedigree far back in England and Scotland, to which let every one ascribe the faith and merit he chooses.” (Jefferson, Writings, 3.) See also PTJ, I, 62.

“I ROSE AT 6 O’CLOCK” Diary of William Byrd II, February 27, 1711, Elliot J. Gorn, Randy Roberts, and Terry D. Bilhartz, eds., Constructing the American Past, I, (New York, 2004), 71. An additional passage from the day describes the Byrds’ treatment of a slave, Jenny: “In the evening my wife and little Jenny had a great quarrel in which my wife got the worst but at last by the help of the family Jenny was overcome and soundly whipped.” (Ibid.)

VISITING VIRGINIA AND MARYLAND Edmund S. Morgan, Virginians at Home: Family Life in the Eighteenth Century (Charlottesville, 1963), 7.

“THE YOUTH OF THOSE MORE INDULGENT SETTLEMENTS” Ibid.

INSTRUCTED IN MUSIC Ibid., 18.

TAUGHT TO DANCE Ibid.

“WAS INDEED BEAUTIFUL” Ibid.

A PROSPEROUS, CULTURED, AND SOPHISTICATED FAMILY Kern, Jeffersons at Shadwell, 1–13. For a discussion of the political impact of Jefferson’s social background, particularly on affairs in Virginia, see Ronald L. Hatzenbuehler, “Growing Weary in Well-Doing: Thomas Jefferson’s Life Among the Virginia Gentry,” The Virginia Magazine of History and Biography 101 (January 1993): 5–36. See also Jack P. Greene, The Quest for Power: The Lower Houses of Assembly in the Southern Royal Colonies, 1689–1776 (New York, 1972), and Charles S. Sydnor, Gentlemen Freeholders: Political Practices in Washington’s Virginia (Chapel Hill, N.C., 1952), for assessments of the politically, economically, and culturally privileged world in which Jefferson grew to maturity.

HIS STUDY ON THE FIRST FLOORKern, Jeffersons at Shadwell, 29.

A CHERRY DESKIbid., 43.

PETER JEFFERSON’S LIBRARYIbid., 33–38. Kevin J. Hayes, The Road to Monticello: The Life and Mind of Thomas Jefferson (Oxford, 2008), 15–29, is also useful.

“WHEN YOUNG” Hayes, Road to Monticello, 27.

VOYAGE ROUND THE WORLDAND JOHN OGILBY’S AMERICA Ibid., 26–27.

“FROM THE TIME WHEN” TDLTJ, 37.

A WORLD OF LEISUREIbid., 23–24.

“MY FATHER HAD A DEVOTED FRIEND” Ibid., 24.

BELIEVED HIS FIRST MEMORYIbid., 23. His great-granddaughter reported that Jefferson “often declared that his earliest recollection in life was of being … handed up to a servant on horseback, by whom he was carried on a pillow for a long distance.” (Ibid.)

BOUND FOR TUCKAHOEJHT, I, 18–20.

“HENRY WEATHERBOURNE’S BIGGEST BOWL” Randall, Jefferson, I, 7.

THE JEFFERSONS WOULD STAYWhy not bring the Randolph children to Shadwell and remotely manage Tuckahoe, rather than moving his own family to Tuckahoe and remotely managing Shadwell? Was Peter Jefferson in an inferior position, essentially coming to work for Randolph? Some Randolph descendants thought so, and later enjoyed asserting that their more celebrated Jefferson cousins descended from a father who had taken wages from an ancestor of theirs.

Writing a century later, in 1871, however, Jefferson’s great-granddaughter noted that the fact that Peter Jefferson “refused to receive any other compensation for his services as guardian is not only proved by the frequent assertion of his son in after years, but by his accounts as executor, which have ever remained unchallenged.” In an arch footnote, the great-granddaughter added: “In spite of these facts, however, some of Randolph’s descendants, with more arrogance than gratitude, speak of Colonel [Peter] Jefferson as being a paid agent of their ancestor.” (TDLTJ, 22–23.) As Jefferson was to learn, the Randolphs were an eccentric clan. One 1775 incident was reported to Jefferson by Archibald Cary: “A dispute arose at dinner at Chatsworth between Peyton Randolph and his brother Lewis Burwell, who gave the other the lye, on which Peyton struck him, Burwell snatch’d a knife and struck him in the side, but fortunately a rib preventing its proving mortal. He was prevented by the ladies from making a second stroke. You’ll judge what poor Mrs. Randolph must suffer on this unhappy affair, but she is become familiar with misfortune.” (PTJ, I, 250.)

THE ROOTS OF THAT NEAR-OBSESSIONFawn M. Brodie, Thomas Jefferson: An Intimate History (New York, 1998), 48, speculates on the psychological impact of Jefferson’s life at Tuckahoe, though she focuses on his affection for his own home, not his avoidance of conflict, which I think a likely legacy.

“THE WHOLE COMMERCE” Jefferson, Writings, 288.

ANOTHER SMALL CHILDHOOD MOMENTTDLTJ, 23.

THOMAS’S MOTHER, JANE RANDOLPH JEFFERSON Jane Jefferson has long been depicted as a riddle, a mystery at the heart of the story of Thomas Jefferson. There are several reasons for this. For one, Jefferson appears to have spoken more often and more fully about his father than about his mother, leaving more family stories that, combined with the extant public records available for leading colonial men (who held office and left more traces than women of the day), have given us a more detailed sense of Peter Jefferson than we have had for Jane Jefferson. Another reason is the Shadwell fire in 1770 destroyed family papers that may have shed light on the relationship between mother and son. And another reason lies in Jefferson’s larger reticence about the women in his life. Evidence of Jefferson’s musing about either his mother or his wife is sparse. The relatively thin traditions about Jane Jefferson have led some writers to speculate that mother and son were estranged. See, for instance, Brodie, Thomas Jefferson, 40–46.

Reflecting on Merrill Peterson’s observation that “By his own reckoning she was a zero quantity in his life” (Peterson, Thomas Jefferson and the New Nation: A Biography [New York, 1970], 9), Brodie wrote: “No mother is a zero quantity in any son’s life, and the fact that Jefferson, whether deliberately or not, managed to erase all traces of his opinion and feeling for her seems evidence rather of very great influence which he deeply resented, and from which he struggled to escape.” (Brodie, Thomas Jefferson, 43.) More recent scholarship has attempted to revise the estrangement interpretation, most notably Kern, Jeffersons at Shadwell, and Scharff, Women Jefferson Loved,3–57.

“A WOMAN OF A CLEAR” TDLTJ, 21–22.

A METICULOUS RECORD KEEPERKern, Jeffersons at Shadwell, 230.

THOMAS’S SISTER ELIZABETHBrodie, Thomas Jefferson, 48.

“THE MOST FORTUNATE OF US ALL” PTJ, I, 10.

“SHE WAS AN AGREEABLE” Randall, Jefferson, I, 16–17. See also Kern, Jeffersons at Shadwell, 70. From the traditions we have of Jane Jefferson, bluster and threats were out of character. In contrast to her own mother, Mrs. Isham Randolph, Jane Jefferson was described by the family as “mild and peaceful by nature, a person of sweet temper and gentle manners.” (Brodie, Thomas Jefferson, 41.) Even allowing for familial sentimentality, this description of Mrs. Jefferson of Shadwell differs from that of Mrs. Randolph of Dungeness, who was said to be “a stern, strict lady of the old school, much feared and little loved by her children.” Her daughter Jane, however, was different. Ibid., 681. The source of these traditions is Ellen Wayles Randolph.

REBUILT SHADWELL AFTER IT BURNEDKern, Jeffersons at Shadwell, 64.

“HE WAS BORN” Jefferson, Writings, 3.

SURVEYING AND MAPMAKINGIbid., 3–4.

“HE DIED AUGUST 17TH, 1757” Ibid., 4.

A BRIEF MENTION IN A LETTERPTJ, I, 409. “The death of my mother you have probably not heard of,” Jefferson wrote William Randolph. “This happened on the last day of March after an illness of not more than an hour. We suppose it to have been apoplectic.” (Ibid.)

PAYING A CLERGYMANMB, I, 444.

“MY MOTHER’S HOUSE” PTJ, I, 34. The characterization was in a letter Jefferson wrote to John Page.

HE DID NOT MOVEMB, I, 212.

HER YOUNGER BROTHER’S “CONSTANT COMPANION” Randall, Jefferson, I, 40–41. See also TDLTJ, 38–39.

COMMON PASSIONSRandall, Jefferson, I, 41.

JANE SANG HYMNS FOR HER BROTHERTDLTJ, 34.

“HE EVER REGARDED HER” Ibid.

SENT TO STUDY CLASSICSJHT, I, 39–40. See also Randall, Jefferson, I, 17–18.

THE REVEREND WILLIAM DOUGLASJHT, I, 39–40.

JEFFERSON LATER THOUGHT DOUGLASJefferson, Writings, 4.

THE REVEREND JAMES MAURYParton, Life, 17–18.

“A CORRECT CLASSICAL SCHOLAR” Jefferson, Writings, 4.

MAURY DID SPLENDIDLY JHT, I, 40–43.

“WOULD BEGUILE OUR LINGERING HOURS” PTJRS, IV, 671. The letter was written on April 25, 1812.

BORN IN 1743 TJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/research-and-collections/dabney-carr-1743–1773 (accessed 2011). See also TDLTJ, 45–46.

FROM LOUISA COUNTYIbid.

THEY TOOK THE BOOKSParton, Life, 44. My portrait of the friends’ time together is drawn from this page of Parton and from TDLTJ, 45–46.

NO MAN, JEFFERSON RECALLED LATERTJ to Dabney Carr, Jr., January 19, 1816, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

WHOEVER SURVIVED THE OTHERTDLTJ, 45. See also Parton, Life, 44.

DISSERTATION ON EDUCATION Helen D. Bullock, ed., “A Dissertation on Education in the Form of a Letter from James Maury to Robert Jackson, July 17, 1762,” Papers of the Albemarle County Historical Society 2 (1941–42): 36–60. See also Hayes, Road to Monticello, 30–42.

“AN ACQUAINTANCE WITH” Hayes, Road to Monticello, 36.

GREEK AND LATIN Ibid.

REMARKING THAT, GIVEN THE CHOICE TDLTJ, 25.

“AT 14 YEARS OF AGE” Ibid., 26. Yet his mother was alive, and there were no fewer than four executors of his father’s will. (JHT, I, 437–38.) Still, Jefferson apparently could not imagine any one of those men taking the place of his father as patriarch and counselor.

ARRIVED FOR THE 1759–60 HOLIDAYSPTJ, I, 3. The letter describing the visit and his uncle’s counsel is the oldest extant written document of Jefferson’s. (Ibid.)

HOLIDAYS AT CHATSWORTHIbid. For details about the estate itself, see Marc R. Matrana, Lost Plantations of the South (Jackson, Miss., 2009), 26–27.

“BY GOING TO THE COLLEGE” Ibid.

THE TEST FOR POTENTIAL STUDENTSHayes, Road to Monticello, 47.

TWO · WHAT FIXED THE DESTINIES OF MY LIFE

“ENLIGHTENMENT IS MAN’S EMERGENCE” Michael Allen Gillespie, The Theological Origins of Modernity (Chicago, 2008), 258.

“THE BEST NEWS I CAN TELL YOU” John J. Reardon, Peyton Randolph, 1721–1775: One Who Presided (Durham, N.C., 1982), 39.

GAMBLED ON HORSESRandall, Jefferson, I, 23. Jefferson discussed his extracurricular activities in a letter to his grandson Thomas Jefferson Randolph dated November 24, 1808. (Ibid., 22–23.)

WASHINGTON RECEIVED HIS SURVEYING CERTIFICATEWilliam and Mary Alumni Association, http://www.wmalumni.com/general (accessed 2011). A writer for the London Magazine delivered a mixed verdict on the College of William and Mary before Jefferson arrived, writing that while “the masters were men of great knowledge and discretion,” the college could not “yet vie with those excellent universities … of the Massachusetts,” arguing that students were “pampered much more in softness and ease” in Virginia than they were in New England. (Susan H. Godson, The College of William and Mary: A History, I, 1693–1888 [Williamsburg, Va., 1993], 84.)

THE WREN BUILDINGColonial Williamsburg Foundation, http://www.history.org/almanack/places/hb/hbwren.cfm (accessed 2012).

THREE BLOCKS EASTI drew on several sources for this portrait of Williamsburg. In 1724, a professor at William and Mary described the basic scene Jefferson saw in the spring of 1760: “From the church runs a street northward called Palace Street; at the other end of which stands the Palace or Governor’s House, a magnificent structure built at the public expense, finished and beautified with gates, fine gardens, offices, walks, a fine canal, orchards, etc… . This likewise has the ornamental addition of a good cupola or lanthorn, illuminated with most of the town, upon birth-nights, and other nights of occasional rejoicings.” Hugh Jones, The Present State of Virginia (London, 1724), 31.

NOT QUITE HALF A SQUARE MILEI am grateful to Del Moore of the John D. Rockefeller, Jr., Library in Williamsburg for guidance on these details. See John W. Reps, Tidewater Towns: City Planning in Colonial Virginia and Maryland (Williamsburg, Va., 1972); and the eWilliamsburg Map, Colonial Williamsburg Foundation, http://research.history.org/ewilliamsburg2/ (accessed 2012).

A FRENCH TRAVELER SAW “THREE NEGROES” “Journal of a French Traveller in the Colonies, 1765, I,” American Historical Review 26 (July 1921): 745.

“THE FINEST SCHOOL OF MANNERS AND MORALS” “Memoir of Thomas Jefferson Randolph,” Edgehill-Randolph Papers, Collection 1397, Box 11, University of Virginia.

DR. WILLIAM SMALL, A SCOTTISH LAYMANJHT, I, 51–55.

“IT WAS MY GREAT GOOD FORTUNE” Jefferson, Writings, 4. Jefferson added: “He, most happily for me, became soon attached to me, and made me his daily companion when not engaged in the school; and from his conversation I got my first views of the expansion of science, and of the system of things in which we are placed.” (Ibid.)

BORN IN SCOTLAND IN 1734 TJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/Jefferson/William-small (accessed 2011).

A “POLITE, WELL-BRED MAN” Virginia Magazine of History and Biography 16 (1908): 209. This letter, from Stephen Hawtrey to his brother Edward Hawtrey, was written from London on March 26, 1765, and reported a conversation with Small, who had since left America, about William and Mary.

LIVED IN TWO ROOMSIbid., 210.

ETHICS, RHETORIC, AND BELLES LETTRESHayes, Road to Monticello, 50–51.

NATURAL PHILOSOPHYTJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/Jefferson/William-small (accessed 2011).

LECTURING IN THE MORNINGSIbid.

SEMINAR-LIKE SESSIONS IN THE AFTERNOONSIbid.

BACON, LOCKE, NEWTONIbid. See also Hayes, Road to Monticello, 50–56.

KEY INSIGHT OF THE NEW INTELLECTUAL AGEHenry F. May, The Enlightenment in America (New York, 1976), is useful.

“ENLIGHTENMENT IS MAN’S EMERGENCE” Gillespie, Theological Origins of Modernity, 258.

“TO ME … A FATHER” PTJRS, VIII, 200.

STUDIED FIFTEEN HOURS A DAY My portrait of his student days at Williamsburg is drawn from TDLTJ, 31–32; Randall, Jefferson, I, 24–32; and JHT, I, 55–57.

“OF ALL THE CANKERS” PTJ, XI, 250–51.

“KNOWLEDGE,” JEFFERSON SAIDIbid., X, 308.

A VIGOROUS BODY HELPED CREATE A VIGOROUS MINDIbid. “It is of little consequence to store the mind with science if the body be permitted to become debilitated,” Jefferson said. (Ibid.) See also PTJ, VIII, 405–8.

“NOT LESS THAN TWO HOURS” Ibid.

THEIR MORNINGS TO THE LAW Ibid., VIII, 408.

WITH “THE MECHANIC” TDLTJ, 37–38.

A “WALKING ENCYCLOPEDIA” Ibid., 37.

“A LITTLE TOO SHOWY” RANDALL, Jefferson, I, 22.

AN AVUNCULAR TONEIbid., 22–23.

THE MOTTO AT WILLIAMSBURG’S POPULAR RALEIGH TAVERNWillard Sterne Randall, Thomas Jefferson: A Life (New York, 1993), 43. The motto in the tavern was in Latin.

HELD FREQUENT GATHERINGS TDLTJ, 27–28.

HE CALLED FAUQUIER’S “FAMILIAR TABLE” Ibid., 28.

INVITED TO JOIN Randall, Jefferson, I, 30–31. In British America, the architects of revolution were delighted to learn the civilizing arts from their colonial masters. George Washington had a similar experience in northern Virginia, where his connection to the Fairfax family seat of Belvoir introduced him to more sophisticated and cultivated ways of life than he might have otherwise known. (Douglas Southall Freeman, John Alexander Carroll, and Mary Wells Ashworth, George Washington: A Biography, I [New York, 1948], 199–203.)

HE LOVED SCIENCE Ibid., 30–32. “With some allowance he was everything that could have been wished for by Virginia under a royal government,” the Virginia chronicler John Daly Burk wrote in a history published in 1804. “Generous, liberal, elegant in his manners and acquirements, his example left an impression of taste, refinement, and erudition on the character of the colony, which eminently contributed to its present high reputation in the arts.” (Ibid., 30.)

THE STORY WAS TOLDIbid., 31. According to Burk, Fauquier “was but too successful in extending the influence of this pernicious and ruinous practice.” When not in residence at the Palace, it was reported, Fauquier “visited the most distinguished landholders in the colonies, and the rage for playing deep, reckless of time, health, or money, spread like a contagion among a class proverbial for their hospitality, their politeness, and fondness of expense.”

FAUQUIER’S FATHER WAS A HUGUENOT PHYSICIANJHT, I, 76. I am indebted to Malone for this short portrait of Fauquier. See also Parton, Life, 27–29; and “Francis Fauquier (bap. 1703–1768),” The Dictionary of Virginia Biography, http://www.EncyclopediaVirginia.org/Fauquier_Francis_bap_1703–1768 (accessed March 24, 2012).

BECAME A FELLOW OF THE ROYAL SOCIETYJHT, I, 76.

AN UNUSUAL JULY HAILSTORMIbid., 77.

A SCIENTIFIC PAPER “Francis Fauquier (bap. 1703–1768).”

THE LAWYER GEORGE WYTHEImogene E. Brown, American Aristides: A Biography of George Wythe (Rutherford, N.J., 1981) was helpful on Wythe, as was Bruce Chadwick’s I Am Murdered: George Wythe, Thomas Jefferson, and the Killing That Shocked a New Nation (Hoboken, N.J., 2009).

HAWK-NOSEDChadwick, I Am Murdered, 7–9, offers a fine descriptive section on Wythe.

“OF THE MIDDLE SIZE” TDLTJ, 30.

A HOUSE NEAR BRUTON PARISHImogene E. Brown, American Aristides, 87.

“MR. WYTHE CONTINUED” TDLTJ, 28.

EXPENSIVE TASTESImogene E. Brown, American Aristides, 81–82.

“MRS. WYTHE PUTS” Ibid., 82. See also MB, I, 328.

INTRODUCED JEFFERSON TO THE PRACTICE OF LAWRandall, Jefferson, I, 46.

“APART FROM THE INTELLECTUAL” Ibid., 31.

JEFFERSON ALSO INCLUDED HIS COUSINIbid., 22.

RANDOLPH WAS “OF AN AFFABLE” Ibid., 51.

HE ALSO “COMMANDS” Ibid.

“UNDER TEMPTATIONS AND DIFFICULTIES” Ibid., 22.

“VERY HIGH STANDING” Ibid.

MET PATRICK HENRYJohn P. Kaminski, The Founders on the Founders: Word Portraits from the American Revolutionary Era (Charlottesville, Va., 2008), 260–61.

CONCEIVED OF LIFE IN SOCIAL TERMSGordon S. Wood, The Creation of the American Republic (Chapel Hill, N.C., 1998), ix, and Revolutionary Characters: What Made the Founders Different (New York, 2006), 104–7. See also Jack Rakove, Revolutionaries: A New History of the Invention of America (Boston, 2010), 299–302. With industry and skill, Jefferson studied much, but he was no cloistered intellectual or lonely scholar. We often think of him as a grand, solitary figure, alone with his thoughts and his pen and his inventions, shut off in his chambers at Monticello or upstairs in the President’s House. He was very rarely alone, however, and would have thought it odd if he had found himself long in isolation.

“I AM CONVINCED” TDLTJ, 284. The quotation, from a letter to his daughter Polly Jefferson Eppes, continues: “and that every person who retires from free communication with it is severely punished afterwards by the state of mind into which he gets, and which can only be prevented by feeding our sociable principles.” (Ibid.)

A SECRET SOCIETYMB, I, 338.

LONGED FOR INTELLIGENCE PTJ, I, 5.

A YOUNG WOMAN NAMED REBECCAIbid., 6.

THE EPISODE IS CHIEFLY INTERESTINGFor the basic details, see ibid.; for analysis, see JHT, I, 80–86.

RATS AND RAINPTJ, I, 3–6.

COMPARED HIMSELF TO JOBIbid., 3–5.

“ALL THINGS HERE” Ibid., 7.

“WE MUST FALL” Ibid., 15.

JEFFERSON DECIDED TO DECLAREIbid., 11–12.

THE APOLLO ROOM OF THE RALEIGH TAVERNLyon Gardiner Tyler, Williamsburg: The Old Colonial Capital (Richmond, Va., 1907), 232–35.

“I WAS PREPARED” PTJ, I, 11.

HE TRIED TO SPEAKIbid.

A CONVERSATIONIbid., 13–14.

“I ASKED NO QUESTION” Ibid., 14.

“ABOMINABLY INDOLENT” Ibid., 16.

A LETTER TO A FRIEND Ibid., 15–17.

HIS “SCHEME” TO MARRYIbid.

THE WEALTHY JACQUELIN AMBLERAlfred J. Beveridge, The Life of John Marshall, I (Boston, 1916), 149.

“MANY AND GREAT ARE THE COMFORTS” PTJ, I, 16. E. M. Halliday, Understanding Thomas Jefferson (New York, 2001), thinks it unlikely that Jefferson would have availed himself of the obvious means of satisfying his sexual desires (Ibid., 16–17), but his views are as speculative as those suggesting Jefferson might well have done so. Such activity in the elite of his time was hardly unknown.

Kathleen M. Brown, Good Wives, Nasty Wenches, and Anxious Patriarchs: Gender, Race, and Power in Colonial Virginia (Chapel Hill, N.C., 1996), 319–66, offers a compelling account of issues of sexuality and power in the world in which Jefferson grew up and ultimately lived. William Byrd II, the prominent planter, left a diary that included accounts of his sexual designs on women of inferior rank, both white and black. “On one of his first trips to Williamsburg as a councillor,” Brown wrote, “Byrd ‘sent for the wench to clean my room and when I came [to the room] I kissed her and felt her, for which God forgive me.’ Several days later, Byrd kissed Mrs. Chiswell with excessive passion in front of his wife ‘until she [Chiswell] was angry and my wife also was uneasy.’ After that incident, Byrd confined his philandering to private encounters with women who were clearly his social inferiors: He tried unsuccessfully to entice a chambermaid to his room in Williamsburg, engaged in some group ‘sport’ with a drunken Indian woman along with members of his militia, and kissed various women he and his male companions met during their visits to Williamsburg.” After Byrd’s wife died, Brown wrote, “Byrd began to visit prostitutes and initiated several longer affairs with white women who were not of his social rank.” Ultimately these included enslaved women. (Ibid., 331–32.)

For his part, Halliday found it more likely that Jefferson resorted to masturbation. (Halliday, Understanding Thomas Jefferson, 20–21.) Andrew Burstein, Jefferson’s Secrets: Death and Desire at Monticello (New York, 2005), explores the influence of contemporary medical thought about human sexuality on the mature Jefferson. In Burstein’s interpretation, masturbation would have been seen as an exercise in depletion, whereas moderate sexual activity was essential to give “a healthy balance to the body’s internal forces,” Burstein wrote. “Sex was seen much as diet was, part of a regimen of self-control, and important to understand if one was to enjoy a productive life.” (Ibid., 157; see especially 151–88.) In my view, it is as likely that Jefferson, like William Byrd II, took advantage of available women—those in dependent stations such as service or slavery—to experiment sexually.

THREE · ROOTS OF REVOLUTION

“OUR MINDS WERE CIRCUMSCRIBED” Jefferson, Writings, 5.

“MAY WE OUTLIVE OUR ENEMIES” MB, I, 283.

JEFFERSON SENT TO LONDONIbid., 16.

“NO LIBERTY, NO LIFE” Ibid.

THE DEFINITION OF LIBERTYI am indebted to many sources for my analysis of the intellectual, political, and cultural background to the American Revolution. In general, see Bailyn, Origins of American Politics (New York, 1968), and Ideological Origins of the American Revolution; Wood, Creation of the American Republic, 1776–1787, The Radicalism of the American Revolution (New York, 1993), The American Revolution: A History (New York, 2003), and The Idea of America: Reflections on the Birth of the United States (New York, 2011); Lawrence Henry Gipson, The British Empire Before the American Revolution: vol. XIII, The Triumphant Empire: The Empire Beyond the Storm, 1770–1776 (New York, 1967), 171–224, which offers a valuable “Summary of the Series”; Gipson, “The American Revolution as an Aftermath of the Great War for the Empire” in Colbourn and Patterson, American Past in Perspective, I, 103–20; Clinton Rossiter, “Political Theory in the Colonies,” in ibid., 121–31; Page Smith, “David Ramsay and the Causes of the American Revolution,” in ibid., 132–60; T. H. Breen, American Insurgents, American Patriots: The Revolution of the People (New York, 2010); Taylor, American Colonies; Esmond Wright, ed. Causes and Consequences of the American Revolution (Chicago, 1966); Edmund S. Morgan and Helen M. Morgan, The Stamp Act Crisis: Prologue to Revolution (Chapel Hill, N.C., 1995), 6–7; John Ferling, Independence: The Struggle to Set America Free (New York, 2011), 8–51; Morgan, Birth of the Republic, 15–60; Charles M. Andrews, “The American Revolution: An Interpretation,” American Historical Review 31, no. 2 (January 1926): 219–32; and Don Higginbotham, War and Society in Revolutionary America: The Wider Dimensions of Conflict (Columbia, S.C., 1988).

Middlekauff, Glorious Cause, 7–97, covers the origins of the conflict through the Stamp Act Crisis, concluding: “By late August [1765] two major colonies, Virginia and Massachusetts, each in its own way, had vented their anger at the Stamp Act. They in fact had started more than they knew; they had started a fire. Its spread seemed virtually inevitable.” (Ibid., 97.) Taylor, American Colonies, xiv, generally describes the rise of scholarly attention to the Atlantic world. “The Atlantic approach examines the complex and continuous interplay of Europe, Africa, and colonial America through the transatlantic flows of goods, people, plants, animals, capital, and ideas.” (Ibid.) See also Eliga H. Gould and Peter S. Onuf, eds., Empire and Nation: The American Revolution in the Atlantic World(Baltimore, Md., 2005); Edmund S. Morgan, “The American Revolution Considered as an Intellectual Movement” in Wright, Causes and Consequences of the American Revolution, 172–92; and Risjord, Jefferson’s America, 1760–1815, 47–69.

THE ALBANY PLAN OF UNION Walter Isaacson, Benjamin Franklin: An American Life (New York, 2003), 158–62. See also Gipson, “American Revolution as an Aftermath,” 100. Gipson suggested that the American Revolution might have been prevented had the 1754 proposal been accepted. For a critical view of Gipson’s epic series in general and of his thoughts on 1754 in particular, see Patrick Griffin, “In Retrospect: Lawrence Henry Gipson’s ‘The British Empire Before the American Revolution,’ ” Reviews in American History 31, no. 2 (June 2003), 171–83. Griffin wrote: “Was the American Revolution inevitable? Gipson by and large does not fancy such counter-factuals, but he does point to one moment that seemed to offer an opportunity to construct a more enduring imperial scheme: the Albany Plan of Union. Under the aborted plan drawn up in 1754, the American colonies, united together through friendship and common concerns, would be tied to Britain under the Crown but by little else. If Americans, [Gipson] suggests, had embraced this plan, they could have avoided the touchy constitutional issues that led to rebellion.” (Ibid., 176.)

Late in life, Franklin himself saw the failure of the Albany Plan as a critical step on the road to revolution. “The colonies so united would have been sufficiently strong to have defended themselves,” he said. “There would then have been no need of troops from England; of course the subsequent pretense for taxing America, and the bloody contest it occasioned, would have been avoided.” (Isaacson, Benjamin Franklin, 161–62.) See also Middlekauff, Glorious Cause, 32.

ITS AUTHOR, BENJAMIN FRANKLIN Isaacson, Benjamin Franklin, 158–62. The proposal was the brainchild of Franklin, who wrote of it: “By this plan the general government was to be administered by a president-general appointed and supported by the crown, and a grand council was to be chosen by the representatives of the people of the several colonies, met in their respective assemblies.… Its fate was singular: the assemblies did not adopt it as they all thought there was too much prerogative in it, and in England it was judged to have too much of the democratic.” (A Benjamin Franklin Reader, ed. Walter Isaacson [New York, 2003], 512–13.)

HE INHERITED HIS FATHER’S EDITIONFrancis D. Cogliano, Thomas Jefferson: Reputation and Legacy (Charlottesville, Va., 2006), 22.

INEXTRICABLY LINKED WITH THE STORY OF ENGLANDIbid., 22–24.

A CONSTANT STRUGGLE TO PRESERVE INDIVIDUAL LIBERTYTrevor Colbourn, The Lamp of Experience: Whig History and the Intellectual Origins of the American Revolution (Indianapolis, 1998), 3–47. See also Cogliano, Thomas Jefferson, 21.

HISTORY WAS “PHILOSOPHY” Cogliano, Thomas Jefferson, 21. Bolingbroke attributed the aphorism to Dionysius of Halicarnassus.

HISTORY, THEN, MATTERED ENORMOUSLYIn Query XIV of his Notes on the State of Virginia, Jefferson offered an expansive vision of the role history should play in the lives of nations and of peoples: Nothing was more important, he said, than “rendering the people safe, as they are the ultimate, guardians of their own liberty.” The reading of history was essential for this enterprise.

History by apprising them of the past will enable them to judge of the future; it will avail them of the experience of other times and other nations; it will qualify them as judges of the actions and designs of men; it will enable them to know ambition under every disguise it may assume; and knowing it, to defeat its views. In every government on earth is some trace of human weakness, some germ of corruption and degeneracy, which cunning will discover, and wickedness insensibly open, cultivate, and improve. Every government degenerates when trusted to the rulers of the people alone. The people themselves are its only safe depositories. And to render even them safe their minds must be improved to a certain degree. (Jefferson, Writings, 274.)

Cogliano, Thomas Jefferson, 26, quotes this passage from the Notes, concluding: “In Jefferson’s view knowledge of history was necessary for the people of Virginia if they were to protect their liberty. It was a political necessity in a republic.” (Ibid.)

SOCIETIES EVERYWHERE WERE LIKELY DIVIDEDIbid., 22–26.

THE DRAMA OF THE ENGLISH CIVIL WARSee Alfred F. Young, “English Plebeian Culture and Eighteenth-Century American Radicalism,” in The Origins of Anglo-American Radicalism, ed. Margaret Jacob and James Jacob (London, 1984), 187–212, for an account of the cultural impact of the Cromwellian legacy in AmeriCA.

LIVED IN AN ATMOSPHEREIbid., 131. Bailyn wrote: “Their intellectual world framed by the concept of the mixed constitution, the colonists found ready at hand, in the terms of that powerful paradigm, a means of comprehending the disturbances around them. Some, reflecting on the socio-constitutional structure of colonial society, were struck by the discrepancies between the ideal and the real, the English model and the colonial duplicates, and attributed their ills to these discrepancies. It was often noted that the all-important middle order, the element of aristocracy—so vital, according to the standard constitutional theory, in keeping the extremes of power and liberty from tearing each other apart—was not properly represented in the colonies, in certain cases did not exist at all.” (Ibid.)

SECURITY COULD BE FOUND ONLYIbid., 151–52. Bailyn wrote: “England stood almost completely alone in the Old World, sustained in its distinctive role, so far successfully, by the skillful rebalancing of its constitution in the settlement that had followed the Glorious Revolution. But that settlement had not extended, fully, to America. The phalanx of strong guarantees against the authoritarian power of the state was missing here, and the situation here, consequently, was peculiarly dangerous, peculiarly delicate, peculiarly demanding of the powers of vigilance and resistance.” (Ibid.)

THE HISTORY AMERICANS WANTED Ibid., 106. On the question of ideology and power, Bailyn wrote:

I have suggested that a paradox lay at the heart of provincial politics in eighteenth-century America: on the one hand an enlargement, beyond what was commonly thought compatible with liberty, of the legal authority possessed by the first branch of government, the executive; and on the other hand, a radical reduction of the actual power in politics exercised by the executive, a reduction accounted for by the weakness of the so-called “influence” by which the crown and its ministers in England actually managed politics in that country. At once regressive and progressive—carrying forward into the Augustan world powers associated with Stuart autocracy yet embodying reforms that would remain beyond the reach of reformers in England for another century or more—American politics in the mid-eighteenth century was a thoroughgoing anomaly. Conflict was inevitable: conflict between a presumptuous prerogative and an overgreat democracy, conflict that had no easy resolution and that raised in minds steeped in the political culture of eighteenth-century Britain the specter of catastrophe. (Ibid.)

Bailyn found the impetus for Revolution in the degree to which the colonists believed America was not fully sharing in the classic eighteenth-century balance of monarchy, aristocracy, and commons. It was not, in other words, a dislike of or objection to the English constitution but rather disappointment that the New World was not allowed to live wholly within the post–Glorious Revolution system. “What the colonial opposition at every stage saw in contemplating the role of government, of power, of the executive, in the colonies were evidences—scattered to be sure, fading in and out of focus, rising and falling in importance, but palpable evidences nevertheless—of … conspiracy against the constitutional guarantees of liberty.” (Ibid., 136.)

RAPIN’S MULTIVOLUME HISTORY OF ENGLANDColbourn, Lamp of Experience, 43–44.

PETER JEFFERSON WAS “A STAUNCH” Randall, Jefferson, I, 14.

FREEDOM-LOVING SAXONSColbourn, Lamp of Experience, 237–43. For details about the longstanding Whig argument, see Joseph J. Ellis, American Sphinx, 32–34. The section is an excellent explanation of the theory, its origins, and how, in Ellis’s words, “Jefferson clung to the theory with nearly obsessive tenacity throughout his life, though even he admitted that ‘I had never been able to get any one to agree with me but Mr. Wythe.’ ” (Ellis, American Sphinx, 33.)

JEFFERSON AND LIKE-MINDED AMERICANSBailyn, Origins of American Politics, 159–61. Within two years of the Stamp Act repeal, in 1766, Bailyn notes:

The train of events that manifestly led to Independence was clearly visible: Stamp Act, Townshend Duties, Massacre. But these enactments and the other famous events of the period are not self-evidently incendiary. The stamp tax was not a crushing tax; it was generally considered to be an innocuous and judicious form of taxation. The Townshend Duties, which were also far from crippling, were withdrawn. And the Massacre was the result of a kind of urban riot common both in England and America throughout the century. Yet these events were in fact incendiary; they did in fact lead to the overthrow of constituted authority and, ultimately, to the transformation of American life. For they were not in some pure sense simply objective events, and they were not perceived by immaculate minds aloft in a cosmic perch. To minds steeped in the literature of eighteenth-century history and political theory, these events, charged with ideology, were the final realization of tendencies and possibilities that had been seen and spoken of, with concern and foreboding, since the turn of the seventeenth century. There was no calm before the storm. The storm was continuous, if intermittent, throughout the century. An inflamed, unstable politics, incapable of duplicating the integration and control that “influence” had created in England, had called forth the full range of advanced ideas, not as theories simply, not as warnings merely of some ultimate potentiality, but as explanations of present conflicts, bitter conflicts, conflicts between a legally overgreat executive and an irrepressible though shifting opposition.

The Seven Years’ War was the catalyst.

For before 1763 there had been no relentless pressures within the system of Anglo-American politics, no sustained drive or inescapable discipline guided by central policy. When, after the conclusion of the Seven Years’ War, that impetus and control appeared in the form of a revamped colonial system with more effective agencies of enforcement; when the system finally tightened and the pressure was maintained; and when, associated with this, evidence accumulated in the colonies that corruption was softening the vigilance that had heretofore preserved England’s own mixed constitution—that an escalation of ministerial power initially stimulated by John Stuart, Earl of Bute, was taking place in England itself—when all of this happened, the latent tendencies of American politics moved swiftly to their ultimate fulfillment. (IBId.)

AT THE CONCLUSION OF THE FRENCH AND INDIAN WARFred Anderson, Crucible of War: The Seven Years’ War and the Fate of Empire in British North America, 1754–1766 (New York, 2001), is a masterful account of the origins, course, and implications of the war. See also Middlekauff, Glorious Cause, 17–73, and Risjord, Jefferson’s America, 1760–1815, 71–96. Risjord wrote:

At the close of the French and Indian War in 1763, Great Britain stood at the pinnacle of its power. The peace conference at Paris that year was a triumphant recognition of British conquests in seven bloody years of war. The French empire in North America had disappeared; from Canada to the Floridas, the territory east of the Mississippi River was under British dominion. Yet … it almost seemed as if the empire had been won too quickly and too easily. Unaccustomed to managing dominions flung in desultory fashion around the world, British politicians were slow to comprehend the meaning of their victory and even slower in developing a comprehensive worldview to match their world empire. They remained wedded to local politics, encumbered by petty rivalries, stubborn, and unimaginative. As a result, the first British empire began to crumble almost as soon as it was fully formed.… The very size of the empire set loose centrifugal forces that had to be countered with more efficient administrative ties. (Ibid., 71.)

EMPIRES ARE EXPENSIVE Risjord, Jefferson’s America, 1760–1815, 71–72. “Adding to the sense of urgency was the enormous debt Britain had incurred in fighting the war and financing allies, such as Frederick the Great of Prussia. Interest on the debt alone amounted to $5 million a year, while the government’s annual income was little more than $8 million.” (Ibid.) As Middlekauff pointed out, Britain had fought three wars since the Glorious Revolution, each with France and her allies “in three lengthy periods,” leading to rising debt and military and administrative costs. (Middlekauff, Glorious Cause, 23–26.) The landowning interest in Parliament understandably pressed for taxes on imports. “Excises on a vast array of items—soap and salt, beer and spirits, cider, paper, and silk, among other things consumed by ordinary and mighty folk alike—replaced land as the largest source of revenue from taxes.… Customs, that is, duties on trade, also increased as commerce grew in the century.” (Ibid., 23.)

SHOULD BEAR MORE OF THE COSTMorgan and Morgan, Stamp Act CrisiS, 6.

TROOPS WERE TO REMAIN IN NORTH AMERICAIbid., 21–23.

GRANTS OF THE WESTERN LANDSRisjord, Jefferson’s America, 1760–1815, 72–74. See also Thomas Perkins Abernethy, Western Lands and the American Revolution (New York, 1959); and Middlekauff, Glorious Cause, 58–60. To Middlekauff, “Among the white Americans no group was more aggressive or greedy than the Virginians.” (Ibid., 58.) A commonly cited example of the colonists’ holdings is that of the Ohio Company, whose investors included George Washington, which had received 200,000 acres whose value was now endangered. (IBId.)

AN UPRISING OF OHIO VALLEY INDIAN TRIBESMiddlekauff, Glorious Cause, 59–60. The campaign was led by Pontiac, chief of the Ottawa. See Gregory Evans Dowd, War Under Heaven: Pontiac, the Indian Nations, and the British Empire (Baltimore, Md., 2004).

SOUGHT TO GIVE THE KING THE POWERIbid., 60. The Proclamation of 1763, issued on October 7, closed the West to white settlement and established Quebec, East Florida, and West Florida. (Ibid.) According to Risjord,

Seeking to reserve all lands west of the Appalachian ridge for the tribes, the proclamation prohibited any further land grants or sales in the West without royal license and ordered the removal of all white squatters… . The result, it was hoped, would prevent border warfare and reduce the expense of maintaining an army in America. The ministry intended to negotiate further land cessions from the Native Americans, thus permitting a gradual advance of the frontier; and the proclamation itself permitted land grants to veterans of the French war. Despite these loopholes, colonists—especially the Virginians, who had the best legal claims to the West, were outraged… . The proclamation was the first seed of imperial disunion. (Risjord, Jefferson’s America, 1760–1815, 73–74.)

ENFORCEMENT OF NAVIGATION ACTSRisjord, Jefferson’s America, 1760–1815, 74–75.

A CAMPAIGN TO USE “WRITS OF ASSISTANCE” Ibid. See also Middlekauff, Glorious Cause, 65, and Oliver M. Dickerson, The Navigation Acts and the American Revolution (Philadelphia, 1951), 172–89.

THE SUGAR ACT OF 1764 Morgan and Morgan, Stamp Act Crisis, 21–40. See also Middlekauff, Glorious Cause, 64–66.

LOWERED THE TAX ON MOLASSES Morgan and Morgan, Stamp Act Crisis, 24.

MADEIRA WINE, A FAVORITE OF THE YOUNG JEFFERSONIbid., 25. We know about Jefferson’s affection for the wine from his remarks about Mrs. Wythe’s entertaining (see above) and TJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/research-and-collections/wine (accessed 2011). After his residence in France in early middle age, he lost his preference for MadEIRA.

ATTEMPT TO ESTABLISH A PRINCIPLE AND A PRECEDENTIbid., 27.

HAD RISEN TO ANNOUNCEIbid., 54–55.

JAMES OTIS’S RIGHTS OF THE BRITISHMorgan, Birth of the Republic, 18.

WYTHE DRAFTED A PETITIONJHT, I, 91–92. See also Morgan and Morgan, Stamp Act Crisis, 97.

“THAT THE PEOPLE” Morgan and Morgan, Stamp Act Crisis, 39–40.

HAD LEFT WILLIAMSBURG FOR HOMEHenry Mayer, A Son of Thunder: Patrick Henry and the American Republic (New York, 2001), 81.

“YET A STUDENT” Jefferson, Writings, 5.

A NUMBER OF ANTI–STAMP ACT RESOLUTIONSMayer, Son of Thunder, 82–85. See also Morgan and Morgan, Stamp Act Crisis, 95–97.

STOOD AT THE DOOR OF THE HOUSEJefferson, Writings, 5.

“GREAT INDEED” Ibid., 6. Henry’s talents as a “popular orator,” Jefferson wrote, were “such as I have never heard from any other man.” (IbID.)

HENRY SAID TARQUIN AND CAESAR“Journal of a French Traveller in the Colonies, 1765, I,” 745.

ACCORDING TO THE SINGLE CONTEMPORANEOUS ACCOUNT Ibid. A grander account, oft-repeated, appeared in William Wirt, Sketches of the Life and Character of Patrick Henry (Philadelphia, 1878), 78–83. In 1921 the account of the French traveler emerged. (Morgan and Morgan, Stamp Act Crisis, 93–95.)

“HE APPEARED TO ME” Jefferson, Writings, 6.

“SPOKE TREASON” “Journal of a French Traveller in the Colonies, 1765, I,” 745.

“HE WAS READY TO ASK PARDON” IBID.

“MOST BLOODY” Mayer, Son of Thunder, 85.

THE “FIFTH RESOLUTION” Morgan and Morgan, Stamp Act Crisis, 96–97.

MEN SUCH AS PEYTON RANDOLPHReardon, Peyton Randolph, 21–23.

“BY GOD” Ibid., 22.

THE SENSE THAT THEY HAD LOST CONTROLMorgan and Morgan, Stamp Act Crisis, 97–98, explains the dynamics well. “Why Randolph, Robinson, Robert Carter Nicholas, and even Richard Bland and George Wythe, all of whom are said to have opposed the resolutions, should have been so hostile to them is not apparent,” wrote Morgan and Morgan.

George Wythe, who had drawn the petition to the House of Commons, told Jefferson that his first draft had required toning down because the other members of the committee thought it treasonable. And Richard Bland was soon to express in print a view of Parliament’s authority which was at least as restricted as that taken in the resolutions. The argument of the opposition … was that the petitions of the preceding year were a sufficient statement of the colonial position and that no further step should be taken until some answer was received to these. But this argument was specious, for the Burgesses knew that the petitions had not received a hearing. In all probability, the opposition is not to be explained so much by the measure itself as by the men who were backing it. Henry and his friends were upstarts in Virginia politics, and their introduction of the resolves constituted a challenge to the established leaders of the House of Burgesses. (IbID.)

HENRY LEFT THE CAPITALMayer, Son of Thunder, 88. Mayer referred to Henry’s early exit as “unaccountab[le].” (IBID.)

ARRIVED AT THE CHAMBER EARLYPTJRS, VII, 544–51. See also Morgan and Morgan, Stamp Act Crisis, 97–98.

EXAMINING THE RECORDS OF THE HOUSEIbid. “The cautious leaders found themselves arguing for quiet submission in the most angry terms,” wrote Henry Mayer. “This was no time for hot-headed, ill-considered, and possibly treasonous assertion, they insisted.” (Mayer, Son of Thunder, 85.)

FAUQUIER WROTE THE BOARD OF TRADEMorgan and Morgan, Stamp Act Crisis, 98.

THE ANNUAL BIRTH-NIGHT BALL “Journal of a French Traveller in the Colonies, 1765, I,” 746. See also Hayes, Road to Monticello, 81.

TO BEND THE NATURAL WORLDJHT, I, 115–16. See also Parton, Life, 42.

“WILD AND ROMANTIC” PTJRS, I, 386.

IN OCTOBER 1765 JHT, I, 115.

“LAUDABLE AND USEFUL” IBID.

“CLEARING THE GREAT FALLS” PTJ, I, 88.

HELPED BRING A MARYLAND PUBLISHERHayes, Road to Monticello, 88. Hayes cites Isaiah Thomas, The History of Printing in America: With a Biography of Printers and an Account of Newspapers (New York, 1970), 556.

“UNTIL THE BEGINNING” Jeffrey L. Pasley, ‘The Tyranny of Printers’: Newspaper Politics in the Early American Republic (Charlottesville, Va., 2003), 37.

ONTASSETE, THE CHEROKEE CHIEFJefferson, Writings, 1263.

WHO CROSSED THE ATLANTIC IN 1762 JHT, I, 60–61.

“THE MOON WAS IN FULL SPLENDOR” Jefferson, Writings, 1263.

“ONE OF THE CHOICE ONES” PTJ, VIII, 181.

“HIS POWERS OF CONVERSATION WERE GREAT” Randall, Jefferson, I, 45.

THE STORY OF A “MOST INTELLIGENT” Ibid., 45–46.

MARTHA HAD MARRIED HIS FRIEND DABNEY CARRMB, I, 21.

HIS SISTER JANE DIEDRandall, Jefferson, I, 41.

“THE LOSS OF SUCH A SISTER” TDLTJ, 38–39.

THE ENGLISH POET WILLIAM SHENSTONEMB, I, 247.

“AH, JOANNA” Ibid. See also Hayes, Road to Monticello, 87–88.

BEGAN HIS GARDEN BOOKGB, 1.

“PURPLE HYACINTH” IBID.

“PUCKOON FLOWERS FALLEN” IBID.

AN EXCURSION NORTH PTJ, I, 18–21. See also JHT, I, 98–101.

WITH ELBRIDGE GERRYJHT, I, 100.

BROKE AWAY FROM HIMPTJ, I, 19.

TERRIBLE RAINSIBID.

FORDING A STREAMIBID.

STOPPING IN ANNAPOLIS IBID.

“I WAS SURPRISED” Ibid., 19–20.

“I WOULD GIVE YOU” Ibid., 20.

PARLIAMENT HAD STOOD DOWNMorgan and Morgan, Stamp Act Crisis, 279–92.

“IN ALL CASES WHATSOEVER” Ibid., 288.

CASES TOOK HIM Frank L. Dewey, Thomas Jefferson, Lawyer (Charlottesville, Va., 1987), covers this aspect of his lifE WeLL.

HIS SISTER MARTHA WROTE HIM GB, 6.

HIS CARNATIONS WERE IN BLOOMIBID.

CALCULATED HOW MUCH HAYIbId., 7.

A BRIGHT, ENTHUSIASTIC “He pursued the law with an eager industry,” said Edmund Randolph. “Reserved toward the world at large, to his intimate friends he showed a peculiar sweetness of temper and by them was admired and beloved.… He panted after the fine arts and discovered a taste in them not easily satisfied with such scanty means as existed in a colony.… It constituted a part of Mr. Jefferson’s pride to run before the times in which he lived.” (Willard Sterne Randall, Thomas Jefferson, 100.)

A BOTTLE OF WHISKEY AND A SHIRTJHT, I, 123.

“HE SAW [FRAME]” IBid.

FOUR · TEMPTATIONS AND TRIALS

“YOU WILL PERCEIVE THAT” JHT, I, 448.

“ALL MEN ARE BORN FREE” Gordon-Reed, Hemingses of Monticello, 100.

PETER JEFFERSON HAD MADE WALKER’S FATHERJHT, I, 449. Malone devotes an appendix to this volume to what he called “The Walker Affair, 1768–1809.” (Ibid., 447–51.) See also Jon Kukla, Mr. Jefferson’s Women (New York, 2007), 41–63, for an extended discussion of the Walker-Jefferson sToRY.

“WE HAD PREVIOUSLY” IBID.

DAUGHTER OF BERNARD MOORERobert A. Lancaster, Jr., Historic Virginia Homes and Churches (Philadelphia, 1915), 266–67.

“JACK WALKER IS ENGAGED” PTJ, I, 15.

THE ABSENCE OF HIS HORSES IBId.

DATED FROM “DEVILSBURG” Ibid., 14.

“BUT I HEAR” IbiD., 15.

THE FIRST WEEK OF JUNE JHT, I, 449.

“THE FRIEND OF MY HEART” Ibid.

BY 1768 THE WALKERS WERE LIVINGIbid., 154.

BOUND FOR FORT STANWIXIbid., 449.

APPOINTED “MR. JEFFERSON … MY NEIGHBOR” IBID.

DEPARTED FOR NEW YORKKukla, Mr. Jefferson’s WomEN, 51.

ABOUT TWO YEARS YOUNGERIbiD., 44.

SEEMS TO HAVE FALLEN IN LOVEJHT, I, 449–50, details the Walkers’ version of events. As noted below, Jefferson conceded his culpability though he is not known to have commented on the particulars of the Walkers’ acCOUnt.

JOHN WALKER RECALLED Ibid., 449.

“RENEWED HIS CARESSES” IBid.

JOHN COLES, A GREAT HUNTERThe Virginia Magazine of History and Biography 7 (1900): 101.

“HE PRETENDED TO BE SICK” JHT, I, 449.

CONFIRMED THE WALKER STORYIbid., 448.

AFTER A POLITICAL BREAKIbid., 447–48.

AN INCORRECT THING TO DOIbid., 448.

A GLORIOUS AUTUMN MB, I, 73.

DAVIES, A PRESBYTERIAN CLERGYMANLynn Gardiner Tyler, Williamsburg: The Old Colonial Capital (Richmond, Va., 1907), 230.

OFFERINGS IN THE CAPITALMB, I, 73.

BRINGING THE ITALIAN MUSICIAN FRANCIS ALBERTIIbid., 70.

FAUQUIER DIED AT THE GOVERNOR’S PALACEIbiD., 97.

REGRET THAT HIS SLAVES WOULD HAVE TO BE SOLDIbID.

HE “MAY BECOME MORE USEFUL” William and Mary College Quarterly Historical Magazine, VII, ed. Lyon G. Tyler (Richmond, Va., 1900), 174.

FAUQUIER’S BURIAL FIVE DAYS LATERThe Official Papers of Francis Fauquier, I (Charlottesville, Va., 1980), xxXVIiI.

“THE ABLEST MAN” Jefferson, WritinGS, 33.

DETERMINED TO MAKE HIMSELF PLEASANTJHT, I, 139.

“CHARMING, CHARMING!” IBID.

HAPPILY JOINED THEMIBID.

A HEAVILY BLACK-BORDERED BOXThe Virginia Gazette, March 10, 1768.

THE EIGHTH INSTALLMENT IBiD.

“LET US THEN TAKE ANOTHER STEP” Milton E. Flower, John Dickinson: Conservative Revolutionary (Charlottesville, Va., 1983), 66–67.

“LEVEL 250 FT. SQUARE” GB, 12–13.

REPORTED THOMAS JEFFERSON’S ELECTIONJHT, I, 129–31.

THE TOWNSHEND ACTSMorgan, Birth of the Republic, 34–35.

A SENSE OF URGENCYJHT, I, 134–37.

SUMMONED THE BURGESSESIbid., 136.

WALKED TO THE APOLLO ROOMIbid., 137.

LEAD BUST OF SIR WALTER RALEIGHTyler, Williamsburg: Old Colonial CapitaL, 233.

THE VIRGINIANS HAD A PLAN PTJ, I, 27–31.

THEY WOULD NOT IMPORT OR CONSUMEIbid., 27–31. The signatories to this agreement pledged “to be frugal in the use and consumption of British manufactures” in the hope that “the merchants and manufacturers of Great-Britain may, from motives of interest, friendship, and justice, be engaged to exert themselves to obtain for us a redress of those grievances under which the trade and inhabitants of America at present labour.” (Ibid.) A provocative document, but in the spring of 1769 Jefferson, who signed it, and most of his colleagues were still far from revolution. In the Apollo Room after the adoption of the Nonimportation Resolutions, the assembled legislators drank toasts to the royal family, to Lord Botetourt, to “a speedy and lasting union between Great-Britain and her colonies,” and to the author of the Letters from a Farmer in Pennsylvania. (Ibid., 31) It was, to say the least, a confusinG TIME.

ACCOMPANYING HIS MOTHER Parton, LiFE, 99.

THE SLAVE REPLIEDTDLTJ, 43.

THE BURNED BOOKSPTJ, I, 35.

“WOULD TO GOD” IBID.

DESPERATE, EVEN FRANTIC Ibid., 34–38.

HE CONTEMPLATED MOVINGIbid., 35. “If this conflagration, by which I am burned out of a home,” he said, “had come before I had advanced so far in preparing another, I do not know but I might have cherished some treasonable thoughts of leaving these my native hills.” (IbID.)

HE BLEAKLY ALLUDED TO ITIbID.

THE SUMMIT OF HIS MOUNTAINGB, 16–19.

CREATED AN ORCHARDIbid., 15. His thought was to build and move into a house he described to his uncle as “another habitation which I am about to erect, and on a plan so contracted as that I shall have but one spare bedchamber for whatever visitants I may have.” He was ready for a demanding pace: “Nor have I reason to expect at any future day to pass a greater proportion of my time at home.” What he called the “way to and from Williamsburg” was to be a familiar one. (PTJ, I, 24.)

“YOU BEAR YOUR MISFORTUNE” PTJ, I, 38.

“CARRY ON, AND PRESERVE” Ibid. John Page sensed, too, that Jefferson was applying his reading of the ancients to the destruction of a whole domestic world. “I have heard of your loss and heartily condole with you, but am much pleased with the philosophy you manifest.” (Ibid.) As philosophical as Jefferson tried to be, the pain was still there, and his thoughts turned to other hearths and other lives. He idealized his brother-in-law’s situation. Dabney Carr, he told Page, “speaks, thinks, and dreams of nothing but his young son. This friend of ours, Page, in a very small house, with a table, half a dozen chairs, and one or two servants, is the happiest man in the universe.” (Ibid., 36.)

AN ADVERTISEMENT JEFFERSON PLACEDPTJ, I, 33.

WOULD OWN MORE THAN 600 SLAVES Stanton, “Those Who Labor for My Happiness,” 106. Writing of the difficulties of historical work on slavery at Monticello, Stanton noted: “To reconstruct the world of Monticello’s African Americans is a challenging task. Only six images of men and women who lived there in slavery are known, and their own words are preserved in just four reminiscences and a handful of letters. Archaeological excavations are unearthing fascinating evidence of the material culture of Monticello’s black families, and since 1993, steps have been taken to record the oral histories of their descendants. Without the direct testimony of most of the African American residents of Monticello, we must try to hear their voices in the sparse records of Jefferson’s Farm Book and the often biased accounts and letters dealing with labor management and through the inherited memories of those who left Monticello for lives of freedom.” (Ibid.) See also Cassandra Pybus, “Thomas Jefferson and Slavery,” in Cogliano, ed., A Companion to Thomas Jefferson, 271–83. A new work is Henry Wiencek, Master of the Mountain: Thomas Jefferson and His Slaves (New York, 2012). Wiencek was kind to share a galley of his book with me; he offers a bracing argument about Jefferson and slavery—one that is of a piece with my contention that Jefferson was driven to control and exert power over the world around him. “The regime at Monticello was far crueler than we have been led to believe; but more important, Jefferson’s financial letters and accounts reveal his icy calculus of slavery’s profits. He calculated he was getting a 4% increase in capital assets per year on the births of black children. He urged a neighbor to invest in slaves. He financed the rebuilding of Monticello with a $2,000 ‘slave-equity’ loan from a Dutch banking house. Far from being stuck or ensnared in slavery, Jefferson embraced it. He modernized slavery, diversified it, industrialized it. Through him we can see why slavery survived the Revolution and how it emerged as a robust and adaptable component of the American economy.” (Henry Wiencek to author, June 27, 2012.)

INHERITED 150 Stanton, “Those who labor for My Happiness,” 106.

BOUGHT ROUGHLY 20 IBiD.

MOST OF THE OTHERS WERE BORN INTO SLAVERY ON HIS LANDS IBid.

FROM 1774 TO 1826 IbID.

THE CASE OF SAMUEL HOWELL V. WADE NETHERLAND John C. Miller, The Wolf by the Ears: Thomas Jefferson and Slavery (Charlottesville, Va., 1991), 4–5. See also Gordon-Reed, Hemingses of Monticello, 99–101.

“I MADE ONE EFFORT” Jefferson, WritiNGS, 5.

CRAFTED A BILLJHT, I, 121–22, and Miller, Wolf by the EarS, 4–5.

UNILATERAL AUTHORITY TO FREE A SLAVEMiller, Wolf by the Ears, 4. Miller wrote: “For half a century, manumission had been permitted only with the consent of the governor and council; Jefferson sought to give every slaveowner the right to free his slaves if he so desired.” (IBID.)

“MERITORIOUS SERVICES” Gordon-Reed, Hemingses of Monticello, 109. As Gordon-Reed wrote, the statute governing manumission, in effect since 1723, stated: “No negro, mulatto or Indian slaves shall be set free upon any pretense whatsoever, except for some meritorious services, to be adjudged and allowed by the governor and council.” (IBID.)

JEFFERSON ASKED RICHARD BLANDMiller, Wolf by the EARS, 5.

THE HOWELL CASEIbid., 5–6. See also Gordon-Reed, Hemingses of Monticello, 99–101.

“EVERYONE COMES INTO” Gordon-Reed, Hemingses of MonticellO, 100.

LOST THE CASEMiller, Wolf by the Ears, 5–6.

“I REFLECT OFTEN” Ibid., 35–36.

FIVE · A WORLD OF DESIRE AND DENIAL

“HARMONY IN THE MARRIAGE” PTJ, XXX, 15.

“A LITHE AND EXQUISITELY” TDLTJ, 43.

“HER COMPLEXION WAS BRILLIANT” Randall, Jefferson, I, 63–64.

“GOOD SENSE AND GOOD NATURE” PTJ, I, 66.

ONE KINSMAN THOUGHT THE JEFFERSONS “A COUPLE” Ibid., 84. The kinsman was Robert Skipwith, who married a sister of Martha’s. By the middle of 1771, Jefferson was writing Skipwith at the Forest: “Offer prayers for me too at that shrine to which, tho’ absent, I pay continual devotion.” (Ibid., 78.) In reply, on September 20, 1771, Skipwith said: “My sister Skelton, Jefferson I wish it were, with the greatest fund of good nature has all that sprightliness and sensibility which promises to ensure you the greatest happiness mortals are capable of enjoying.” (Ibid., 84.)

“THE BEGINNINGS OF KNOWLEDGE” Parton, Life, 128.

HE CONFIDED IN HER ABOUT POLITICS PTJ, I, 247.

PATTY’S “PASSIONATE ATTACHMENT” TDLTJ, 343.

JEFFERSON’S “CONDUCT AS A HUSBAND” IBId.

PATTY ONCE COMPLAINED THAT SOME INSTANCEIBiD.

“BUT IT WAS ALWAYS SO” IBId.

LIKED HAVING HER WAYKukla, Mr. Jefferson’s WomeN, 72.

JEFFERSON ONCE GENTLY REBUKEDTDLTJ, 343.

“MY DEAR, A FAULT IN SO YOUNG” Ibid., 344.

“WARM GUSH OF GRATITUDE” IbID.

“MY GRANDMOTHER JEFFERSON” TJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/jefferson/martha-wayles-skelton-jeffeRSOn.

“MUCH BETTER … IF OUR COMPANION VIEWS A THING” PTJ, XXX, 15.

HAD RISEN FAR IN VIRGINIA Gordon-Reed, Hemingses of Monticello, 57–90, is a brilliant, groundbreaking account of John Wayles’s background in England, his life in Virginia, and his relationship with Elizabeth HEMINgs.

POOR, UNDISTINGUISHED FAMILY Ibid., 59.

THE CHILD LIVED BUT THE MOTHER DID NOT Ibid., 77. The first Mrs. Wayles lost a set of twins before giving birth to Patty. (IBID.)

NEVER WANTED HER OWN CHILDREN TO FACEIbid., 145. Gordon-Reed wrote: “Her reported words do not appear to have been motivated by a desire to die knowing that her husband would in some perverse way always belong just to her. This was not about him. It was about her children. She was concerned about the prospect of her daughters’ growing up under the control of a woman who was not their mother.” (IBID.)

WAYLES WAS A DEBT COLLECTORIbid., 68–69.

“MR. WAYLES WAS A LAWYER” Jefferson, WritiNGS, 5.

PROVOKED ANXIETY AMONG THE PLANTERS Gordon-Reed, Hemingses of Monticello, 69–71. One day Wayles was trying to track down Jefferson kinsman Thomas Mann Randolph only to be informed that Randolph had (conveniently, given the nature of Wayles’s business) “gone to some springs on the frontiers to spend the summer.” (IBID.)

A MOCKING POEMIbiD., 74.

A CONTROVERSIAL MURDER TRIALIbid., 74–76. In the frenzy of the hour, Wayles clearly had enemies with a motive to say the most extreme and negative things they could. He did, however, come from obscurity—there are suggestions in the written record that he arrived in America as a “servant boy” to a richer family—and debt collecting and slave trading were not considered entirely gentlemanly lines of work. (Ibid., 75.)

Understanding that he was not engaged in business calculated to endear him to the elite of his time and place—an elite to which he very much wanted to belong—Wayles had a political sense of his own. One of the things political people do (whether they are political in the vote-seeking sense or simply in the context of seeking status among one’s neighbors) is take advantage of whatever avenue may be at hand. Along with the purchase and sale of slaves, the church was one of the most widely shared aspects of life among rich Virginians. Believers or not, prominent men—including Jefferson—were expected to play a role in the life of one’s parish. Wayles apparently decided that he would assume such a role, thus building up social capital among those who may have seen him mainly as the face of the creditor enemy or as, in the words from The Virginia Gazette, “ill-bred.” He took pains to help fill the pulpit on different occasions. In a letter, a contemporary reported these efforts of Wayles’s, writing: “Mr. Wayles is extremely kind in doing what he can.… He has engaged Parson Masson already and designs likewise to get Parson Duglish, he says to make us laugh.” (Ibid., 67.)

UNDERTOOK LEGAL WORK FOR WAYLES MB, I, 64.

MARRIED BATHURST SKELTONJHT, I, 157.

AND THEIR SON, JOHN, DIED TJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/jefferson/martha-wayles-skelton-jefFErSON.

AN ATTRACTIVE WIDOW TDLTJ, 43.

SUITORS LURKED ABOUTIbiD., 44.

QUESTIONS OF BLOOD, SEX, AND DOMINIONAs noted, Gordon-Reed, Hemingses of Monticello, is the masterwork on this subject. I also learned much from Lewis and Onuf, Sally Hemings and Thomas Jefferson; Joshua D. Rothman, Notorious in the Neighborhood: Sex and Families Across the Color Line in Virginia, 1787–1861 (Chapel Hill, N.C., 2003); and Elise Lemire, “Miscegenation”: Making Race in America (Philadelphia, 2002).

A MAN NAMED HEMINGSLewis and Onuf, Sally Hemings and Thomas Jefferson, 255. The source is Madison Hemings’s oral history. See also Gordon-Reed, Hemingses of Monticello, 49–50.

THE EPPES FAMILY OF BERMUDA HUNDREDGordon-Reed, Hemingses of Monticello, 50–51.

BECAME WAYLES’S PROPERTYIbiD., 57.

GAVE BIRTH TO SEVERAL CHILDRENIbiD., 59.

HIS DAUGHTER’S TWO STEPMOTHERS JHT, I, 432–33. Wayles’s two other wives were Tabitha Cocke and Elizabeth LOMAX.

“TAKEN BY THE WIDOWER WAYLES” Lewis and Onuf, Sally Hemings and Thomas Jefferson, 255.

ELIZABETH HEMINGS BORE FIVE CHILDRENGordon-Reed, Hemingses of MonticellO, 80.

IN 1773 CAME A SIXTHIBiD.

“ANY LADY IS ABLE” Ibid., 346. As Gordon-Reed notes, the members of a white master’s official family—that is, the one sanctioned by custom and law and the church—would pretend that the head of their household was not doing what he was self-evidently doing. And so mixed-race children lived in a cultural twilight in which they were denied yet fought over as white family members worried that guilt or love or duty (or all three) would lead the master to give his nonwhite children some part of his estate. (IBiD.)

THE YEAR HE TURNED UPMB, I, 209.

A “ROMANTIC, POETICAL” DESCRIPTIONPTJ, I, 65.

AN ELDERLY WOMANIbiD., 66.

DESTINED FOR EACH OTHERTDLTJ, 44.

“I HAVE WHAT I HAVE BEEN TOLD” PTJ, I, 62.

ORDERED A CLAVICHORDIbid., 71.

“LET THE CASE BE” IBiD.

HALF-DOZEN WHITE SILK COTTON STOCKINGSIbid., 71–72.

THE REVEREND WILLIAM COUTTSMB, I, 285. See also Gordon-Reed, Hemingses of Monticello, 101.

THE VIRGINIA GAZETTE REPORTED THE MARRIAGEThe Virginia Gazette, January 2, 1772.

REFERRED TO HER AS A “SPINSTER” PTJ, I, 86–87.

BORN AT ONE O’CLOCK IN THE MORNINGMB, I, 294.

THE JEFFERSONS REMAINED AT THE FORESTGB, 35.

SNOW HAD GROWN TOO DEEP Randall, Jefferson, I, 64.

PRESSED ON THROUGH THE FORESTS IBID.

AT SUNSETIBId.

FIRES WERE OUTIBiD.

“THE HORRIBLE DREARINESS” IBID.

DISCOVERED PART OF A BOTTLE OF WINEIbid., 65. On the subject of Monticello, Jefferson had been worried for some months about the seeming inadequacy of the nascent estate to receive a new bride. “I have here but one room, which, like the cobbler’s, serves me for parlor for kitchen and hall,” Jefferson said on Wednesday, February 20, 1771. “I may add, for bed chamber and study too. My friends sometimes take a temperate dinner with me and then retire to look for beds elsewhere. I have hopes however of getting more elbow room this summer.” (PTJ, I, 63.) His vision for Monticello was mythic. “Come to the new Rowanty,” he wrote Robert Skipwith, Patty’s brother-in-law, in August 1771. “A spring, centrically situated, might be the scene of every evening’s joy. There we should talk over the lessons of the day, or lose them in music, chess, or the merriments of our family companions. The heart thus lightened, our pillows would be soft, and health and long life would attend the happy scene.” (Ibid., 78.)

MOVED ON TO ELK HILL MB, I, 286.

AT ITS PEAK ELK HILL WAS 669 ACRESIbid., 366.

“THE TENDER AND THE SUBLIME” PTJ, I, 96.

OSSIAN’S EPIC IMAGERYThomas M. Curley, Samuel Johnson, the Ossian Fraud and the Celtic Revival in Great Britain and Ireland (New York, 2009) offers a full-scale treatment of the literary decepTiON.

“AS TWO DARK STREAMS” Jefferson’s Literary Commonplace Book, ed. Douglas L. Wilson (Princeton, N.J., 1989), 142–43.

A CAREFUL HOUSEKEEPER Scharff, Women Jefferson Loved, 93–94.

“MRS. JEFFERSON WOULD” Bear, Jefferson at MonticellO, 3.

A CALLER AT MONTICELLO VTM, 8.

“COPIOUS AND WELL-CHOSEN” IbID.

“AS ALL VIRGINIANS” IbiD., 9.

CARR DIED OF A “BILIOUS FEVER” MB, I, 340.

SKETCHING OUT HIS PLANSTDLTJ, 47.

JOHN WAYLES DIED MB, I, 329.

TO MOVE ELIZABETH HEMINGSGordon-Reed, Hemingses of MonticellO, 92.

THE HEMINGS FAMILYSee, for instance, ibid.; Lucia Stanton, Free Some Day: The African-American Families of Monticello (Charlottesville, Va., 2000); and TJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/plantation-and-slavery/hemings-family (accessed 2012).

SIX · LIKE A SHOCK OF ELECTRICITY

“THE AMERICANS HAVE MADE A DISCOVERY” “Speech on Townshend Duties, 19 April 1769,” The Writings and Speeches of Edmund Burke, II, ed. Paul Langford (Oxford, 1980), 231. See also Virginia History, Government, and Geography Service, Road to Independence: Virginia 1763–1783 (Memphis, Tenn., 2010), 33.

“THINGS SEEM TO BE HURRYING” PTJ, I, 111.

THE EARLY AFTERNOON HOURSIbid., 104. Writing from Williamsburg, John Blair told Jefferson that there had been “a very moderate trembling of the earth [in Williamsburg], so moderate that not many perceived it, but Dr. Gilmer informs me it was a pretty smart shock with you.” (IBID.)

REPUTEDLY MENTALLY DISABLED SISTERBrodie, Thomas Jefferson, 48, 71.

A SPRINGTIME SNOWSTORM GB, 55.

KILLED “ALMOST EVERYTHING” IBId.

“THIS FROST WAS GENERAL” IBID.

A SECOND DAUGHTER ON SUNDAY MB, I, 372.

SHE HAD BEEN PREGNANTFor accounts of the toll of childbirth on women in these years, see Catherine M. Scholten, “ ‘On the Importance of the Obstetrick Art’: Changing Customs of Childbirth in America, 1760 to 1825,” William and Mary Quarterly, 3d ser., 34, no. 3 (July 1977): 426–45, and Childbearing in American Society: 1650–1850(New York, 1985), 42–49; Mary Beth Norton, Liberty’s Daughters: The Revolutionary Experience of American Women, 1750–1800 (Ithaca, N.Y., 1996), 71–84; Judith Walzer Leavitt, Brought to Bed: Childbearing in America, 1750 to 1950 (New York, 1986), 36–63; Marie Jenkins Schwartz, Birthing a Slave: Motherhood and Medicine in the Antebellum South (Cambridge, Mass., 2006), 143–86.

THE PURCHASE OF “BREAST PIPES” Scharff, Women Jefferson Loved, 93. See also MB, I, 373.

THE TOWNSHEND ACTSMorgan, Birth of the Republic, 34–35.

THE BOSTON TEA PARTYMiddlekauff, Glorious Cause, 231–37.

NONIMPORTATION AGREEMENTSPTJ, I, 27–31, is one eXAMpLE.

THE POSSIBLE ARREST OF AMERICANSMiddlekauff, Glorious Cause, 219–20. In 1772, New England radicals had burned a British ship on customs duty, the HMS Gaspee, after it had run aground in Narragansett Bay. When no one was arrested in the case, London announced a special investigation and said that anyone apprehended in the matter would be tried in England. For the colonists the decree was infuriating and terrifying. Here was a grave imperial threat. (IBID.)

COMMITTEES OF CORRESPONDENCE Ibid., 221.

HE ORDERED A “ROBE” Imogene E. Brown, American Aristides, 86.

“OUR SALE OF SLAVES GOES” PTJ, I, 96.

TO REBEL QUITE ANOTHERIsaac Samuel Harrell, Loyalism in Virginia: Chapters in the Economic History of the Revolution (Durham, N.C., 1926), 1. It was not a clear-cut call. “Despite the events of the preceding decade, in 1773 loyalism was the logical state of mind in Virginia; loyalism called for the maintenance of the long established social, religious, and political order,” wrote Harrell. “In religion, in social customs, in personal contact, Virginia, of all the colonies in North America, was most closely akin to the mother country.” (Ibid.) In terms of Virginia’s predominant position, Harrell believed the March 1773 session, which was prorogued, to be “the beginning of the end” of royal rule. (Ibid., 30–31.)

Middlekauff, Glorious Cause, 30–52, offers an intriguing account of the roots of revolution. “Why these Americans engaged in revolution had much to do with the sort of people they were.” (Ibid., 31.) Middlekauff argued that the combination of the Protestant emphasis on the centrality of the individual and the Whig sense of history created the climate for revolution. (Ibid., 30–52.)

For Jefferson, whether it was Crown or Parliament, the consistent theme was usurpation. Even Loyalists were willing to acknowledge London bore some blame; their point was that the constitution could, with effort, be brought back into balance. For example, in June and July 1774, in William Rind’s Virginia Gazette, Thomson Mason, brother of George, argued that the English constitution was “the wisest system of legislation that ever did, or perhaps ever will, exist.” To Mason, the “monarchy, aristocracy, and democracy [each] possessed of their distinct powers, checked, tempered, and improved each other.… The honor of the monarchy tempered the impetuosity of democracy, the moderation of aristocracy checked the ardent aspiring honor of monarchy, and the virtue of democracy restrained the one, impelled the other, and invigorated both.” (Virginia History, Government, and Geography Service, Road to Independence, 37.) The problem, Mason said, was that the aristocracy had knocked the system off balance by usurping power through Parliament.

Looking back from the perspective of 1926, Charles M. Andrews also argued that the central motivation came from rivalries between the colonial assemblies and Parliament:

Primarily, the American Revolution was a political and constitutional movement and only secondarily one that was either financial, commercial, or social. At bottom the fundamental issue was the political independence of the colonies, and in the last analysis the conflict lay between the British Parliament and the colonial assemblies, each of which was probably more sensitive, self-conscious, and self-important than was the voting population that it represented. For many years these assemblies had fought the prerogative successfully and would have continued to do so, eventually reducing it to a minimum, as the later self-governing dominions have done; but in the end it was Parliament, whose powers they disputed, that became the great antagonist. (Andrews, “American Revolution,” 230.)

Reflecting on the American Revolution from the perspective of 1790, William Smith, Jr., the New York–born chief justice of Canada, wrote Lord Dorchester:

The truth is that the country had outgrown its government, and wanted the true remedy for more than half a century before the rupture commenced.… To expect wisdom and moderation from near a score of petty Parliaments, consisting in effect of only one of the three necessary branches of a Parliament, must, after the light brought by experience, appear to have been a very extravagant expectation.… An American Assembly, quiet in the weakness of their infancy, could not but discover in their elevation to prosperity, that themselves were the substance, and the governor and Board of Council were shadows in their political frame. All America was thus, at the very outset of the plantations, abandoned to democracy. And it belonged to the Administrations of the days of our fathers to have found the cure, in the erection of a Power upon the continent itself, to control all its own little republics, and create a Partner in the Legislation of the Empire, capable of consulting their own safety and the common welfare. (Sir Charles Prestwood Lucas, A History of Canada, 1763–1812 [Oxford, 1909], 256.)

Proposals for reconciliation were considered but none really seemed practicable. The most prominent was that of Joseph Galloway. (Middlekauff, Glorious Cause, 257–58.) And there was John Randolph’s, described and reprinted in Mary Beth Norton, “John Randolph’s ‘Plan of Accommodations,’ ” William and Mary Quarterly, 3d ser., 28, no. 1 (January 1971): 103–20.

HIS COUSIN JOHN RANDOLPHSamuel Willard Crompton, “Randolph, John,” February 2000, American National Biography Online, http://www.anb.org/articles/01/01–00767.html (accessed 2011). In London, Mary Beth Norton wrote, John Randolph was “one of the most active and respected refugees, playing a major role in each of the three organizations formed by the American exiles. In 1779 he was selected to present to George III a petition on the American war signed by 105 loyalists; a few months later he led a group of loyalists who offered their services to the king in the event of a French invasion of Great Britain; and in 1783 he was named chairman of the committee established by Virginia refugees to review the property claims they intended to submit to the British government.” (Norton, “John Randolph’s ‘Plan of Accommodations,’ ” 104.) For more on Loyalists and the Revolution, see Wilbur H. Siebert, “The Dispersion of the American Tories” in Wright, Causes and Consequences of the American Revolution, 249–58; Harrell, Loyalism in Virginia; Richard Archer, As If an Enemy’s Country: The British Occupation of Boston and the Origins of Revolution (New York, 2010); Thomas B. Allen, Tories: Fighting for the King in America’s First Civil War (New York, 2010); and Paul H. Smith, “The American Loyalists: Notes on Their Organization and Numerical Strength,” William and Mary Quarterly, 3d ser., 25, no. 2 (April 1968): 259–77.

ABOUT A FIFTH OF WHITE AMERICAN COLONISTSGordon S. Wood, American Revolution, 113. The usual figure for the number of Loyalists in America during the Revolution is a third, but recent scholarship based on militia recruitment puts the estimate at closer to a fifth. Sixty to eighty thousand Loyalists left America during the war. (Ibid.) I am indebted to Wood for insights on this pOInT.

“NON SOLUM NOBIS” MB, I, 37.

FOR THE ELITE, REVOLUTION WASMichael A. McDonnell, The Politics of War: Race, Class, and Conflict in Revolutionary Virginia (Chapel Hill, N.C., 2007), 1–15, delineates the tensions that divided Virginians by class before and during the war. “The way patriot leaders organized for war and reacted to the demands of those they expected to fight it depicts a conservative, anxious, sometimes fearful group clinging to traditional notions of hierarchy, deference, and public virtue in an attempt to maintain its privileged position within an increasingly challenged and challenging social and political culture,” McDonnell wrote. (Ibid., 6.)

VIRGINIA’S PUBLIC FINANCESHarrell, Loyalism in Virginia, 22–25.

THE MONEY THAT PLANTERS OWED CREDITORSIbid., 26–29.

SUCH DEBTS WERE NOW “HEREDITARY” Ibid., 26.

VIRGINIANS OWED AT LEASTIBID.

NEARLY HALF THE TOTALIbID.

IN MAY 1774, JEFFERSON AND PATRICK HENRYIbid., 26–27. The measure failed, Harrell wrote, because the “conservatives … were not yet ready for the leadership of these radicals. In October, 1777, when the principles of rifle democracy were supreme, a law was passed which provided in part for the sequestration of these debts.” (Ibid., 27.)

JOHN WAYLES DIED IN 1773 Sloan, Principle and IntereST, 14.

ESTATE WORTH £30,000 IBID.

LARGEST CREDITOR, FARELL AND JONES Ibid. There was also a contested £6,000 charge against Wayles over a shipment of slaves. (Ibid., 14.)

DECIDED TO BREAK UP Ibid., 15.

JEFFERSON’S LIABILITY IbiD., 16.

WAS NOT SOLELY ECONOMICThe economic issues at play in the Revolution is, of course, a subject of long and ferocious debate. Known as the “progressive interpretation” (or the “Beardian interpretation” after the historian Charles Beard), it can be summarized, as Esmond Wright pointed out in 1966, with the following quotation from Louis M. Hacker: “The struggle was not over high-sounding political and constitutional concepts: over the power of taxation and, in the final analysis, over natural rights: but over colonial manufacturing, wild lands and furs, sugar, wine, tea and English merchant capitalism within the imperial-colonial frame-currency, all of which meant, simply, the survival or collapse of work of the mercantilist system.” (Wright, Causes and Consequences of the American Revolution, 114–15.) Arthur M. Schlesinger, Sr., offered a more nuanced view, arguing that the emphasis of interpretation should be on “the clashing of economic interests and the interplay of mutual prejudices, opposing ideals and personal antagonisms—whether in England or in America—which made inevitable in 1776 what was unthinkable in 1760.” (Ibid., 103.) For selections of Hacker’s and Schlesinger’s arguments, see ibid., 103–42.

My own view is that economics clearly—even self-evidently—played a critical role for Jefferson and many others. It would be folly to deny this, for arguments about power and rights are obviously of a piece with matters of property and wealth. I do not believe, however, that the American Revolution was only about the rich preserving their riches. Harrell (to whom I am indebted for his work on this subject in relation to Virginia) put it well, noting that pointing out the economic factors was not to

underestimate the political theories involved in the American Revolution, to question the devotion of Washington, the patriotism of Henry, or the political astuteness of Jefferson. But an examination of the constitutional principles that appealed to leading citizens does not afford a complete explanation of the momentous movement which transformed Virginia, the most ultra-British colony in North America, into a staunch supporter of the Revolutionary doctrines. Lands to the west, claimed by Virginia under charters, won from France partly by Virginia men and with Virginia money, and sorely needed by Virginia in 1775, were being exploited by an irresponsive government—bartered and pawned to court favorites, politicians, and speculators. The rapid contraction of the currency to meet the demands of the British trading interests and the ruinous trend of Virginia exchange accentuated the diverse economic interests of the colony and the mother country. The planters were hopelessly in debt to the British merchants. Current political theories in the colonies and the economic interests of the planters were in harmony. (Harrell, Loyalism in Virginia, 28–29.)

Also illuminating is Jack P. Greene, “William Knox’s Explanation for the American Revolution,” William and Mary Quarterly, 3d ser., 30, no. 2 (April 1973): 293–306.

BEFORE 1729, NO ROYAL GOVERNORHarrell, Loyalism in Virginia, 4. I am indebted to Harrell for these statISTICS.

GOVERNORS INTERVENED FEWER THANIBID.

BETWEEN 1764 AND 1773, THERE WEREIBID.

ANNOUNCED THE BOSTON PORT ACT PTJ, I, 106.

AGREED “WE MUST BOLDLY” IBID.

JOINED JEFFERSON IN THE COUNCIL CHAMBERIbID.

“WE WERE UNDER [THE] CONVICTION” Ibid. “No example of such a solemnity had existed since the days of our distresses in ’55, since which a new generation had grown up,” Jefferson said, alluding to a difficult period in the French and IndiaN WAR.

“RUMMAGED” THROUGH RUSHWORTH’S COLLECTIONIBID.

“COOKED UP A RESOLUTION” IBid.

FROM “THE EVILS OF CIVIL WAR” Ibid. The proclamation passed on Tuesday the twenty-fourth; on Thursday the twenty-sixth, Lord Dunmore called the House to the Council Room where the document had originated. The governor was direct. “I have in my hand a paper published by order of your House, conceived in such terms as reflect highly upon his Majesty and the Parliament of Great Britain; which makes it necessary for me to dissolve you; and you are dissolved accordingly.” (Ibid.) Off the burgesses went to the Raleigh, from which, on May 27, 1774, they called for a “general congress … to deliberate on those general measures which the united interests of America may from time to time require.” (Ibid., 108.)

Then, on Sunday the twenty-ninth, came a plea from Boston: All the colonies, Massachusetts hoped, would join in what amounted to an economic boycott of Great Britain through nonimportation and nonexportation agreements. (Ibid., 110.) At ten o’clock on Monday morning, Peyton Randolph summoned the remaining burgesses to the Raleigh (there were, both the resolution and The Virginia Gazette reported, twenty-five still in the area), where the group chose a moderate course. Under Randolph’s leadership, the Virginians said they would schedule a meeting of “the late Members of the House of Burgesses” for August 1. An “Association against Importations,” the Monday caucus said, would “probably be entered into” once enough burgesses arrived back in Williamsburg, and “perhaps against Exportations also after a certain time.” (Ibid.)

The caution was understandable. With so many burgesses out of town, the remaining legislators could not risk the appearance of usurpation nor were they yet ready to contemplate all-out war. On that day in late May 1774, Peyton Randolph, Thomas Jefferson, George Washington, and others were declining to commit themselves until they absolutely had to. The exports—tobacco, really—were the key. To end that trade would cost Virginia untold economic and political pain. Just before leaving Williamsburg for Monticello on the thirty-first, Jefferson added his name to the call for the August 1 meeting: “We fixed this distant day in hopes of accommodating the meeting to every gentleman’s private affairs, and that they might, in the meantime, have an opportunity of collecting the sense of their respective counties.” (Ibid., 111.)

AWARE OF THE STAKESIbid., 111.

MONTICELLO’S CHERRIES HAD RIPENEDGB, 55.

A LETTER TO THEIR CONSTITUENTS PTJ, I, 116–17.

THE REVEREND CHARLES CLAYIbid., 117.

“THE NEW CHURCH” ON HARDWARE RIVERIbid., 116.

THE “PLACE … THOUGHT THE MOST” IBiD.

“THE PEOPLE MET GENERALLY” Jefferson, WritiNGS, 9.

THE FREEHOLDERS OF ALBEMARLEPTJ, I, 117–19.

COMPOSED BY JEFFERSON Ibid., 119.

“THE COMMON RIGHTS OF MANKIND” Ibid., 117.

“WE WILL EVER BE READY” IBID.

AN IMMEDIATE BANIbid., 117–18. As he drafted the Albemarle resolutions he also wrote a proposed Declaration of Rights for the approaching August 1 meeting. (Ibid., 119–20.)

FRESH CUCUMBERS AND LETTUCEGB, 56.

INSTRUCTIONS TO THE DELEGATESPTJ, I, 121–37. See also Anthony M. Lewis, “Jefferson’s ‘Summary View’ as a Chart of Political Union,” William and Mary Quarterly, 3d ser., 5, no. 1 (January 1948): 34–51. Kristofer Ray, “Thomas Jefferson and ‘A Summary View of the Rights of British North America,’ ” in Cogliano, ed., A Companion to Thomas Jefferson, 32–43, is also valUABlE.

WITH THESE PAGES PTJ, I, 121–37.

“THAT OUR ANCESTORS” Jefferson, Writings, 105–6.

CONCLUDED WITH A PASSAGEIbid., 121.

“IT IS NEITHER OUR WISH” Ibid., 121–22.

STRICKEN WITH DYSENTERYJefferson, WritiNGS, 9.

WITH TWO COPIESIbID.

THE ASSEMBLED BURGESSES APPLAUDED PTJ, I, 671.

HAND-PULLED PRESSColonial Williamsburg Foundation, http://www.history.org/almanack/life/trades/tradepri.cfm (accessed 2012).

“WITHOUT THE KNOWLEDGE” PTJ, I, 672.

“IT IS THE INDISPENSABLE DUTY” IBID.

GEORGE WASHINGTON PAID 3S 9DIBID.

LOANED HIS TO WILLIAM PRESTONIBID.

URGING HIM TO READ “THE ENCLOSED” IbID.

TOO STARKLY FOR SOME AT THAT HOURRandall, Jefferson, I, 90. See also Hayes, Road to Monticello, 159. One man was apparently unimpressed: Patrick Henry. “Whether Mr. Henry disapproved the ground taken, or was too lazy to read it (for he was the laziest man in reading I ever knew), I never learned; but he communicated it to nobody,” wrote Jefferson. (Jefferson, Writings, 9.) In the way of politics, the Summary View’s most immediate practical use for Virginia lay in the fact that it was not adopted; it instead served as a warning. “It will evince to the world the moderation of our late convention, who have only touched with tenderness many of the claims insisted on in this pamphlet, though every heart acknowledged their justice,” read the editors’ preface of Jefferson’s pamphlet. Translation: Take care, Your Majesty, for things could be worse. (PTJ, I, 672.)

Still, in private, Jefferson was furious that his draft had had so little impact at Williamsburg. Using the language of the General Confession of Sin in the Anglican Book of Common Prayer, he said: “We have done those things which we ought not to have done. And we have not done those things which we ought to have done.” Writing on a copy of the final “Instructions” as passed, Jefferson was merciless, listing four technical “defects” on the import/export question. More broadly, he was unhappy with the failure of rhetoric and what was to his mind a fatal political flaw. “The American grievances are not defined,” he wrote. Without them, he believed, such a document lost potency. Looking ahead to the Continental Congress about to assemble in Philadelphia, he wrote: “We are to conform to such resolutions only of the Congress as our deputies assent to: which totally destroys that union of conduct in the several colonies which was the very purpose of calling a Congress.” (Ibid., 143.)

ADDED TO A BILL OF ATTAINDER IN LONDONJefferson, Writings, 10. See also JHT, I, 189–90.

“DEATH IS THE WORST” Jefferson’s Literary Commonplace Book, 87. See also Garrett Ward Sheldon, The Political Philosophy of Thomas Jefferson (Baltimore, Md., 1993), 19–21.

“A VERY HANDSOME PUBLIC PAPER” Randall, Jefferson, I, 188.

SEVEN · THERE IS NO PEACE

“BLOWS MUST DECIDE” John Ferling, Almost a Miracle: The American Victory in the War of Independence (New York, 2009), 28.

THE PEACH TREES WERE BLOSSOMING GB, 66. Jefferson noted the blossoms on March 10, 1775. (IBID.)

PREPARING TO LEAVE FOR RICHMOND MB, I, 392.

ST. JOHN’S JHT, I, 194. See also Mayer, Son of Thunder, 241. The church, Henry Mayer wrote, was “a spare wooden building with a peaked roof and squat belfry.” (IBID.)

A HILLTOP WOODEN ANGLICAN CHURCHVirginia Writers’ Project, Virginia: A Guide to the Old Dominion (Richmond, Va., 1992), Virginia State Library and Archives. See also Lewis W. Burton, Annals of Henrico Parish (Richmond, Va., 1904), 18–19.

THE LARGEST STRUCTURE IN RICHMONDRobert Douthat Meade, Patrick Henry: Practical Revolutionary (Philadelphia, 1969), 17–18.

SAT BEHIND THE COMMUNION RAILBurton, Annals of Henrico PariSH, 22.

THE TOUGH-MINDED, SCOTTISH-BORNBenjamin Quarles, “Lord Dunmore as Liberator,” William and Mary Quarterly, 3d ser., 15, no. 4 (October 1958): 494–507.

HAD FORBIDDEN VIRGINIANS John E. Selby, The Revolution in Virginia, 1775–1783 (Williamsburg, Va., 1988), 1–2.

NEITHER SIDE SHOWED JHT, I, 194. Militia were also forming across ViRGINiA.

WARM ENOUGH FOR THE WINDOWS Meade, Patrick HenRY, 23.

CALLED ON VIRGINIAMayer, Son of Thunder, 243–47.

STANDING IN PEW 47 Burton, Annals of Henrico Parish, 23–24.

THE EASTERN AISLEIbid. Henry “stood, according to tradition, near the present corner of the east transept and the nave, or more exactly, as it is commonly stated, in pew 47, in the east aisle of the nave, the third one from the transept aisle. He … faced the eastern wall of the transept, where were then two windows.” (IBID.)

“GENTLEMEN MAY CRY” Mayer, Son of Thunder, 245.

“HIS ELOQUENCE WAS PECULIAR” The Writings and Speeches of Daniel Webster, XVII, ed. Fletcher Webster (Boston, 1903), 367.

A COMMITTEE THAT INCLUDED JEFFERSON JHT, I, 195.

THE COMMITTEE RESOLVEDPTJ, I, 161. In Richmond, Jefferson also wrote a resolution authorizing the creation of a committee to investigate Lord Dunmore’s March 21 proclamation on lands, writing George Wythe, who was in Williamsburg, for counsel. (Ibid., 115–16, 162–63.)

POSSIBLE FISSURESIbid., 159.

DRINKING AT MRS. YOUNGHUSBAND’SMB, I, 392.

DINING AT GUNN’SIBID.

BUYING BOOK MUSLINIBID.

ELECTED AS A DEPUTYIbid. He was to serve if, as expected, Peyton Randolph had to be in Richmond for the revision of the Virginia constitUTiON.

THE FIRST CONGRESS HAD BEEN CALLED “America During the Age of Revolution, 1764–1775,” Library of Congress, http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/collections/continental/timeline1e.html (accessed 2012). See also Jack N. Rakove, The Beginnings of National Politics: An Interpretive History of the Continental Congress (New York, 1979).

BRITISH TROOPS TOOK CONTROL OF POWDER MAGAZINESMiddlekauff, Glorious Cause, 270. “During the autumn and winter [Gage] had received a series of surprises which persuaded him that only force could bring the Americans to heel,” Middlekauff wrote. (IBID.)

“FORCE,” THE GOVERNMENT ADVISED GAGEIbid., 272.

LEAVE VIRGINIA IN “EVIDENT DANGER” PTJ, I, 160.

AT LEXINGTON AND CONCORDMiddlekauff, Glorious Cause, 273–81. See also George F. Scheer and Hugh F. Rankin, Rebels and Redcoats (New York, 1957), 17–40.

A SHIFTING SIXTEEN-MILE FRONT Middlekauff, Glorious Cause, 279.

273 BRITISH AND 95 AMERICAN CASUALTIES IbID.

THE EXACT SEQUENCE OF THE BATTLE IS UNCLEAR Ibid., 276.

ANY “LAST HOPES OF RECONCILIATION” Ibid., 281. See also PTJ, I, 165.

“A FRENZY OF REVENGE” Ibid., 279.

“THE FLAME OF CIVIL WAR” Scheer and Rankin, Rebels and RedcoaTS, 45.

CONTENDING WITH SLAVE VIOLENCEMcDonnell, Politics of War, 47–53. See also Quarles, “Lord Dunmore as LibeRATOR.”

SUPPLIES OF GUNPOWDERMcDonnell, Politics of War, 49–50.

WHITES WERE “ALARMED” Ibid., 47.

IN NORTHUMBERLAND COUNTYIbid., 49.

AS THURSDAY, APRIL 20, 1775 Ibid., 52–54.

ROYAL MARINES REMOVED FIFTEEN HALF BARRELSIBID.

A FURIOUS CROWD OF COLONISTSIbid. Peyton Randolph and others won some time before violence could break out by convincing the Virginians to allow a delegation to confront Dunmore for an explanation. (IbID.)

AT THE PALACE, DUNMORE ANNOUNCEDIBiD.

“ONE OF THE HIGHEST INSULTS” IBID.

“UNDER THE MUSKETS” IbID.

TWO DAYS LATER DUNMORE ARRESTEDIBID.

ANNOUNCED THAT “BY THE LIVING GOD” Ibid., 55. Dunmore also said he would rally “a majority of white people and all the slaves on the side of the government.” (IBID.)

SWIFT AND PREDICTABLE Ibid., 56. According to McDonnell, Dunmore, with some evident satisfaction, said: “My declaration that I would arm and set free such slaves as should assist me if I was attacked has stirred up fears in them which cannot easily subside.” (IBID.)

“HELL ITSELF” Quarles, “Lord Dunmore as Liberator,” 495. Of Dunmore, George Washington wrote to Richard Henry Lee: “If that man is not crushed before spring, he will become the most formidable enemy America has; his strength will increase as a snow ball by rolling: and faster, if some expedient cannot be hit upon, to convince the slaves and servants of the impotency of his designs.” (Ibid.)

Just how impotent those designs were was now the prevailing question. Jefferson was worried enough to speculate on how to evacuate his clan. On December 2, 1775, John Hancock called on Washington to “effectually repel [Dunmore’s] violences and secure the peace and safety of that colony.” On December 4 the Congress as a whole urged Virginia to resist the governor “to the utmost.” (IBId.)

“BUT FOR GOD’S SAKE” PTJ, I, 167. He lined out the sentence in a draft of the letter. (IBID.)

“WITHIN THIS WEEK” Ibid., 165.

SEEMED TO DOOMIbID.

THE MILITIA DECLARED McDonnell, Politics of War, 61–62.

THE PARTICULAR MANIFESTATION In a section of the letter he composed but deleted from the version he sent to Small, Jefferson said:

It is a lamentable thing that the persons entrusted by the king with the administration of government should have kept their employers under … constant delusion. It appears now by their letters laid before the Parliament that from the beginning they have labored to make the ministry believe that the whole ferment has been raised and constantly kept up by a few hot headed demagogues principal men in every colony, and that it might be expected to subside in a short time either of itself, or by the assistance of a coercive power. The reverse of this is most assuredly the truth: the utmost efforts of the more intelligent people having been requisite and exerted to moderate the almost ungovernable fury of the people. That the abler part has been pushed forward to support their rights in the field of reason is true; and it was there alone they wished to decide the contest. (PTJ, I, 166–67.)

Jefferson thought “principal men” such as himself could ultimately control the Virginians. There was no central command, however, and different counties dispatched—or threatened to dispatch—troops to Williamsburg. Dunmore took no chances, sending his wife and children to live on board the HMS Fowey. (McDonnell, Politics of War, 61–62, 73–74.) Jefferson also held the king responsible for the haughty tone and tough tactics of the British. “It is a lamentable circumstance that the only mediatory power acknowledged by both parties”—that is, George III—“instead of leading to a reconciliation [of] his divided people, should pursue the incendiary purpose of still blowing up the flames as we find him constantly doing in every speech and public declaration,” Jefferson wrote Small. “This may perhaps be intended to intimidate into acquiescence, but the effect has been unfortunately otherwise.” (PTJ, I, 165.)

“A LITTLE KNOWLEDGE” PTJ, I, 165–66.

A SPIRITED SESSION McDonnell, Politics of War, 71. They were there at Dunmore’s invitation—or, more precisely, at the invitation of Lord North’s ministry, which had directed each colonial governor to convene the local legislatures. The business at hand: consideration of conciliatory proposals from North. London was asking that the colonists contribute toward the common defense and the support of the imperial government in each colony. In exchange, Britain would not tax the colonists for these services beyond the initial amount. (IBID.)

CONCILIATORY PROPOSALSIBId.

THREE VIRGINIA COLONISTS Ibid., 72–73.

DUNMORE FELT THE SITUATIONIbid., 73. Dunmore said that his “house was kept in continual alarm and threatened every night with an assault.” (IBID.)

SEEKING REFUGE ABOARD THE HMS FOWEYQuarles, “Lord Dunmore as Liberator,” 497.

A MEASURED TONEPTJ, I, 170–74.

AS JEFFERSON RECALLED ITJefferson, Writings, 10–11.

PEYTON RANDOLPH, WHO BELIEVEDIbid., 11. Randolph was just back from Philadelphia, where the sense of the Continental Congress opposed London’s proposals. It would be useful, then, for Virginia to be in the forefront of the movement against the overtures. Randolph, Jefferson said, “was anxious that the answer of our assembly … should harmonize with what he knew to be the sentiments and wishes of the body he had recently left.” (IBID.)

“LONG AND DOUBTFUL” IBId.

UNITY AMONG THE COLONIESPTJ, I, 173. In closing, Jefferson asked: “What then remains to be done?” Virginia deferred the matter to the Congress in Philadelphia, praying for “the even-handed justice of that being who doth no wrong, earnestly beseeching him to illuminate the councils and prosper the endeavors of those to whom America hath confided her hopes.” (IBID.)

EIGHT · THE FAMOUS MR. JEFFERSON

“AS OUR ENEMIES HAVE FOUND” PTJ, I, 186.

“THE PRESENT CRISIS” Ibid., 224.

LODGING ON CHESTNUT MB, I, 399.

SENT ACCOUNTS OF THE MILITARY SITUATIONPTJ, I, 246–47.

BENJAMIN FRANKLIN’S PROPOSALIbid., 177–82.

RECORDED THE “FINANCIAL AND MILITARY” Ibid., 182–84.

NEW IDEAS, NEW PEOPLE, NEW FORCESFor portraits of Philadelphia as it was in these years, see McCullough, John Adams, 78–85; and Paul H. Smith, ed., Letters of Delegates to Congress, 1774–1789, IV, May 16–August 15, 1776 (Washington, D.C., 1976), 123–24; 194–95; 307–8; 311–12.

WERE “A PEOPLE, THROWN TOGETHER” United States National Park Service, Independence: A Guide to Independence National Historical Park, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania (Washington, D.C., 1982), 20.

“THE POOREST LABORER” Ibid. America’s connection to larger forces was also self-evident. “French vessels frequently arrive here,” wrote Josiah Bartlett, a delegate from New Hampshire. “Two came up to this city yesterday, their loading chiefly cotton, molasses, sugar, coffee, canvass etc. Last Saturday an American vessel arrived from the French West Indies with 7400 lb. of powder, 149 stand of arms.” (Paul H. Smith, Letters of Delegates to Congress, IV, 124.)

JOHN ADAMS OF MASSACHUSETTSPTJ, I, 175. Jefferson reported Washington’s selection as what he called “Generalissimo of all the Provincial troops in North-America,” adding: “The Congress have directed 20,000 men to be raised and hope by a vigorous campaign to dispose our enemies to treaty.” (Ibid.) See also Scheer and Rankin, Redcoats and Rebels, 68–73. As Adams described the nomination, “Mr. Washington, who happened to sit near the door, as soon as he heard me allude to him, from his usual modesty, darted into the library-room.” (Ibid., 70–71.)

THE BATTLE AT BUNKER HILLScheer and Rankin, Redcoats and Rebels, 52–64.

RECORDED SEEING “THE FAMOUS MR. JEFFERSON” Hayes, Road to Monticello, 167.

“JEFFERSON IS THE GREATEST” Kaminski, Founders on the Founders, 286.

ADAMS AND JEFFERSON See, for instance, McCullough, John Adams, 110–17; Ferling, Adams vs. Jefferson; and Lester J. Cappon, ed., The Adams-Jefferson Letters: The Complete Correspondence Between Thomas Jefferson and Abigail and John Adams (Chapel Hill, N.C., 1987), for accounts of the relationship between the two men, and between Jefferson and Abigail Adams and their larger famILIeS.

BORN IN BRAINTREE, MASSACHUSETTS, IN 1735 McCullough, John Adams, 30.

“I CONSIDER YOU AND HIM” Ibid., 604.

AN INTENSE ADMIRATION He had already personally contributed toward the support of Boston during the Port Act siege (MB, I, 396), but now his appreciation rose to a new level. “The adventurous genius and intrepidity of those people is amazing,” Jefferson said of the New Englanders in early July 1775. (PTJ, I, 185.)

CONGRESS AUTHORIZED AN INVASION OF CANADA Middlekauff, Glorious Cause, 309–14. From the Declaration of Causes: “We have received certain intelligence that General Carleton, the Governor of Canada, is instigating the people of that province and the Indians to fall upon us; and we have but too much reason to apprehend that schemes have been formed to excite domestic enemies against us.” (PTJ, I, 217.)

MONTREAL SURRENDERED BUT QUEBEC HELD OUT Paul S. Boyer and Melvyn Dubofsky, eds., The Oxford Companion to United States History (New York, 2001) 285.

“NOBODY NOW ENTERTAINS” PTJ, I, 186.

JEFFERSON AND JOHN DICKINSONMB, I, 400. See also PTJ, I, 187–219.

DECLARATION OF THE CAUSESPTJ, I, 187–219. The audience was a trans-atlantic one. Jefferson argued that America was not the aggressor and that all was not yet lost. Americans, he said, “mean not in any wise to affect that union with [Great Britain] in which we have so long and so happily lived, and which we wish so much to see again restored.” (Pauline Maier, American Scripture: Making the Declaration of Independence [New York, 1997], 19–20.) They did not wish to “disquiet the minds of our Friends and fellow subjects in any part of the empire.” He offered a triptych of declarative assertions to support his case: “We did not embody a soldiery to commit aggression on them; we did not raise armies for glory or for conquest. We did not invade their island carrying death or slavery to its inhabitants.” Americans took up arms in defense only, Jefferson said, and longed for a reconciliation to “deliver us from the evils of a civil war.” (PTJ, I, 203.)

RODE THE FERRY TO THE WOODLANDS MB, I, 401.

MADE A TRIP TO THE FALLSIbid., 403.

EXTENDED ITS HAND TO THE KINGPTJ, I, 219–23.

“ELOQUENCE IN PUBLIC ASSEMBLIES” Kaminski, Founders on the Founders, 287.

“A PUBLIC SPEAKER” IBiD.

“FEW PERSONS CAN BEAR” IBiD.

“THE CONTINUANCE AND THE EXTENT” PTJ, I, 223–24.

FACED A “DEFICIENCY” Ibid., 224.

AFTER A VISIT TO ROBERT BELL’S SHOP MB, I, 402.

LEFT PHILADELPHIA FOR VIRGINIAIbid., 403–4.

STOPPED ALONG THE ROADIBid.

“FOR GOD’S SAKE” Morgan, Virginians at HoME, 50.

NEVER STOPPED HUMMING Bear, Jefferson at MonticelLO, 13.

AN AEOLIAN HARPMB, I, 28.

“MRS. JEFFERSON WAS SMALL” Bear, Jefferson at MonticeLLO, 5.

SUPERVISING THE SLAUGHTER OF DUCKS Stein, Worlds of Thomas Jefferson at Monticello, 15–16.

MANAGED THE SLAVES IN THE HOUSEIbid., 16.

“THE HOUSE WAS BUILT” Ibid., 14.

HE ACQUIRED A CHESSBOARDJefferson bought books, he bought clothes, he bought tickets to plays—then he bought punch at the playhouse. He spent money to make himself handsome, comfortable, entertained, and engaged. MB, I, 28, records the examples here, and the Memorandum Books and PTJ—as well as the extant collections at Monticello—record a life of acquisition and consumPtION.

“A COPIOUS AND WELL-CHOSEN” Stein, Worlds of Thomas Jefferson at MonticellO, 14.

HIS ARCHITECTURAL SENSEMB, I, 24.

THE PAINTING SCHEME IbiD., 27.

ORDERED A COPYIbiD., 35.

SENT FOR A CLOTHESPRESSIbiD., 29.

JOINED THE PHILOSOPHICAL SOCIETYIbid., 338–39. See also Ibid., 525.

PUBLISHED A BOOKIbid., 341.

HIS KINSMAN JOHN RANDOLPHPTJ, I, 240–43. For details on John Randolph’s violin, see Hayes, Road to Monticello, 104, and MB, I, 77.

WAS FASCINATED BY GARDENINGTJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/houses-and-gardens/Jefferson-scientist-and-gaRDENER.

EXPRESSING REGRETIbid., 241. Jefferson cast the issue in personal terms. “There may be people to whose tempers and dispositions contention may be pleasing.… But to me it is of all states but one the most horrid.” He added: “My first wish is a restoration of our just rights; my second a return of the happy period when, consistently with duty, I may withdraw myself totally from the public stage and pass the rest of my days in domestic ease and tranquility, banishing every desire of afterwards even hearing what passes in the world.” (Ibid.) The longing for withdrawal was something of a conventional trope for public men in the eighteenth century, men whose idealized model of service was that of Cincinnatus, the Roman general who was summoned, reluctantly, to power from hiS PLOW.

CONCENTRATED WITHIN “A SMALL FACTION” IBId.

“THEY HAVE TAKEN IT” Ibid. “Even those in Parliament who are called friends to America seem to know nothing of our real determinations,” he told Randolph. The British seemed to think that Americans “did not mean to insist rigorously on the terms they held out,” said Jefferson, but “continuance in this error may perhaps have very ill consequences.” In fact, the offer of the Congress of 1774 amounted to “the lowest terms they thought possible to be accepted in order to convince the world they were not unreasonable.” Those conditions, however, had been set out “before blood was spilt.” Now Jefferson could make no promises. “I cannot affirm, but have reason to think, these terms would not now be accepted,” he told Randolph. (Ibid.) Jefferson also made bold to suggest that Britain’s imperial destiny might be in the balance. “If indeed Great Britain, disjoined from her colonies, be a match for the most potent nations of Europe with the colonies thrown into their scale, they may go on securely,” he told Randolph. “But if they are not assured of this, it would be certainly unwise, by trying the event of another campaign, to risk our accepting a foreign aid which perhaps may not be obtainable but on a condition of everlasting avulsion from Great Britain.” (Ibid., 242.)

DRAFTED BUT DELETEDIbid., 243. Yet he remained defiant, telling Randolph that he would “lend my hand to sink the whole island in the ocean” if Britain did not satisfy American demands. (Ibid., 242.) The conflict felt inescapably personal, for the North Atlantic world was a comparatively small one. After a trip to London in 1772, Alexander McCaul, a merchant friend, wrote Jefferson: “I saw several of our old Virginia friends and on the Change of London you would meet with many faces you had seen before.” There was an assumption of enduring common ties. “It is happy for the natives of Britain [that] they have such a resource as North America, for there, if they happen to be reduced, they may always have bread with industry,” McCaul wrote Jefferson. “The Virginia planters may thank their stars they have so good a country to cultivate, though many of them are not sensible of the happiness they enjoy.” (PTJ, I, 93.)

TO USE HIS DEPARTING KINSMANIBID.

PARTED ON A WARM NOTE Ibid., 242–43.

“THOUGH WE MAY POLITICALLY DIFFER” Ibid., 244.

2ND EARL OF DARTMOUTHIbid., 243.

HIS DAUGHTER JANERandall, Jefferson, I, 383.

ONLY A YEAR AND A HALF OLDIbid. According to Jefferson’s notes in his Book of Common Prayer, Jane was born on April 3, 1774, and died in September 1775. (IbiD.)

ON CHESTNUT STREETMB, I, 407.

“I HAVE SET APART” PTJ, I, 251.

“I HAVE NEVER RECEIVED” Ibid., 252.

CANNONS EN ROUTEIbid., 247.

COMING “AT THE EXPRESS” Ibid. The British, Jefferson reported to Francis Eppes, had a continental strategy ready. Ten thousand more troops—raised from the garrison at Gibraltar and from Ireland—were due in the spring. While in control of New York, Albany, St. John’s, and Quebec they would use their naval vessels as communication channels to keep these cities and Boston in contact. The feared effect, according to Jefferson: The British would “distress us on every side acting in concert with one another.” (IbiD.)

AT ROXBOROUGH, THE COUNTRY HOUSEMB, I, 407.

RANDOLPH SUFFERED A STROKEIBiD.

“OUR MOST WORTHY SPEAKER” PTJ, I, 268.

AT HAMPTON, NEAR NORFOLKIbid., 249.

THE BRITISH TRIED TO LAND IBID.

UNDERTAKING EXPEDITIONS AGAINST CANADAIbid. See also Middlekauff, Glorious Cause, 309–14. “We are all impatience to hear from Canada,” said Robert Carter Nicholas on November 10, 1775. (PTJ, I, 256.)

CREATED A COMMITTEE OF SAFETY McDonnell, Politics of War, 92–97. The committee’s duties, McDonnell noted, included the “sole power to direct the movement of the army and to call out the minutemen and militia into service, to call for assistance from other colonies, and to purchase any arms outside the colony. All officers in every branch of the armed forces were specifically ordered to obey the Committee of Safety; no military officers whatsoever could sit on it.” (Ibid., 97.) See also Middlekauff, Glorious Cause, 565–66.

THE ELEVEN MONTHS PRECEDING THE DECLARATIONIn August, Jefferson had written John Randolph that he “would rather be in dependence on Great Britain, properly limited, than on any nation upon earth, or than on no nation.” (PTJ, I, 242.) The flummoxing phrase, though, was “properly limited”: What did that mean? As 1775 fell away, month by month, to stand alone as a nation was not yet the chief desire of Jefferson’s heart, or of the broad American public’s. (See Maier, American Scripture, 21.) So what happened? George III and Lord Dunmore, two men cloaked in the ancient authority of the Old World, chose this season to assert themselves in ways that proved inflammatory and decisive. On Thursday, October 26, 1775, George III told Parliament that the American course was “manifestly carried on for the purpose of establishing an independent Empire.” It was a “desperate conspiracy” whose “authors and supporters … meant only to amuse, by vague expressions of attachment to the parent State, and the strongest protestations of loyalty to me, whilst they were preparing for a general revolt.” (Ibid.) London now intended “to put a speedy end to these disorders by the most decisive exertions.” The words gave the king’s unhappy subjects no apparent opening for negotiation, and little reason to think that they might avert total war. (Ibid.) And then Dunmore struck in ViRGINIA.

DEPREDATIONS OF A SUPERIOR MILITARY FORCEPTJ, I, 260. “Former labors in various public employments now appear as recreations compared with the present,” Edmund Pendleton wrote. (IBiD.)

“WE CARE NOT FOR OUR TOWNS” Ibid., 259. Page continued: “I have not moved many of my things away—indeed nothing but my papers, a few books, and some necessaries for housekeeping. I can declare without boasting that I feel such indignation against the authors of our grievances and the scoundrel pirates in our rivers and such concern for the public at large that I have not and cannot think of my own puny person and insignificant affairs.” (IBId.)

FROM HIS QUARTERS Quarles, “Lord Dunmore as Liberator,” WMQ, 494.

ISSUED A PROCLAMATIONIbid. See also McDonnell, The Politics of War, 133–34.

DECLARED MARTIAL LAWMcDonnell, The Politics of WaR, 134.

ANY SLAVE OR INDENTURED SERVANTIbid. Dunmore proclaimed: “And I do hereby further declare all indented servants, Negroes, or others (appertaining to the Rebels,) free that are able and willing to bear arms [and join] His Majesty’s Troops, as soon as may be, for the more speedily reducing this Colony to a proper sense of their duty, to His Majesty’s crown and dignity.” (IBiD.)

SAW THEIR MOST FEVEREDPTJ, I, 266–67. In a letter to the Virginia delegates in Philadelphia, Robert Carter Nicholas wrote of “the unhappy situation of our country.” It was worse than ever, Nicholas said: “A few days since was handed to us from Norfolk Ld. D’s infamous proclamation, declaring the law martial in force throughout this colony and offering freedom to such of our slaves, as would join him.” Dunmore allies were “plying up the rivers, plundering plantations and using every art to seduce the negroes. The person of no man in the colony is safe, when marked out as an object of their vengeance; unless he is immediately under the protection of our little army.” (IbID.)

“I HAVE WRITTEN TO PATTY” Ibid., 264.

SWEPT UP AND DOWNQuarles, “Lord Dunmore as Liberator,” 494–97. On December 8, 1775, Edward Rutledge wrote that Dunmore’s proclamation had done “more effectually to work an eternal separation between Great Britain and the Colonies, than any other expedient, which could possibly have been thought of.” (Ibid., 495.)

“FOR GOD’S SAKE” PTJ, I, 265–66.

“SOME RASCALS, ALL FOREIGNERS” Ibid., 271.

“NO COUNTRY EVER REQUIRED” Ibid., 268. Jefferson was committed to doing all he could to prepare for the worst. For him, the period between the end of August, when he wrote John Randolph his calculated letter about American determination, and late November was one of unremitting strife. Sitting down to write Randolph again on November 29, 1775, three months after his first charming message, Jefferson held out less hope that there was anything London might do to reach reconciliation.

He opened with a rosy account of American success in Canada, noting “in a short time we have reason to hope the delegates of Canada will join us in Congress and complete the American Union as far as we wish to have it completed.” He then turned to Dunmore, blaming him for the violence in Virginia. “You will have heard before this reaches you that Lord Dunmore has commenced hostilities in Virginia,” Jefferson wrote. “That people bore with everything till he attempted to burn the town of Hampton. They opposed and repelled him with considerable loss on his side and none on ours. It has raised our country into [a] perfect frenzy.” He spoke of George III. “It is an immense misfortune to the whole empire to have a king of such a disposition at such a time. We are told and everything proves it true that he is the bitterest enemy we have. His minister is able, and that satisfies me that ignorance or wickedness somewhere controls him.” Unlike August, this time Jefferson’s message was more militant. “Believe me, Dear Sir, there is not in the British empire a man who more cordially loves a Union with Great Britain than I do,” he said. “But by the God that made me I will cease to exist before I yield to a connection on such terms as the British Parliament propose and in this I think I speak the sentiments of America. We want neither inducement nor power to declare and assert a separation. It is will alone which is wanting and that is growing apace under the fostering hand of our king.” (PTJ, I, 269.)

NAMED TO A COMMITTEEIbid., 272–75.

“THE CONTINENTAL FORCES BY SEA AND LAND” Ibid., 272.

ETHAN ALLEN HAD BEEN CAPTUREDIbid., 276–77.

“WE DEPLORE THE EVENT” Ibid., 276.

CONGRESS DEFERRED ANY DECISIONIbid., 277.

LEAVING PHILADELPHIAMB, I, 411.

OPENED A CASK OF 1770 MADEIRAIbid., 413.

RECEIVED A NEW PAMPHLETPTJ, I, 286.

“THE CAUSE OF AMERICA” Craig Nelson, Thomas Paine: Enlightenment, Revolution, and the Birth of Modern Nations (New York, 2006), 85.

NINE · THE COURSE OF HUMAN EVENTS

“FOR GOD’S SAKE” PTJ, I, 287.

THE BELLS RUNG Harlow Giles Unger, John Hancock: Merchant King and American Patriot (New York, 2000), 242.

ABOUT SEVEN O’CLOCKMB, I, 415.

ASKED THE REVEREND CHARLES CLAYIbid.

BURIED AT MONTICELLOKern, Jeffersons at Shadwell, 243–44.

AN “ATTACK OF MY PERIODICAL HEADACHE” TDLTJ, 184.

HE WAS “OBLIGED TO AVOID READING” PTJ, VI, 570.

STRANGE TIMEIbid., I, 297. A week after his mother’s death, Jefferson received letters from Williamsburg about declaring independence. “The notion of independency seems to spread fast in this colony,” said James McClurg on April 6, 1776. (Ibid.)

LIVED WITH THE HEADACHE Ibid., 296.

PAYING A MIDWIFE TO DELIVER MB, I, 416.

COLLECTED MONEYIbid.

LEFT MONTICELLO FOR PHILADELPHIAIbid., 417.

ARRIVING SEVEN DAYS LATERIbid., 418.

“I AM HERE” PTJ, I, 292.

ON MAY 23 HE TOOKIbid., 293. See also MB, I, 418.

THREE-STORY BOARDINGHOUSE Thomas Donaldson, The House in Which Thomas Jefferson Wrote the Declaration of Independence (Philadelphia, 1898), examines the sundry claims of different houses but concludes Graff’s establishment was home to Jefferson as he wrote. For details about the house, see John H. Hazelton, The Declaration of Independence: Its History (New York, 1970), 149–54.

HE INITIALLY FELT OUT OF PHASE PTJ, I, 293. “I have been so long out of the political world that I am almost a new man in it,” Jefferson wrote Page on May 17, 1776. (Ibid.) But he knew this: Not every colony was in the same place in terms of its determination to declare independence, an irrevocable step. Foreign alliances were essential to the success of the American cause, and “for [independence] several colonies, and some of them weighty, are not yet quite ripe. I hope ours is and that they will tell us so.” (Ibid., 294.)

THAT THE “UNITED COLONIES” Ibid., 298–99.

BEGAN THE NEXT DAYIbid., 309.

SOME REPRESENTATIVES ARGUEDIbid. Jefferson heard John Dickinson and James Wilson of Pennsylvania, Robert Livingston of New York, Edward Rutledge of South Carolina, and others argue for delay. The chief issue lay with the middle colonies—Pennsylvania, Maryland, Delaware, New Jersey, and New York. (South Carolina, too, was reluctant.) Recording the thrust of the argument, Jefferson wrote that they said the time was not yet right, for they believed the Congress should not “take any capital step till the voice of the people drove us into it.” (Ibid.) The reaction had been bad enough the previous month with John Adams’s May 15 resolution “for suppressing the exercise of all powers derived from the crown [which] had shown, by the ferment into which it had thrown these middle colonies, that they had not yet accommodated their minds to a separation from the mother country.” (Ibid.)

A PRECIPITOUS DECLARATION Ibid., 309–10.

“FOREIGN POWERS WOULD” Ibid., 310. There was an even darker possibility: How could the Congress be confident that Britain’s rivals would be inclined to throw themselves in the balance with a newly independent America? Surely, the anti-declaration members suggested, “France and Spain had reason to be jealous of that rising power which would one day certainly strip them of all their American possessions,” which could mean that “it was more likely they should form a connection with the British court, who, if they should find themselves unable otherwise to extricate themselves from their difficulties, would agree to a partition of our territories, restoring Canada to France, and the Floridas to Spain, to accomplish for themselves a recovery of these colonies.” (Ibid.)

JOHN ADAMS, RICHARD HENRY LEE, GEORGE WYTHEIbid., 311.

“NO GENTLEMAN” Ibid. Arguing that the only truly problematic colonies were Pennsylvania and Maryland, the pro-declaration delegates suggested “the backwardness of these two colonies might be ascribed partly to the influence of proprietary power and connections, and partly to their having not yet been attacked by the enemy.” (Ibid., 312.)

A COMPROMISE WAS PROPOSED Ibid., 313. Adams, Wythe, Lee, and their allies were practical men. Understanding how quickly opinion was moving, they did not try to force their will on the Congress—at least not that day.

WERE “NOT YET MATURED” Ibid.

ADAMS THOUGHT JEFFERSON SHOULD DO ITKaminiski, Founders on the Founders, 287–88.

A SECRET CONVERSATION Hazelton, Declaration of Independence, 9–11.

“WE WERE ALL SUSPECTED” Ibid., 10.

“THIS WAS PLAIN DEALING” The Works of John Adams, II, ed. Charles Francis Adams (Boston, 1856), 513.

“YOU INQUIRE WHY SO YOUNG A MAN” Ibid.

THE ENSUING CONVERSATION WITH JEFFERSONIbid.

WAS “NOT TO FIND OUT” TJ to Henry Lee, May 8, 1825 (LOC). Extract published at Papers of Thomas Jefferson Retirement Series Digital Archive, www.monticello.org/familyletters (accessed 2011).

SECOND-FLOOR ROOMSHazelton, Declaration of Independence, 149–51. Robert G. Parkinson, “The Declaration of Independence,” in Cogliano, ed., A Companion to Thomas Jefferson, 44–59, is a valuable essay; it is particularly good on the (necessarily, given the practical demands of the political moment) collaborative nature of the writing of the Declaration.

HE SLEPT IN ONE ROOM Hazelton, Declaration of Independence, 149–51.

“NEITHER AIMING AT ORIGINALITY” TJ to Henry Lee, May 8, 1825 (LOC). Extract published at Papers of Thomas Jefferson Retirement Series Digital Archive, www.monticello.org/familyletters (accessed 2011).

“WHEN IN THE COURSE OF HUMAN EVENTS” PTJ, I, 315, 413–33.

“SELF-EVIDENT” WAS FRANKLIN’SIsaacson, Benjamin Franklin, 312.

BE SENT “TO THE SEVERAL ASSEMBLIES” Maier, American Scripture, 130.

CONSTITUENCIES INCLUDED READERSIbid., 130–32.

MANY OF WHICH WERE OBSCURE Ibid., 107.

JEFFERSON’S INFLUENCES WERE MANIFOLDSee, for instance, Maier, American Scripture; Garry Wills, Inventing America: Jefferson’s Declaration of Independence (Garden City, N.Y., 1978); and Carl Becker, The Declaration of Independence: A Study in the History of Political Ideas (New York, 1970).

JAMES WILSON’S PAMPHLETHatzenbuehler, “Growing Weary in Well-Doing,” 12–14.

GEORGE MASON’S DECLARATION OF RIGHTS Ibid., 14–20.

“THE ENCLOSED PAPER” PTJ, I, 404.

WHOSE GOUT AND BOILSIsaacson, Benjamin Franklin, 310.

“A MEETING WE ACCORDINGLY HAD” The Works of John Adams, II, ed. Charles Francis Adams, 514.

INTRODUCED ON FRIDAY, JUNE 28 PTJ, I, 313–14.

“THE PUSILLANIMOUS IDEA” Ibid., 314.

“THE CLAUSE, TOO, REPROBATING” Ibid., 314–15.

HE FAIRLY WRITHEDIsaacson, Benjamin Franklin, 313.

FRANKLIN TRIED TO SOOTHE HIS YOUNG COLLEAGUEIbid. Franklin deployed an old anecdote about a hatmaker who had wanted a sign that read “John Thompson, hatter, makes and sells hats for ready money,” with a picture of a hat. His friends so pecked away at the sign it wound up with only the hatmaker’s name and the picture of a hat. (Ibid.)

“I HAVE MADE IT A RULE” Ibid., 310.

VOTED TO ADOPT THE RESOLUTION William Hogeland, Declaration: The Nine Tumultuous Weeks When America Became Independent, May 1–July 4, 1776 (New York, 2012), 173.

THE TEMPERATURE WAS 76 JHT, I, 229.

OVERNIGHT THE PHILADELPHIA PRINTER JOHN DUNLAPTranscript of Publishing the Declaration of Independence, LOC, http://www.loc.gov/rr/program/journey/declaration-transcript.html (accessed 2012).

BENJAMIN TOWNE, PUBLISHER OF THE PENNSYLVANIA EVENING POSTIbid.

THE NEWS WAS ANNOUNCEDJHT, I, 229.

IN FRONT OF THE STATE HOUSEHogeland, Declaration, 179.

“GOD BLESS THE FREE STATES” Ibid.

HORSEFLIES BUZZED THROUGHParton, Life, 191.

“THE SILK-STOCKINGED LEGS” Ibid.

JEFFERSON ALWAYS LOVEDRandall, Jefferson, I, 153.

“GERRY, WHEN THE HANGING COMES” Ibid.

“A THEATRICAL SHOW” Kaminski, Founders on the Founders, 315.

“JEFFERSON RAN AWAY” Ibid.

BENTHAM SCOFFEDDavid Armitage, The Declaration of Independence: A Global History (Cambridge, Mass., 2007), 173–86, reprints the text of Bentham’s “Short Review of the Declaration,” which was originally published in London in 1776.

“ABSURD AND VISIONARY” Ibid., 173.

“ ‘ALL MEN’ ” Ibid., 174.

“YOU WILL JUDGE” PTJ, I, 456. The colleague was Richard Henry Lee. In reply, Lee said that he wished “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.” (Ibid., 471.)

“I AM HIGHLY PLEASED” Ibid., 470. See also Robert M. S. McDonald, “Thomas Jefferson’s Changing Reputation as Author of the Declaration of Independence: The First Fifty Years,” Journal of the Early Republic, 19, no. 2 (Summer, 1999): 169–95.

TEN · THE PULL OF DUTY

“I PRAY YOU TO COME” PTJ, I, 477.

“REBELLION TO TYRANTS” Ibid., 677–79.

SUFFERED A DISASTROUS MISCARRIAGEScharff, Women Jefferson Loved, 118. By now Patty’s health was a perennial issue for Jefferson. “I am sorry the situation of my domestic affairs renders it indispensably necessary that I should solicit the substitution of some other person here in my room,” Jefferson wrote on June 30, 1776. “The delicacy of the House will not require me to enter minutely into the private causes which render this necessary: I trust they will be satisfied I would not have urged it again were it not necessary.” (PTJ, I, 408.)

“I WISH I COULD” PTJ, I, 458.

“A FAVORITE WITH” TJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/jefferson/martha-wayles-skelton-jefferson (accessed 2012).

THE ONSLAUGHT OF MILITARY REPORTSPTJ, I, 433–74.

FRAUGHT WITH FEARSIbid., 475–76, describes the case of Carter Braxton, a Virginia politician who had fallen from popular favor. Braxton’s wife’s family, the Corbins, included three brothers with sympathies to the Crown. Rumors in Williamsburg, William Fleming reported to Jefferson, alleged unspecified instances of “extreme[ly] imprudent, and inimical conduct” on the part of Mrs. Braxton, which “affected his political character exceedingly.” (Ibid., 475.) The conduct appears to have been remarks protesting the imprisonment of her brother in Williamsburg. (Alonzo Thomas Dill, Carter Braxton, Virginia Signer: A Conservative in Revolt [Lanham, Md., 1983], 69–73.)

A LOYALIST PLOT IN NEW YORKIbid., 412–13. “One fact is known of necessity, that one of the General’s lifeguard being thoroughly convicted was to be shot last Saturday,” wrote Jefferson on July 1. (Ibid., 412.)

THE MAYOR OF NEW YORKChernow, Washington, 903–4.

THE BRITISH, MEANWHILE, WERE PTJ, I, 412. “General Howe with some ships (we know not how many) is arrived at the Hook, and, as is said, has landed some horse on the Jersey shore,” wrote Jefferson. (Ibid.)

“OUR CAMPS RECRUIT SLOWLY” Ibid., 477. There was a delay in the flow of British troops to serve under Howe, but Jefferson noted that “our army [in] Canada” was “in a shattered condition.” He was frustrated by the pace of the Congress’s post-declaration business of forming a government. “The minutiae of the Confederation have hitherto engaged us; the great points of representation, boundaries, taxation etc being left open,” he told Lee. It was time, he said, for Lee to relieve him. “For God’s sake, for your country’s sake, and for my sake, come.” (Ibid.) There was one welcome piece of news from Virginia: the defeat of Dunmore at Gwynn’s Island. “This was a glorious affair,” John Page told Jefferson on July 15, 1776. “Lord Dunmore has had a most complete Drubbing.” (Ibid., 462.) Richard Henry Lee cheered the “disgrace of our African Hero at Gwynn’s Island.” (Ibid., 471.)

“IT IS A PAINFUL SITUATION” Ibid., 412.

“IF ANY DOUBT” Ibid., 412–13. The vicissitudes of politics were much in evidence, and the defeat of two Virginia delegates for reelection to the Congress troubled some observers. “We are now engaged beyond the power of withdrawing, and I think cannot fail of success in happiness, if we do not defeat ourselves by intrigue and canvassing to be uppermost in offices of power and lucre,” Edmund Pendleton wrote Jefferson. There was, Pendleton said, “much of this” in the sessions at Williamsburg in which Benjamin Harrison and Carter Braxton were denied new terms. (Ibid., 471–72.) Harrison was eliminated for fairly mundane reasons: He had championed the appointment of an official physician opposed by another faction, and his foes took him out. (Ibid., 475.)

A WAR WITH THE CHEROKEES Anthony F. C. Wallace, Jefferson and the Indians: The Tragic Fate of the First Americans (Cambridge, Mass., 1999), 54–60.

JEFFERSON’S VIEWS OF NATIVE AMERICANS Ibid., 1–20, offers a good overview. See also Francis Paul Prucha, The Great Father: The United States Government and the American Indians, I (Lincoln, Neb., 1984), 5–88, for an account of the colonial, revolutionary, and early post-revolutionary periods. He believed them more capable than blacks. (Jefferson, Writings, 266.) “The Indians … will often carve figures on their pipes not destitute of design and merit,” Jefferson wrote in Query XIV of Notes on the State of Virginia. “They will crayon out an animal, a plant, or a country, so as to prove the existence of a germ in their minds which only wants cultivation. They astonish you with strokes of the most sublime oratory; such as to prove their reason and sentiment strong, their imagination glowing and elevated. But never yet could I find that a black had uttered thought above the level of plain narration; never see even an elementary trait of painting or sculpture.” (Ibid.) See also Andrew Cayton, “Thomas Jefferson and Native Americans,” in Cogliano, ed., A Companion to Thomas Jefferson, 237–52.

A GENUINE CURIOSITY Jefferson, Writings, 218–29.

“NOTHING WILL REDUCE” PTJ, I, 485–86.

A PROPOSED CONSTITUTION FOR VIRGINIAIbid., 329–86.

HE CLOSELY FOLLOWED THE CONGRESS’S DEBATESJefferson, Writings, 24–32.

“THE ARTICLES OF CONFEDERATION” Ibid., 24.

DRAFT RULES OF PROCEDURE FOR THE CONGRESSPTJ, I, 456–58.

HE AND JOHN ADAMS ONCE DISAGREEDMcCullough, John Adams, 113–14.

“I RECEIVE BY EVERY POST” PTJ, I, 477.

A POSTSCRIPT BEGGING LEEIbid. The next day, writing John Page, he said: “I purpose to leave this place the 11th of August, having so advised Mrs. Jefferson by last post, and every letter brings me such an account of the state of her health, that it is with great pain I can stay here till then.” (Ibid., 483.) Lee was delayed, preventing Jefferson from keeping his promise to Patty to leave on August 11. (Ibid., 486.)

TO KEEP VIRGINIA’S QUORUM Ibid., 483.

“I AM UNDER THE PAINFUL NECESSITY” Ibid., 486. There was some talk that Patty was on the mend. “I wish you as pleasant a journey as the season will admit,” wrote Edmund Pendleton, “and hope you’ll find Mrs. Jefferson recovered, as I had the pleasure of hearing in Goochland she was better.” (Ibid., 508.)

A SEAL FOR THE NEW NATIONIbid., 494–97.

“PHARAOH SITTING IN AN OPEN CHARIOT” Ibid., 495.

SO WHY DID THE COLONISTSI am indebted to EOL; J. G. A. Pocock, The Machiavellian Moment: Florentine Political Thought and the Atlantic Republican Tradition (Princeton, N.J., 1975); Joyce Oldham Appleby, Liberalism and Republicanism in the Historical Imagination (Cambridge, Mass., 1992); and Wood, Radicalism of the American Revolution.

LONGED TO BE IN THE THICK OF SHAPING THE GOVERNMENT PTJ, I, 292.

HER FREQUENT PREGNANCIES Gordon-Reed, Hemingses of Monticello, 141–43.

“I HOPE YOU’LL GET CURED” PTJ, I, 489.

TO USE THE WYTHE HOUSE Ibid., 585.

THE HANDSOME BRICK HOUSEColonial Williamsburg Foundation, http://www.history.org/almanack/places/hb/hbwythe.cfm (accessed 2011).

ELEVEN · AN AGENDA FOR LIBERTY

“THOSE WHO EXPECT” Thomas Paine, The American Crisis, No. 4, September 11, 1777.

“IT IS ERROR ALONE” Jefferson, Writings, 286.

CHOSE TO ENTRUST THE MISSION PTJ, I, 521–22.

STAKES FOR THE COUNTRYIbid., 522–23. “With this country, everything depends upon it,” said Richard Henry Lee on September 27, 1776. (Ibid., 522.)

RUSSIA MIGHT DISPATCH Ibid., 522.

“TO ACQUAINT ME” Ibid., 523.

ASKED THE MESSENGER TO AWAIT Ibid., 524. The messenger bearing Hancock’s letter arrived on October 8, 1776; Jefferson’s reply to Hancock is dated October 11. (Ibid.)

PATTY COULD BE WITH HIMIbid., 604. See also MB, I, 426.

“IT WOULD ARGUE” Ibid., 524.

“NO CARES FOR MY OWN PERSON” Ibid. Jefferson was so anxious about missing out on the service in France that he told Silas Deane, who was to serve with Franklin, “I feel within myself the same kind of desire of an hour’s conversation with yourself or Dr. Franklin which I have often had for a confabulation with those who have passed the irredeemable bourne.” (Ibid., II, 25.) By framing the matter in such terms—equating time with Deane and Franklin with unobtainable time with the dead—he invested the work in France with the highest possible meaning, equal to his love for his parents, his sister Jane, Dabney Carr, Peyton Randolph, and his lost children. He felt the loss of the French opportunity that deeply.

A REMARKABLE LEGISLATIVE AGENDA FOR LIBERTYJHT, I, 235–85.

“THE STRENGTH OF THE GENERAL PULSE” Randall, Jefferson, I, 199.

A STRIKE AGAINST ENTAILJHT, I, 247–60. “To annul this privilege, and instead of an aristocracy of wealth … to make an opening for the aristocracy of virtue and talent … was deemed essential to a well-ordered republic,” Jefferson said. “To effect it, no violence was necessary, no deprivation of natural right, but rather an enlargement of it by a repeal of the law. For this would authorize the present holder to divide the property among his children equally, as his affections were divided; and would place them, by natural generation, on the level of their fellow citizens.” (Jefferson, Writings, 32–33.)

“A DISTINCT SET OF FAMILIES” Jefferson, Writings, 32.

ALTERING CRIMINAL JUSTICE Ibid., 270.

GENERAL PUBLIC EDUCATION Randall, Jefferson, I, 223–26.

THE NATURALIZATION OF THE FOREIGN-BORNIbid., 202.

A NEWCOMER ON THE POLITICAL SCENEIbid., 198.

BORN IN 1751 For background on Madison, see Ralph Ketcham, James Madison: A Biography (Charlottesville, Va., 1990). Richard Brookhiser, James Madison (New York, 2011), is an interesting recent work, as is Andrew Burstein and Nancy Isenberg, Madison and Jefferson (New York, 2010).

MADISON “ACQUIRED A HABIT” Randall, Jefferson, I, 198.

“BUT A WITHERED LITTLE APPLE-JOHN” “James Madison,” White House, http://www.whitehouse.gov/about/presidents/jamesmadison (accessed 2012).

“NEVER WANDERING FROM” Randall, Jefferson, I, 198.

FREEDOM OF RELIGIONPTJ, I, 525–58.

HAD BECOME A READERThomas Jefferson, Jefferson’s Extracts from the Gospels: “The Philosophy of Jesus” and “The Life and Morals of Jesus,” ed. Dickinson W. Adams and Ruth W. Lester (Princeton, N.J., 1983). I have long found the introduction to this volume essential reading on the subject of Jefferson and religion. See also Eugene R. Sheridan, Jefferson and Religion (Charlottesville, Va., 1998); Paul K. Conkin, “The Religious Pilgrimage of Thomas Jefferson,” in Jeffersonian Legacies, ed. Peter S. Onuf (Charlottesville, Va., 1993), 19–49; Edwin S. Gaustad, Sworn on the Altar of God: A Religious Biography of Thomas Jefferson (Grand Rapids, Mich., 1996); and Charles B. Sanford, The Religious Life of Thomas Jefferson (Charlottesville, Va., 1984). I also explored aspects of Jefferson’s views on religion in my American Gospel: God, the Founding Fathers, and the Making of a Nation (New York, 2006).

HONEST ABOUT HIS STATE’S ABYSMAL RECORDJefferson, Writings, 283–87.

HEARD BAPTIST MINISTERS PREACHINGWilliam Lee Miller, The First Liberty: America’s Foundation in Religious Freedom (Washington, D.C., 2003), 6. For more on Madison’s work in Virginia on liberty of conscience, especially on the distinction between “liberty” and “toleration,” see ibid., 4–8; Robert A. Rutland, George Mason: Reluctant Statesman (Baton Rouge, La., 1980), 60; and Ketcham, James Madison, 71–73.

IN 1767, JEFFERSON WAS INVOLVEDMB, I, 22. In another matter, sincerely devoted to helping a friend who longed to be ordained an Anglican priest, Jefferson wrote several letters on the subject, including a plea for Peyton Randolph’s influence, yet marveled at what he believed to be the inherent limitations of minds defined by Christian factionalism. His friend’s father was a Presbyterian minister in Aberdeen, Scotland, who received his son on a visit with joy—until he discovered his son’s mission. “Yet, so wonderful is the dominion of bigotry over her votaries that on the first information of his purpose to receive episcopal ordination he shut him from his doors and abjured every parental duty,” Jefferson told Randolph. (PTJ, I, 49–51.)

“SPIRITUAL TYRANNY” Jefferson, Writings, 34.

“OUR SAVIOR CHOSE NOT TO PROPAGATE” PTJ, I, 544.

JEFFERSON’S NOTES ON THE ISSUEIbid., 537.

PETITIONED THE ASSEMBLY FOR RELIEF JHT, I, 274–80.

“BROUGHT ON THE SEVEREST CONTESTS” Jefferson, Writings, 34.

“HONEST MEN, BUT ZEALOUS” Ibid.

STATUTE FOR RELIGIOUS LIBERTYIbid., 40. See also John A. Ragosta, “The Virginia Statute for Establishing Religious Freedom,” in Cogliano, ed., A Companion to Thomas Jefferson, 75–90.

“MEANT TO COMPREHEND” Jefferson, Writings, 34.

AN AMENDMENT STIPULATING “THE FREEDOM” Ibid., 44. See also Randall, Jefferson, I, 227, and Miller, Wolf by the Ears, 19–22.

“IT WAS FOUND THAT” Ibid.

“YET THE DAY IS NOT DISTANT” Ibid. Two acts did succeed in 1778 and in 1782 in Virginia: an abolition of the slave trade and a liberalization of manumission laws—what Miller called “the only concrete legislative achievements of the war years with a direct bearing upon slavery. For Jefferson, it was a disappointing performance: He had hoped that Virginia would take the lead among the states in providing for the eventual abolition of slavery and in arranging for the resettlement of the freed blacks outside the United States after peace had been restored.” (Miller, Wolf by the Ears, 22.)

“THE ENEMY” PTJ, I, 659.

“NO MAN … EVER HAD” Ferling, Almost a Miracle, 167.

REPORTS THAT GERMANYPTJ, II, 13–14.

“10,000 MEN CHIEFLY GERMANS” Ibid., 14.

“THE SOUTHERN AND MIDDLE COLONIES” Ibid.

GAVE BIRTH TO A SON MB, I, 447.

LIVED ONLY SEVENTEEN DAYSIbid.

IF THE JEFFERSONS GAVE HIM A NAMEIbid.

AT HOME ON THE FIRST OF AUGUSTIbid., 468.

RECORDING THE DOMESTIC DETAILSMartha Wayles Skelton Jefferson Account Book.

HANDWRITING WAS STRONG AND CLEAR Author observation.

THERE ARE DOODLES, TOOIbid.

“FREE FROM BLOT” TJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/jefferson/martha-wayles-skelton-jefferson (accessed 2012).

“TOLD OF NEATNESS” Ibid.

TO SEW CLOTHES AND SUPPLY THE ARMYPTJ, III, 532. See also Scharff, Women Jefferson Loved, 134–35. Scharff reported that at least one additional letter from Mrs. Jefferson on the subject has been located in recent years, which changes the historical consensus that the communication to Eleanor Conway Madison was the only surviving letter of Patty Jefferson’s. (Ibid., 419.)

“MRS. WASHINGTON HAS” Ibid.

“COULD WE BUT GET” Ibid., II, 3.

“THEY PLAY THE VERY DEVIL” Ibid.

“WE HAVE PRETTY CERTAIN” Ibid., 264. See also Randall, Jefferson, I, 245. A different kind of war was at hand. “I am of opinion the enemy have pretty well lost sight of conquering America by arms; for instead of drawing their force to a point, and making an effort against our grand army, it seems to be their plan to carry on a kind of piratical war in detached parties, by burning our towns, plundering our sea coasts, and distressing individuals,” William Fleming wrote Jefferson on May 22, 1779. (PTJ, II, 268.)

ELECTED GOVERNOR OF VIRGINIAIbid., 277–78.

“IN A VIRTUOUS AND FREE STATE” Ibid.

THE BALLOTING HAD PITTEDIbid.

JEFFERSON AND JOHN PAGE WERE COMPELLEDIbid., 278–79.

“AS THIS IS THE FIRST” Ibid., 279.

ISAAC JEFFERSON RECALLEDBear, Jefferson at Monticello, 4.

TWELVE · A TROUBLESOME OFFICE

“THEY CERTAINLY MEAN” PTJ, II, 236.

“I AM THOROUGHLY” Ibid., III, 405.

“THEY FORMED IN LINE” Bear, Jefferson at Monticello, 8.

THE THREAT AND THEN THE REALITYOverall, optimism about America’s military prospects grew in 1779–80. France and Spain were now with the United States; these allies were able to pressure Britain in the Atlantic, the Caribbean, and the Mediterranean. The British faced wars as far away as southern India. (Jeremy Black, Crisis of Empire: Britain and America in the Eighteenth Century [London, 2008], 159.) The difficulties Britain confronted globally, though, did not immediately translate into fatal weakness in America. By turning more attention and force to the South—to Georgia, to the Carolinas, and to Governor Jefferson’s Virginia—the British were able to bring terror to the American interior.

For a revisionist view of Jefferson’s performance as governor, see Emory G. Evans, “Executive Leadership in Virginia, 1776–1781: Henry, Jefferson, and Nelson,” in Sovereign States in an Age of Uncertainty, ed. Ronald Hoffman and Peter J. Albert (Charlottesville, Va., 1981), 185–225.

GEORGIA HAD COLLAPSED Ferling, Almost a Miracle, 384–85.

SOUTH CAROLINA WAS NEXTIbid.

A TWO-FRONT WARPTJ, III, 29–30. As Richard Henry Lee told Jefferson: “In Virginia we have properly two frontiers, one bordered by a wilderness, the other by a sea. Into both of these issue savages, and into the latter the most savage.” (Ibid.)

YEARS OF “INTENSE LABOR” PTJ, II, 298.

“I WILL NOT CONGRATULATE YOU” Ibid., III, 11.

CAPTURE OF HENRY HAMILTONPTJ, II, 287. See also ibid., 292–95, for the actual orders about the irons. Under attack from the British about the treatment of Hamilton, Jefferson, who detested such attacks, put the matter to George Washington. “The importance of this question in a public view, and my own anxiety under a charge of a violation of national faith, [as] the Executive of this Commonwealth, will I hope apologize for my adding this to the many, many troubles with which I know you to be burdened,” Jefferson wrote Washington on July 17, 1779. (Ibid., III, 41.) Washington’s reply was moderate in tone. “Whether it may be expedient to continue him in his present confinement from motives of policy and to satisfy our people, is a question I cannot determine; but if it should, I would take the liberty to suggest that it may be proper to publish all the cruelties he has committed or abetted … and the evidence in support of the charges.” (Ibid., 61.)

“THE HAIR BUYER GENERAL” Ibid.

IN MAY 1778 HE HAD DRAFTED A BILL OF ATTAINDER Ibid., 189–93. See also W. P. Trent, “The Case of Josiah Philips,” American Historical Review 1, no. 3 (April 1896): 444–54.

FOR “COMMITTING MURDERS” Ibid., 190. As Jefferson recalled the episode, “Philips was a mere robber, who availing himself of the troubles of the times, collected a banditti, retired to the Dismal swamp, and from thence sallied forth, plundering and maltreating the neighboring inhabitants, and covering himself, without authority, under the name of a British subject.” (Ibid., 191.)

AN EXTRAORDINARY EXPRESSION OF POWERIbid., 191–93. In PTJ, Julian P. Boyd wrote:

The Bill that TJ drew, though it was indeed an attainder limited by the condition that Philips surrender himself before a certain date to be tried according to regular judicial procedure, nevertheless was an assumption by the legislature that (1) Philips was a common criminal and was not acting under a British commission, and (2) that the legislature could of right make such a distinction affecting the life and liberty of an individual. Since this was assuming to the legislature a power over the rights of an individual usually regarded as belonging within the province of the judiciary and under protection of established legal procedures, the least that can be said about the Bill of Attainder of 1778 is that it was an extreme violation of TJ’s belief in the principle of the separation of powers of government. (Ibid., 192.)

Leonard Levy uses the case in his argument against Jefferson’s record on civil liberties. (Leonard W. Levy, Jefferson and Civil Liberties: The Darker Side [Chicago, 1989].)

“COMMUTE A GOOD PART” PTJ, II, 194. The problem of recruitment was a recurring one. Jefferson’s tendency to cast reality in congenial ways at the price of strict accuracy was on display in a letter he wrote to Benjamin Franklin. At a time of disturbing rumors about the commitment of different American states to the cause of an independent nation, Jefferson wanted to impress Franklin with Virginia’s fealty. “With respect to the state of Virginia in particular, the people seem to have deposited the monarchial and taken up the republican government with as much ease as would have attended their throwing off an old and putting on a new suit of clothes,” Jefferson said on August 13, 1777. “Not a single throe has attended this important transformation.” (Ibid., 26.)

“UNSUCCESSFUL BEYOND ALL” Ibid., III, 39.

TOURING VIRGINIA’S GUNNERYMB, I, 437.

PLANNED AN EXPEDITIONIbid., 321.

CLARK WAS A TALLFor major treatments of George Rogers Clark see Lowell H. Harrison, George Rogers Clark and the War in the West (Lexington, Ky., 1976); John Bakeless, Background to Glory: The Life of George Rogers Clark (Philadelphia, 1957); and Temple Bodley, George Rogers Clark: His Life and Public Services (Boston, 1926). See also Richard M. Ketchum, “Men of the Revolution: 11. George Rogers Clark,” American Heritage 25, no. 1 (December 1973): 32–33; 78; Gregory Fremont Barnes and others, eds., The Encyclopedia of the American Revolutionary War: A Political, Social, and Military History, I, A–D, 222–24.

HE CAPTURED KASKASKIABarnes and others, Encyclopedia of the American Revolutionary War, I, 223.

AND VINCENNESIbid.

SECURED AMERICAN INFLUENCEKetchum, “Men of the Revolution: 11. George Rogers Clark,” 78.

AFTER SEVERELY BURNING HIS LEGIbid.

“WELL, IS IT OFF?” Ibid.

“THE WANT OF MEN” PTJ, III, 321.

“THERE IS REASON” Ibid., 317. Jefferson was unflinching. “I am sorry to hear that there are persons in your quarters so far discontented with the present government as to combine with its enemies to destroy it.… The measures they are now taking expose them to the pains of the law, to which it is our business to deliver them.” Try them for treason, he advised William Preston on March 21, 1780. Failing conviction on capital grounds, Jefferson also advised Preston not to give up, for “perhaps it may be sufficient to convict them of a misprision of treason which is punishable by fine and imprisonment at the pleasure of the court.” (Ibid., 325.)

THE COLDEST WINTERIbid., 343. “We have had all over N. America a winter so severe as to exceed everything conceivable in our respective climates,” Jefferson told Mazzei. “In this state our rivers were blocked up to their mouths with ice for six weeks. People walked over York river at the town of York, which was never before done, since the discovery of this country. Regiments of horse with their attendant wagons marched in order over Patowmack at Howe’s ferry, and James river at Warwick.” (Ibid.)

SHIFTING THE CAPITAL OF VIRGINIA Ibid., 333–34.

A HOUSE ON RICHMOND’S SHOCKOE HILLMB, I, 495.

CLIMATE OF EXTREME EMERGENCYPTJ, III, 335. “Among the various conjectures of alarm and distress which have arisen in the course of the revolution, it is with pain I affirm to you, Sir, that no one can be singled out more truly critical than the present,” James Madison wrote Jefferson from Philadelphia on March 27, 1780. (Ibid.) While the Congress begged Virginia for men and matériel, Madison also complained to Jefferson about the feeble national government. “They can neither enlist, pay, nor feed a single soldier,” Madison wrote Jefferson on May 6, 1780. (Ibid., 370.)

CHARLESTON FELL TO THE BRITISHFerling, Almost a Miracle, 426–28. From Paris, Mazzei commiserated about Charleston. “Bad news have long legs,” he wrote Jefferson on June 22, 1780, reporting the glee over the South Carolina victory in British circles. “It is amazing the impression such an event makes in Europe,” Mazzei said. “The greater the distance, the more it will be magnified in men’s own imagination.” There was much talk of the significance of Charleston, and the talk fed upon itself. “Men of liberal sentiments consider all other causes as secondary, and of little moment, in comparison to the establishment of a free asylum for mankind,” he said. “Want of information makes them apprehensive of consequences too bad, and very distant from probability.” John Adams was “almost worn out” from reassuring allies and friends. (PTJ, III, 458–60.) Yet Jefferson’s belief in the cause, however troubled the cause might be, was abiding.

“WHILE WE ARE” PTJ, III, 447.

ANOTHER TORY UPRISING Ibid., 479. On August 8, 1780, William Preston wrote: “A most horrid conspiracy amongst the Tories in this Country being providentially discovered about ten days ago.” (Ibid., 533.) Jefferson had specific thoughts about how to fight such rebellions: “It will probably be better to seek the insurgents and suppress them in their own settlements than to await their coming, as time and space to move in will perhaps increase their numbers,” he told Preston on July 3. (Ibid., 481.)

MORE INDIAN VIOLENCEIbid., 544.

ELECTED TO A SECONDIbid., 410. Jefferson was pleased and gratified. “I receive with great satisfaction this testimony of the public approbation,” he said on June 4, 1780. (Ibid., 417.)

CORNWALLIS ROUTED THE AMERICAN GENERALMiddlekauff, Glorious Cause, 460–63. See also PTJ, III, 558–59. Edward Stevens told Jefferson to “picture it as bad as you possible can and it will not be as bad as it really is.” The militia had performed miserably. “Their cowardly behavior has indeed given a mortal wound to my feelings,” Stevens said. (Ibid.) While John Page thought Gates was to blame (“Did not the General venture on too boldly, relying too much on a continuance of his former good fortune?” [Ibid., 576]), Jefferson felt a personal responsibility for the loss and was humiliated by the reports of the Virginia militia’s performance. “I am extremely mortified at the misfortune incurred in the South and the more so as the militia of our state concurred so eminently in producing it,” Jefferson wrote to Gates on September 3, 1780. (Ibid., 588.) To Edward Stevens, Jefferson tried to make the best of things. “I sincerely condole with you on our late misfortune which sits the heavier on my mind as being produced by my own countrymen,” he wrote. “Instead of considering what is past, however, we are to look forward and prepare for the future.” (Ibid., 593.) It was a mature point of view, but he could not hide his embarrassment.

He wanted out—or thought he did. “The application requisite to the duties of the office I hold is so excessive, and the execution of them after all so imperfect, that I have determined to retire from it at the close of the present campaign,” Jefferson wrote to Richard Henry Lee on September 13, 1780. “I wish a successor to be thought of in time who to sound whiggism can join perseverance in business, and an extensive knowledge of the various subjects he must superintend. Such a one may keep up above water even in our present moneyless situation.” (Ibid., 643.) He repeated his thoughts about standing down early to John Page, suggesting that perhaps Page should take his place. Page was having none of it, telling Jefferson that “should you resign, you will give me great uneasiness, and will greatly distress your country.” (Ibid., 655.)

CITING THE “DISASTER” PTJ, III, 564.

BENEDICT ARNOLD, THE AMERICAN GENERALBoyer and Dobofsky, Oxford Companion to United States History, 50. See also MB, I, 504–5. Jefferson’s anger at Arnold was intense and personal. “You will readily suppose that it is above all things desirable to drag him from those under whose wing he is now sheltered,” Jefferson wrote General Peter Muhlenberg on January 31, 1781.

Jefferson wanted Arnold dead. “I shall be sorry to suppose that any circumstances may put it out of their power to bring him off alive after they shall have taken him and of course oblige them to put him to death,” Jefferson wrote in lines he deleted from the final version of the letter to Muhlenberg. “Should this happen … I must give my approbation to their putting him to death.” (PTJ, IV, 487.)

WORD OF THE BRITISH ATTACKMichael Kranish, Flight from Monticello: Thomas Jefferson at War (New York, 2010), 166.

A SERIES OF INVASION RUMORSHoffman and Albert, Sovereign States, 214–15.

CREATED “DISGUST” WHEN THE MILITIAMENIbid.

HE DECLINED TO CALL OUT Kranish, Flight from Monticello, 166–67.

A MESSENGER FOUND HIM Ibid., 166.

JEFFERSON HAD ISSUED Ibid., 174–75.

ROBERT HEMINGS AND JAMES HEMINGSBear, Jefferson at Monticello, 6.

PROPERTY JEFFERSON OWNED ON FINE CREEK Ibid., 124.

AT ABOUT ONE O’CLOCKKranish, Flight from Monticello, 191.

TOOK OFF THE TOP OF A BUTCHER’S HOUSEBear, Jefferson at Monticello, 7.

“IN TEN MINUTES” Ibid., 7–8.

“THE BRITISH WAS DRESSED IN RED” Ibid., 8.

SPENT THE HOURS OF THE INVASIONKranish, Flight from Monticello, 190.

BROUGHT ALONG HANDCUFFS Bear, Jefferson at Monticello, 9.

A BRITISH OFFICER ASKEDIbid., 8.

HIS FATHER HAD “PUT ALL THE SILVER” Ibid.

“LIKE AN EARTHQUAKE” Ibid., 9.

“MEN OF ENTERPRISE” PTJ, IV, 487. See also JHT, I, 340–41.

UNHAPPY AND SKEPTICALMcDonnell, Politics of War, 399–477, is a brilliant account of the actual politics of the hour in Virginia. Militiamen disliked being too long away from home (ibid., 404–5), were uncomfortable serving under Continental officers (ibid., 405–10), and resisted draft orders from the Continental army (ibid., 411–19). “By this point, many Virginians were reluctant to aid the patriot cause in any way,” wrote McDonnell. “Many were tired of giving supplies—through both impressments and taxes—and getting little back.” (Ibid., 442.)

“MILD LAWS, A PEOPLE” PTJ, V, 113.

RISKING THE WRATH OF THE PEOPLEMcDonnell, Politics of War, 452.

THIRTEEN · REDCOATS AT MONTICELLO

“SUCH TERROR AND CONFUSION” JHT, I, 358–59.

RETREATED FROM RICHMONDMcDonnell, Politics of War, 462–63.

THE DEATH OF YET ANOTHER CHILDMB, I, 508.

JEFFERSON CHOSE TO STAYScharff, Women Jefferson Loved, 139.

THERE WERE RIOTS OVER A DRAFTMcDonnell, Politics of War, 453–61.

REDUCED TO ASKING GEORGE WASHINGTONPTJ, VI, 32–33.

HIS “LONG DECLARED” Ibid., 33.

“THE LABORS OF” Ibid.

HE SPENT SATURDAY, JUNE 2, 1781 Ibid., 78.

ELECT THOMAS NELSON, JR. Hayes, Road to Monticello, 231.

FOR A “UNION OF” Ibid.

CORNWALLIS HAD ORDERED TARLETONIbid.

RIDING FAST, THE BRITISH DRAGOONSVirginius Dabney, “Jouett Outrides Tarleton, and Saves Jefferson from Capture,” Scribner’s Magazine, June 1928, 690.

IT WAS LATE Ibid., 691.

A GIANT OF A VIRGINIA MILITIAMANIbid.

“THE BEST AND FLEETEST OF FOOT” Ibid.

CRASHED THROUGH THE WILDERNESSIbid.

HIS FACE WAS “CRUELLY LASHED” Ibid., 691–92.

BROKE THEIR MARCH AT A PLANTATIONIbid., 692.

FOR ABOUT THREE HOURSIbid.

TO SET FIRE TO A WAGON TRAINIbid. “Tarleton says in his account of the expedition that he burned the wagons with their contents, instead of taking them with him, in order that no time might be lost,” wrote Dabney. “He adds: ‘Soon after daybreak some of the principal gentlemen of Virginia who had fled to the borders of the mountains for security, were taken out of their beds.… In the neighborhood of Doctor [Thomas] Walker’s a member of the Continental Congress was made prisoner, and the British light troops, after a halt of half an hour to refresh the horses, moved on toward Charlottesville.’ ” (Ibid.)

JOUETT ARRIVED AT MONTICELLOIbid. “The raiders were still many miles away,” wrote Dabney. “Jack gave the alarm to the governor.… He then spurred his all-but-exhausted mount to Charlottesville, two miles farther on, and warned the legislature. He had beaten the British by about three hours. Paul Revere’s fifteen-mile jaunt over fairly good roads in the moonlight seems almost nothing by comparison.” (Ibid.)

COOLLY, JEFFERSON ORDERED BREAKFAST Ibid.

PATTY AND THE TWO CHILDRENKranish, Flight from Monticello, 279.

HIDING SILVER IN ANTICIPATIONBear, Jefferson at Monticello, 8. See also Kranish, Flight from Monticello, 284.

“IN PREPARING FOR FLIGHT” PTJ, VI, 84.

TO A NEIGHBORING PEAKDabney, “Jouett Outrides Tarleton,” 693.

TOOK HIS SPYGLASSIbid.

LOOKING OUT AT CHARLOTTESVILLEIbid.

HE TURNED TO GOIbid.

HIS SWORD CANEIbid.

AS HE RETRIEVED IT, HIS CURIOSITYIbid.

HE SAW THE BRITISHIbid.

MOUNTED HIS BEST HORSEKranish, Flight from Monticello, 283.

THE REDCOATS ARRIVEDIbid., 284.

ONE COCKED A PISTOLIbid.

“FIRE AWAY, THEN” Ibid.

DRANK SOME OF JEFFERSON’S WINEIbid.

LEGEND HAS ITHayes, Road to Monticello, 284.

ESPECIALLY ELK HILL MB, I, 515–16. See also PTJ, VI, 224–25.

TWENTY-THREE OF JEFFERSON’S SLAVES I am grateful to Lucia Stanton for these figures. See also Stanton, “Those Who Labor for My Happiness,” 132–33.

RIDING AWAY FROM MONTICELLOIbid., 510.

AT POPLAR FORESTJoan L. Horn, Thomas Jefferson’s Poplar Forest: A Private Place (Forest, Va., 2002), 22.

EXPRESSED ITS GRATITUDEDabney, “Jouett Outrides Tarleton,” 694–95. “What would have been the fate of Jefferson, Henry, Lee, Harrison, and Nelson had they been taken captive by Tarleton?” wrote Dabney. “Some are of the opinion that Jefferson, at least, would have been tried in England as a traitor and hanged, but it is quite unlikely that such severe punishment would have been meted out to him. It is probably safe to assume, however, that these leaders in the revolutionary movement would have been treated as harshly as any civilian Americans who could have fallen into British hands. If the career of Jefferson alone had been cut short or substantially altered at this period of his life, the history of the United States would have been vastly changed. It is conceivable that, if he had been made prisoner, this country would have been deprived for all time of the services of the American who did most to burst the fetters which bound the souls of men 150 years ago, and to fix the principles upon which democracy in the Republic rests today. Nor should we forget that the capture of the author of the Declaration of Independence, three of its signers, and Patrick Henry would have been a severe blow to the struggling colonials.” (Ibid., 697.)

IT ALSO PASSED A RESOLUTIONPTJ, VI, 88–90.

“RESOLVED, THAT AT THE NEXT SESSION” Ibid., 88.

“COULD NOT BE INTENDED” Ibid., 105.

TIME HAD COME FOR A “DICTATOR” McDonnell, Politics of War, 465.

NEEDED TO BE “ARMED” Ibid.

THE MOTION FAILEDIbid.

ACCOUNTS OF JEFFERSON’S TERRIBLE TIMEFor a sympathetic view, see Evans, “Executive Leadership in Virginia,” 215–16. “In evaluating Thomas Jefferson’s governorship, historians have more often than not focused on his last five months in office and especially on the few days in late December and early January 1781,” wrote Evans.

The result is that, in the popular mind, he is considered not to have been a very good chief executive. Nothing could be further from the truth. It is true, of course, that the governor did not respond as quickly as he should have on December 31 to the news that a “fleet of 27 sail” had been sighted at the mouth of the James River.… Invasion scares and raids during the past several years had made both the public and its leaders less alert than they should have been. But the demands on the state were now tremendous, and the governor did not want to take any action that would strain its resources unnecessarily.… Under the circumstances the conclusion must be that he did remarkably well. (Ibid., 215–18.)

THE HOUSE INQUIRY WAS SHORT-LIVEDMcDonnell, Politics of War, 465. Jefferson believed Patrick Henry, an emerging political rival, was the motivating force behind the censure. “The trifling body who moved this matter was below contempt; he was more an object of pity,” Jefferson said of George Nicholas. “His natural ill-temper was the tool worked by another hand. He was like the minnows which go in and out of the fundament of the whale. But the whale himself was discoverable enough by the turbulence of the water under which he moved.” (PTJ, VI, 143.)

“NO FOUNDATION” Ibid.

“TAKEN MY FINAL LEAVE” Ibid., 118.

“A DESIRE TO LEAVE PUBLIC OFFICE” Ibid.

THE AMERICANS TRIUMPHED AT YORKTOWNAt Yorktown on October 17, 1781, a European soldier fighting with Cornwallis described the siege. “At daybreak the enemy bombardment resumed, more terribly strong than ever before,” he wrote. “They fired from all positions without let-up.… There was nothing to be seen but bombs and cannonballs raining down on our entire line.” (Black, Crisis of Empire, 166.)

“THERE WAS TREMENDOUS FIRING” Bear, Jefferson at Monticello, 10–11.

“LET ME DESCRIBE TO YOU” TDLTJ, 58–60.

“STOOD ARRAIGNED” PTJ, VI, 185. In May 1782, Patty Jefferson gave birth to another daughter, also Lucy Elizabeth. As a result of the birth Mrs. Jefferson was quite ill. Two days before the birth of the daughter, Jefferson had informed the Speaker of the House of Delegates, John Tyler, that he declined his recent election to the House of Delegates. (See JHT, I, 393–97; PTJ, VI, 179–87; and Willard Sterne Randall, Thomas Jefferson, 347.)

Speaker Tyler responded with a possible threat that Jefferson might be arrested and forced to attend. James Monroe also sent a letter to Jefferson on May 11, 1782, urging him to attend. According to the historian Dumas Malone’s account, Jefferson wrote Monroe what Julian P. Boyd called a long “embittered” letter of May 20 spelling out in “extreme anxiety” why he would not attend. (See JHT, I, 394–97; and PTJ, VI, 184–87.)

In a footnote to this letter, the editor of the Monroe papers wrote: “Jefferson, still smarting from the criticism of his conduct as governor and gravely concerned about the dangerous state of his wife’s health, declined to serve in the House of Delegates, following his election as a delegate. He used this response to JM’s letter of 11 May as a means of communicating to the House the justification for his decision not to serve.” There is no indication that they actually arrested or seized Jefferson to compel his attendance. There was only the threat. Patty Jefferson, of course, died four months later on September 6, 1782. (The Papers of James Monroe, II, ed. Daniel Preston and Marlena C. Delong [Westport, Conn., 2003–], 36.)

“MRS. JEFFERSON HAS ADDED” Ibid., 186.

FOURTEEN · TO BURN ON THROUGH DEATH

“MRS. JEFFERSON HAS AT LAST” Scharff, Women Jefferson Loved, 151.

MAY HAVE SUFFERED FROM TUBERCULOSIS MB, I, 521. See also Gordon Jones and James A. Bear, “Thomas Jefferson: A Medical History,” unpublished manuscript, Thomas Jefferson Foundation, Charlottesville, Va.

JEFFERSON “WAS NEVER OUT OF CALLING” TDLTJ, 63.

HELPING HER TAKE MEDICINESIbid.

EITHER AT HER BEDIbid.

CRAVED JEFFERSON’S COMPANYRandall, Jefferson, I, 380.

SOME LINES FROM STERNEPTJ, VI, 196–97.

“I HAVE BEEN MUCH” Scharff, Women Jefferson Loved, 148.

“THE HOUSE SERVANTS” Bear, Jefferson at Monticello, 99.

“HAVE OFTEN TOLD MY WIFE” Ibid.

“WHEN SHE CAME TO THE CHILDREN” Ibid., 99–100.

HE GAVE HIS PROMISEIbid., 100.

TO HELP THE GRIEVING HUSBANDTDLTJ, 63.

“THE SCENE THAT FOLLOWED” Ibid.

A PALLET TO LIE ONIbid.

“HE KEPT HIS ROOM” Ibid.

“WHEN AT LAST” Ibid.

“I HAD HAD SOME THOUGHTS” PTJ, VI, 197.

RUMOR HAD JEFFERSON Ibid., 199.

“I EVER THOUGHT HIM” Scharff, Women Jefferson Loved, 151.

HIS EPITAPH FOR PATTYRandall, Jefferson, I, 383.

THE POSSIBILITY OF SUICIDEPTJ, VI, 198–99.

HE KNEW HIS DUTYIbid. “The care and instruction of our children indeed affords some temporary abstractions from wretchedness and nourishes a soothing reflection that if there be beyond the grave any concern for the things of this world there is one angel at least who views these attentions with pleasure and wishes continuance of them while she must pity the miseries to which they confine me,” Jefferson wrote. (Ibid.)

HE WAS A LONG WAYIbid., 198. He neglected Elk Hill, saying that he was “finding myself absolutely unable to attend to anything like business.” (Ibid.)

FIFTEEN · RETURN TO THE ARENA

“I KNOW NO DANGER SO DREADFUL” PTJ, VI, 248.

“THE STATES WILL GO TO WAR” Ibid.

MUSING ON THE PERILS OF FAMEIbid., 204–5.

“IF YOU MEANT” Ibid., 205.

ASKED HIM TO SERVEIbid., 202. According to James Madison, “the act took place in consequence of its being suggested that the death of Mrs. J had probably changed the sentiments of Mr. J with regard to public life, and that all the reasons which led to his original appointment still existed.” (Ibid.) See also ibid., 210–15.

“I HAD TWO MONTHS BEFORE” Ibid., 210.

VISITING AMPTHILL, THE CARY PLANTATIONIbid., 206–7.

“PURSUE THE OBJECT OF MY MISSION” Ibid., 206.

“I SHALL LOSE NO MOMENT” Ibid.

“A LITTLE EMERGING” Ibid., 203.

PUBLISHED A NOTICE IN THE VIRGINIA GAZETTEIbid., 210.

HE AND PATSY EXPECTED TO SAILIbid., 211.

TOOK ROOMS AT MARY HOUSE’SMB, I, 527.

CHARMING POLITICAL COMPANY Ibid.

ELIZA HOUSE TRIST PTJ, VI, 375. “Your character was great in my estimation long before I had the pleasure of your acquaintance personally, for I always understood your country was greatly benefited by your counsels; and I value you now because I know you are good,” she wrote him in late 1783. (Ibid.)

MADISON’S WOOING OF FIFTEEN-YEAR-OLDIbid., 262–64. See also Gordon-Reed, Hemingses of Monticello, 309–12. Gordon-Reed made an illuminating point about the marriageable ages of women in these years, noting that men of Jefferson and Madison’s generation often pursued teenaged girls. Hence Jefferson and Sally Hemings and Madison and Kitty Floyd. There are other examples: John Marshall was twenty-five when he set out to win Polly Ambler—who was fourteen at the time. (Ibid., 311.) Thomas Mann Randolph, Sr., was to marry a seventeen-year-old when he was fifty. (Ibid.) “Much as it may assault present-day sensibilities, fifteen- and sixteen-year-old girls were in Hemings’s time thought eligible to become seriously involved with men, even men who were substantially older,” wrote Gordon-Reed. (Ibid., 309.)

TOOK DETAILED NOTESIbid., 212–13.

“HAD I JOINED YOU” Ibid., 217.

“MY INDIVIDUAL TRIBUTE” Ibid., 222. Jefferson understood, he wrote to Washington, “you must receive much better intelligence from the gentlemen whose residence there has brought them into a more intimate acquaintance with the characters and views of the European courts, yet I shall certainly presume to add my mite.” (Ibid., 222–23.)

JEFFERSON RETURNED TO VIRGINIAIbid., 259–61. His mission suspended, he left Philadelphia for Virginia on April 12. Madison kept him apprised of romantic and political developments. “Before you left us,” Madison wrote of Kitty Floyd, “I had sufficiently ascertained her sentiments. Since your departure the affair has been pursued.” (Ibid., 262.) On his way home Jefferson stopped in Richmond. For two weeks he reacquainted himself with the minutiae of Virginia, “associating and conversing with as many” legislators as he could. It was his first sustained period of time among these men since the end of the gubernatorial crisis, and Jefferson seems to have hurled himself back into the action with enthusiasm. He wrote Madison with his impressions of possible candidates for the Congress—and of his sense of how the state’s leadership viewed the fundamental question of national power. Jefferson confided this political intelligence in a letter written from Tuckahoe on the morning of Wednesday, May 7, 1783. (Ibid., 265–67.)

“SHOULD THE CALL BE MADE” Ibid., 267.

“MR. JEFFERSON WAS PLACED” Ibid.

THE CONGRESS TO WHICH JEFFERSON WAS ELECTEDBoyer and Dubofsky, Oxford Companion to United States History, 51, summarizes the powers of the Confederation Congress (and the lack thereof).

TO DEVISE A “VISIBLE HEAD” PTJ, VI, 516–29.

“THIS WAS THEN IMPUTED” Randall, Jefferson, I, 394–95.

“OUR PLAN BEST, I BELIEVE, COMBINES” Ibid.

A POWER OF CENTRAL PTJ, VI, 248. “We have substituted a Congress of deputies from every state to perform this task,” Jefferson wrote, “but we have done nothing which would enable them to enforce their decisions. What will be the case? They will not be enforced.… Can any man be so puffed up with his little portion of sovereignty as to prefer this calamitous accompaniment to the parting of a little of his sovereign right and placing it in a council from all the states, … who being chosen by himself annually, removable at will?” (Ibid.)

HAD TO LAY THEIR “SHOULDERS” Ibid., 249.

“I HAVE LONG THOUGHT” PTJ, X, 272. Jay made such points often. “An uneasiness prevails through the country and may produce untoward events,” he wrote on July 14, 1786. “Time alone can decide this and many other doubts, for nations, like individuals, are more frequently guided by circumstances than circumstances by them.” (Ibid., 135.) Through the years, they got along, but only just. In Madison’s view, expressed in 1785, the Congress had thus far “kept the vessel from sinking, but it has been by standing constantly at the pump, not by stopping the leaks which have endangered her.” (Ibid., VIII, 579.)

“THERE NEVER WILL BE MONEY” Ibid., X, 225.

“THE STATES WILL GO” Ibid., VI, 248.

“WHAT, THEN, IS THE AMERICAN” J. Hector St. John de Crèvecoeur, Letters from an American Farmer; and, Sketches of Eighteenth-Century America, ed. Albert E. Stone (New York, 1986), 69.

IN 1780, THE MARQUIS DE BARBÉ-MARBOIS PTJ, IV, 166–67.

NOTES ON THE STATE OF VIRGINIA Jefferson, Writings, 123–325. See also David Tucker, Enlightened Republicanism: A Study of Jefferson’s Notes on the State of Virginia (Lanham, Md., 2008), and “ ‘I have known’: Thomas Jefferson, Experience, and ‘Notes on the State of Virginia,’ ” in Cogliano, ed., A Companion to Thomas Jefferson, 60–74.

“AN EXACT DESCRIPTION” Jefferson, Writings, 127.

“THEparticular customs” Ibid., 288. When John Adams read the Notes, he praised them highly. “It is our meditation all the day long,” Adams wrote to Jefferson. “I cannot now say much about it, but I think it will do its author and his country great honor.” (PTJ, VIII, 160.) Adams added that the passages on slavery were “worth diamonds.” (Ibid.)

IN AN EVENING’S CONVERSATION PTJ, VI, 377.

TWO LARGELY NEGLECTED PIECESIrving Brant, “Two Neglected Madison Letters,” William and Mary Quarterly, 3d ser., 3, no. 4 (October 1946): 569–87.

KITTY FLOYD BROKE OFFPTJ, VI, 333. Writing obliquely to Jefferson, Madison said that “the object I was … pursuing has been brought [to an end] by one of those incidents to which such affairs are liable.” (Ibid.)

“I SINCERELY LAMENT” Ibid., 335–36.

“PARLIAMENTARY NEWS IS INTERESTING” PTJ, VI, 317.

SIXTEEN · A STRUGGLE FOR RESPECT

“FOREIGN CIVIL ARRANGEMENT” PTJ, VI, 470.

FOUR HUNDRED CONTINENTAL SOLDIERSPTJ, VI, 318–19. It was only after the legislature’s departure, Madison told Jefferson, that “the mutineers surrendered their arms and impeached some of their officers, the two principal of whom have escaped to sea.” (Ibid., 318.)

PENNSYLVANIA OFFICIALSPeter S. Onuf, ed., Congress and the Confederation (New York, 1991), 70–71.

TO “PREVENT ANY INFERENCES” PTJ, VI, 319.

REMAINED AT PRINCETONSee Varnum Lansing Collins, The Continental Congress at Princeton (Whitefish, Mont., 2005).

MOVED TO ANNAPOLISEdith Rossiter Bevan, “Thomas Jefferson in Annapolis, November 25, 1783–May 11, 1784,” Maryland Historical Magazine 41, no. 2 (1946): 115–24, offers some commentary and an accounting of daily expenditures.

TO SECURE HIM A ROOM PTJ, VI, 336.

LEFT MONTICELLO ON THURSDAY, OCTOBER 16, 1783 MB, I, 536.

OFFERED “SCANTY ACCOMMODATIONS” PTJ, VI, 319.

A “VILLAGE WHERE THE PUBLIC BUSINESS” Ibid., 337.

AS “THE UNITED STATES” Ibid., 369.

“IT IS NOW ABOVE A FORTNIGHT” Ibid., 381.

“THE RIOT OF PHILADELPHIA” Ibid.

THE TREATY OF PARISJHT, II, 414–17.

STILL NO QUORUM IN THE CONGRESSPTJ, VI, 388. “I am sorry to say that I see no immediate prospect of making up nine states, so careless are either the states or their delegates to their particular interests as well as the general good which would require that they be all constantly and fully represented in Congress,” Jefferson told Benjamin Harrison on December 17, 1783. (Ibid.)

“I CANNOT HELP” Ibid., 419.

“ALL THAT CAN BE SAID” Ibid. With France distracted by a continental war, America would be in a weakened bargaining position—a fact Jefferson understood and feared. (Ibid.) Jefferson was determined that Congress abide by its own rules and hold off on ratification until what he called “the danger of not having nine states” was overcome. (Ibid., 420.) The making of treaties was “an act of so much energy and substance” that to settle for seven states only would be “a breach of faith in us a prostitution of our seal, and a future ground … of denying the validity of a ratification.” (Ibid., 424–25.)

“I HAVE HAD VERY ILL HEALTH” Ibid., 438.

JEFFERSON SOUGHT A COMPROMISEIbid., 441–42. In Jefferson’s words, those members of the “opinion that 9 having ratified the Provisional treaty and instructed their ministers to enter into a definitive one conformable thereto, which is accordingly done, seven may under these particular circumstances ratify what has been so declared by 9 to have their approbation.” (Ibid., 441.)

CONNECTICUT AND NEW JERSEY AT LENGTH ARRIVEDIbid., 461.

HE CALLED ON “ALL THE GOOD” Ibid., 463.

“THAT WERE IT CERTAIN” Ibid., 386–87.

“I HAVE BEEN JUST ABLE” Ibid., 466.

“THE DIFFERENT SPECIES OF BONES” Ibid., 371.

THE COMTE DE BUFFONMB, I, 549.

“UNCOMMONLY LARGE PANTHER SKIN” Ibid.

“I FIND THEY HAVE SUBSCRIBED” PTJ, VI, 371.

A MECHANICAL COPYING DEVICEIbid., 373.

SEVENTEEN · LOST CITIES AND LIFE COUNSEL

THE GOVERNOR ISPTJ, VII, 303.

ALL THE TALK WAS OF BALLOONSIbid., 57.

GRAND BALLOONING EXPERIMENTS Jefferson and Hopkinson are referring to a series of experimental balloon flights that were conducted in Paris in late 1783. In June 1783, the brothers Montgolfier—Joseph-Michel and Jacques-Étienne, who had developed the first hot-air balloons—conducted the first public launching of a balloon in Paris. Then, on November 21, 1783, Jean-François Pilâtre de Rozier made the first free manned flight in a balloon in Paris. Pilâtre de Rozier was killed on June 15, 1785, when he and a companion, Pierre-Ange Romain, “plummeted over 1,000 feet to their deaths near Bologne when the double balloon in which they were attempting to cross the English Channel caught fire and partially collapsed.” (L. H. Butterfield, Wendell D. Garrett, and Marjorie E. Sprague, eds., Adams Family Correspondence, VI, 181.) Jefferson refers to the Pilâtre de Rozier crash in a letter of June 19, 1785. (PTJ, VIII, 237.) Jefferson also mentioned the crash in a letter to Abigail Adams on June 21, 1785. “This will damp for a while the ardor of the Phaetons of our race who are endeavoring to learn us the way to heaven on wings of our own,” he wrote. (Ibid., 241.)

THE REVOLUTIONARY POSSIBILITIES PTJ, VI, 542.

TEN YEARS LATER MB, I, 548–49.

“I WISH YOU HAD” PTJ, VI, 545.

“A SUBTERRANEOUS CITY” Ibid., VII, 123.

“THE BRITISH ROBBED ME” Ibid., VI, 507.

“YOU HAVE NO DOUBT” Ibid., 508.

“IN SOME OF THE REMOTEST SETTLEMENTS” Ibid., 509.

BUFFON’S THEORY OF HEATIbid., 436–37.

“I HAVE ALWAYS THOUGHT” Ibid., XVIII, 98.

HE WROTE THE MARQUIS DE BARBÉ-MARBOISIbid., VI, 373–74. “The plan of reading which I have formed for her is considerably different from what I think would be most proper for her sex in any other country than America,” he wrote Marbois. “I am obliged in it to extend my views beyond herself, and consider her as possibly at the head of a little family of her own. The chance that in marriage she will draw a blockhead I calculate at about fourteen to one, and of course that the education of her family will probably rest on her own ideas and direction without assistance.” He was thus pressing her harder than he otherwise would have. “With the best poets and prosewriters I shall therefore combine a certain extent of reading in the graver sciences. However I scarcely expect to enter her on this till she returns to me. Her time in Philadelphia will be chiefly occupied in acquiring a little taste and execution in such of the fine arts as she could not prosecute to equal advantage in a more retired situation.” (Ibid., 374.)

“THE ACQUIREMENTS WHICH I HOPE” Ibid., 359.

“CONSIDER THE GOOD LADY” Ibid., 359–60. As he traveled as a member of the Congress, Jefferson kept an eye on his daughters. On the road, this time to Annapolis, he wrote James Monroe that he was leaving Patsy in Philadelphia “having had it in my power to procure for her the best tutors in French, dancing, music, and drawing.” (Ibid., 355.)

Also to Patsy, who was apparently caught up in an enthusiasm about the coming of the apocalypse in the wake of a severe earthquake, Jefferson advised caution and perspective. “I hope you will have good sense enough to disregard those foolish predictions that the world is to be at an end soon,” he wrote her on December 11, 1783. “The Almighty has never made known to anybody at what time he created it, nor will he tell anybody when he means to put an end to it, if ever he means to do it.” (Ibid., 380.)

“WITH RESPECT TO THE DISTRIBUTION” Ibid., 360.

“YOU ARE NOW OLD ENOUGH” Ibid., 379.

TO BECOME “A MAN” Ibid.

“OUR FUTURE CONNECTION WITH SPAIN” Ibid., VIII, 408.

“FIX REASON FIRMLY” Ibid., XII, 15.

“MONROE IS BUYING” Kaminski, Founders on the Founders, 291.

“THOUGH THE DIFFERENT WALKS OF LIFE” PTJ, XXXI, 118.

THE NOTE, DONALD TOLD JEFFERSON, “WAS SO FRIENDLY” Kaminski, Founders on the Founders, 224–25.

“ADMONITION AFTER ADMONITION” PTJ, VI, 546.

“AMONG OTHER LEGISLATIVE” Ibid., 549.

TO WARN OF “ENCROACHMENTS” Ibid., 511–12.

“GIVES A PICTURE” Ibid., VII, 15–16.

“AN ATTACK OF MY PERIODICAL HEADACHE” Ibid., VI, 570.

“I SUPPOSE THE CRIPPLED STATE” Ibid., VII, 25.

FOR PREWAR DEBTSEOL, 112, and Charles Pinnegar, Virginia and State Rights, 1750–1861 (Jefferson, N.C., 2009), 53.

AT LEAST TWO ELEMENTSIbid.

A TRADE ROUTE CONNECTING PTJ, VI, 548. See also Joel Achenbach, The Grand Idea: George Washington’s Potomac and the Race to the West (New York, 2004), 34–35.

“THIS IS THE MOMENT” Ibid., VII, 26–27.

FASCINATED WASHINGTON Achenbach, Grand Idea, 37. See also Stuart Leibiger, Founding Friendship: George Washington, James Madison, and the Creation of the American Republic (Charlottesville, 1999), 37.

“I HAVE NO EXPECTATION” PTJ, VII, 49.

WASHINGTON SUPERVISED IMPROVEMENTS Leibiger, Founding Friendship, 46. See also Achenbach, Grand Idea, 129–35.

CHESAPEAKE AND OHIO CANAL Leibiger, Founding Friendship, 46–47.

“opinion of the Institution of the Society of Cincinnati” PTJ, VII, 88–89.

“IS INTERESTING, AND, SO FAR AS” Ibid., 105–7.

“THE WAY TO MAKE FRIENDS QUARREL” Ibid., 106.

WASHINGTON APPEARS TO HAVE TAKEN JEFFERSON’S COUNSEL SERIOUSLY Ibid., 108–9. See also Markus Hunemorder, The Society of the Cincinnati: Conspiracy and Distrust in Early America (New York, 2006), 28–29.

“MIGHT DRAW INTO THE ORDER” Hunemorder, Society of the Cincinnati, 47.

JEFFERSON THOUGHT BROADLY AND BOLDLYThe West let him dream big, and he proposed the union of the Ohio and Potomac rivers. “This is the moment … for seizing it if ever we mean to have it,” he said. “All the world is becoming commercial.” Jefferson was pushing Virginia to approve a special tax for the river project, but, as he told George Washington, “a most powerful objection always arises to propositions of this kind. It is that public undertakings are carelessly managed and much money spent to little purpose.” (PTJ, VII, 26–27.)

Jefferson’s plan for overcoming these obstacles: Recruit Washington from retirement to head up the project. The general’s reply was astute. Though he agreed with Jefferson about the merits of the project, Washington said, “I have no expectation that the public will adopt the measure; for besides the jealousies which prevail, and the difficulty of proportioning such funds as may be allotted for the purposes you have mentioned, there are two others, which in my opinion, will be yet harder to surmount. These are (if I have not imbibed too unfavorable an opinion of my countrymen) the impracticability of bringing the great and truly wise policy of this measure to their view, and the difficulty of drawing money from them for such a purpose if you could do it.” (Ibid., 49.) Washington was insightful, too, about the nature of legislative assemblies. “Men who are always together get tired of each other’s company,” he told Jefferson. “They throw off the proper restraint. They say and do things which are personally disgusting. This begets opposition. Opposition begets faction, and so it goes on till business is impeded, often at a stand.” (Ibid., 51–52.)

In April, Washington implicitly complimented Jefferson by writing for his “opinion of the Institution of the Society of Cincinnati,” an organization of Washington’s officers that some feared was a nascent aristocratic order that could corrupt the republic. (Ibid., 88.)

Jefferson was happy that Washington had asked. The issue of the Cincinnati, he said, “is interesting, and, so far as you have stood connected with it, has been a matter of anxiety to me.… I have wished to see you stand on ground separated from it; and that the character which will be handed to future ages at the head of our revolution may in no instance be compromised in subordinate altercations.”

Jefferson knew his man. Nothing could be better calculated to win Washington’s attention than the suggestion that his own reputation was at risk. Jefferson said that he was certain that Washington meant no harm. The “moderation and virtue of a single character”—Washington—“has probably prevented this revolution from being closed as most others have been by a subversion of that liberty it was intended to establish,” but even he “is not immortal, and his successor or some one of his successors at the head of this institution may adopt a more mistaken road to glory.” Congress, Jefferson said, shared his views. (Ibid., 105–7.)

Jefferson argued against the Order on two grounds. First, that the political nature of man made it highly unlikely that a society designed to meet regularly would long endure peaceably. “The way to make friends quarrel is to pit them in disputation under the public eye,” Jefferson said. A second Jeffersonian objection was that a hereditary society was out of harmony with the spirit of a republic based on what Jefferson called the “natural equality of man.” (Ibid., 106.)

Washington appears to have taken Jefferson’s counsel seriously. (Ibid., 109.)

“I SEE THE BEST EFFECTS” PTJ, VI, 548–49.

CONGRESS ACCEPTED THE VIRGINIA CESSIONIbid., 571–80.

A PLAN TO CREATE NEW STATESIbid., 581–617.

HAD NAMES FOR THEMIbid., 591.

ORDINANCE OF 1784 Ibid., 581–617.

“FOREVER REMAIN A PART” Ibid., 614.

“THEIR RESPECTIVE GOVERNMENTS” Ibid.

BANNED THE EXPANSION OF SLAVERY Miller, Wolf by the Ears, 27.

THE PLAN FAILED BY A SINGLE VOTEIbid., 28.

A DELEGATE FROM NEW JERSEY WAS TOO ILLIbid.

“THUS WE SEE THE FATE” Ibid.

WOULD NO LONGER RISK HIS “USEFULNESS” Ibid., 89.

THE NORTHWEST ORDINANCE OF 1787 Ibid., 29. See also Boyer and Dubofsky, Oxford Companion to United States History, 557–58; Adam Rothman, Slave Country: American Expansion and the Origins of the Deep South (Cambridge, Mass., 2005), 18–19; and EOL, 121–22.

THE MORNING AND INTO THE AFTERNOONPTJ, VII, 221–30.

AFTER THE REGULAR POST HAD LEFT ANNAPOLISIbid., 229.

“I AM NOW TO TAKE” Ibid., 233.

“AT THE CLOSE OF EVERY SESSION” Ibid.

“A TENDER LEGACY” Ibid., 233–34.

A FAREWELL TO THE VIRGINIA HOUSEIbid., 244.

“FOOLISH WORLD IN PARIS” Ibid., 257.

GATHERED INTELLIGENCE ON THE COMMERCEIbid., 323–55.

“MIGHT IN SOME DEGREE” Ibid., 358.

FOUR O’CLOCK ON THE MONDAY MORNINGMB, I, 554.

EIGHTEEN · THE VAUNTED SCENE OF EUROPE

“HE IS FULL OF HONOR AND SINCERITY” William Howard Adams, The Paris Years of Thomas Jefferson (New Haven, Conn., 2000), 184.

“A COWARD IS MUCH MORE” PTJ, VII, 640.

REMEMBERED THE “GOOD COMPANY” TDLTJ, 73.

“THE WINDS WERE SO FAVORABLE” MB, I, 555.

HE WAS DETERMINED Lawrence S. Kaplan, Jefferson and France: An Essay on Politics and Political Ideas (Westport, Conn., 1980), 19–20.

JEFFERSON VIEWED FRANCE IN THE CONTEXT Ibid. I agree with Kaplan’s argument, one supported by the more astute of contemporary players. For the case against Jefferson on the French question, see Conor Cruise O’Brien, The Long Affair: Thomas Jefferson and the French Revolution, 1785–1800 (Chicago, 1996). Iain McLean, “The Paris Years of Thomas Jefferson,” in Cogliano, ed., A Companion to Thomas Jefferson, 110–27, is a fine survey of the period.

HARES, RABBITS, AND PARTRIDGESPTJ, VII, 383–84.

STILTON CHEESESIbid., 384. In the end, he could not send the cheeses. (Ibid., 429.)

“VERY THICK WEATHER” Ibid., 508.

A FEVER STRUCK PATSYIbid.

“THROUGH A COUNTRY” Ibid.

“THE MOST AGREEABLE COUNTRY” Roy and Alma Moore, Thomas Jefferson’s Journey to the South of France, (New York, 1999) 16.

JEFFERSON NEGOTIATED TREATIES ON WHALE OIL Kaplan, Jefferson and France, 30. See also JHT, II, 196–97, and Merrill D. Peterson, “Thomas Jefferson and Commercial Policy, 1783–1793,” William and Mary Quarterly, 3d ser., 22, no. 4 (October 1965): 599–600.

HE KEPT A WARY EYEIbid., 33. I am indebted to Kaplan for these points. See also PTJ, VIII, 339 and 373–74.

THE PURCHASE OF AMERICAN EXPORTSIbid. See also PTJ, XIV, 304–5; Ibid., XV, 502.

TO THE OPENING OF ST. DOMINGUEIbid. See also PTJ, XV, 502.

“I BEG YOU’D PUT” PTJ, VII, 376.

A CHATTY, DETAILED MEMORANDUMIbid., 386–91.

THE MARQUIS DE CONDORCETWilliam Howard Adams, Paris Years of Thomas Jefferson, 7.

JEFFERSON TOOK UP RESIDENCEIbid., 47–48.

“FOR THE ARTICLES OF HOUSEHOLD FURNITURE” PTJ, VIII, 230.

“A MOST AGREEABLE MAN” McCullough, John Adams, 312.

“AS MUCH YOUR BOY” Ibid., 311.

“EVERY DAY ENLARGING” William Howard Adams, Paris Years of Thomas Jefferson, 41.

HOUSES, THEATERS, THE WALL OF THE FARMERS-GENERAL Ibid., 43–45.

THE PALAIS ROYALIbid., 59.

THIS “GREAT AND GOOD” COUNTRY Jefferson, Writings, 98.

“SO ASK THE TRAVELLED INHABITANT” Ibid.

THE BARBARY STATESEOL, 633–39. See also Robert W. Tucker and David C. Hendrickson, Empire of Liberty: The Statecraft of Thomas Jefferson, 294–99; Frank Lambert, The Barbary Wars: American Independence in the Atlantic World (New York, 2005); and Joseph Wheelan, Jefferson’s War: America’s First War on Terror, 1801–1805 (New York, 2003).

“THESE STATES ARE NOTED” David Adams, Geography; Or, A Description of the World (Boston, 1820), 306.

“TO PURCHASE THEIR PEACE” PTJ, VII, 511.

“YET FROM SOME GLIMMERINGS” Ibid.

“SURELY OUR PEOPLE” Ibid., 511–12.

CAPTURE OF A VIRGINIA SHIPIbid., 639–40.

PRESSED AGAIN FOR A WARLIKE RESPONSEIbid. John Jay had other, more conventional ideas, transmitting instructions from the Congress directing Jefferson, Franklin, and Adams to treat with the Barbary States, and even raising the possibility that American funds might be used to bribe the right people in order to make peace. A deal was necessary, Jay wrote, “because the continuance of … hostilities must constantly expose our free citizens to captivity and slavery.” (Ibid., VIII, 20.) If the diplomats found it wise to buy influence, then so be it. “At courts where favoritism as well as corruption prevails, it is necessary that attention be paid even to men who may have no other recommendation than their influence with their superiors.” (Ibid., 21.)

“THESE ARE FRAMED” Ibid., 644. He was soon confronted with a conflict with Spain over the American West. On Thursday, July 22, 1784, at New Orleans, Spain closed the Mississippi to navigation. Madrid’s offer to Americans—to allow some maritime traffic down the river, but to prohibit American exportation from New Orleans—was a poor one, and Jefferson needed to know how hard he should push the matter. “I would wish you to sound your acquaintances on the subject and to let me know what they think of it; and whether if nothing more can be obtained, this or no treaty, that is to say, this or war would be preferred.” (Ibid., 510.)

From home Charles Thomson had disagreeable news about the Committee of the States, the quasi-executive body Jefferson had helped bring into being. The committee had adjourned without “the harmony and good humor that could have been wished,” Thomson reported on October 1, 1784. (Ibid., 432.) The price to be paid was not limited to the domestic scene. “I am apprehensive it will have an ill aspect in the eyes of European nations and give them unfavorable impressions, which will require all your address and abilities to remove,” he wrote Jefferson. (Ibid.) The Congress had a difficult time even choosing a home. “If Congress should not be able to make a majority … to determine on any one place of fixed residence (a case very likely to happen),” Francis Hopkinson wrote Jefferson, “will they not be in a situation like that of Mahomet’s Tomb—suspended between Heaven and Earth and belonging to neither!” (Ibid., 535.)

By November Jefferson’s fears about America’s loss of face because of the weak Confederacy were confirmed. “All respect for our government is annihilated on this side [of] the water, from an idea of its want of tone and energy,” Jefferson wrote Elbridge Gerry. “It is a dangerous opinion to us, and possibly will bring on insults which will force us into war.” (Ibid., 502.)

“HE HAS A PRINCIPLE” William Howard Adams, Paris Years of Thomas Jefferson, 184–85. English policy on trade was so stringent, Jefferson believed it “a nation so totally absorbed in self interest that nothing will force them to be just but rigorous retaliation.” (PTJ, VII, 516; also see ibid., 509–10.)

Jefferson always maintained a tough line with Britain. “Nothing will bring them to reason but physical obstruction applied to their bodily senses,” he told Madison on March 18, 1785. “We must show that we are capable of foregoing commerce with them before they will be capable of consenting to an equal commerce.” Tobacco was America’s ally in this case: “Our tobacco they must have from whatever place we make its deposit, because they can get no other whose quality so well suits the habits of their people.” (PTJ, VIII, 40.)

INVENTED A FICTITIOUS FRENCH OFFICER PTJ, VII, 540–45. The “officer lately returned” allowed that there had been a few incidents: the Philadelphia Mutiny (“Yet in this mutiny there neither was blood shed nor a blow struck”); a riot in Charleston; the passage of some resolutions in town meetings protesting various articles of the Treaty of Paris; and, in Virginia, the call to halt payment of the British debts until there was restitution for the confiscated slaves.

Yet the disturbances in America, Jefferson’s officer wrote, were nothing compared to the recent violence in London under Lord Gordon. “Where is there any country of equal extent with the U.S. in which fewer disturbances have happened in the same space of time? … With respect to the people their confidence in their rulers in general is what common sense will tell us it must be, where they are of their own choice annually, unbribed by money, undebauched by feasting, and drunkenness. It would be difficult to find one man among them who would not consider a return under the dominion of Great Britain as the greatest of all possible miseries.” (Ibid., 540–42.)

The difficulty facing Jefferson in answering widely distributed attacks was formidable. “The views and designs, the intrigues and projects, of courts are let out by insensible degrees and with infinite art and delicacy in the gazettes,” said John Adams. “The English papers are an engine by which everything is scattered all over the world.… Of these papers, the French emissaries in London, even in time of war—but especially in time of peace, make a very great use; they insert in them things which they wish to have circulated far and wide.” (Ibid., 544.)

“NOTHING IS KNOWN” Ibid., 540.

HE WAS DISPATCHING BARRELS OF BRANDYIbid., 500–501.

LUCY, AGE TWO, WAS DEADIbid., 441.

DESCRIBED AS A “CONVULSIVE STRANGULATING” Robert Hooper, Quincy’s Lexicon-Medicum: A New Medical Dictionary (Philadelphia, 1817), 611. See also Nicholas Bakalar, “First Mention; Pertussis, 1913,” The New York Times, April 13, 2010.

“IT’S IMPOSSIBLE TO PAINT” PTJ, VII, 441.

“BOTH SUFFERED AS MUCH PAIN” Ibid., 441–42.

“PRESENT ME AFFECTIONATELY” Ibid., 636.

“MR. J. IS A MAN OF GREAT SENSIBILITY” William Howard Adams, Paris Years of Thomas Jefferson, 181.

“BEHOLD ME AT LENGTH” PTJ, VIII, 568.

“MY GOD! HOW LITTLE DO” Ibid., 233.

WALKING UP TO SIX OR EIGHT MILES A DAYIbid., 90.

“I MUST HAVE POLLY” Ibid., 141.

“I THINK I HAVE SOMEWHERE” Kaminski, Founders on the Founders, 292–93.

“OUR COUNTRY IS GETTING” PTJ, VIII, 357.

“WE HAVE INTELLIGENCE” Ibid., 293.

“IT IS SAID THAT GREAT BRITAIN” Ibid., 196.

“OUR GOVERNMENTS” Ibid.

NINETEEN · THE PHILOSOPHICAL WORLD

“WILL YOU TAKE THE TROUBLE” PTJ, IX, 158.

SHOPPING IN FRANCEMB, I, 565 and ff.

ATTENDED MASQUERADE BALLS Ibid., 600.

A FORWARD BARONESS Ibid., 611.

MADE HIS WAY TO VERSAILLES Ibid., 562.

HE ALSO VISITED PATSYCynthia Kierner, Martha Jefferson Randolph, Daughter of Monticello: Her Life and Times (Chapel Hill, N.C., 2002), 51–59.

“A HOUSE OF EDUCATION” PTJ, XI, 612. See also Kierner, Martha Jefferson Randolph, 54.

HE TRIED TO PLAY CHESSMB, I, 610.

“I HAVE HEARD HIM SAY” Ibid.

CALLED ON THE COMTESSE D’HOUDETOT AT SANNOIS PTJ, VIII, 241. See also William Howard Adams, Paris Years of Thomas Jefferson, 75.

“IN ALL ITS PERFECTION” Ibid.

THE COMMISSIONING OF A STATUEIbid., VII, 378. “The intention of the assembly is that the statue should be the work of the most masterly hand,” Harrison told Jefferson. “I shall therefore leave it to you to find out the best in any of the European states.” (Ibid.)

COME TO AMERICA “FOR THE PURPOSE” Ibid., 567. “I trust that having given to your country so much of your time heretofore, you will add the short space which this operation will require to enable them to transmit to posterity the form of the person whose actions will be delivered to them by History. Monsieur Houdon is at present engaged in making a statue of the king of France. A bust of Voltaire executed by him is said to be one of the first in the world.” (Ibid.)

“AN IMPROVEMENT IS MADE HERE” Ibid., VIII, 455.

“TO COMMUNICATE TO ME” Ibid., 301.

DOCUMENTS ABOUT FRENCH MARINESIbid., XI, 31.

TO CONVINCE THE COMTE DE BUFFONIbid., IX, 158.

TRAVELED TO A SCHOOL FOR THE BLINDMB, I, 595.

EXCHANGED AMERICAN NUTS AND BERRIESIbid., 599.

THE AMERICAN EXPLORER JOHN LEDYARDIbid., 586.

LEDYARD WAS PLANNING A JOURNEYJHT, II, 67–68.

“IT IS CERTAINLY OF GREAT IMPORTANCE” PTJ, VIII, 73.

“HAS THE ABBE ROCHON” Ibid., 75.

HE PURCHASED A PORCELAIN MARSIbid., 548.

THE FIGURINES WERE ACCIDENTALLY DESTROYEDIbid., IX, 126.

HE ONCE SENT CORSETSIbid., XI, 45–46.

“HE WISHES THEY MAY” Ibid.

ENGLISH TAILORING AND SHOEMAKING NEEDSIbid., XII, 484–85. Jefferson’s direct contact was William Stephens Smith, the Adamses’ son-in-law.

“I HAVE AT LENGTH” Ibid., VIII, 473.

HôTEL DE LANGEAC MB, I, 594.

“I CULTIVATE IN MY OWN GARDEN” PTJ, XII, 135.

“I AM NOW OF AN AGE” Ibid., VIII, 500.

“I OBSERVED THAT” William Howard Adams, Paris Years of Thomas Jefferson, 185–86.

“HE IS EVERYTHING” Kaminksi, Founders on the Founders, 293.

“MR. JEFFERSON IS A MAN” Ibid., 294.

A PORTRAIT OF THE DAILY ROUTINEPTJ, XI, 122–23.

“THE POLITICS OF EUROPE” Ibid., IX, 264.

FOR “A HUNDRED OR TWO” Ibid., 267.

A CONVENTION TO DEAL Ibid., 335.

“I ALMOST DESPAIR” Ibid.

PAINE VISITED JEFFERSON IN PARISJHT, II, 142–43.

THE SON OF A CORSET MAKERChristopher Hitchens, Thomas Paine’s Rights of Man: A Biography (New York, 2006), 20–21.

WAS BORN IN THETFORDCraig Nelson, Thomas Paine, 14.

YOUNG PAINE WAS BAPTIZEDIbid., 16–17. “Having been raised in two religions simultaneously during a period when competing doctrines waged armed warfare against one another could have triggered Paine’s adult tendency to question all received wisdom,” wrote Nelson. (Ibid., 17.)

MORE THAN HALF A MILLION COPIESSusan Jacoby, Freethinkers: A History of American Secularism (New York, 2004), 35.

THE RIGHTS OF MAN Ibid., 38–39.

THE AGE OF REASON Ibid., 41–43.

PAINE AND JEFFERSON BECAME FRIENDSWood, Idea of America, 213–28, examines Paine and Jefferson in detail. Referring to historical indictments of Jefferson on questions of slavery and of the racial inferiority passages in the Notes on the State of Virginia, Wood writes: “Paine may be able to help redeem Jefferson. Since it is clear that Jefferson and Paine thought alike on virtually every issue, Paine’s radical and democratic credentials may allow historians, especially those of the left, to see Jefferson in a somewhat more favorable light, or at least see him in light of the eighteenth century, and not in today’s light.” (Ibid., 227.) See also Seth Cotlar, Tom Paine’s America: The Rise and Fall of Transatlantic Radicalism in the Early Republic (Charlottesville, Va., 2011).

In 1801, Jefferson offered Paine passage from France to the United States on a U.S. Navy vessel after Paine had spent time in prison for opposing the execution of Louis XVI. By now president, Jefferson argued to Madison that the author of Common Sense deserved special attention. “There is a clear enough line between Thomas Paine and citizens in general,” he told Madison. (PTJ, XXXV, 125.) Paine declined Jefferson’s offer and ultimately arrived in the United States in November 1802.

A SERIES OF MEETINGSPTJ, IX, 285–88.

LARGE PIPES OF TOBACCOIbid. See also Abigail Adams 2d to John Quincy Adams, Adams Family Correspondence, VII, 41–42.

“WHAT HAS BEEN ALREADY” Ibid., 295. “I am so impressed and distressed with this affair that I will go to New York or to Algiers or first to one and then to the other … rather than it should not be brought to a conclusion.” (Ibid.) For Adams’s correspondence with John Jay on these matters, see The Works of John Adams, Second President of the United States: With a Life of the Author, Notes, and Illustrations, by His Grandson Charles Francis Adams, VIII (Boston, 1853), 372–79.

IN A LETTER DATED TUESDAYIbid.

HE WOULD BE BACK BEFORE Ibid., 318.

AT A LONDON DINNERIbid., 398–99.

“HE WAS SERIOUS IN THIS” Ibid., 399.

“I KNOW OF NO GENTLEMAN” Ibid., 555.

“IMPOSSIBLE FOR ANYTHING” Jefferson, Writings, 57.

“THEY TEEM WITH EVERY HORROR” PTJ, VIII, 548.

“IT WOULD HAVE ILLY SUITED ME” Ibid.

SURVEYING ENGLISH GARDENSIbid., IX, 369–75; McCullough, John Adams, 356–62.

“MY ANXIETIES ON THIS SUBJECT” PTJ, VIII, 451. “I must now repeat my wish to have Polly sent to me next summer,” Jefferson wrote Francis Eppes on August 30, 1785. “With respect to the person to whose care she should be trusted, I must leave it to yourself and Mrs. Eppes altogether,” Jefferson said. “Some good lady passing from America to France, or even England, would be most eligible; but a careful gentleman who would be so kind as to superintend her would do.” (Ibid.)

A SIMPLE LETTER ARRIVEDIbid., 517.

“I WISH SO MUCH TO SEE YOU” Ibid., 532–33.

“I WILL VENTURE TO ASSERT” Ibid., IX, 380.

TWENTY · HIS HEAD AND HIS HEART

“WE ARE NOT IMMORTAL OURSELVES” PTJ, X, 451.

“A GOLDEN-HAIRED, LANGUISHING” Helen Duprey Bullock, My Head and My Heart: A Little History of Thomas Jefferson and Maria Cosway (New York, 1945), 14.

BORN NEAR FLORENCE Ibid., 15. My portrait of Cosway relies on ibid.; William Howard Adams, Paris Years of Thomas Jefferson; and Stephen Lloyd, “The Accomplished Maria Cosway: Anglo-Italian Artist, Musician, Salon Hostess and Educationalist (1759–1838),” Journal of Anglo-Italian Studies 2 (1992): 108–39. Adams’s book is especially thorough and engaging.

MARIA WAS BARELY RESCUEDIbid., 14.

TO THE GLAMOROUS ARTISTIC AND LITERARY CIRCLESIbid., 15–16.

THE WRITER JAMES BOSWELLGordon Trumbull, “Boswell, James (1740–1795),” in Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, 729–40.

SIR JOSHUA REYNOLDSJane Turner, ed., The Dictionary of Art, XXVI (New York, 1996), 270–81.

ANGELICA KAUFFMANNWendy Wassyng Roworth, “Kauffman, (Anna Maria) Angelica Catharina (1741–1807),” in Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, XXX, 914–17.

THE COLLECTOR CHARLES TOWNLEYB. F. Cook, “Townley, Charles (1737–1805),” in Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, LV, 115–17.

“A WELL-MADE LITTLE MAN” Kukla, Mr. Jefferson’s Women, 89.

WON THE PATRONAGE OF THE PRINCE OF WALESWilliam Howard Adams, Paris Years of Thomas Jefferson, 101, 225.

SET UP HOUSEKEEPING AT SCHOMBERG HOUSEIbid., 225.

THE EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY SEX THERAPIST DR. JAMES GRAHAM Ibid.

“HIS NEW HOUSE” Bullock, My Head and My Heart, 18.

FURNITURE WAS ORNATELY CARVEDIbid. I am indebted to Bullock for the details of the Cosways’ interior design. She quoted a long passage from John Thomas Smith, the antiquarian.

WILLIAM HAZLITT WROTEWilliam Howard Adams, Paris Years of Thomas Jefferson, 225.

HORACE WALPOLE, THE WRITERIbid., 225–26.

MADEMOISELLE LA CHEVALIèRE D’EON, KNOWN IN HER DAYIbid., 226.

ONE COSWAY FRIEND Ibid., 224–25.

HUGUES AND THE COSWAYSIbid., 103.

THE ARTIST JOHN TRUMBULLTurner, Dictionary of Art, XXXI, 391–92.

THE MEN WHO HAD DESIGNED THE DOMEWilliam Howard Adams, Paris Years of Thomas Jefferson, 62–63.

ALLOWING LIGHT TO POUR THROUGH Ibid., 62. Adams wrote: “To [Jefferson’s] eye, the light-filled room seemed to manifest the idealism of the age. It was a recurring image that he could not shake. The marriage of practical engineering and aesthetic beauty was a relationship that would often inspire his architectural fantasies.” (Ibid., 62–63.)

“THE MOST SUPERB THING” Ibid. Adams added: “The halle’s sparkling glass and thin wooden ribs somehow captured for Jefferson the spirit of an ‘enlightened space’ that was both symbolic and utilitarian.” (Ibid., 63.)

NOS. 6–8 RUE ST.-FLORENTINMichael Gallet, Paris Domestic Architecture of the 18th Century (London, 1972), 21.

VOLUPTUOUS LIPSBullock, My Head and My Heart, 13–14, offers a vivid description of Mrs. Cosway; the effect of her lips are evident from portraits of her.

DIPLOMATIC DISPATCHES HAD ARRIVEDPTJ, X, 445. See also Bullock, My Head and My Heart, 21.

“EVERY SOUL OF YOU” Ibid.

HER ENGLISH WAS NOT PARTICULARLY FLUENTSee, for instance, PTJ, X, 494–96.

HAD DINNER TOGETHER Bullock, My Head and My Heart, 21. The details of the day come from this account of Bullock’s, who drew them from Jefferson’s “Head and Heart” letter. See also PTJ, X, 443–55.

TREATED “MEN LIKE DOGS” Ibid., 20.

“EVERY MOMENT WAS FILLED” PTJ, X, 446.

A FONDNESS FOR GETAWAY SPOTSWilliam Howard Adams, Paris Years of Thomas Jefferson, 244–47, describes the Jefferson-Cosway excursions in detail.

“HOW GRAND THE IDEA” Ibid., 244.

“THE WHEELS OF TIME” Ibid.

JEFFERSON DISLOCATED HIS RIGHT WRISTBullock, My Head and My Heart, 24. See also PTJ, X, 431–33.

“IT WAS BY ONE OF THOSE FOLLIES” PTJ, X, 478.

“I ONLY MENTION MY WISH” Ibid., 394.

“I HAVE PASSED” Ibid., 431–32.

“I AM VERY, VERY SORRY” Ibid., 433.

“MR. AND MRS. COSWAY ARRIVED” Ibid., 438.

HIS “LAST SAD OFFICE” Ibid., 443.

“SEATED BY MY FIRESIDE” Ibid., 444.

“YOUR LETTER COULD EMPLOY ME” Ibid., 494.

TWENTY-ONE · DO YOU LIKE OUR NEW CONSTITUTION?

“CHERISH THEREFORE THE SPIRIT” PTJ, XI, 49.

DEBT-RIDDEN, FRANCE FACED A SUPREME TEST Sylvia Neely, A Concise History of the French Revolution (Lanham, Md., 2008), 1–54, is instructive. See also Bailey Stone, Reinterpreting the French Revolution: A Global-Historical Perspective (New York, 2002), 14–61, and William Doyle, The Oxford History of the French Revolution (New York, 2002), 66–85.

PARTLY BECAUSE OF ITS SPENDING ON THE AMERICAN REVOLUTIONNeely, Concise History of the French Revolution, 40–42.

JEFFERSON WAS SHOCKED PTJ, XI, 415.

TAXES WERE UNEQUAL Neely, Concise History of the French Revolution, 7–12.

“IT IS IMPOSSIBLE” Ibid., 45.

THE KING SUMMONED AN ASSEMBLY OF NOTABLESPTJ, XI, 31–32. “You will have seen in the public papers that the king has called an Assembly of the Notables of his country,” Jefferson told John Jay in January 1787. “This has not been done for 160 years past.” (Ibid., 31.)

“OF COURSE” Ibid.

“SHOULD THEY ATTEMPT” JHT, II, 182.

THE ASSEMBLY OF NOTABLES FAILEDNeely, Concise History of the French Revolution, 47.

ONE FROM THE MARQUIS DE LAFAYETTEIbid.

CREATED IN THE MIDDLE AGESIbid., 6.

ITS LAST MEETING HAD BEEN HELD IN 1614 Ibid.

“WE TALKED ABOUT THE ESTABLISHMENT” Ibid., 57.

“THE INEFFICACY OF OUR GOVERNMENT” PTJ, X, 488.

A GROUP LED BY DANIEL SHAYSWilentz, Rise of American Democracy, 30–32. See also EOL, 111; William Hogeland, The Whiskey Rebellion: George Washington, Alexander Hamilton, and the Frontier Rebels Who Challenged America’s Newfound Sovereignty (New York, 2006), 52–53; and Don Higginbotham, “War and State Formation in Revolutionary America” in Gould and Onuf, Empire and Nation, 67. There were international sources for the discontent. Several of the eastern states, Jefferson wrote, “depended before the war chiefly on their whale oil and fish. The former was consumed in London, but being now loaded there with heavy duties, cannot go there. Much of their fish went up the Mediterranean, now shut to us by the piratical states. Their debts therefore press them, while the means of payment have lessened.” (PTJ, X, 631.)

“A SPIRIT OF LICENTIOUSNESS” PTJ, X, 488. Ezra Stiles of Yale wrote Jefferson about the rebellion on September 14, 1786: “Our enemies are fomenting discord among us and have succeeded to excite some tumults and popular insurrections.” (Ibid., 386.) Liberty would be safe, Stiles said, so long as “property in the United States is so minutely partitioned and transfused among the inhabitants.” (Ibid.)

John Jay also sent Jefferson newspaper accounts of the unrest. “A reluctance to taxes, an impatience of government, a rage for property, and little regard to the means of acquiring it, together with a desire of equality in all things, seem to actuate the mass of those who are uneasy in their circumstances,” Jay wrote. (Ibid., 489.)

To Stiles, Jefferson replied: “The commotions which have taken place in America, as far as they are yet known to me, offer nothing threatening. They are a proof that the people have liberty enough, and I would not wish them less than they have. If the happiness of the mass of the people can be secured at the expense of a little tempest now and then, or even of a little blood, it will be a precious purchase. Malo libertatum periculosam quam quietam servitutem. Let common sense and common honesty have fair play and they will soon set things to rights.” (Ibid., 629.)

SOUGHT TO REASSURE JEFFERSONIbid., 557. Contradicting her husband on the Shays violence, Abigail Adams had a different, darker view, writing Jefferson: “With regard to the tumults in my native state … Instead of that laudable spirit which you approve, which makes a people watchful over their liberties and alert in the defense of them, these mobbish insurgents are for sapping the foundation, and destroying the whole fabric at once.” (Ibid., XI, 86.)

“I CAN NEVER FEAR” Ibid., 619.

THERE MIGHT BE CANADIAN DESIGNSIbid., 596.

AN “IDEA THAT MAY DO” Ibid. William S. Smith was explicit about the connection between the British and Indians. “I hope there will not be any necessity for [the] spilling of blood, for there is no knowing where it will end,” Smith wrote Jefferson. “If there is an appearance of it, may we not shelter ourselves from the horror and inconvenience of internal commotion by turning the tide on these Britons by a formal declaration of war[?] They are at the bottom of it, and merit our highest indignation.” (Ibid., XI, 90.)

“THE BASIS OF OUR GOVERNMENTS” Ibid., 49.

A LETTER TO MADISONIbid., 92–97.

“I HOLD IT THAT A LITTLE REBELLION” Ibid., 93.

JOURNEY THROUGH THE SOUTHIbid., 415–64. See also TJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/research-and-collections/journey-through-france-and-italy-1787 (accessed 2011).

“ARCHITECTURE, PAINTING, SCULPTUREPTJ, XI, 215.

“I AM NOW IN THE LAND” Ibid., 247.

THE CONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTION HAD BEGUNMiddlekauff, Glorious Cause, 642–44.

SKEPTICAL OF A PROPOSALIbid., 480–81.

POLLY DID NOT WANT TO PART WITH THE MANIbid., 501–2.

“THE OLD NURSE WHOM YOU” Ibid., 502.

APPEARED NEARLY WHITEBear, Jefferson at Monticello, 4. The source is Isaac Jefferson, who said: “Sally Hemings’s mother Betty was a bright mulatto woman, and Sally mighty near white.” (Ibid.)

“VERY HANDSOME, [WITH] LONG HAIR STRAIGHT DOWN HER BACK” Ibid.

WAS WELL DEVELOPEDGordon-Reed, Hemingses of Monticello, 194–95. I am indebted to Gordon-Reed for her insights on possibilities suggested by Abigail Adams’s account of receiving Sally Hemings.

ABIGAIL ADAMS GUESSED SHE WAS OLDERIbid.

RAMSEY WAS HOPING Ibid., 197–208.

“I TELL HER THAT I DID NOT” Ibid., 502.

SHOULD COME FETCH HIS YOUNGER DAUGHTERIbid.

“AS CONTENTED … AS SHE WAS MISERABLE” Ibid., 503.

“THE GIRL WHO IS WITH [POLLY]” Ibid.

JEFFERSON THANKED ABIGAILIbid., 514–15.

CRYING AND “THROWN INTO ALL” Ibid., 551.

POLLY JEFFERSON AND SALLY HEMINGS ARRIVEDMB, I, 674.

“SHE HAD TOTALLY FORGOTTEN” PTJ, XI, 592.

“HER READING, HER WRITING” Ibid., 634.

“IT IS REALLY” Ibid., XII, 69.

“NOTHING CAN EXCEED” Ibid., 103.

“THE REPORT OF AN INTENTION” Dunbar, Study of “Monarchical” Tendencies, 96.

HAMILTON WAS SAID TO BELIEVEIbid., 97.

ALLEGED PLAN OF HAMILTON’S “THAT HAD IN VIEW” Ibid., 96–97.

“AT THIS MOMENT THERE IS NOT” Brymner, Douglas, Report on Canadian Archives, 1890, 97–98. Lord Dorchester sent this report to Lord Sydney on April 10, 1787.

“THEY ARE DIVIDED INTO THREE” Ibid., 99.

A CRISIS IN THE UNITED NETHERLANDSJHT, II, 184–87.

“IT CONVEYS TO US THE IMPORTANT LESSON” Ibid., 184.

“WE ARE, THEREFORE, NEVER SAFE” Ibid., 187.

GEORGE WASHINGTON DISPATCHEDPTJ, XII, 149–50.

BENJAMIN FRANKLIN SENT ONEIbid., 236–37.

LETTERS ABOUT THE CONSTITUTION FLOWED“It has in my mind great faults, but … it is fairly to be concluded that this is a better scheme than can be looked for from another experiment,” wrote Edward Carrington. (Ibid., 255.) St. John de Crèvecoeur told Jefferson, “I trust that every man who [is] attached to the glory and happiness of his country, as well as to his property, will be for it.” (Ibid., 332.)

IT “SEEMS TO BE” Ibid., 335.

“HOW DO YOU LIKE” Ibid., 350–51.

“HE MAY BE REELECTED FROM” Ibid., 351.

“THE WORLD HAS AT LENGTH” Ibid., 356.

“WE HAVE HAD 13 STATES” Ibid., 356–57.

“THE WANT OF FACTS” Ibid., 357.

HE REACTED TO THE CONSTITUTION Ibid., 438–43.

“FREEDOM OF RELIGION” Ibid., 440.

“AFTER ALL, IT IS MY PRINCIPLE” Ibid., 442.

JEFFERSON SUGGESTED THATIbid., 569–70. “I sincerely wish that the 9 first conventions may receive, and the 4 last reject it,” he wrote Madison in February 1788. “The former will secure it finally, while the latter will oblige them to offer a declaration of rights in order to complete the union. We shall thus have all its good, and cure its principal defect.” (Ibid.) Madison disagreed. He believed full ratification was the essential first step.

Some in Virginia wanted a conditional ratification like the one Jefferson had suggested earlier or a call for a new convention to take matters up again. “In either event, I think the Constitution and the Union will be both endangered,” Madison wrote Jefferson in April 1788. (PTJ, XIII, 98.)

“THERE ARE INDEED SOME FAULTS” Ibid., XIII, 174. Jefferson was brought into the debate over the ratification of the Constitution by proxy on Monday, June 9, 1788, by Patrick Henry, who sought to turn Jefferson’s skepticism about parts of the Constitution into wholehearted opposition. (Ibid., 354–55.)

“I might go farther,” Henry told the Virginia ratifying convention, “I might say, not from public authority, but good information, that his opinion is, that you reject this government. His character and abilities are in the highest estimation; he is well acquainted, in every respect, with this country.… This illustrious citizen advises you to reject this government till it be amended.… At a great distance from us, he remembers and studies our happiness. Living in splendor and dissipation, he thinks yet of bills of rights—thinks of those little, despised things called maxims. Let us follow the sage advice of this common friend of our happiness.” (Ibid., 354.)

Madison had had enough of Henry. “I believe that, were that gentleman now on this floor, he would be for the adoption of this Constitution. I wish his name had never been mentioned. I … know that the delicacy of his feelings will be wounded when he will see in print what has and may be said concerning him on this occasion.” (Ibid., 355.)

The problem was that Henry’s interpretation of Jefferson’s position was plausible—but Henry was interpreting Jefferson’s February position in June, after Jefferson had moved to an affirmative view of the Constitution. Jefferson was now largely in agreement with Francis Hopkinson, who observed: “Whether this is the best possible system of government, I will not pretend to say. Time must determine; but I am well persuaded that without an efficient federal government, the states must in a very short time sink into contempt and the most dangerous confusion.” (Ibid., 370.) Because of the distance, however, no one could know that Jefferson had reached this conclusion, which made Madison’s rescue mission all the more difficult. But the mission succeeded.

JEFFERSON FOLLOWED THE POLITICS OF RATIFICATION Ibid., 159–61.

THE SIGNIFICANCE OF THE PRESIDENCYIbid., 352.

GLIMPSED MARIA COSWAY’S HANDWRITING Ibid., 103–4.

“AT HEIDELBERG I WISHED” Ibid., 104.

HE SHARED A JOKE WITH HER Ibid. See also Gordon-Reed, Hemingses of Monticello, 281–82.

FASCINATED BY A 1699 PAINTINGGordon-Reed, Hemingses of Monticello, 281–83. Fawn Brodie was the first observer to point out the implications of Jefferson’s interest in an image of a patriarchal figure being given a young slave woman for sexual purposes while Sally Hemings was living with Jefferson in Paris. (Ibid.)

THE PICTURE, HE SAID, WAS “DELICIOUS” PTJ, XIII, 103.

“PARIS IS NOW BECOME” Ibid., 151.

TWENTY-TWO · A TREATY IN PARIS

“HE DESIRED TO BRING MY MOTHER” Lewis and Onuf, Sally Hemings and Thomas Jefferson, 256.

THERE WAS SALLY HEMINGSGordon-Reed, Hemingses of Monticello, 326–28.

HAD BEEN PAID SOME SMALL WAGESIbid., 236.

TWELVE LIVRES A MONTH FOR TEN MONTHSIbid., 236–41.

HAD BOUGHT CLOTHING Ibid., 259–60.

HAD HER INOCULATEDIbid., 213–23.

JAMES WAS TRAINED AS A CHEFIbid., 169–90.

MAY HAVE SERVED THE JEFFERSON DAUGHTERSIbid., 211–13.

“THE STRONGEST OF HUMAN PASSIONS” Burstein, Jefferson’s Secrets, 171.

“LIGHT COLORED AND DECIDEDLY GOOD LOOKING” http://www.monticello.org/site/plantation-and-slavery/appendix-h-sally-hemings-and-her-children (accessed 2012).

AT THE TIMES SHE WAS LIKELY TO HAVE CONCEIVED Ibid.

ENSLAVED PERSONS COULD APPLY FOR THEIR LIBERTYIbid., 172–82.

HE HAD ONCE ADVISED A FELLOW SLAVE OWNER Ibid., 182–83.

“MR. JEFFERSON’S CONCUBINE” Lewis and Onuf, Sally Hemings and Thomas Jefferson, 256.

WAS PREGNANT WHEN JEFFERSON WAS PREPARINGIbid.

“SHE WAS JUST BEGINNING” Ibid.

SHE, NOT HE, WAS IN CONTROLGordon-Reed, Hemingses of Monticello, 339. “Whether she had had time in her young life to learn this fact about him or not, the truth is that few things could have disturbed the very thin-skinned, possessive, and controlling Jefferson more deeply than having persons in his inner circle take the initiative and express their willingness to remove themselves from it,” wrote Gordon-Reed. (Ibid.)

“TO INDUCE HER TO DO SO” Lewis and Onuf, Sally Hemings and Thomas Jefferson, 256.

“IN CONSEQUENCE OF HIS PROMISE” Ibid.

THEIR FATHER KEPT THE PROMISEIbid.

“WE ALL BECAME FREE” Ibid., 256. Here is a summary of the Jefferson-Hemings children and their fates, from Lucia C. Stanton, Shannon Senior Research Historian at Monticello:

Sally Hemings had at least six children, who are now believed to have been fathered by Thomas Jefferson years after his wife’s death. According to Jefferson’s records, four survived to adulthood. Beverly (b. 1798), a carpenter and fiddler, was allowed to leave the plantation in late 1821 or early 1822 and, according to his brother, passed into white society in Washington, D.C. Harriet (b. 1801), a spinner in Jefferson’s textile shop, also left Monticello in 1821 or 1822, probably with her brother, and passed for white. Madison Hemings (1805–1878), a carpenter and joiner, was given his freedom in Jefferson’s will; he resettled in southern Ohio in 1836, where he worked at his trade and had a farm. Eston Hemings (1808–ca. 1856), also a carpenter, moved to Chillicothe, Ohio, in the 1830s. There he was a well-known professional musician before moving about 1852 to Wisconsin, where he changed his surname to Jefferson along with his racial identity. Both Madison and Eston Hemings made known their belief that they were sons of Thomas Jefferson. (TJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/plantation-and-slavery/sally-hemings [accessed 2012].)

THE CALLING OF THE ESTATES-GENERALJHT, II, 193.

“I IMAGINE YOU HAVE HEARD” PTJ, XIII, 358.

THE TWO MEN MET IN AMSTERDAMJHT, II, 187–92, and Peterson, Thomas Jefferson and the New Nation, 367–68, are useful on these issues.

THE FIRST TREATY TO BE RATIFIEDJHT, II, 199–202; PTJ, XIV, 66–180.

WASHINGTON WAS TO BE PRESIDENTPTJ, XIV, 3–4. To Jefferson, William S. Smith reported on a (failed) anti-Federalist scheme to roil the new government. The purported plan: Have Virginia refuse to vote for Washington for president, which would then, in this scenario, make Adams president. It was a result, Smith told Jefferson, “which would not be consistent with the wish of the country and could only arise from the finesse of antifederal electors with a view to produce confusion and embarrass the operations of the Constitution, against which many have set their faces.” (Ibid., 559–60.)

“IT IS … DOUBTFUL” Ibid., XIII, 502.

“HANCOCK IS WEAK” Ibid., XIV, 17.

AN “ILL UNDERSTANDING” Ibid., 275.

“WHO HAD BEEN UTTERLY AVERSE” Ibid., 301. Humphreys concluded: “Still, all the more reasonable men saw that the remedy would be infinitely worse than the disease.” (Ibid.)

JEFFERSON WANTED TO COME HOMEIbid., 189. “I consider as no small advantage the resuming the tone of mind of my constituents, which is lost by long absence, and can only be recovered by mixing with them.” (Ibid.)

ESPECIALLY INTERESTED IN ESTABLISHINGIbid., 332. “I shall hope … for the pleasure of personal conferences with your Excellency on the subjects of this letter and others interesting to our country, of getting my own ideas set to rights by a communication of yours, and of taking again the tone of sentiment of my own country which we lose in some degree after a certain absence.” (Ibid.)

“BY THE BYE, YOU HAVE BEEN OFTEN” Ibid., 324.

THE SPIRIT OF FACTIONRichard Hofstadter, The Idea of a Party System: The Rise of Legitimate Opposition in the United States, 1780–1840 (Berkeley, Calif., 1969), viii. (The first 121 pages of Hofstadter are on point.) The Founders, Hofstadter wrote, “did not believe in political parties as such, scorned those that they were conscious of as historical models, had a keen terror of party spirit and its evil consequences, and yet, almost as soon as their national government was in operation, found it necessary to establish parties.” (Ibid., viii.) See also Wood, Radicalism of the American Revolution, 298–301.

“I AM NOT” PTJ, XIV, 650.

“MY GREAT WISH” Ibid., 651.

“J. ADAMS ESPOUSED THE CAUSE” Ibid., XV, 147–48.

JEFFERSON CALLED ADAMS’S PROPOSALIbid., 315. In May 1789, Madison tucked an intriguing point in the middle of a letter. “I have been asked whether any appointment at home would be agreeable to you. Being unacquainted with your mind I have not ventured on an answer.” (Ibid., 153.)

A BRUTALLY COLD WINTER IN FRANCEJHT, II, 205.

“OUR NEW CONSTITUTION” PTJ, XIV, 420. Kaplan, Jefferson and France, makes an interesting point, arguing that Jefferson’s reactions to events both in France and in America were colored by his consistent belief in the centrality of the French alliance. “Fear of alienating the support of French liberals rising to power with the Revolution made him look upon the suppression of Shays’ Rebellion and the creation of the Constitution as threats to America’s republicanism and hence to America’s continued friendship with France.” (Ibid., 35.) Jefferson hoped that France would peaceably find its way to a kind of English constitution with defined individual rights. He hoped, too, that reform would come with relative ease and that France might “within two or three years, be in enjoyment of a tolerably free constitution, and that without its having cost them a drop of blood.” It was, of course, not to be. (William Howard Adams, Paris Years of Thomas Jefferson, 252; JHT, II, 193.)

RIOTS IN PARIS KILLED ABOUT ONE HUNDRED PEOPLEPTJ, XV, 104.

INTERPRETED THE VIOLENCE IN THE MOST BENIGN LIGHTIbid., 111. By way of explanation, Kaplan wrote: “With the future of his own country in mind, Jefferson gave wholehearted support to the revolutionists in their struggle against the internal hostility of the privileged classes and the external enmity of the rest of Europe.” (Kaplan, Jefferson and France, 36.)

JEFFERSON HAD SKETCHED A CHARTER OF RIGHTSPTJ, XV, 167–68.

THE FRUSTRATED THIRD ESTATEDoyle, Oxford History of the French Revolution, 104–7.

HIS HOUSE WAS ROBBEDIbid., 260. “My hotel having lately been robbed, for the third time, I take the liberty of uniting my wish with that of the inhabitants of this quarter” in hoping for “the protection of a guard,” he wrote Comte de Montmorin on July 8, 1789. (Ibid.)

HE MONITORED A STREET BATTLEIbid., 273.

HE WAS AT HIS FRIEND MADAME DE CORNY’SWilliam Howard Adams, Paris Years of Thomas Jefferson, 287.

“THE TUMULTS IN PARIS” PTJ, XV, 276–77.

“THE HEAT OF THIS CITY” Ibid., 277.

“A MORE DANGEROUS SCENE OF WAR” Ibid., 279.

“HERE IN THE MIDST OF TUMULT” Ibid., 305.

“BREAK EVERY ENGAGEMENT” Ibid., 354.

ADOPTED THE DECLARATION Larry E. Tise, The American Counterrevolution: A Retreat from Liberty, 1783–1800 (Mechanicsburg, Pa., 1998), 440–41. In addition, the Comte de Mirabeau, Emmanuel-Joseph Sieyès, and Jean-Joseph Mounier each played a part in determining its final form. (David P. Forsythe, Encyclopedia of Human Rights, I, [Oxford, 2009], 406.)

INFLUENCED BY THE DECLARATION Peter Hanns Reill and Ellen Judy Wilson, Encyclopedia of the Enlightenment (New York, 1996), 143. Other influences included the 1776 Virginia Declaration of Rights (Ibid.) and the U.S. state constitutions, especially those of Virginia, Maryland, and Massachusetts. (Forsythe, Encyclopedia of Human Rights, I, 406.)

GIVEN COUNSEL Forsythe, Encyclopedia of Human Rights, I, 406. Before writing the Declaration, Lafayette consulted with Thomas Paine, Benjamin Franklin, and Alexander Hamilton. Jefferson sent Madison a copy of the draft, which Gouvernour Morris also reviewed while in Paris. (Ibid.)

BEGAN AT FOUR PTJ, XV, 355.

“A SILENT WITNESS” Ibid., 355. He knew that he was in a dangerous position—an American diplomat appearing to meddle in the internal politics of his host nation. The next morning, Jefferson went to Montmorin to confess and perform the “duties of exculpation.” The count, though, was ahead of Jefferson—or chose to pretend that he was. “He told me he already knew everything which had passed, that, so far from taking umbrage at the use made of my house on that occasion, he earnestly wished I would habitually assist at such conferences, being sure I should be useful in moderating the warmer spirits, and promoting a wholesome and practicable reformation only.” (Ibid.)

AGREED TO A STRUCTURE Ibid. “The result was an agreement that the king should have a suspensive veto on the laws, that the legislature should be composed of a single body only, and that to be chosen by the people.” The decisions made by the Assembly that evening “reduced the Aristocracy to insignificance and impotence.” (Ibid.)

“DECIDED THE FATE OF THE [FRENCH] CONSTITUTION” Ibid.

WHO HAD SENT GEORGE WASHINGTON THE KEY TO THE BASTILLETJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/jefferson/marquis-de-lafayette (accessed 2012).

PATSY JEFFERSON RECALLED STANDING AT THE WINDOWMrs. O. J. Wister and Miss Agnes Irwin, eds. Worthy Women of Our First Century (Philadelphia, 1877), 22. See also TJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/jefferson/marquis-de-lafayette (accessed 2012).

FIRST CAME THE ROYAL COACH, AND A CHAMBERLAIN BOWEDIbid.

RESEMBLED “THE BELLOWINGS OF THOUSAND OF BULLS” Ibid.

“LAFAYETTE! LAFAYETTE!” Ibid.

NOTICING PATSY WATCHING FROM THE WINDOW, BOWED TO HERIbid.

A MARK OF RESPECT SHE NEVER FORGOTIbid.

ALL HER LIFE SHE KEPT A TRICOLORED COCKADEIbid.

“SO FAR IT SEEMED” PTJ, XVI, 293. The letter was written in 1790.

A LONG LETTER TO JAMES MADISONIbid., XV, 384–99.

HE DID NOT SERIOUSLY PRESSConsider, for instance, a letter Jefferson wrote later, in 1816.

I am certainly not an advocate for frequent and untried changes in laws and constitutions. I think moderate imperfections had better be borne with; because, when once known, we accommodate ourselves to them, and find practical means of correcting their ill effects. But I know also that laws and institutions must go hand in hand with the progress of the human mind. As that becomes more developed, more enlightened, as new discoveries are made, new truths disclosed, and manners and opinions change with the change of circumstances, institutions must advance also, and keep pace with the times. We might as well require a man to wear still the coat which fitted him when a boy, as civilized society to remain ever under the regimen of their barbarous ancestors. (TJ to Samuel Kercheval, July 12, 1816, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.)

CLAY WAS SEEKING A CONGRESSIONAL SEAT PTJ, XVI, 129.

“YOU ARE TOO WELL INFORMED” Ibid.

THE ISSUE OF RIFLE MANUFACTURING Ibid., XV, 422.

“THE SPIRIT OF PHILOSOPHICAL” Ibid., XVI, 150.

JEFFERSON LEFT PARIS Ibid., XV, 487.

HOW TO MEASURE THE WIDTH Ibid., 493.

TUTORED POLLY IN SPANISHIbid., 497.

HE ALSO SET OUT “ROVING THROUGH” Ibid., 509.

“ON OUR RETURN” Ibid.

PURCHASING “A CHIENNE BERGERE” TJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/house-and-gardens/dogs (accessed 2012).

“THE MOST CAREFUL INTELLIGENT DOGS” Ibid.

TWENTY-THREE · A NEW POST IN NEW YORK

“WE HAVE BEEN FELLOW-LABORERS” PTJ, XVI, 179.

“IN GENERAL, I THINK IT NECESSARY” Ibid., 493.

“FINE AUTUMN WEATHER” Ibid., XV, 552.

AT A QUARTER TO ONE Ibid., 560.

AN OFFER FROM THE PRESIDENT Ibid., 519. “In the selection of characters to fill the important offices of government in the United States,” George Washington wrote Jefferson, “I was naturally led to contemplate the talents and disposition which I knew you to possess and entertain for the service of your country.” (Ibid.)

Madison underscored Washington’s message. “I take for granted that you will … have known the ultimate determination of the President on your appointment,” he wrote Jefferson on January 24, 1790. “All that I am able to say on the subject is that a universal anxiety is expressed for your acceptance; and to repeat my declarations that such an event will be more conducive to the general good, and perhaps to the very objects you have in view in Europe, than your return to your former station.” (Ibid., XVI, 126.) Madison had been consistent. “It is of infinite importance that you should not disappoint the public wish on this subject,” he had written when the nomination was approved. (Ibid., 169.)

“CRITICISMS AND CENSURES” Ibid., XVI, 34.

WASHINGTON LEFT THE TACTICAL WORKIbid., 118. All in all, Jefferson said, he preferred to return to France. “But it is not for an individual to choose his post,” Jefferson wrote Washington. “You are to marshal us as may best be for the public good.… [B]e so good only as to signify to me by another line your ultimate wish, and I shall conform to it cordially.” (Ibid., 34–35.)

WAS NOT TO BE IN CHARGE OF ALL DOMESTIC AFFAIRSIbid. “I was sorry to find him so little biased in favor of the domestic service allotted to him,” Madison wrote Washington on Monday, January 4, 1790, “but was glad that his difficulties seemed to result chiefly from what I take to be an erroneous view of the kind and quantity of business annexed to that which constituted the foreign department.” There was a domestic component to the job, but Madison expected it to be minimal. (Ibid.)

A STRONG CASE FOR THE CABINETIbid., 116.

WASHINGTON WANTED AN ANSWERIbid., 118. As Jefferson considered his course, he replied to an “Address” the people of Albemarle County had presented to him expressing their thanks and respect on his return from abroad. (Ibid., 167–80.) “At an early period of your life and a very critical era of public affairs we elected you our representative in the general Assembly.… In that station your virtues and talents became known to your country, by whom they were afterwards made more extensively beneficial to the community at large.” (Ibid., 177.)

As noted above, his reply encapsulated the creed he had forged through experience and contemplation in the quarter century since his first session of the House of Burgesses:

We have been fellow-laborers and fellow-sufferers, and heaven has rewarded us with a happy issue from our struggles. It rests now with ourselves alone to enjoy in peace and concord the blessings of self-government, so long denied to mankind: to show by example the sufficiency of human reason for the care of human affairs and that the will of the majority, the natural law of every society, is the only sure guardian of the rights of man. Perhaps even this may sometimes err. But its errors are honest, solitary and short-lived.—Let us then, my dear friends, forever bow down to the general reason of the society. We are safe with that, even in its deviations, for it soon returns again to the right way. These are lessons we have learnt together. (Ibid., 178.)

HE ACCEPTED WASHINGTON’S OFFERIbid., 184.

SPOKE IN PRACTICAL POLITICAL TERMSIbid., 228–29.

DECIDED TO MARRY HER THIRD COUSINThomas Mann Randolph, Jr. JHT, II, 250–52. See also Kierner, Martha Jefferson Randolph, 76–82.

THEY HAD MET WHEN PATSY WAS A CHILD Kierner, Martha Jefferson Randolph, 76–77.

AMBITIOUS, WELL EDUCATED, AND BLACK-HAIREDIbid., 77. “My daughter, on her arrival in Virginia, received the addresses of a young Mr. Randolph, the son of a bosom friend of mine,” Jefferson wrote Madame de Corny. (PTJ, XVI, 290.)

“THOUGH HIS TALENTS” PTJ, XVI, 290.

TO ARRANGE PATSY’S MARRIAGE SETTLEMENTIbid., 182.

THE WEDDING TOOK PLACEIbid., 189–91.

WAS PERHAPS REACTING TO HER FATHER’S LIAISON Gordon-Reed, Hemingses of Monticello, 422. For Gordon-Reed’s complete discussion of Patsy’s courtship and marriage—including the fact that Jefferson did not follow custom and give Sally Hemings, a familiar figure, to either of his daughters on the occasions of their marriages—see ibid., 414–27.

RANDOLPH WAS INTERESTED IN FARMINGPTJ, XVI, 370. “The necessity I am under of turning my attention to the cultivation of my little farm has inclined my thoughts of late towards agriculture,” Thomas Mann Randolph, Jr., wrote Jefferson. “To one as fond as I am of physical research, and so much accustomed to exercise, such an inclination might be dangerous: but however enticing the subject, however pleasing the employment, I am resolved it shall never seduce me from the study of the law, and the attempt to acquire political knowledge.” (Ibid.)

Jefferson was intimately engaged with the lives of his daughters. Patsy’s marriage did not change that. Randolph’s father gave the couple an estate southeast of Richmond, called Varina. Both of the newlyweds came to prefer Edgehill, a place near Monticello, but they could not yet afford it. Jefferson offered his counsel, but his own financial affairs were such that he could not offer much more. (Ibid., 386–87. See also JHT, II, 252–53.) “No circumstance ever made me feel so strongly the thralldom of Mr. Wayles’s debt,” he told his eldest daughter. “Were I liberated from that, I should not fear but that Col. Randolph and myself … could effect fixing you there.” (PTJ, XVI, 387.) The Randolphs ultimately bought Edgehill.

THE CARE AND TENDINGGordon-Reed, Hemingses of Monticello, 247–48.

THE PRECISE LOCATION OF HER LIVING QUARTERS IS UNKNOWNI am indebted to Monticello’s Lucia Stanton and Susan Stein for this information.

MULBERRY ROWI am indebted to Susan Stein for this description of Mulberry Row.

SLOW AND AT TIMES SNOWY PTJ, XVI, 277–78.

“THE CONGRESS UNDER THE NEW CONSTITUTION” Ibid., XV, 91.

JEFFERSON COULD NOT FIND QUARTERSIbid., XVI, 278–79.

“AN INDIFFERENT ONE” Ibid., 300.

“MR. JEFFERSON IS HERE” Cappon, Adams-Jefferson Letters, xxxix.

THEN–RELATIVELY REMOTE NEIGHBORHOODJHT, II, 259.

LEOPOLD II, THE HOLY ROMAN EMPERORJeremy Black, From Louis XIV to Napoleon (London, 1999), 159.

THE DECLARATION OF PILLNITZIbid.

DECLARED WAR ON AUSTRIAIbid., 160.

A THIRTEEN-YEAR SERIES OF WARSEOL, 175.

DREW BRITAIN AND SPAIN INTO WARFor a very general overview, see U.S. Department of State, Office of the Historian, “The United States and the French Revolution, 1789–1799,” http://history.state.gov/milestones/1784-1800/FrenchRev (accessed 2012).

ON SUNDAY, MARCH 21, 1790 PTJ, XVI, 288.

A “DAILY, CONFIDENTIAL AND CORDIAL” PTJRS, VII, 103.

AFTER WASHINGTON SAT FOR A PORTRAITJHT, II, 259.

“NOTHING CAN EXCEL MR. JEFFERSON’S ABILITIES” PTJ, XIV, 223.

“I HAVE FOUND MR. JEFFERSON” Ibid., XV, 498.

“YOU CAN SCARCELY HAVE HEARD” Ibid., VII, 383.

“HE WAS INCAPABLE OF FEAR” PTJRS, VII, 101.

“HIS MIND WAS GREAT” Ibid.

“HIS TEMPER WAS NATURALLY” Ibid.

WAS STRUCK BYSee PTJ, XVI, 416; 432; 435–36; 487.

“BE SO GOOD AS TO SAY” Ibid., 286.

“THE TRANSACTION OF BUSINESS” Ibid., 379.

“HE HAD A RAMBLING, VACANT LOOK” Journal of William Maclay: United States Senator from Pennsylvania, 1789–1791 (New York, 1965), 272.

HE WAS “LOFTY AND ERECT” TJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/research-and-collections/physical-descriptions-jefferson (accessed 2011).

“HIS INFORMATION WAS EQUALLY POLITE” TJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/research-and-collections/jefferson-conversation (accessed 2011).

“WHEN THE HOUR OF DINNER” PTJ, XX, 646–47.

“PERHAPS THEIR CONDUCT” Ibid., XVIII, 80.

“WONDER AND MORTIFICATION” Ibid., XVI, 237.

“FOR THE MOST PART” Ibid.

THE QUASI-REGAL AIR AROUND THE PRESIDENTJHT, II, 256–68.

ESSAYS ENTITLED DISCOURSES ON DAVILAPTJ, XVI, 238–39.

JEFFERSON ARRANGED FOR FENNO TO PUBLISH Ibid., 238–41.

FENNO BECAME ENTIRELY A CREATUREIbid., 240–41.

“I HAVE BUT ONE SYSTEM OF ETHICS” Ibid., 291.

A LATE SNOW IN NEW YORKIbid., 405.

WASHINGTON BECAME SO ILLIbid., 429. “On Monday last the President was taken with a peripneumony of threatening appearance,” Jefferson wrote Patsy on May 16, 1790. “Yesterday (which was the 5th day) he was thought by the physicians to be dying. However about 4 o’clock in the evening a copious sweat came on, his expectoration, which had been thin and ichorous, began to assume a well digested form, his articulation became distinct, and in the course of two hours it was evident he had gone through a favorable crisis. He continues mending today, and from total despair we are now in good hopes of him. Indeed he is thought quite safe.” (Ibid.)

A FISHING TRIP OFF SANDY HOOKIbid., 2.

WOULD “CARRY OFF THE REMAINS” Ibid., 475.

JEFFERSON RAN INTO ALEXANDER HAMILTONIbid., XVII, 205–7.

BORN IN 1755 Chernow, Alexander Hamilton, 17. See ibid., 7–40, for details of Hamilton’s early life.

ENROLLING AT KING’S COLLEGE Ibid., 41–61.

QUICK WITH HIS PENIbid., 58–61.

HE BECAME A TOP AIDE Ibid., 85–129.

MARRIED INTO A POWERFUL NEW YORK FAMILYIbid., 128–32.

A DELEGATE TO THE CONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTIONIbid., 222–42.

SAID TO BE “AMAZINGLY FOND” Julian P. Boyd, Number 7: Alexander Hamilton’s Secret Attempts to Control American Foreign Policy (Princeton, N.J., 1964), 23.

IN A SPEECHChernow, Alexander Hamilton, 233.

“THE EYE SETTLED WITH A DEEPER INTEREST” Randall, Jefferson, III, 336.

“HIS LOOK WAS SOMBER” PTJ, XVII, 205.

IN HIS REPORT ON THE PUBLIC CREDIT IN EARLY 1790 Sharp, American Politics in the Early Republic, 34–35.

BY TARIFFS ON IMPORTS AND EXCISE TAXES ON DISTILLED SPIRITSIbid., 34.

FUNDING THE DEBT Ibid., 35.

SHREWDER SPECULATORS, MADISON TOLD JEFFERSONIbid.

THE SECOND ELEMENT OF HAMILTON’S PLANIbid., 36.

INSTANTLY DIVIDED THE NATIONIbid. In Sharp’s estimation, “Hamilton’s assumption proposal threatened to destroy the newly organized government.” (Ibid.)

VOTED DOWN FEDERAL ASSUMPTIONIbid.

HE ASKED FOR A WORDPTJ, XVII, 205.

“IT WAS A REAL FACT” Ibid., 206. Jefferson also said: “And … it has become probable that unless they can be reconciled by some plan of compromise, there will be no funding bill agreed to, our credit … will burst and vanish, and the states separate to take care everyone of itself.” (Ibid., XVI, 537.)

UNLIKE MANY OF HIS FELLOW VIRGINIANS Sharp, American Politics in the Early Republic, 36. Sharp quoted “Light-Horse Harry” Lee on the subject. Lee said he “had rather myself submit to all the hazards of war and risk the loss of everything dear to me in life than to live under the rule of an … insolent northern majority.” One hope, Lee noted, was moving the capital to “the territorial center” of the country. (Ibid.)

THE LOCATION OF THE NATIONAL CAPITALJHT, II, 287–99, is a good account of the politics of the decision about the capital.

“THE POTOMAC STANDS A BAD CHANCE” Ibid., 298.

HE CONVENED A DINNERIbid., 301. “On considering the situation of things,” Jefferson said, “I thought the first step towards some conciliation of views would be to bring Mr. Madison and Col. Hamilton to a friendly discussion of the subject.” (Ibid., 298.)

“MEN OF SOUND HEADS” Ibid., 301.

“THAT IF EVERYONE RETAINS” PTJ, XVI, 540. Sharp, American Politics in the Early Republic, 37, described Jefferson’s thinking as well.

MADISON AGREED TO EASE HIS OPPOSITION JHT, II, 301.

“AS THE PILL WOULD BE A BITTER ONE” PTJ, XVII, 207. “This is the real history of the assumption,” Jefferson said. (Ibid.)

“THE LEAST BAD OF ALL THE TURNS” Ibid., XVI, 575.

“IT IS MUCH TO BE WISHED” Ibid., VIII, 399. He added: “No man can have a natural right to enter on a calling by which it is at least ten to one he will ruin many better men than himself. Yet these are the actual links which hold us whether we will or no to Great Britain.” (Ibid.)

“EVERY HUMAN BEING, MY DEAR” Ibid., XVII, 215.

“ONE PARTY CHARGES THE CONGRESS” Ibid., XVIII, 131.

TWENTY-FOUR · MR. JEFFERSON IS GREATLY TOO DEMOCRATIC

“I OWN IT IS MY OWN OPINION” PTJ, XXII, 38.

NOOTKA SOUND, A DISTANT INLET ON THE WESTERN COASTJHT, II, 310–14.

“BEEN AMONGST SUCH INSOLENT BULLIES” PTJ, XVI, 414.

JEFFERSON FRETTED ABOUT A SPRAWLING WARJHT, II, 310–11. Jefferson was cold-eyed about the threat. “I am so deeply impressed with the magnitude of the dangers which will attend our government if Louisiana and the Floridas be added to the British empire,” he wrote Washington in August 1790, “that in my opinion we ought to make ourselves parties in the general war expected to take place, should this be the only means of preventing the calamity.” (PTJ, XVII, 129.)

WAR, JEFFERSON SAIDPTJ, XVII, 127.

ENCIRCLEMENT BY THE BRITISHJHT, II, 310. See also PTJ, XVII, 138.

VICE PRESIDENT ADAMS AGREEDPTJ, XVII, 138. Adams wrote: “The consequences … on the general security and tranquility of the American confederation of having them in our rear, and on both our flanks, with their navy in front, are very obvious.” (Ibid.)

SECRETARY OF WAR KNOX BELIEVEDIbid., 140.

TO MARCH THROUGH U.S. TERRITORYIbid., 128–29.

“A MIDDLE COURSE” Ibid., 130.

“WAR IS FULL OF CHANCES” Ibid., 129.

CAMPAIGN AGAINST THE SHAWNEE AND MIAMI INDIANSIbid., 131–32.

SHOULD KEEP THE INDIAN MISSION Ibid., 131.

ALEXANDER HAMILTON HAD ALREADYIbid., 133.

GEORGE BECKWITH, WHO HAD PLAYED A ROLEScheer and Rankin, Rebels and Redcoats, 379–84, is a general account of the Arnold treason. See Frank T. Reuter, “ ‘Petty Spy’ or Effective Diplomat: The Role of George Beckwith,” Journal of the Early Republic 10 (Winter 1990), 471–92, for more on Beckwith.

HAMILTON’S RELATIONSHIP WITH BECKWITHAs the title suggests, Julian P. Boyd’s Number 7: Alexander Hamilton’s Secret Attempts to Control American Foreign Policy offers a considered indictment of Hamilton’s conduct. See also Chernow, Alexander Hamilton, 294–95, for a kinder interpretation than Boyd’s.

“I HAVE ALWAYS PREFERRED” Boyd, Number 7, 24. At stake, perhaps, were the British West Indies, which Hamilton noted would be protected in an alliance with London but endangered if the Americans were more closely linked with France. (Ibid., 24–25.)

AMERICA’S “NAVAL EXERTIONS” Ibid., 25.

“MAY BE DEPENDED UPON” Ibid. One of the questions raised by the Nootka Sound episode was about control of the British forts along the western borders of the United States. Despite the provisions of the Treaty of Paris, London had refused to give them up. Now the British were interested in taking advantage of any fighting related to Nootka Sound to secure their hold on the forts and possibly expand their influence within the United States—a sign that the war between America and Britain was not fully and forever over. (Ibid., 34–35.)

“MR. JEFFERSON … IS GREATLY TOO DEMOCRATIC” Ibid., 27.

“MR. JEFFERSON … IS A MAN” Ibid., 32.

SPAIN BACKED DOWNJHT, II, 310.

STOPPED AT MOUNT VERNONPTJ, XVIII, 2. In August 1790 Jefferson had joined Washington for a journey to Rhode Island. Beginning on August 15, 1790, they enjoyed “a very pleasant sail of two days going and two days returning” through Long Island Sound, and at Newport and Providence the president was received with what Jefferson called “great cordiality.” (PTJ, XVII, 402.)

“THE RICHEST GROUND” Ibid., 45. “The grain, though small, is always plump,” Jefferson wrote. “The President is so excellent a farmer that I place full confidence in his recommendation.” (Ibid.)

LEASING A FOUR-STORY BRICK HOUSE FROM THOMAS LEIPERPTJ, XVII, 309–10.

ORDERED WINE FOR HIMSELFIbid., 493.

THREE SEPARATE BUT RELATED ISSUESSee PTJ, XVIII, 220, 310, 369.

THE PROPOSAL FOR A NATIONAL BANKEOL, 143–45.

JEFFERSON AND MADISON OBJECTEDJHT, II, 338. See also PTJ, XIX, 275–82.

THE BANK BILL’S CONSTITUTIONALITY PTJ, XIX, 281.

“TO TAKE A SINGLE STEP BEYOND” Ibid., 276.

“IF THE PRO AND THE CON HANG SO EVEN” Ibid., 280.

HAMILTON REPLIED BRILLIANTLYJHT, II, 347.

“AN ADHERENCE TO THE LETTER” Ibid.

WASHINGTON HAD MADISON DRAFT A VETO MESSAGEEOL, 144.

“CONGRESS MAY GO HOME” JHT, II, 340.

RECORDED THE BURST OF COLORS PTJ, XX, 250.

“WE ARE RUINED, SIR” Ibid., 236.

“MRS. TRIST HAS OBSERVED” Ibid.

JONATHAN B. SMITH, A PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTIbid., 290. Also see ibid., 268–313. In defense of his father in the face of Jefferson’s “heresies” remark, John Quincy Adams launched a counterattack (“took up the cudgels,” in Jefferson’s phrase) in the newspapers under the pseudonym Publicola. PTJ, XX, 298–301. Adams himself was long believed to be the author, but it was his son’s work, and the Publicola assaults on Jefferson were powerful. Publicola, Madison reported to Jefferson, “is probably the manufacture of his son out of materials furnished by himself.… There is more of method also in the arguments, and much less of clumsiness and heaviness in the style, than characterize [the senior Adams’s] writings.” (Ibid., 298–99.)

By midsummer 1791 the controversy over Jefferson’s attack on Adams had expanded to include the secretary of state’s antagonism to Hamilton as well. The tensions at the highest levels of government were palpable. “A host of writers have risen in favor of Paine, and prove that in this quarter at least the spirit of republicanism is sound,” Jefferson told Monroe on July 10, 1791. “The contrary spirit of the high officers of government is more understood than I expected. Col. Hamilton, avowing that he never made a secret of his principles, yet taxes the imprudence of Mr. Adams in having stirred the question and agrees that ‘his business is done.’ ” (Ibid., 297.)

Jefferson was flummoxed. What to do about Adams, whom he had unquestionably attacked in the note about the Rights of Man? He wanted to explain himself to the vice president but wavered about how to go about it. “I have a dozen times taken up my pen to write to you and as often laid it down again, suspended between opposing considerations,” Jefferson wrote Adams on July 17, 1791. “I determine however to write from a conviction that truth, between candid minds, can never do harm.”

Yes, he had written the words attributed to him; and yes, he believed Adams’s views to be among the “heresies” he mentioned. What Jefferson regretted most, he told Adams, was how they had been “thrown on the public stage as public antagonists. That you and I differ in our ideas of the best form of government is well known to us both: but we have differed as friends should do, respecting the purity of each other’s motives, and confining our difference of opinion to private conversation. And I can declare with truth in the presence of the Almighty that nothing was further from my intention or expectation than to have had either my own or your name brought before the public on this occasion.” (Ibid., 302.)

Adams accepted the thrust of Jefferson’s explanation, but his anguished reply shows how far-reaching the implications of the affair had become. The publisher who printed Jefferson’s note, Adams said, “has sown the seeds of more evils than he can ever atone for. The pamphlet, with your name … was generally considered as a direct and open personal attack upon me, by countenancing the false interpretation of my writings as favoring the introduction of hereditary monarchy and aristocracy into this country.”

Adams’s sensitivity about Davila was self-evident. “The question everywhere was what heresies are intended by the Secretary of State?” he told Jefferson. “The answer in the newspapers was, the Vice President’s notions of a limited monarchy, an hereditary government of king and lords, with only elective commons.” The charge had set off a “hue and cry [among] all my enemies and rivals,” Adams said. “It is thought by some, that Mr. Hancock’s friends are preparing the way, by my destruction, for his election to the place of Vice President, and that of Mr. Samuel Adams to be Governor of this Commonwealth, and then [the anti-Adams faction] will be sure of all the loaves and fishes in the national government and the state government as they hope.” In sum, it had been a miserable summer for the vice president. (Ibid., 305–7.)

All in all, Jefferson drew some comfort from the episode, for the public reaction tended to favor Paine over Davila or Publicola. The people, Jefferson wrote Paine on July 29, 1791, “appear firm in their republicanism, notwithstanding the contrary hopes and assertions of a sect here, high in names, but small in numbers.” (Ibid., 308.)

HE WAS “EXTREMELY PLEASED” Ibid., 290.

“THAT I HAD IN MY VIEW” Ibid., 291.

“TO TAKE OFF A LITTLE OF THE DRYNESS” Ibid., 293.

“OPPOSITION TO THE GOVERNMENT” Ibid., 294.

“MEANT FOR THE ENEMIES OF THE GOVERNMENT” Ibid.

“I HAVE REASON TO THINK” Ibid., 300.

A CONTEST BETWEEN JEFFERSON AND HAMILTONSee, for instance, Claude G. Bowers, Jefferson and Hamilton: The Struggle for Democracy in America (Boston, 1966).

“WE WERE EDUCATED IN ROYALISM” Ibid., XIV, 661.

“COURTS LOVE THE PEOPLE ALWAYS” Ibid., 431.

“IF THE DUKE OF ANGOULEME” Ibid., XII, 220–21.

“IN SHORT, MY DEAR FRIEND” Ibid., 221.

“THE POLITICS OF THE WESTERN COUNTRY” Dunbar, Study of “Monarchical” Tendencies, 106. Wilkinson added that only a “high toned monarchy” could remedy the Confederation government’s “imbecility, distraction and capricious policy.” (Ibid.)

“THERE IS SUCH A ROOTED AVERSION” PTJ, XIII, 461–62.

IN A REPORT OF A CONVERSATION“Governor Simcoe’s Conversation with Peirce Duffy,” June 1793, Niagara. George Beckwith also reported that an American informant had told him that there was no gentleman “who does not view the present government with contempt, who is not convinced of its inefficiency, and who is not desirous of changing it for a Monarchy.” (Boyd, Number 7, 7.)

“TO MY MIND A TRUE ESTIMATE” Hamilton, Writings, 978. The quotation is found in the course of a revealing letter of Hamilton’s to James Bayard about Jefferson, Burr, and the 1800 election. (Ibid., 977–81.)

IN 1790 AND IN 1791 EOL, 200–201; 533–34. See also Herring, From Colony to Superpower, 62–63.

FOUGHT TO WIN THE LIBERTIES Miller, Wolf by the Ears, 133.

“THE SITUATION OF THE SAINT-DOMINGUE FUGITIVES” PTJ, XXVI, 503.

“IT IS HIGH TIME” Ibid.

THE LONG-DREADED SLAVE WAR Miller, Wolf by the Ears, 133–34.

“EVERY ACCOUNT OF THE SUCCESS” Edward Thornton to Lord Hawkesbury, May 1, 1802, FO 5/35, National Archives of the United Kingdom, Kew.

MIGHT BECOME THE ASYLUMIbid., 133.

THE LEADERSHIP OF TOUSSAINT-LOUVERTUREHerring, From Colony to Superpower, 105–6.

REASSESS ITS AMBITIONSIbid.

“I WRITE TODAY” PTJ, XX, 342–43.

A TRIP OF THEIR OWN Ibid., 434–73, covers the journey and its sundry purposes. See also Andrea Wulf, The Founding Gardeners, 90–110. In New York, Sir John Temple, the British consul general, told London that Jefferson’s “party and politics” were popular. (Ibid., XVIII, 240–41.) Robert Troup, a Hamiltonian, told the Treasury secretary that he believed the Jefferson interest, which in his view included Chancellor Robert R. Livingston and Aaron Burr—was moving toward total war. “There was every appearance of a passionate courtship between the Chancellor—Burr—Jefferson and Madison when the latter two were in town,” Troup wrote Hamilton on June 15, 1791. “Delenda est Carthago [Carthage must be destroyed] I suppose is the maxim adopted with respect to you.” (Ibid., XX, 434.)

IN THEIR BRIEF TIME TOGETHERIbid., 435.

PHILIP FRENEAU, A WRITERIbid., 453, 657, and 718. For the full account of the Freneau chapter in early national Jeffersonian politics, see ibid., 718–59.

See also Philip M. Marsh, “Philip Freneau and His Circle,” Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography 63, no. 1 (January 1939): 37–59, and Marsh, “Freneau and Jefferson: The Poet-Editor Speaks for Himself About the National Gazette Episode,” American Literature 8 (May 1936); 180–89.

WHOM MADISON HAD KNOWNMarsh, “Philip Freneau and His Circle,” 39.

SUBSIDIZED BY THE DEPARTMENT OF STATEIbid., 45–47. “I should have given him the perusal of all my letters of foreign intelligence and all foreign newspapers; the publication of all proclamations and other public notices within my department, and the printing of the laws, which added to his salary would have been a considerable aid,” Jefferson wrote Madison on July 21, 1791. (PTJ, XX, 657.)

A CRITICAL STEPTodd Estes, “Jefferson as Party Leader,” in Cogliano, ed., A Companion to Thomas Jefferson, 132–34.

JOHN BECKLEYIbid., 139.

“THE FLOATING ARDOR” Bailey, “Jefferson on Public Opinion and the Executive” in Ibid., 194. The context was the enforcement of the embargo in 1807, but as Bailey notes, the remark “reveals nicely the relationship between executive action and public judgment.” (Ibid.)

“NOTHING NEW IS TALKED OF HERE” Ibid., 617.

“YOU MENTIONED FORMERLY” Ibid., 706.

JEFFERSON AND HAMILTON SPOKE PRIVATELYIbid., XXII, 38–39. Hamilton added of the republican experiment: “The success indeed so far is greater than I had expected, and therefore at present success seems more possible than it had done heretofore, and there are still other stages of improvement which, if the present does not succeed, may be tried and ought to be tried before we give up the republican form altogether, for that mind must be really depraved which would not prefer the equality of political rights which is the foundation of pure republicanism, if it can be obtained with order.” (Ibid.)

“WHETHER THESE MEASURES” Peterson, Thomas Jefferson and the New Nation, 436.

“THE PEOPLE IN YOUR QUARTER” Ibid., 437.

“THERE IS A VAST MASS” Ibid., 436.

LAWMAKERS WERE BECOMING FINANCIALLY ENMESHEDPTJ, XXIII, 537–41. See also Ibid., XXIV, 25–27. On a separate but related matter, EOL, 299, alludes to Jefferson’s broader concerns about the corrupting possibilities of patronage.

TWENTY-FIVE · TWO COCKS IN THE PIT

“HOW UNFORTUNATE … THAT WHILST” PTJ, XXIV, 317.

DINNER WAS OVER PTJRS, III, 305.

PRESIDENT WASHINGTON WAS OUT OF TOWN Ibid.

DOMINATED BY A “COLLISION OF OPINION” Ibid.

IN HIS VIEW “IF SOME OF ITS” Ibid.

“IT WAS THE MOST PERFECT MODEL” Ibid. See also Chernow, Alexander Hamilton, 393–94.

SIR FRANCIS BACON, JOHN LOCKE, AND SIR ISAAC NEWTONIbid.

HAMILTON ASKED JEFFERSONIbid.

“I TOLD HIM” Ibid.

HAMILTON PAUSEDIbid.

“THE GREATEST MAN” Ibid.

“MR. ADAMS WAS HONEST” Ibid.

JEFFERSON WAS RUNNING LATEPTJ, XXIII, 184.

“DOUBLING THE VELOCITY” Ibid.

FOR “THE TREASURY POSSESSED ALREADY” Ibid. Jefferson continued “that even future Presidents (not supported by the weight of character which [he] himself possessed) would not be able to make head against this department.” It was a gentle, effective way to flatter Washington and to raise his concerns about Hamilton to Washington, who did not mind tributes to his own character. (Ibid.)

NOT ONE OF “PERSONAL INTEREST” Ibid.

THE PRESIDENT THEN BROUGHT THE TALK Ibid. During “that pause of conversation which follows a business closed,” Jefferson later wrote, Washington “said in an affectionate tone that he had felt much concern at an expression which dropt from me yesterday, and which marked my intention of retiring” when Washington did. (Ibid.)

WASHINGTON SAID HE INTENDEDIbid., 184–85.

“I TOLD HIM THAT NO MAN” Ibid., 185.

“HAD SET OUT WITH” Ibid., 186.

“ONLY A SINGLE SOURCE” Ibid.

“DELUGING THE STATES WITH PAPER-MONEY” Ibid.

“FEATHERED THEIR NESTS” Ibid. Jefferson had asked Madison to supply a list of the names of lawmakers who held public securities or stock in the Bank of the United States. He wanted it, he said, to show the president “that I have not been speaking merely at random.” Jefferson ultimately did not use any such list in arguments with Washington. (Ibid., XXIV, 26.)

HIS FOES “HAD NOW” Ibid., 187. Washington asked what, specifically, Jefferson was talking about. “I answered … that in the Report on Manufactures which, under color of giving bounties for the encouragement of particular manufactures, meant to establish the doctrine that the power given by the Constitution to collect taxes to provide for the general welfare of the U.S. permitted Congress to take everything under their management which they should deem for the public welfare, and which is susceptible to the application of money.” (Ibid.)

“DAILY PITTED IN THE CABINET LIKE TWO COCKS” PTJRS, II, 272.

JEFFERSON NOTICED THATPTJ, XXIII, 259.

“HE SAID THAT HE DID NOT LIKE” Ibid., 263. “He stopped here,” Jefferson continued, “and I kept silence to see whether he would say anything more in the same line, or add any qualifying expression to soften what he had said. But he did neither.” (Ibid.)

THE PUBLIC DEBT, PAPER MONEYIbid., 535–41. On first hearing Washington raise the possibility of retiring after a single term, Jefferson had chosen to remain silent on the question. He knew, he said, “we were some day to try to walk alone, and if the essay should be made while you should be alive and looking on, we should derive confidence from that circumstance, and resource if it failed.” (Ibid., 536.) In May, Jefferson used a letter urging Washington to reconsider stepping down to marshal his case against Hamilton. Washington’s possible retirement after a single term, Jefferson said, was “a subject of inquietude to my mind.” (Ibid., 535.)

THE “ULTIMATE OBJECT” Ibid., 537.

“THAT THIS WAS CONTEMPLATED” Ibid.

IT “WILL BE THE INSTRUMENT” Ibid.

THE “MONARCHIAL FEDERALISTS” Ibid., 538. Jefferson was practical about what could be rescued. A new Congress, he said, “will not be able to undo all which the two preceding legislatures, and especially the first, have done.… But some parts of the system may be rightfully reformed; a liberation from the rest unremittingly pursued as fast as right will permit, and the door shut in future against similar commitments of the nation.” (Ibid.) Such a moderate approach, however, depended on a Republican Congress. If the majority of the next legislature “be still in the same principles with the present,” Jefferson said, “it is not easy to conjecture what would be the result, nor what means would be resorted to for correction of the evil.” (Ibid.)

“I CAN SCARCELY CONTEMPLATE” Ibid.

“THE CONFIDENCE OF THE WHOLE UNION” Ibid., 539. Jefferson continued: “If the first corrective of a numerous representation should fail in its effect, your presence will give time for trying others not inconsistent with the union and peace of the states.” (Ibid.)

GIVE US A FEW YEARSIbid.

JEFFERSON DINED AT WASHINGTON’SIbid., XXIV, 50. Two days later, at what Jefferson described as a “dinner of Jay-ites,” the financier Robert Morris raised the prospect of a challenge to John Adams in the 1792 election for vice president. “R.M. mentioned to the company that [George] Clinton was to be vice-president, that the Antis intended to set him up.” (Ibid.)

“I WAS NOT DISPLEASED” Ibid.

“TOO MANY OF THESE” Ibid., 85.

WASHINGTON GENTLY TRIED TO CALMIbid., 210–12. Washington added: “That there might be a few who wished [a monarchy] in the higher walks of life, particularly in the great cities. But that the main body of the people in the Eastern states were as steadily for republicanism as in the Southern.” (Ibid., 210.) Washington also claimed to have been always ambivalent about the ceremonial pomp of the presidency.

According to an account of the administration’s first days in New York that passed from Washington’s personal secretary Tobias Lear to Attorney General Edmund Randolph to Jefferson, Washington “resisted for 3 weeks the efforts to introduce levees” before agreeing to them, and he left the details to his aide David Humphreys and others. After “an Antichamber and Presence room were provided, and those who were to pay their court were assembled, the President set out, preceded by Humphreys.” They walked through the outer room, entered the second, and Humphreys preceded Washington, “first calling out with a loud voice ‘the President of the US.’ The President was so much disconcerted with it that he did not recover it the whole time of the levee, and when the company was gone he said to Humphreys, ‘Well, you have taken me in once, but by God you shall never take me in a second time.’ ” (Ibid., XXV, 208.)

“HOW UNFORTUNATE” Ibid., 317.

JEFFERSON REPLIED WITH PASSIONIbid., 351–60.

“THAT I HAVE UTTERLY” Ibid., 353.

“FLOWED FROM PRINCIPLES ADVERSE TO LIBERTY” Ibid.

“HE UNDERTOOK” Ibid., 354. Jefferson added: “These views thus made to prevail, their execution fell of course to me; and I can safely appeal to you, who have seen all my letters and proceedings, whether I have not carried them into execution as sincerely as if they had been my own, though I ever considered them as inconsistent with the honor and interest of our country.” (Ibid.)

“NEWSPAPER CONTESTS” Randall, Jefferson, II, 82.

“I WILL NOT SUFFER” PTJ, XXIV, 358.

“THOUGHT IT IMPORTANT” Ibid., 434.

“DID NOT BELIEVE” Ibid., 435.

“THERE WERE MANY MORE” Ibid.

“FOR I WILL FRANKLY” Ibid., 499. Washington also found the congressional corruption charge overwrought. “He said that as to that interested spirit in the legislature, it was what could not be avoided in any government, unless we were to exclude particular descriptions of men, such as the holders of the funds, from all office. I told him there was a great difference between the little accidental schemes of self interest which would take place in every body of men and influence their votes, and a regular system for forming a corps of interested persons who should be steadily at the orders of the Treasury.” (Ibid., 435.)

“WHY, THEN,” Ibid.

WORRIED ABOUT REBELLION Ibid., 383–85.

THE SECRETARY OF STATE’S SIGNATUREIbid., 385.

“SHOULD CONGRESS ADOPT” Dunbar, Study of “Monarchical” Tendencies, 105.

“THERE WAS NO STABILITY” PTJ, XXIV, 607.

REVELATIONS OF AN AFFAIRIbid., 751. See also notes to PTJ, XVIII, 611–88.

GILES OF VIRGINIA INTRODUCED RESOLUTIONSIbid., XXV, 311–12. As the editors of the PTJ write: “Nevertheless, Jefferson’s covert support of the House Republican drive against Hamilton in 1793 remains a highly significant benchmark in his public career, marking a crucial stage in his gradual shift from the role of a statesman standing above the clash of conflicting political parties to the more partisan role that eventually propelled him to the presidency, that of chief leader of the Republican party.” (Ibid., 292.) See also Todd Estes, “Jefferson as Party Leader,” in Cogliano, ed., A Companion to Thomas Jefferson, 128–44.

GILES “AND ONE OR TWO OTHERS” PTJ, XXV, 311.

“1. OF BANK DIRECTORS” Ibid.

“THE PUBLIC WILL SEE” Ibid., 314.

UNTIL “THOSE WHO TROUBLED” Ibid., 137.

“WHEN THEY SUFFER” Ibid.

REPORTS OF RISING VIOLENCE IN FRANCENeely, Concise History of the French Revolution, 189–220.

THE SEPTEMBER 1793 DECLARATION OF THE REIGN OF TERROR Ibid., 191–97; 254–55.

“WE WERE ALL STRONGLY ATTACHED TO FRANCE” EOL, 174–75.

FROM THE AUTUMN OF 1792 FORWARDIbid., 176–77. As Wood wrote:

Now some Federalists began to see in France the terrifying possibilities of what might happen in America if popular power were allowed to run free. The rioting in Paris and elsewhere, the horrific massacres in September 1792 of over fourteen hundred prisoners charged with being enemies of the Revolution, the news that Lafayette had been deserted by his troops and his allies in the Assembly and had fled France—all these events convinced the Federalists that the French Revolution was sliding into popular anarchy.… When Americans learned that the thirty-eight-year-old king Louis XVI, the ruler who had helped them win their independence from the British a decade earlier, had been executed for treason on January 21, 1793, and that the French Republic had declared war on England on February 1, 1793, their division into Federalists and Republicans intensified. The meaning of the French Revolution now became entwined in the quarrel that Americans were having among themselves over the direction of their own revolution. (Ibid.)

HE LOST FRIENDS TO THE GUILLOTINEWilliam Howard Adams, Paris Years of Thomas Jefferson, 295–97. See also O’Brien, Long Affair.

LAFAYETTE SPENT FIVE YEARSPaul S. Spalding, Lafayette: Prisoner of State (Columbia, S.C., 2012).

“IN THE STRUGGLE WHICH WAS NECESSARY” PTJ, XXV, 14.

PRO-FRENCH ORGANIZERS IN BOSTONCharles Warren, Jacobin and Junto; or, Early American Politics as Viewed in the Diary of Dr. Nathaniel Ames, 1758–1822 (New York, 1968), 46.

“A NUMBER OF CITIZENS” Ibid.

CONSIDER RETURNING TO PARISIbid., 243–45. Washington, who characteristically took a moderate position, tended to be warmer toward the French in his conversations with Jefferson. The president, Jefferson wrote on January 3, 1793, said “he considered France as the sheet anchor of this country and its friendship as a first object. There are in the U.S. some characters of opposite principles; some of them are high in office, others possessing great wealth, and all of them hostile to France and looking fondly to England as the staff of their hope.… The little party above mentioned have espoused it only as a stepping stone to monarchy, and have endeavored to approximate it to that in its administration, in order to render its final transition more easy.” (Ibid., 14–15.)

WASHINGTON’S REPLY WAS POINTEDIbid., 244.

JEFFERSON STRUCK BACKIbid.

ASKED JEFFERSON “TO CONSIDER MATURELY” Ibid.

TWENTY-SIX · THE END OF A STORMY TOUR

“I FEEL FOR YOUR SITUATION” PTJ, XXVI, 133.

THE PLANTATION WAS CALLED BIZARRESee Cynthia A. Kierner, Scandal at Bizarre: Rumor and Reputation in Jefferson’s America (New York, 2004), for details and analysis of the episode.

“NEVER THROW OFF THE BEST AFFECTIONS” PTJ, XXV, 621.

“IN THE COURSE OF OUR CONVERSATION” Ibid., 301–2.

SHOULD NOT “SUFFER YOURSELF” Ibid., 304.

“MR. JEFFERSON [IS] … DISTINGUISHED AS” The Words of Thomas Jefferson (Charlottesville, Va., 2008), 200. On the public debt, Jefferson said he believed “the only difference which I can see between the two parties is that the republican one wish it could be paid tomorrow, the fiscal party wish it to be perpetual, because they find in it an engine for corrupting the legislature.” (PTJ, XXV, 318.) For a list of stockholders in the Congress, see ibid., 432–35.

Civility was strained. “I understood on Saturday from the Attorney General,” Hamilton wrote Jefferson, “that it was your wish a meeting should be had—to which I replied, in substance, that I considered it in your power to convene one; and should attend if called upon; but that I did not perceive the utility of one at this time.” (Ibid., 440.)

A HOUSE ON THE SCHUYLKILL RIVERIbid., 353.

“FROM MONTICELLO YOU” Ibid., 444.

“OUR REPUBLIC” PTJ, XXVI, 101.

“YOUR MIN. PLEN.” Ibid.

“CERTAINLY OURS WAS A REPUBLICAN” Ibid., 101–2.

“KNOX TOLD SOME” Ibid., 554–55.

“MAKE HIM BELIEVE” Ibid., 522.

“HE WAS EVIDENTLY SORE” Ibid., 102.

THE FRENCH REPUBLIC DECLARED WAR ON BRITAINEOL, 177.

“IT HAS BEEN ASKED” PTJ, XXVI, 272–73.

“UNCONSTITUTIONAL AND IMPROPER” Ibid., 382. “I am extremely afraid that the P. may not be sufficiently aware of the snares that may be laid out for his good intentions by men whose politics at bottom are very different from his own,” Madison wrote in June 1793. “An assumption of prerogatives not clearly found in the Constitution and having the appearance of being copied from a monarchial model will beget animadversion equally mortifying to him, and disadvantageous to the government.” (Ibid., 273.)

“WE HAD NOT OBJECTED” Ibid., XXVII, 400.

“OTHER QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS” Ibid., 401.

“THOUGH IT WOULD BE A GOOD THING” Ibid., 428.

EDMOND-CHARLES GENETIbid., XXV, 469–70. Washington, who was to be away, told Jefferson that Genet “should unquestionably be received, but he thought not with too much warmth or cordiality.” Jefferson “wondered at first at this restriction; but.… became satisfied it was a small sacrifice to the opinion of Hamilton.” (Ibid.)

“LENGTHY CONSIDERATIONS” Ibid., 469

JEFFERSON HOPED AN ENTHUSIASTIC PUBLIC RECEPTIONIbid., 619. On April 28, 1793, he wrote Madison: “We expect Mr. Genet here within a few days. It seems as if his arrival would furnish an occasion for the people to testify their affections without respect to the cold caution of their government.” (Ibid.)

THE ENVOY WAS ORGANIZING PRIVATEERSEOL, 185–89.

“HOTHEADED, ALL IMAGINATION” PTJ, XXVI, 444.

INDEED GENET DID EOL, 188.

“NOT AS SECRETARY OF STATE” Ibid.

TO RECALL GENETPTJ, XXVI, 598, 685–715. There was a second element to the decision: that Genet be informed of the requested recall. Jefferson disagreed with the last, thinking “it would render him extremely active in his plans, and endanger confusion. But I was overruled by the other three gentlemen and the President.” (Ibid., 598.)

HAMILTON HAD WON THIS BATTLEIbid., 502–3. “H., sensible of the advantage they have got, is urging a full appeal by the government to the people” to have Genet recalled to France, Jefferson said. “Such an explosion would manifestly endanger a dissolution of the friendship between the two nations.” (Ibid.)

“HE WILL SINK” Ibid., 606.

“TO MY FELLOW-CITIZENS” Ibid., 239.

“THE MOTION OF MY BLOOD” Ibid., 240.

“WORN DOWN” Ibid., 240–41.

“TORN TO PIECES AS WE ARE” Ibid., 552.

A RUMOR REACHED JEFFERSONIbid., 219.

WHAT WERE CALLED DEMOCRATIC-REPUBLICAN SOCIETIES Ibid., 601–3.

“THE PRESIDENT WAS MUCH INFLAMED” Ibid., 602–3.

JEFFERSON WANTED OUTIbid., 593–94, 660. For a benign view of Jefferson’s motivations, see Philip M. Marsh, “Jefferson’s Retirement as Secretary of State,” Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography 69, no. 3 (July 1945): 220–24.

HE PAID A CALLPTJ, XXVI, 627–30. For Jefferson’s successor, Washington’s mind was on the politics of the moment. He liked Robert R. Livingston of New York, but “to appoint him while Hamilton was in and before it should be known he was going out, would excite a newspaper conflagration, as the ultimate arrangement would not be known.” (Ibid., 629.)

THE “PARTICULAR UNEASINESS” Ibid., 628.

“THE CONSTITUTION WE HAVE” Ibid.

“MEN NEVER CHOSE TO DESCEND” Ibid., 630.

YELLOW FEVER STRUCK Ibid., XXVII, 7.

“IT HAS NOW GOT” Ibid.

“VIEWING WITH SORROW” Ibid., 334.

“HAMILTON IS ILL OF THE FEVER” Ibid., 62.

“I WOULD REALLY GO AWAY” Ibid.

“WITH SINCERE REGRET” Ibid., XXVIII, 3.

“LET A CONVICTION” Ibid.

“THAT RICHMOND IS MY NEAREST PORT” Ibid., XXVII, 661.

“COVERED WITH GLORY” PTJ, XXVIII, 7.

THE MARVEL OF HOW WELL Adams, ed., Letters of John Adams, II, 240.

“JEFFERSON WENT OFF” Words of Thomas Jefferson, 201.

“MY PRIVATE BUSINESS” PTJ, XXVIII, 14.

TWENTY-SEVEN · IN WAIT AT MONTICELLO

“TO PRESERVE THE FREEDOM” PTJ, XXXI, 128.

“I LIVE ON MY HORSE” PTJ, XXVIII, 332.

“I ENTREAT YOU” Ibid., 607.

“I THINK IT IS MONTAIGNE” PTJ, XXVIII, 15. Despite his protestations, he remained in touch with the times. Acknowledging his obsession with the Hamilton-congressional axis, Jefferson said: “I indulge myself on one political topic only, that is, in disclosing to my countrymen the shameless corruption of a portion of the representatives in the 1st and 2nd Congresses and their implicit devotion to the treasury. I think I do good in this, because it may produce exertions to reform the evil on the success of which the form of the government is to depend.” (Ibid., 15–16.)

“I COULD NOT HAVE SUPPOSED” Ibid., 21–22.

“I CONGRATULATE YOU” Ibid., 50.

“INSTEAD OF WRITING” Ibid., 57.

“MY COUNTRYMEN ARE GROANING” Ibid.

MIGHT SOON “GET OUT” Ibid., 72.

DISPATCHED JOHN JAY Ibid., 69–71.

“MAY EXTRICATE US FROM” Ibid., 75.

“THE SPIRIT OF WAR” Ibid., 55.

HE DECIDED TO PULL DOWN JHT, III, 221–22, details the story of the two Monticellos.

“WE ARE NOW LIVING” PTJ, XXVIII, 181.

“HE IS A VERY LONG TIME” JHT, III, 221.

“ARCHITECTURE IS MY DELIGHT” Ibid., 222.

THE TERRACES AND DEPENDENCIESTJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/plantation-and-slavery/overview-mulberry-row (accessed 2012).

NEW SLAVE QUARTERS, A SMOKEHOUSE, AND A DAIRYIbid.

A NAILERYFB, 426–53.

“AS HE CANNOT” Ibid., xiv.

“IN INCESSANT TORMENT” PTJ, XXVIII, 155.

“JEFFERSON IS VERY ROBUST” Ibid., 249.

HIS MOUNTS TENDED TO HAVE NOBLE NAMESTJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/research-and-collections/horses (accessed 2012). See also FB, 87–109.

“BELOW THE OLD DAM” TJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/research-and-collections/fishing (accessed 2012).

OUTINGS ON THE SCHUYLKILL RIVERIbid.

A DAY AT LAKE GEORGE Ibid. See also PTJ, XX, 463–64.

“A FAR LESS PLEASANT WATER” PTJ, XX, 464.

HE KEPT GUNS TJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/research-and-collections/firearms#_note-4 (accessed 2012).

TRAVELED ARMEDIbid.

HE ONCE LEFT BEHINDIbid.

BEST FORM OF EXERCISEIbid.

OFTEN RECOMMENDED ITIbid.

RIDING WAS THE GREAT SOLACE AND ACTIVITYIbid.

JEFFERSON HUNTED “SQUIRRELS AND PARTRIDGES” Bear, Jefferson at Monticello, 17–18. See also TJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/research-and-collections/hunting (accessed 2012).

“OLD MASTER WOULDN’T SHOOT” Bear, Jefferson at Monticello, 18.

WOULD “SCARE … UP” PARTRIDGESIbid.

DRIVE HUNTERS AWAY FROM MONTICELLO’S DEER PARKIbid., 21.

A “TWO SHOT-DOUBLE BARREL” TJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/research-and-collections/firearms#_note-4 (accessed 2012).

A SET OF TURKISH PISTOLSIbid.

“20 INCH BARRELS” Ibid.

“EVERY AMERICAN WHO WISHES” Ibid.

A “GUN-MAN” Ibid.

“I AM A GREAT FRIEND” Ibid.

“PERSONALITIES, WHICH LESSEN THE PLEASURES” PTJ, XXVIII, 24.

THE NEXT WEEK JAMES MONROEIbid., 29–31. Jefferson made no secret of his own opinions. In an April 1794 letter, he weighed in on the Treasury, rumors of war with Britain, an issue about the French islands, naval and land armaments, and marine fortifications. Then came the obligatory denial of his own interest in the questions in which he had just expressed his interest: “I find my mind totally absorbed in my rural occupations,” he told Madison. (Ibid., 49–50.) A telling reaction to Federalism came in late March, when the House of Representatives created a Ways and Means Committee as a check on Hamilton. In the debate over whether to establish the panel, “the fiscal party,” Madison said, “perceiving their danger, offered a sort of compromise,” but the measure failed, and the committee was created. The House now had the institutional means to manage money matters more carefully. (Ibid., 46.)

LEGISLATION TO CREATE A NEW ARMYIbid., 38.

WAS “FOUNDED UPON THE IDEA” Ibid., 41.

“A CHANGE SO EXTRAORDINARY” Ibid.

TO RENOUNCE ANY HEREDITARY TITLESIbid., 245.

“YOU WANT TO HOLD US UP” Ibid.

GILES’S AMENDMENT PASSED; DEXTER’S FAILEDIbid.

HIS ANNUAL MESSAGEIbid., 213.

THE WHISKEY REBELLION IN THE WEST See Hogeland, Whiskey Rebellion.

ATTACKS ON BOWER HILLIbid., 147–50, 152–83.

GENERAL JOHN NEVILLE Ibid., 97–105.

JAMES MCFARLANE, WAS SHOT AND KILLEDIbid., 154–56.

THE DEMOCRATIC-REPUBLICAN SOCIETIESEugene P. Link, Democratic-Republican Societies, 1790–1800 (New York, 1973), is a full account. See also Philip S. Foner, ed. The Democratic-Republican Societies, 1790–1800: A Documentary Sourcebook of Constitutions, Declarations, Addresses, Resolutions, and Toasts (Westport, Conn., 1976); and PTJ, XXVIII, 220–22.

“THE ATTEMPT WHICH HAS BEEN” PTJ, XXVIII, 219.

“THE DENUNCIATION OF” Ibid., 228.

“THERE WAS INDEED” Ibid., 229.

HE WOULD USE A WHITE CAMBRIC HANDKERCHIEFTDLTJ, 48–49.

“THE ONLY IMPATIENCE OF TEMPER” Randall, Jefferson, III, 675.

WHEN JEFFERSON ORDERED TDLTJ, 321.

“TELL JUPITER TO COME” Ibid.

“IN TONES AND WITH A LOOK” Ibid.

TWO FERRYMEN HAD BEEN FIGHTINGIbid.

“HIS EYES FLASHING” Ibid., 322.

“AND THEY DID ROW” Ibid.

“IF YOU VISIT ME” PTJ, XXVIII, 337.

“COME THEN … AND LET US” Ibid., 368.

“YOU OUGHT TO BE” Ibid., 315. Jefferson had suggested Madison should consider his own possible candidacy, a scenario Madison dismissed: “Perhaps it will be best, at least for the present to say in brief, that reasons of every kind, and some of them of the most insuperable as well as obvious kind, shut my mind against the admission of any idea such as you seem to glance at.” In fact, Madison implied, the time was coming when he and Jefferson would have to speak privately and in person about Jefferson’s political future. (Ibid.)

JEFFERSON ADMITTED THAT THE SUBJECTIbid., 338–40. This letter of April 27, 1795, has been the subject of intriguing scholarly attention. James Roger Sharp, “Unraveling the Mystery of Jefferson’s Letter of April 27, 1795,” Journal of the Early Republic 6, no. 4 (Winter 1986): 411–18, explores an important textual change in the copy of the letter that Jefferson kept. Jefferson wrote that as he would not seek the office, “my sole object is to avail myself of the first opening ever given me from a friendly quarter (and I could not with decency do it before), of preventing any division or loss of votes, which might be fatal to the Southern interest.” Yet someone—Jefferson himself, perhaps, or Thomas Jefferson Randolph (who edited his grandfather’s papers in the 1820s) or Nicholas P. Trist, who worked with Randolph—changed the word “Southern” in the letter to read “Republican.”

Anxious to present the Jeffersonian political movement as a national, not a sectional, undertaking, whoever changed the phrase was evidently attempting to protect Jefferson from appearing to be anything less than a firm nationalist. States’-rights and national tensions existed from the start, and the prolific Jefferson proved a useful source of quotations and inspiration for sectionalist (and even secessionist) elements in America in his lifetime and long afterward. The preponderance of his life and work, though, put Jefferson on the side of the American union.

It seems likely that his use of the word “Southern” in 1795 was more of a reference to the choice of candidate to lead the Republican interest than it was a wholesale characterization of Republicanism as a regional phenomenon. Consider the sentences following the use of the phrase “Southern interest”: “If that [the Southern interest] has any chance of prevailing, it must be by avoiding the loss of a single vote, and by concentrating all its strength on one object. Who [emphasis mine] this should be is a question I can more freely discuss with anybody than yourself. In this I painfully feel the loss of Monroe. Had he been here I should have been at no loss for a channel through which to make myself understood.” (PTJ, XXVIII, 339.)

My reading of this is that Jefferson is still trying to encourage Madison to seek the presidency, in part because Jefferson loved Madison and believed in him, but also because Jefferson would prefer a Republican president from the South to a Republican president from the middle states or New England.

“CONTINUAL INSINUATIONS” Ibid., 338.

“THE LITTLE SPICE OF AMBITION” Ibid., 339.

GAVE BIRTH TO THEIR DAUGHTER HARRIETGordon-Reed, Hemingses of Monticello, 516–17.

THE CHILD DIED Ibid., 530.

“I AM CONVINCED” PTJ, XXXVI, 676.

“MAKE ME UP A SET” Ibid., XXVIII, 377.

“A FUGITIVE PUBLICATION” Ibid., 387.

WILLIAM BRANCH GILES ANNOUNCEDNoble E. Cunningham, The Jeffersonian Republicans: The Formation of Party Organization, 1789–1801 (Chapel Hill, N.C., 1957), 86.

IN THE FALL, AARON BURR OF NEW YORK Ibid., 86–87.

FEDERALIST CHARGES THAT THE TWO MEN Ibid.

A BRIEF VISIT ON JEFFERSON’S MOUNTAINTOP Nancy Isenberg, Fallen Founder: The Life of Aaron Burr (New York, 2008), 145–46. As Isenberg noted, “There is no record of what Jefferson and Burr discussed during this brief visit.… The two men had little time to plan, and it is highly unlikely that they accomplished anything so momentous as cementing the Republican ticket. Still, Burr wasactively campaigning. He had made the long trip not just to consult with Jefferson but to show in the flesh his commitment to the Virginia Republicans.” (Ibid., 146.)

THE TREATY, WHICH PRESIDENT WASHINGTON RECEIVEDPTJ, XXVIII, 400.

ANGRY CROWDS BURNED JAY IN EFFIGY EOL, 198. For more on reaction to the Jay Treaty, see Warren, Jacobin and Junto.

TALK OF IMPEACHING WASHINGTONIbid. See also Michael Beschloss, Presidential Courage: Brave Leaders and How They Changed America 1789–1989 (New York, 2007), 1.

JEFFERSON DESPISED THE TREATYPTJ, XXVIII, 55. By August, Jefferson was writing Madison about Hamilton’s maneuvers in New York. “You will perceive by the enclosed that Hamilton has taken up his pen in support of the treaty.… He spoke on its behalf in the meeting in New York, and his party carried a decision in favor of it by a small majority. But the Livingstonians appealed to stones and clubs and beat him and his party off the ground. This from a gentleman just from Philadelphia.” (Ibid., 430.) Madison later corrected Jefferson on the details of the anecdote, almost none of which was accurate. (Ibid., 432.)

“FROM NORTH TO SOUTH” Ibid., 435.

MID-AUGUST FLOODSIbid., 439.

“SO GENERAL A BURST OF” Ibid., 449.

“REALLY A COLOSSUS TO THE ANTIREPUBLICAN PARTY” Ibid., 475.

FRETTING ABOUT “THE QUIETISM” Ibid., 476. The storm stirred Jefferson’s allies. Rutledge, telling him the obligation to serve outweighed his concern about his reputation: “The experience of every day evinces that the service of our country, like the practice of virtue, must bring with it its own reward: whoever expects that gratitude to be the fruit of patriotism expects a vain thing, and disappointment, or mortification will be his portion.” (Ibid., 502.)

Rutledge’s son delivered the letter personally and stayed at Monticello for a time. “He found me in a retirement I dote on, living like an Antediluvian patriarch among my children and grandchildren, and tilling my soil,” Jefferson wrote the senior Rutledge afterward. On the question of public life, Jefferson was apparently unwavering. “You hope I have not abandoned entirely the service of our country: after a five and twenty years continual employment in it, I trust it will be thought I have fulfilled my tour, like a punctual soldier, and may claim my discharge.” Yet he could not avoid politics, adding: “I join with you in thinking the treaty an execrable thing.” It was, Jefferson said, an “infamous act, which is really nothing more than a treaty of alliance between England and the Anglomen of this country against the legislature and people of the United States.” (Ibid., 541–42.)

“A BOLDER PARTY-STROKE WAS NEVER STRUCK” JHT, IV, 247.

THE HOUSE NEEDED TO APPROVE FUNDING John C. Miller, The Federalist Era, 1789–1801 (Prospect Heights, Ill., 1998), 172–76. James Madison mounted a bid to bring the treaty before the House of Representatives. Madison’s argument, one with which Jefferson had much sympathy, was that the House should have a voice in a treaty that touched on so many matters that also fell under House jurisdiction. The treaty did require House approval of an appropriations measure to fund parts of the treaty, and the measure passed over Madison’s objection. (Ibid.)

“A SUPERCILIOUS TYRANT” Warren, Jacobin and Junto, 63.

“RULER WHO TRAMPLES” Ibid.

“NEVER, TILL A FEW MONTHS” Ibid., 64.

“THIS WAS THE FIRST TIME” Ibid.

“THE N. ENGLAND STATES” PTJ, XXIX, 95.

“TWO PARTIES THEN DO EXIST” Ibid., XXVIII, 508–9.

JEFFERSON WROTE BACHEIbid., 560–61.

THOUGH HE HAD HARDLY LEFT THE ARENAEllis, American Sphinx, 184, fixes the Aurora moment as the one that marks Jefferson’s reentry into politics. As noted, I do not believe Jefferson ever left, but Ellis makes an interesting point: Asking the editors for the papers put Jefferson back on the stage in the eyes of those most politically engaged of men—the newspaper editors of the eighteenth century.

“YOU OWE IT TO YOURSELF” PTJ, XXVIII, 607.

“YOU WILL HAVE SEEN” Ibid., XXIX, 124.

JEFFERSON HAD READ A REPORTIbid., 127–30. “That to your particular friends and connections, you have described, and they have announced to me, as a person under a dangerous influence; and that, if I would listen more to some other opinions all would be well,” Washington said. He continued:

My answer invariably has been that I had never discovered any thing in the conduct of Mr. Jefferson to raise suspicions, in my mind, of his insincerity; that if he would retrace my public conduct while he was in the Administration, abundant proofs would occur to him, that truth and right decisions, were the sole objects of my pursuit; that there were as many instances within his own knowledge of my having decided against, as in favor of the opinions of the person evidently alluded to; and moreover, that I was no believer in the infallibility of the politics or measures of any man living. In short, that I was no party man myself, and the first wish of my heart was, if parties did exist, to reconcile them. (Ibid., 142.)

“EVERYTHING SACRED AND HONORABLE” Ibid., 127.

MAY “TRY TO SOW TARES” Ibid.

“AS YOU HAVE MENTIONED” Ibid., 142.

PATRICK HENRY TO STANDAPE, I, 36. See also Kidd, Patrick Henry, 234–35.

“TO INFORM YOU THAT THE PEOPLE” Ibid., 169.

“I HAVE NOT THE ARROGANCE” Ibid., 199.

TWENTY-EIGHT · TO THE VICE PRESIDENCY

“THERE IS A DEBT OF SERVICE” PTJ, XXIX, 233.

“YOU AND I HAVE FORMERLY SEEN” Ibid., 456–57.

WASHINGTON’S FAREWELL ADDRESSAPE, I, 38–39.

“A SIGNAL, LIKE DROPPING A HAT” Ibid., 70. See also Ferling, Adams vs. Jefferson, 85. Word spread quickly. “I rejoice at the news” of Washington’s retirement, a correspondent wrote Jefferson, “because I consider him as a man dangerous to the liberties of this country. Misled himself, he lends his influence to others, and by his name gives a sanction to the most dangerous measures.” (PTJ, XXIX, 185.)

PRESIDENTIAL ELECTIONS IN THE FIRST DECADES In the mysterious way these things became clear in presidential elections from 1796 until Andrew Jackson was nominated for reelection by a national party convention thirty-six years later, it was instantly understood that John Adams and Thomas Jefferson were the leading candidates to succeed Washington.

UNTIL THE RATIFICATION OF THE TWELFTH AMENDMENTEOL, 285. See also Bruce Ackerman, The Failure of the Founding Fathers: Jefferson, Marshall, and the Rise of Presidential Democracy (Cambridge, Mass., 2007), which is a fascinating study.

THE COLUMBIAN MIRROR AND ALEXANDRIA GAZETTE PTJ, XXIX, 193.

JOHN TAYLOR OF CAROLINEIbid., 194.

DESCRIBING A 1794 CONVERSATION Ibid. The Republicans immediately sensed the political possibilities of the Taylor report about Adams’s remarks. John Mason, son of George, asked for a certified copy of the account, saying Adams’s comments would “do more good than anything which has yet been spoken of.” (Ibid., 194–95.)

CAMPAIGN LITERATURE READAPE, I, 40.

“THOMAS JEFFERSON IS A FIRM REPUBLICAN” Ferling, Adams vs. Jefferson, 90.

THE RISING PROSPECT OF WAR WITH FRANCEIbid., 93. Pierre Adet, a French diplomat, publicly suggested the Federalists were too favorably disposed toward the British and that Jefferson would be the wiser choice in terms of relations with France. The Federalists in turn used this quasi endorsement against Jefferson. (APE, I, 30.)

A LATE-AUTUMN COLD SPELL PTJ, XXIX, 211.

“FEW WILL BELIEVE” Ibid.

HAMILTON, WHO OPPOSED BOTHAPE, I, 40.

A FASCINATING STRATEGY Ibid. As Page Smith wrote in APE, I:

The plan called for the Federalist electors in New England to cast all their votes for Adam and Pinckney for President and Vice-President while the electors in South Carolina, Pinckney’s home state, would throw away a few Adams votes and thus give the Presidency to the man plainly intended to be Vice-President, leaving Adams in that office. Had it succeeded and the Federalist candidate for Vice-President become President by a ruse, the Federalist party would have been split beyond hope of repair. Adams would almost certainly have resigned as Vice-President, leaving that office presumably to Jefferson or Burr. Equally likely was the election of Jefferson as President. (Ibid.)

ADAMS “TOO HEADSTRONG” PTJ, XXIX, 214. If Pinckney succeeded, Madison also said, “It is to be hoped that P[inckney] may equally disappoint those who expect to make … use of him.… and there is always the chance of a devolution of the business on the House of Reps. which will I believe decide it as it ought to be decided.” (Ibid.)

And there was a chance Jefferson could even place third: “The prevailing idea is that Pinckney will have the greatest number of votes: and I think that Adams will be most likely to stand next.” (Ibid., 218.)

“YOU MUST RECONCILE” Ibid., 218.

“A DIFFICULTY FROM WHICH” Ibid, 223.

“FULLY TO SOLICIT ON MY BEHALF” Ibid.

PINCKNEY FADED TO THIRDAPE, I, 41.

“IT IS EXPECTED” PTJ, XXIX, 226. Madison wrote Jefferson of Adams:

You know that his feelings will not enslave him to the example of his predecessor. It is certain that his censures of our paper system and the intrigues at New York for setting P. above him have fixed an enmity with the British faction. Nor should it pass for nothing, that the true interest of New England particularly requires reconciliation with France as the road to her commerce. Add to the whole that he is said to speak of you now in friendly terms and will no doubt be soothed by your acceptance of a place subordinate to him. It must be confessed however that all these calculations are qualified by his political principles and prejudices. But they add weight to the obligation from which you must not withdraw yourself. (Ibid., 226–27.)

ADAMS WON, BARELY APE, I, 41.

“O LORD!” Miller, Federalist Era, 264–65.

BELIEVED DEEPLY IN “THE SENSE” Ibid.

“I VALUE THE LATE VOTE HIGHLY” PTJ, XXIX, 258. He was always a precise vote counter: “In this point of view the difference between 68 and 71 votes is little sensible, and still less that between the real vote which was 69 and 70 because one real elector in Pennsylvania was excluded from voting by the miscarriage of the votes, and one who was not an elector was admitted to vote.” (Ibid.)

“I KNEW IT WAS IMPOSSIBLE” Ibid., 232. To Edward Rutledge, Jefferson wrote: “You have seen my name lately tacked to so much of eulogy and of abuse, that I daresay you hardly thought it meant for your old acquaintance of 76. In truth I did not know myself under the pens either of my friends or foes. It is unfortunate for our peace that unmerited abuse wounds, while unmerited praise has not the power to heal. These are hard wages for the services of all the active and healthy years of one’s life.” (Ibid.)

His supporters braced him for the inevitable criticism that was to come during the administration, in part by portraying the attackers as agents of what Jefferson hated and feared most. “It is true that you have been abused,” James Sullivan, a Republican lawyer and politician in Massachusetts, wrote Jefferson from Boston on January 12, 1797. “But this abuse came from a party who are determined to abuse every one who will not, with them, bow in adoration to the British monarchy. If the abuse and calumny of these men can deprive the public of the services of those on whom they may confide with safety, there will be an end to our free constitutions: and the enemies of an elective republic will obtain a complete triumph.” (Ibid., 262.)

“THE HONEYMOON WOULD BE” Ibid.

“THIS IS CERTAINLY NOT A MOMENT” Ibid.

WHISPERS OF POSSIBLE SECESSIONIbid., 364.

THE THREE-FIFTHS CLAUSEIbid. See also Garry Wills, “Negro President”: Jefferson and the Slave Power (New York, 2003), for a discussion of the role of the three-fifths clause in the politics of the early republic.

“WE SHALL NEVER” PTJ, XXIX, 364.

“I HAVE NO AMBITION” Ibid., 235. Benjamin Rush believed, with Jefferson, that it had been a lucky thing to lose the top post for now. “Accept of my congratulations upon your election to the Vice President’s Chair of the United States, and upon your escape of the Office of President,” Rush wrote. “In the present situation of our country it would have been impossible for you to have preserved the credit of republican principles, or your own character for integrity, had you succeeded to the New York administration of our government. The seeds of British Systems in everything have at last ripened. What a harvest of political evils is before us!” (Ibid., 251.)

A DRAFT OF THE LETTER Ibid., 247–51. See also McCullough, John Adams, 465–66.

MADISON REPLIED WITH A SIX-POINT CASEIbid., 263–65.

HE WOULD NOT MAILIbid., 280–81. A significant moment in the exchange with Madison over the virtues of the letter to Adams lies in a philosophical passage of Jefferson’s—a passage informed by a sense of tragedy. “In truth I do not recollect in all the animal kingdom a single species but man which is eternally and systematically engaged in the destruction of its own species,” Jefferson wrote. “What is called civilization seems to have no other effect on him than to teach him to pursue the principle of bellum omnium in omnia [an allusion to Thomas Hobbes’s notion of “the war of all against all”] on a larger scale, and in place of the little contests of tribe against tribe, to engage all the quarters of the earth in the same work of destruction.” (Ibid., 248.)

JEFFERSON REACHED PHILADELPHIAMB, II, 954–55.

ADAMS, WHO LODGED AT FRANCIS’SPTJ, XXIX, 551.

REPAID THE COURTESY THE NEXT MORNINGIbid.

CLOSING THE DOOR BEHIND HIMIbid.

WAS GLAD JEFFERSON WAS ALONE Ibid.

HAD MUCH TO TALK ABOUT Ibid.

JEFFERSON AGREED THAT HE SHOULDIbid., 552.

“HE SAID THAT IF MR. MADISON” Ibid.

THE CEREMONIAL PROCEEDINGS IN CONGRESS HALLMcCullough, John Adams, 467–70.

DELIVERED A SHORT SPEECHPTJ, XXIX, 310–12. Should any lawmaker find fault with his rulings from the chair, Jefferson said, he would “rely on the liberality and candor of those from whom I differ to believe that I do it on pure motives.” (Ibid., 311.) Faced with his primary duty—that of presiding over the Senate—he turned to his oldest teacher for guidance on his newest work, writing George Wythe for thoughts on parliamentary procedure. (Ibid., 275–76.)

TO THE MORTALITY OF THE PRESIDENTIbid., 311.

PRESIDENTIAL INAUGURATION OF JOHN ADAMSMcCullough, John Adams, 466–70.

WASHINGTON SEEMED CHEERFULFerling, Adams vs. Jefferson, 98.

“THE PRESIDENT IS FORTUNATE” PTJ, XXIX, 255. Washington’s retirement from power was an epochal event for the country and for those who had fought for him and with him in war and peace. Jefferson assessed his old chief with a cold eye:

Such is the popularity of the President that the people will support him in whatever he will do, or will not do, without appealing to their own reason or to any thing but their feelings towards him: his mind had been so long used to unlimited applause that it could not brook contradiction, or even advice offered unasked. To advice, when asked, he is very open. I have long thought therefore it was best for the republican interest to soothe him by flattery where they could approve his measures, and to be silent where they disapprove, that they may not render him desperate as to their affections, and entirely indifferent to their wishes; in short, to lie on their oars while he remains at the helm, and let the bark drift as his will and a superintending providence shall direct. (Ibid., 252.)

“THE SECOND OFFICE” Ibid., 362. “When I retired from this place and the office of Secretary of State, it was in the firmest contemplation of never more returning here,” Jefferson told Gerry. “There had indeed been suggestions in the public papers that I was looking towards a succession to the President’s chair. But feeling a consciousness of their falsehood, and observing that the suggestions came from hostile quarters, I considered them as intended merely to excite public odium against me. I never in my life exchanged a word with any person on the subject till I found my name brought forward generally in competition with that of Mr. Adams.” (Ibid.)

From Massachusetts, Elbridge Gerry wrote of his pleasure at Jefferson’s election and offered the kind of wisdom most readily available from those familiar with politics but distant from the unfolding drama of the day. “Thus circumstanced, give me leave to express my apprehensions that the consequence of this election will be repeat[ed stratagems, to] weaken or destroy the confidence of the P and VP in each other, from an assurance that if it continues to the end of the President’s administration the VP will be his successor and perhaps from a dread of your political influence.” (Ibid., 326.)

ADAMS AND JEFFERSON DINEDIbid., 552.

“HE IMMEDIATELY SAID” Ibid. Responding specifically to the suggestion that there might be tensions between him and Adams, Jefferson said: “These machinations will proceed from the Hamiltonians by whom he is surrounded, and who are only a little less hostile to him than to me.… I cannot help fearing that it is impossible for Mr. Adams to believe that the state of my mind is what it really is; that he may think I view him as an obstacle in my way.” (Ibid., 362.)

HE FOUGHT TO KEEP THE PEACEEOL, 272–75.

THE QUASI-WAR WITH FRANCE Ibid., 245–46.

“THE HALF WAR WITH FRANCE” Ibid., 245.

RETAINED WASHINGTON’S CABINETMcCullough, John Adams, 471–72.

THIS PROVED PROBLEMATICIt was, McCullough wrote, “one of the most fateful steps of his presidency.” (Ibid., 471.)

REFLECTING ON THE EVENING CONVERSATIONIbid.

PATSY RANDOLPH HAD THREE CHILDRENKierner, Martha Jefferson Randolph, 102.

“CONSTANTLY RESIDES WITH HER FATHER” Anne Hollingsworth Wharton, Social Life in the Early Republic (Williamstown, Mass., 1970), 110.

THE NEXT YEAR POLLY MARRIED JOHN WAYLES EPPESTJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/jefferson/maria-jefferson-eppes (accessed 2012).

NINE MONTHS AND TWO WEEKS LATER Gordon-Reed, Hemingses of Monticello, 530–36. As Gordon-Reed noted, the original William Beverley had been a great Virginian who had known Peter Jefferson and had negotiated the Treaty of Lancaster, the instrument by which Virginia took vast swaths of lands in the West from the Six Nations of the Iroquois. Naming his son Beverly honored Virginia and two other things of immense importance to Jefferson: his father and his vision of a boundless West. (Ibid.)

“I HAVE BEEN FOR SOME TIME” Ibid., XXX, 129.

“A FEW INDIVIDUALS OF NO FIXED SYSTEM” Ibid., XXIX, 437–38. Yet Jefferson still sought a degree of harmony and civility. “Political dissension is doubtless a less evil than the lethargy of despotism: but still it is a great evil, and it would be as worthy the efforts of the patriot as of the philosopher, to exclude its influence if possible, from social life,” he wrote. (Ibid., 404.)

“A DETERMINATION NEVER TO DO” Randall, Jefferson, I, 22–23.

“WHEN THIS IS IN RETURN” Ibid.

A CATACLYSMIC REACTION IN FRANCEEOL, 239.

“I ANTICIPATE THE BURNING” PTJ, XXIX, 404–5.

MAZZEI PUBLICIZED THE WASHINGTON LETTERIbid., 73–88.

“THE PASSIONS ARE TOO HIGH” Ibid., 456.

USING A NEW YELLOW FEVER EPIDEMICPTJ, XXIX, 592. “Ambition is so vigilant, and where it has a model always in view as in the present case”—Madison and Jefferson thought that Adams saw himself in a monarchial light—“is so prompt in seizing its advantages, that it cannot be too closely watched, or too vigorously checked.” (Ibid.)

“DAMN ’EM, DAMN ’EM” Ibid., 593.

“ ‘FOR MY PART … I AVOW MYSELF A MONARCHIST’ ” Ibid., 596.

TWENTY-NINE · THE REIGN OF WITCHES

“NO, I THINK A PARTY IS NECESSARY” PTJ, XXX, 420.

A DISTURBING STORY ABOUT 1787 Ibid., 13–14.

THE FAILURE OF THE NEW GOVERNMENTIbid. “They wished things to get more and more into confusion to justify the violent measure they proposed.” (Ibid., 14)

SPAT IN THE FACE OF ANOTHERJames Morton Smith, Freedom’s Fetters: The Alien and Sedition Laws and American Civil Liberties (Ithaca, N.Y., 1966), 223–24. See also EOL, 227–30.

AFTER GRISWOLD INSULTED LYON’S COURAGEJames Morton Smith, Freedom’s Fetters, 223–24.

AN EFFORT TO EXPEL LYONIbid.

ATTACKED LYON WITH A CANEEOL, 229.

SEIZED SOME FIREPLACE TONGSIbid.

BRAWLED ON THE HOUSE FLOOR Ibid.

A DIPLOMATIC MISSION TO FRANCE HAD FAILEDIbid., 243.

“PRODUCED SUCH A SHOCK” Ibid.

A MESSAGE CALLING ON AMERICANSJohn Adams, “Special Message,” March 19, 1798, The American Presidency Project, http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=65650 (accessed 2012).

“ADOPT WITH PROMPTITUDE” Ibid.

“OUR SEAFARING AND COMMERCIAL CITIZENS” Ibid.

KNOWN AS THE ALIEN AND SEDITION ACTSEOL, 249, 259. See also Risjord, Jefferson’s America, 292–96.

“WRITE, PRINT, UTTER OR PUBLISH” Ibid., 259.

“EVERYONE HAS A RIGHT” PTJ, XXX, 434–35.

“HOW INCREDIBLE WAS IT” PTJ, XXXI, 445.

FINES UP TO $2,000 AND UP TO TWO YEARS IN PRISON EOL, 259.

“FOR MY OWN PART” PTJ, XXX, 560.

THE DANGER OF WAR WAS REAL EOL, 259. “There existed a domestic—what shall I call it?—a conspiracy, a faction leagued with a foreign power to effect a revolution or a subjugation of this country, by the arms of that foreign power,” said Robert Goodloe Harper. (Ibid.)

“THE MANAGEMENT OF FOREIGN RELATIONS” PTJ, XXX, 348.

JEFFERSON DINED WITH ADAMSIbid., 113.

“WITHOUT WISHING TO DAMP” PTJ, XXXI, 129. Of Adams, James Madison said: “His language to the young men of Philadelphia is the most abominable and degrading that could fall from the lips of the first magistrate of an independent people, and particularly from a Revolutionary patriot.… The abolition of royalty was it seems not one of his Revolutionary principles.” (Ibid., XXX, 359.)

“I AM AMONG THOSE” Ibid., 127.

THESE WERE “BRANCHES OF SCIENCE” Ibid., 127.

“THE GENERATION WHICH IS GOING OFF” Ibid., 128.

A PARADE OF ABOUT 1,200 SUPPORTERSIbid., XXX, 341–42.

A FAST DAYIbid.

VIOLENCE BROKE OUTIbid.

“ADAMS’ FAST” Warren, Jacobin and Junto, 75.

“A FRAY ENSUED” PTJ, XXX, 341.

CONSPIRATORIAL FRAME OF MINDIbid., 353. He understood that Adams was attempting to orchestrate public opinion. “All sorts of artifices have been descended to, to agitate the popular mind,” Jefferson wrote Madison on May 17, 1798. “The President received 3 anonymous letters (written probably by some of the war-men) announcing plots to burn the city on the fast-day. He thought them worth being made known, and great preparations were proposed by way of caution.… Many weak people packed their most valuable movables to be ready for transportation.” (Ibid.)

“I KNOW THAT ALL MY MOTIONS” Ibid., 484.

FEARED HIS MAILIbid., 588. “Yet the infidelities of the post office and the circumstances of the times are against my writing fully and freely, whilst my own indispositions are as much against writing mysteries innuendoes and half confidences,” Jefferson said. “I know not which mortifies me most, that I should fear to write what I think, or my country bear such a state of things.” (Ibid.)

“EXECUTED WITH UNRELENTING FURY” Ibid., 440.

HAMILTON WAS TO BECOMEIbid., 300.

HAMILTON ULTIMATELY DECLINEDIbid., 302.

“POLITICS AND PARTY HATREDS” Ibid., 355.

JEFFERSON WAS PRESSED FOR CASHIbid., 277.

“MR. B’S HABITUAL INTOXICATION” Ibid., 15.

ANNOUNCED THE DEATH OF HARRIET HEMINGSIbid., 43.

JEFFERSON COMPOSED A LETTERIbid., XXXI, 172–74.

THE BIRTH OF ANOTHER CHILDGordon-Reed, Hemingses of Monticello, 73, 195.

“THE X. Y. Z. FEVER” Ibid., 559–60.

MONCK WAS A NOBLEMAN WHO BACKED THE RESTORATION For more of the letter that alluded to the Oliverians and to Monck, see PTJ, XXX, 559–60.

BENJAMIN FRANKLIN BACHEJames Morton Smith, Freedom’s Fetters, 188–204.

JAMES THOMSON CALLENDERIbid., 334–58.

MATTHEW LYONIbid., 225–46.

A LETTER HE HAD WRITTEN Ibid., 226.

“CONTINUAL GRASP FOR POWER” Ibid.

“A SEDITIOUS FOREIGNER” Ibid.

LYON WAS INDICTED, TRIED, AND CONVICTEDIbid., 229–38. Steven Thomson Mason reported public reaction to Jefferson on November 23, 1798: “Lyon’s trial has produced a very strong sensation here, and many who have valued themselves on being friends of order and supporters of government admit that this is going too far.” (PTJ, XXX, 586.)

FOUR MONTHS IN JAILIbid., 235.

FINED HIM $1,000 Ibid. Paterson also charged Lyon court costs of $60.96.

“MATTHEW LYON, AS A MEMBER” Ibid.

“I KNOW NOT” Ibid., 237.

SOUGHT REELECTIONIbid., 238–42.

“WHAT PERSON WHO REMEMBERS” PTJ, XXXI, 57.

“PRAY, MY DEAR SIR” Ibid., XXX, 641.

SECRETLY DRAFTED RESOLUTIONS Ibid., 529–56.

BALKED AT THE NULLIFICATION LANGUAGEIbid., XXXI, 266–68.

“IN THE SENATE, THERE WAS A CONSIDERABLE” Ibid., 266.

“I THINK WE SHOULD” Ibid., XXX, 580.

“IN EVERY FREE AND DELIBERATING SOCIETY” Ibid., 388–89.

“NO ONE CAN KNOW” Margaret Bayard Smith, First Forty Years, 406.

“I AM FOR FREEDOM OF RELIGION” PTJ, XXX, 646–47.

HE SOLICITED FRIENDSIbid., 661.

DISCUSSED PUBLIC-OPINION STRATEGIESPTJ, XXXI, 10. One example: “A piece published in Bache’s paper on foreign influence has had the greatest currency and effect,” Jefferson wrote Madison on February 5, 1799. (Ibid.)

“SENSIBLE THAT THIS SUMMER” Ibid.

“I WISH YOU TO GIVE THESE” APE, I, 63. He begged Madison to write letters he could then circulate. “You can render such incalculable services in this way.” (PTJ, XXXI, 10.) The mobilization of public sentiment was a powerful weapon. On February 13, 1799, Jefferson wrote: “A wonderful and rapid change is taking place in Pennsylvania, Jersey and N. York. Congress is daily plied with petitions against the Alien and Sedition laws and standing armies.… The materials now bearing on the public mind will infallibly restore it to its republican soundness in the course of the present summer, if the knowledge of facts can only be disseminated among the people.” Jefferson repeated the point to Pendleton the next day. (Ibid., 35–39.)

“A DECIDED CHARACTER” PTJ, XXXI, 40.

THIRTY · ADAMS VS. JEFFERSON REDUX

“I SHOULD BE UNFAITHFUL” PTJ, XXXII, 126. Jefferson continued: “The first wish of my heart is to see them so guarded as to be safe in any hands, and not to depend on the personal disposition of the depository: and I hope this to be practicable as long as the people retain the spirit of freedom.… Our chief object at present should be to reconcile the divisions which have been artificially excited and to restore society to its wonted harmony.” (Ibid., 126–27.)

“THAT NOT A WORD SHOULD BE SPOKEN” PTJ, XXXI, 64.

THE FEDERALISTS “BEGAN TO ENTER” Ibid.

“IT WAS IMPOSSIBLE TO PROCEED” Ibid.

WAS GOING TO RAISE A “PRESIDENTIAL ARMY” Ibid., 97.

JOHN RANDOLPH OF ROANOKEIbid., 305–6, 314.

THE NEXT EVENING TWO MARINESIbid., 314.

“JOSTLED AND [HAD] HIS COAT PULLED” Ibid. Characteristically, Randolph refused to drop the matter, petitioning President Adams to dismiss the marines “to afford a remedy, and to restrain men … from giving personal abuse and insult.” Nothing came of the petition. (Ibid., 306–7)

A “REIGN OF WITCHES” Ibid., XXX, 389.

REPORTED THAT HAMILTON HAD LED Ibid., XXXI, 337–38.

“NO MORTAL CAN FORESEE” Ibid., 465.

“WILL NEVER PERMIT” APE, I, 68.

“GOD—AND A RELIGIOUS PRESIDENT” Ferling, Adams vs. Jefferson, 154.

“BECAUSE HE IS NOT A FANATIC” APE, I, 68.

HAD “HARANGUED” A GRAND JURY PTJ, XXXI, 589. The familiar Federalist claim that Jefferson was a nonbeliever was on Chase’s mind in part because of a dinner Jefferson had planned to give on a Sunday. (Ibid.)

JAMES THOMSON CALLENDER, A VIRULENT REPUBLICANIbid., 589–90.

THE PROSPECT BEFORE US For discussions of the book, see Ferling, Adams vs. Jefferson, 136–37.

“THE REIGN OF MR. ADAMS” James Morton Smith, Freedom’s Fetters, 339.

“CANNOT FAIL TO PRODUCE” APE, I, 63.

ABIGAIL AND JOHN ADAMS SEETHEDCappon, Adams-Jefferson Letters, 273.

GEORGE WASHINGTON DIEDJHT, III, 442.

JEFFERSON HAD BEEN LESS THAN HONESTWillard Sterne Randall, George Washington: A Life (New York, 1997), 480–81.

“PERHAPS NO MAN IN THIS COMMUNITY” JHT, III, 443.

FRENEAU WROTE SOME VERSESIbid.

“THE HORRORS WHICH” PTJ, XXXI, 524.

“THE BATTERIES OF SLANDER” Ibid., 526.

“OUR OPPONENTS PERCEIVE” Ibid., 536.

“MADNESS AND EXTRAVAGANCE” Ibid., 546–47.

“THE PEOPLE THROUGH ALL THE STATES” Ibid., 547.

ADAMS MADE SOME CABINET CHANGESIbid., 581. See also McCullough, John Adams, 537–39.

ADAMS ALSO DISBANDED Ibid.

“ARE, ON THE APPROACH OF AN ELECTION” Ibid.

PUBLISHED RUMORS THAT JEFFERSON HAD DIEDIbid., XXXII, 42.

“I THOUGHT I HAD LOST” Ibid.

A SMALL GATHERING Ibid., 58–59.

JEFFERSON DENIED IT ALLIbid., 98–99.

JEFFERSON HAD TO COUNTIbid., 97. One sign of the tensions of the moment: Jefferson, who did not know McGregory, sent the reply through another Connecticut friend, noting that “the stratagems of the times [are] very multifarious” and he wanted to be sure that no “improper use” would be made of the letter. No one was to be trusted. (Ibid.)

A SLAVE NAMED GABRIELIbid., 131–32. For Monroe on the revolt, see ibid., 144–45. See also EOL, 534–42; Miller, Wolf by the Ears, 126–29; and Brodie, Thomas Jefferson, 342–43. James Sidbury, Ploughshares into Swords: Race, Rebellion, and Identity in Gabriel’s Virginia, 1730–1810 (New York, 1997), is also illuminating.

HANGING TWENTY-SIX CONSPIRATORSIbid., 145. Once reassured the rebellion had been broken up, Jefferson took a moderate tone. “There is a strong sentiment that there has been hanging enough,” he wrote to James Monroe, then governor. “The other states and the world at large will forever condemn us if we indulge in a principle of revenge, or go one step beyond absolute necessity.” (Ibid., 160.)

“THEIR PLAN WAS TO MASSACRE” Ibid., 137.

A PANICPTJ, XXXVII, 335–36. Gabriel’s conspiracy was in 1800; the subsequent episodes during what John C. Miller called the “Great Fear” (Miller, Wolf by the Ears, 127) included one in Norfolk in 1802. (PTJ, XXXVII, 335–36.)

Jefferson linked St. Domingue to the American situation. “The course of things in the neighboring islands of the West Indies appears to have given a considerable impulse to the minds of the slaves in different parts of the U.S.,” Jefferson wrote Rufus King on July 13, 1802.

A great disposition to insurgency has manifested itself among them, which, in one instance, in the state of Virginia broke out into actual insurrection. This was easily suppressed: but many of those concerned, (between 20. and 30. I believe) fell victims to the law. So extensive an execution could not but excite sensibility in the public mind, and beget a regret that the laws had not provided, for such cases, some alternative, combining more mildness with equal efficacy. The legislature of the state, at a subsequent meeting, took the subject into consideration, and have communicated to me through the Governor of the state, their wish that some place could be provided, out of the limits of the U.S. to which slaves guilty of insurgency might be transported; and they have particularly looked to Africa as offering the most desirable receptacle. we might, for this purpose, enter into negotiations with the natives, on some part of the coast, to obtain a settlement, and, by establishing an African company, combine with it commercial operations, which might not only reimburse expenses but procure profit also. (PTJ, XXXVIII, 54.)

THE STATE’S HOUSE OF DELEGATES ASKED JEFFERSON Ibid., XXXVIII, 56.

A FOREIGN LANDIbid.

AN APPROACH WAS MADEMiller, Wolf by the Ears, 128. Jefferson had suggested Sierra Leone to Monroe. (PTJ, XXXVIII, 56.)

WHERE ABOLITIONISTS HAD RESETTLED SOME AFRICAN AMERICAN SLAVESSimon Schama, Rough Crossings (New York, 2006), 11. The slaves who settled in Freetown, Sierra Leone, had joined the British during the Revolutionary War and had briefly lived in Nova Scotia before making the journey to Sierra Leone. (Ibid., 3–5, 269–81.)

DECLINED TO TAKE ANY OTHERS Miller, Wolf by the Ears, 132.

HAMILTON WAS UNHAPPY APE, I, 60–61.

NEW YORK ELECTION RESULTSPTJ, XXXI, 509.

LEGISLATURES CHOSE PRESIDENTIAL ELECTORSAPE, I, 61.

“A MOST AUSPICIOUS GLOOM” PTJ, XXXI, 554.

APPEALED TO JOHN JAYAPE, I, 61. See also Walter Stahr, John Jay: Founding Father (New York, 2005), 360–61.

“IN TIMES LIKE THIS” Ibid.

“PROPOSING A MEASURE” Ibid.

JEFFERSON MET WITH ADAMSPTJRS, III, 306.

TALK OF FIELDINGPTJ, XXXI, 509. See also APE, I, 61–62.

ANTI-ADAMS FEDERALISTS SUCH AS HAMILTONAPE, I, 61.

“TO SUPPORT ADAMS and PINCKNEY” Ibid.

“HOCUS-POCUS MANEUVERS” PTJ, XXXI, 561.

AN ATTACK ON THE SECOND PRESIDENTIbid., XXXII, 238–39.

“OUR ENEMIES ARE” Life and Correspondence of Rufus King, III, ed. Charles R. King (New York, 1971), 331.

“IF WE MUST HAVE” Ferling, Adams vs. Jefferson, 141. Troup, Hamilton’s old college roommate, echoed the point to Rufus King on December 4, 1800: “General Hamilton makes no secret of his opinion that Jefferson should be preferred to Adams.” (Life and Correspondence of Rufus King, III, 340.)

“I HAVE SOMETIMES ASKED MYSELF” PTJ, XXXII, 122.

RESULTS FROM THE STATES REACHED MONTICELLO See, for instance, ibid., 225–26, in which Stevens Thomson Mason reported the Maryland tallies. See also ibid., 263. Jefferson was relieved at the results of the different state elections. “Whatever may be the event of the Executive election, the Legislative one will give us a majority in the H. of R. and all but that in the Senate,” he wrote. “The former alone will keep the government from running wild, while a reformation in our state legislatures will be working and preparing a complete one in the Senate. A President can then do little mischief.” (Ibid., 227.)

“DEMOCRATIC PRINCIPLES SEEM” Life and Correspondence of Rufus King, III, 353.

“I HAVE NEVER HEARD” APE, I, 128.

“I BELIEVE WE MAY CONSIDER” PTJ, XXXII, 300.

“TEMPESTS AND TORNADOES” Caesar A. Rodney to Joseph H. Nicholson, February 19, 1801, Joseph H. Nicholson Papers, LOC.

“HIGHFLYING FEDERALISTS” PTJ, XXXII, 306–7.

“HAS PRODUCED GREAT DISMAY” Ibid., 322.

“SOME OF THE JACOBINS” Life and Correspondence of Rufus King, III, 354.

“OUR TORIES BEGIN TO GIVE” John Randolph to Joseph Nicholson, December 16, 1800, Joseph H. Nicholson Papers, LOC.

“I DO NOT … APPREHEND” PTJ, XXXII, 343.

SHOWED NO OUTWARD SIGNSIsenberg, Fallen Founder, 210–12.

THERE IS NO EVIDENCEIbid, 216–20. Joanne Freeman points out, however, something that clearly bothered the Jeffersonians. “In the end, Burr kept his word [about not working against Jefferson in the House] but left things open; he didn’t court the Presidency, but once the tie was announced, he said nothing about declining the office if offered, an ambiguity that kept Federalist hopes alive until the final hour.” (Freeman, “The Presidential Election of 1800,” in Cogliano, ed., A Companion to Thomas Jefferson, 155.)

JEFFERSON SOON CAME TO BELIEVEIbid., 230–31.

THE EVENTUAL OUTCOMEPTJ, XXXII, 347.

“THE PRESIDENT, I AM TOLD” Life and Correspondence of Rufus King, III, 366–67.

“THE DREAD NOW” J. Preston to John Breckenridge, December 28, 1800, Breckinridge Family Papers, LOC.

“THE FEDS APPEAR” PTJ, XXXII, 358.

THEY CAME TO JEFFERSONIbid., 367.

“WHERE,” MCHENRY ASKEDLife and Correspondence of Rufus King, III, 362.

THIRTY-ONE · A DESPERATE STATE OF AFFAIRS

“RUMORS ARE VARIOUS” Horn, Lewis, and Onuf, Revolution of 1800, 65.

“IT IS EXTREMELY UNCERTAIN” The Papers of John Marshall, VI, ed. Herbert A. Johnson and others (Chapel Hill, N.C., 1974–), 41.

SIX OR SEVEN BOARDINGHOUSESRecords of the Columbia Historical Society., Vol. 25, 1923, 198–99.

A PHILADELPHIA BOOT MAKER National Intelligencer, February 6. 1801.

A BOOKSTOREIbid., February 16, 1801.

BENJAMIN W. MORRIS AND CO. GROCERIESWashington Federalist, February 17, 1801.

WILD, WOODED, AND FILLED WITH GAMEMargaret Bayard Smith, First Forty Years, 10. “Conrad’s boarding house was on the south side of Capitol Hill and commanded an extensive and beautiful view,” Margaret Bayard Smith wrote. “It was on the top of the hill, the precipitous sides of which were covered with grass, shrubs, and trees in their wild uncultivated state.” (Ibid.) There was only one church in the city. “At this time the only place for public worship in our new city was a small, a very small frame building at the bottom of Capitol Hill. It had been a tobacco-house belonging to Daniel Carroll and was purchased by a few Episcopalians for a mere trifle and fitted up as a church in the plainest and rudest manner. During the first winter, Mr. Jefferson regularly attended service on the Sabbath-day in the humble church.” (Ibid., 13.)

“THE ELECTION” PTJ, XXXII, 385.

BURR “WAS HEARD TO INSINUATE” Ibid., 400.

“SOME OF OUR FRIENDS” Ibid., 399.

“THERE WOULD BE REALLY CAUSE” Dunn, Jefferson’s Second Revolution, 198.

“WHAT WILL BE THE PLANS” Ibid., 204.

“JEFFERSON AS A POLITICIAN” Roger Griswold to Fanny Griswold, January 22, 1801, William Lane Griswold Memorial Collection, Yale University.

ON SUNDAY, JANUARY 11, 1801 Ibid., January 11, 1801.

“OPENS UPON US” PTJ, XXXII, 318.

TOLD BY “HIGH AUTHORITY” Ibid., XXXIV, 21.

“SOME STRANGE REPORTS” Ibid., XXXII, 403.

DEBATING WHETHER TO REMAINIbid.

“UNFRIENDLY FOREIGN MINISTERS” Ibid., 425–26.

THE JUDICIARY ACT OF 1801 Kathryn Turner, “Federalist Policy and the Judiciary Act of 1801,” The William and Mary Quarterly, 3rd ser., 22 (January 1965): 3–32. See also Miller, Federalist Era, 275. John Marshall described things to Rufus King this way on January 18, 1801: “The Congress are probably about to pass a bill reorganizing our judicial system. The principal feature in the new bill is the separation of the supreme from the circuit courts.” (Papers of John Marshall, VI, 57.)

“THE JUDICIARY BILL HAS BEEN” Stevens Thomson Mason to John Breckinridge, February 12, 1801, Breckinridge Family Papers, LOC.

A “PARASITICAL PLANT” EOL, 420.

HAD “RETIRED INTO THE JUDICIARY” Ibid.

“MIDNIGHT JUDGES” Miller, Federalist Era, 275.

TO NAME JOHN MARSHALLKathryn Turner, “The Appointment of Chief Justice Marshall,” The William and Mary Quarterly, 3rd ser., 17 (April 1960): 143–63.

MET IN JANUARY 1801 Simon, What Kind of Nation, 134.

THOUGH ADAMS HAD SOUGHT TO REENLIST JOHN JAY Ibid.

“WHO SHALL I NOMINATE NOW?” Ibid.

HE TOLD THE PRESIDENT THAT HE HAD NO COUNSEL TO GIVEIbid.

“I BELIEVE I MUST NOMINATE YOU” Ibid.

MARSHALL RECALLED BEING “PLEASED” Ibid.

CONFIRMED THE PRESIDENT’S NOMINATION Ibid.

“MR. JEFFERSON IS UNDOUBTEDLY” Caesar A. Rodney to Joseph H. Nicholson, February 17, 1801, Joseph H. Nicholson Papers, LOC.

JEFFERSON HIMSELF WAS WORRIED ENOUGHPTJRS, III, 306. The ensuing scene is drawn from this account of Jefferson’s.

“INTEREST, CHARACTER, DUTY” PTJ, XXXII, 432.

“BUT SHOULD IT BE POSSIBLE” Ibid.

“IF BAD MEN WILL DARE” Ibid., 433.

THE PENNSYLVANIA MILITIA WAS TO BE READIEDIbid., XXXIII, 391.

EVEN A FEW FIRESIbid., XXXII, 435.

“THE BURNING OF THE WAR-OFFICE” Ibid.

“IT SEEMS HEAVEN” Roger Griswold to Fanny Griswold, January 20, 1801, William Lane Griswold Memorial Collection, Yale University.

“I LONG TO BE” PTJ, XXXII, 475.

“THE APPROACH OF THE 11TH FEB.” Ibid., 559.

NOTES JEFFERSON MADEIbid., 583.

BAYARD SOON SHIFTED TACKSharp, Deadlocked Election of 1800, 161.

“THIS IS ABSOLUTELY FALSE” Anas, 238–39.

DID JEFFERSON STRIKE A DEALSee, for instance, EOL, 285; JHT, IV, 487–93; Sharp, Deadlocked Election of 1800, 159–62; Joanne B. Freeman, “Corruption and Compromise in the Election of 1800: The Process of Politics on the National Stage” in Horn, Lewis, and Onuf, Revolution of 1800, 87–120; Chernow, Alexander Hamilton, 637–38; Wilentz, Rise of American Democracy, 93–94 (“After discussions with two of Jefferson’s supporters—though not with the candidate himself—Bayard was persuaded that Jefferson had made specific concessions about preserving the public credit,” wrote Wilentz.)

“HE STOPPED ME” Anas, 239.

STANDING ON THE STEPSIbid.

“I TOLD HIM” Ibid.

“IT WAS UNDERSTOOD” Ibid., 239–40.

JEFFERSON HAD SIMILAR EXCHANGESIbid., 240.

“I DO NOT RECOLLECT” Ibid.

“JEFFERSON IS TO BE PREFERRED” JHT, III, 500.

“IS AS LIKELY” Kaminski, Founders on the Founders, 308.

“MR. JEFFERSON IS A MAN” Ibid., 307–8.

LAWMAKERS SLEPT ON PALLETSMargaret Bayard Smith, First Forty Years, 23–24.

AN AILING REPRESENTATIVEIbid., 24.

CARRIED THROUGH THE SNOWIbid.

HIS WIFE HELPED GUIDE HIS HANDIbid.

AT ONE P.M. ON TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 17, 1801 PTJ, XXXII, 578. See also Joanne B. Freeman, “A Qualified Revolution: The Presidential Election of 1800,” in Cogliano, ed., A Companion to Thomas Jefferson, 145–63.

“THE CONSPIRATORS” Margaret Bayard Smith, First Forty Years, 25.

“HURRIED TO THEIR LODGINGS” Ibid.

“TO GO WITHOUT A CONSTITUTION” PTJ, XXXIII, 4.

“IN THE EVENT OF A USURPATION” Ibid., 230.

“WHEN I LOOK BACK” PTJ, XXXIV, 258–59.

IN ALEXANDRIA, THIRTY-TWO ROUNDS WERE FIREDIbid., XXXIII, 3.

IN RICHMOND, THERE WERE FIREWORKS Ibid., 46.

RANG BELLS FROM BEFORE NOON TO SUNDOWNIbid., 28.

“OUR PEOPLE IN THIS COUNTY” Noble E. Cunningham, Jeffersonian Republicans in Power: Party Operations, 1801–1809 (Chapel Hill, N.C., 1963), 6.

“MANY DECLARE YOU AN ATHEIST” PTJ, XXXIV, 39.

“THE STRANGE REVOLUTION” Papers of John Marshall, VI, 82.

“THE COURSE TO BE PURSUED” Ibid.

WOULD “EXCITE THE RESENTMENT” Ibid., 83.

ASKED THE VICE PRESIDENT TO DINNERMcCullough, John Adams, 558.

“MR. JEFFERSON DINES WITH US” Ibid.

SHE WAS TO LEAVE WASHINGTONIbid., 561.

JEFFERSON “MADE ME A VISIT” Ibid., 559.

“I CANNOT REGRET” PTJ, XXXIII, 37.

“AS TO THE FUTURE” Ibid., 32.

“TO YOU, SIR, DOTH” Ibid., 42.

“IF WE SPEND” Ibid., XXXV, 90.

THE “DUTY OF THE CHIEF MAGISTRATE” EOL, 283. Jefferson articulated this particular view after he left office, in 1810.

“I SINCERELY THANK YOU” PTJ, XXXIII, 422.

THIRTY-TWO · THE NEW ORDER OF THINGS BEGINS

“ALL … WILL BEAR IN MIND” PTJ, XXXIII, 149.

“YOU ALWAYS HAD THE PEOPLE” Ibid., 127.

“I KNOW INDEED” Ibid., 465.

“AS THE TWO HOUSES” Ibid., 119.

MARSHALL REPLIEDIbid., 120–21.

HAD MADE PLANSMcCullough, John Adams, 565.

LEAVE WASHINGTON ON THE FOUR A.M. Papers of John Marshall, VI, 89.

HE WENT THROUGH NEW YORK, IT WAS SAIDMiller, Federalist Era, 276.

“SENSIBLE, MODERATE MEN” McCullough, John Adams, 564. Also see Sharp, Deadlocked Election of 1800, 165–66.

HE WAS MORE THAN READY McCullough, John Adams, 564–66. McCullough makes the case that, contrary to the conventional view, there is “no evidence” that Adams was “downcast, [and] bitter.” Sharp agrees, writing that “there is little evidence that an enraged and ill-tempered Adams [was] skulking out of Washington at the last moment to avoid public humiliation.” (Sharp, Deadlocked Election of 1800, 165–66.)

CANNON FIRENational Intelligencer, March 6, 1801.

THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA’S ARTILLERY CORPSIbid.

SAMUEL HARRISON SMITH CALLED ON JEFFERSON Margaret Bayard Smith, First Forty Years, 26. “Mr. Jefferson had given [S. H. Smith] a copy [of the inaugural address] early in the morning, so that on coming out of the house, the paper was distributed immediately,” Margaret Bayard Smith wrote Miss Susan B. Smith on March 4, 1801. “Since then there has been a constant succession of persons coming for the papers.” (Ibid.)

WRITTEN IN JEFFERSON’S SMALL, NEAT HANDIbid. “The original in Jefferson’s handwriting is among the papers of Mr. J. Henley Smith; also his second inaugural address in his handwriting and signed.” (Ibid.)

AT TEN O’CLOCKNational Intelligencer, March 6, 1801.

SHORTLY BEFORE NOONAlexandria Times, March 6, 1801.

A DELEGATION OF CONGRESSMEN National Intelligencer, March 6, 1801.

FOLLOWED A GROUP OF OFFICERS Alexandria Times, March 6, 1801.

THEIR SWORDS DRAWNIbid.

PARTED TO ALLOW JEFFERSON THROUGHIbid.

STOOD, SALUTINGIbid.

AFTER ANOTHER BLAST OF CANNONNational Intelligencer, March 6, 1801.

ABOUT A THOUSAND PEOPLECunningham, Jeffersonian Republicans in Power, 3.

“MAGNIFICENT IN HEIGHT” Byrd, The Senate, 1789–1989: Addresses on the History of the United States Senate, 406.

THE ROOM WAS 86 BY 48 FEETIbid.

EACH SENATOR HADIbid.

“SO CROWDED THAT” Margaret Bayard Smith, First Forty Years, 26. It was, the National Intelligencer reported, “the largest concourse of citizens ever assembled here.” (National Intelligencer, March 6, 1801.)

ROSE IN DEFERENCE TO JEFFERSON National Intelligencer, March 6, 1801.

AFTER MARSHALL ADMINISTERED THE OATHWilentz, Rise of American Democracy, 99, offers this memorable image: “The first thing that Thomas Jefferson saw as president was the dark face of John Marshall, the chief justice of the Supreme Court, who had just sworn him into office. The two were second cousins, related through the august Randolph family of Virginia—and they intensely disliked each other’s politics.” (Ibid.) See also Jean Edward Smith, John Marshall: Definer of a Nation (New York, 1996). For more on the rivalry between the two Virginians, see R. Kent Newmyer, John Marshall and the Heroic Age of the Supreme Court (Baton Rouge, La., 2001), 146–209, which focuses on Jefferson’s presidential years, and James F. Simon, What Kind of Nation: Thomas Jefferson, John Marshall, and the Epic Struggle to Create a United States (New York, 2002).

IN HIS WEAK VOICEMargaret Bayard Smith, First Forty Years, 26.

“ALL … WILL BEAR IN MIND” PTJ, XXXIII, 149–51.

“TODAY THE NEW POLITICAL YEAR” Papers of John Marshall, VI, 89.

“THE DEMOCRATS ARE DIVIDED” Ibid.

“IF HE ARRANGES HIMSELF” Ibid.

RETURNING TO HIS LETTER WRITING AT FOUR P.M. Ibid.

“YOU WILL BEFORE THIS” Ibid.

“IN POLITICAL SUBSTANCE” Ibid., 137.

“VIRTUALLY A CANDID RETRACTION” Dunn, Jefferson’s Second Revolution, 225.

“OLD FRIENDS WHO HAD BEEN” PTJ, XXXIII, 261.

“IT IS NOT POSSIBLE” Ibid., 426.

“WE REFLECT” Ibid., 290.

“PURSUING STEADILY MY OBJECT” Ibid., XXXVII, 296–97. “Nero wished all the necks of Rome united in one, that he might sever them at a blow,” Jefferson had written in his second year in office. So it was, he said, with his foes, who, “wishing to have a single representative of all the objects of their hatred, honor me with that post, and exhibit against me such atrocities as no nation has ever before heard or endured. I shall protect them in the right of lying and calumniating, and shall go on to merit the continuance of it.” (Ibid.)

“I FEEL A GREAT LOAD” Ibid., XXXIII, 181.

REPUBLICAN CONGRESSIONAL MAJORITIEShttp://artandhistory.house.gov/house_history/partyDiv.aspx (accessed 2012).

THE SENATE MARGINhttp://www.senate.gov/pagelayout/history/one_item_and_teasers/partydiv.htm (accessed 2012).

THE AUTHORITY OF THE PRESIDENTIAL OFFICERobert M. Johnstone, Jr., Jefferson and the Presidency: Leadership in the Young Republic (New York, 1978), stated the case well. “It is a central thesis of this book that Jefferson’s presidency marked the pioneering effort in erecting a working model of presidential leadership characterized by persuasion and the cultivation of influence. Jefferson was the first president willing to implement the bargaining relationships that could enhance presidential influence, and he did so with great natural skill and patience.” (Ibid., 14.) McDonald, in Cogliano, ed., A Companion to Thomas Jefferson, 164–83, explores issues of Jefferson and executive power. “A commonsense understanding of Jefferson’s presidency as a referendum on the issues and ideas that secured his election in 1800 and 1801 holds that, although he sometimes broke rules that he advocated as opposition leader, he never abandoned the goal of a strictly limited and thoroughly republican government,” McDonald writes, and I agree: Such was always his goal, even if his means to the end of securing republicanism were not always strictly republican. Sorting through the scholarship of Leonard White, Jeremy D. Bailey, and Johnstone, McDonald also notes: “Leonard White may be correct to observe that ‘Jefferson fully maintained in practice the Federalist conception of executive power’… , but Johnstone believes that his similar actions were governed by different justifications. So does Jeremy Bailey … , who argues that Jefferson, who had long supported executive vigor, strengthened the presidency by envisioning it as the one branch representative of—and subject to—all of the nation’s voters. The fact that Jefferson, as Johnstone writes, ‘combined the constitutional power of the presidency with a ‘political’ power grounded on popular support’ made this mode of leadership republican… . The fact that it was Jefferson who accomplished the feat made it Republican.” (Ibid., 178.)

SENT A REASSURING SIGNALPTJ, XXXIII, 14.

“ONE IMPUTATION” Ibid.

CUT THE NATIONAL DEBT FROM $83 MILLION TO $57 MILLIONRobert M. S. McDonald, “The (Federalist?) Presidency of Thomas Jefferson,” in Cogliano, ed., A Companion to Thomas Jefferson, 170.

REDUCING MILITARY EXPENDITURES Ibid.

DECLINED TO WEAR A CEREMONIAL SWORDIbid., 134.

DINNER AS USUALMargaret Bayard Smith, First Forty Years, 12–13.

COACHES AND SILVER HARNESSESSeale, President’s House, I, 90.

ABIGAIL ADAMS HUNG LAUNDRY IN THE EAST ROOM Stein, Worlds of Thomas Jefferson at Monticello, 54.

“GREAT UNFINISHED AUDIENCE-ROOM” Ibid.

JEFFERSON INSTALLED HIS SECRETARYIbid., 56.

IN THE SOUTHWEST CORNER OF THE FIRST FLOOR Ibid.

HE KEPT GERANIUMS IN THE WINDOW AND MOCKINGBIRDS AT HANDMargaret Bayard Smith, First Forty Years, 384–85.

DRAWERS FOR JEFFERSON’S TOOLS AND KNICKKNACKSIbid.

HE WAS USUALLY HUMMINGStein, Jefferson at Monticello, 13.

JEFFERSON KEPT PET MOCKINGBIRDSTJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/research-and-collections/mockingbirds (accessed 2012).

“LEARN ALL THE CHILDREN” PTJ, XXVI, 250.

A BIRD HE NAMED DICKTJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/research-and-collections/mockingbirds (accessed 2012). As Lucia Stanton noted, “Dick” is a little disappointing given the standard set by Jefferson’s noble and often mythological names for his horses, but there we are. (Ibid.)

HANGING ITS CAGE IN THE WINDOWMargaret Bayard Smith, First Forty Years, 385.

ORDERED THE DEMOLITIONWilliam Seale, The President’s House: A History, I (Washington, D.C., 1986), 88.

“WATER CLOSETS … OF SUPERIOR CONSTRUCTION” Ibid.

WHICH PIECES OF FURNITUREIbid.

HIS CHIEF DOMESTIC, RAPINPTJ, XXXIII, 96–98.

HENRY DEARBORN OF NEW HAMPSHIREIbid., 13.

BORN IN GENEVA IN 1761 Henry Adams, Life of Albert Gallatin, is full of primary documents. See also “Albert Gallatin, (1761–1849),” Biographical Dictionary of the United States Congress, 1774–Present, http://bioguide.congress.gov/scripts/biodisplay.pl?index=g000020 (accessed 2012).

LOUIS-ANDRÉ PICHON TOLD PARISLouis-André Pichon, Les Archives Diplomatiques.

“ONE CANNOT HELP” Ibid.

“HENCEFORTH, WE CAN PREDICT” Ibid.

“INVARIABLY OPPOSED” Ibid.

“THE STORM THROUGH WHICH” PTJ, XXXIII, 196.

“WE CAN NO LONGER” Ibid., 394.

“I AM SENSIBLE HOW FAR” Ibid., 506.

REFERRED TO THE FEDERALISTS AS MADMENIbid., XXXIV, 262. See also ibid., XXXIII, 403.

“THEIR LEADERS ARE A HOSPITAL” PTJ, XXXIV, 262.

“Politics will not make you” Ibid., XXXIII, 568.

“IN ESSENTIAL HARMONY” Ibid., 254. “It will be a great blessing to our country if we can once more restore harmony and social love among its citizens,” Jefferson told Gerry. Yet he understood the political realities. “I was not deluded by the eulogisms of the public papers in the first moments of change. If they could have continued to get all the loaves and fishes, that is if I would have gone over to them, they would continue to eulogize. But I well knew that the moment that such removals should take place, as the justice of the preceding administration ought to have executed, their hue and cry would be set up and they would take their old stand.” (Ibid., 491.)

“MANY FRIENDS MAY GROW COOL” Ibid., XXXIII, 127.

“THE DANGERS TO OUR FORM OF GOVERNMENT” Ibid., 636.

“THE EJECTED PARTY” Ibid., 228.

A RANGE OF ISSUES AND PROBLEMSSee, for instance, Ibid., XXXIII, 585–94.

LIKE “TWO MICE IN A CHURCH” The Selected Letters of Dolley Payne Madison, ed. David B. Mattern and Holly C. Shulman (Charlottesville, Va., 2003), 39. See also PTJ, XXXIV, 200.

“I AM STILL AT A GREAT LOSS” PTJ, XXXIII, 260.

BE “A REAL FAVOR” Ibid., XXXIV, 242.

“THE CITY IS RATHER SICKLY” Ibid., XXXV, 109.

“IT IS SUBSTITUTING” Ibid.

“WE FIND THIS A VERY AGREEABLE” JHT, IV, 42.

ISSUED PRESIDENTIAL PARDONS James Morton Smith, Freedom’s Fetters, 268.

HIS OLD ALLY JAMES THOMSON CALLENDERPTJ, XXXIII, 309–10.

CALLENDER HAD THREE CHILDRENIbid., 216.

“HURT” BY THE “DISAPPOINTMENT” Ibid., 573.

“I NOW BEGIN” Ibid., 575.

HE ASKED ALBERT GALLATIN TO REPLYIbid., 372.

HAD BEEN OUT OF FAVOR Brodie, Thomas Jefferson, 322–23. “His first writings here had fallen far short … and the scurrilities of his subsequent ones began evidently to do mischief,” Jefferson wrote Monroe. Callender felt the distance and resented it. He knew, he said, that Jefferson “had on various occasions treated me with such ostentatious coolness and indifference that I could hardly say that I was able to love or trust him.” (Ibid., 323.)

“MR. JEFFERSON HAS NOT RETURNED” Ibid., 345.

“THE MONEY WAS REFUSED” Ibid.

“DO YOU KNOW THAT” Claude G. Bowers, Jefferson in Power: The Death Struggle of the Federalists (Boston, 1936), 67.

DISPATCHED MERIWETHER LEWIS TO GIVE CALLENDER Brodie, Thomas Jefferson, 345–46.

HE SENT A NOTE TO HIS CABINETPTJ, XXXV, 576–78.

PAPERS “CONVEYING INFORMATION” Ibid., 606.

THIRTY-THREE · A CONFIDENT PRESIDENT

“THE MEASURES RECOMMENDED” Bowers, Jefferson in Power, 89.

“HERE ARE SO MANY WANTS” PTJ, XXXVI, 176.

“A STEADY AND UNIFORM COURSE” PTJ, XXXV, 677.

“AN INTERVAL OF 4 HOURS” Ibid.

A RIDE OR A WALK PTJ, XXXVI, 99.

“ENGAGED WITH COMPANY” Ibid.

“MECHANICS, MATHEMATICS, PHILOSOPHY” TJ to Thomas Paine, January 13, 1803, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

“I HAD GOOD REASON” PTJ, XXXVII, 475.

TENSION WITH A SUPPORTERTJ to Nathaniel Macon, March 22, 1806, Jefferson Papers, LOC.

“THIS EVENING MY COMPANY” Ibid.

WHOM HE KNEW HE WOULD NOT SEE AGAINTJ to Ellen Wayles Randolph, October 19, 1807, Coolidge Collection of Thomas Jefferson Manuscripts, Massachusetts Historical Society.

THE MADISONS STAYED BRIEFLYSelected Letters of Dolley Payne Madison, 39–40.

ON PENNSYLVANIA AVENUE FOUR BLOCKSIbid., 40.

AT 1333 F STREETIbid.

ESTABLISHED A HOSPITABLE SALONSee Catherine Allgor, A Perfect Union: Dolley Madison and the Creation of the American Nation (New York, 2006).

BRICK WALLS OF THEIR THREE-STORY HOUSE Selected Letters of Dolley Payne Madison, 40.

“FASHIONABLE TALK” Ibid., 54.

“AS GAY AS IN THE WINTER” Margaret Bayard Smith, First Forty Years, 27.

MRS. SMITH SAT NEXT TO JEFFERSONIbid., 29.

THE TWO “WERE SO EASY” Ibid.

LIVED ON M STREET NEAR THIRTY-SECONDBowers, Jefferson in Power, 9.

“HER PERSON IS FAR LESS ATTRACTIVE” Ibid., 9–10.

“THE PRESIDENT’S DINNERS” Cunningham, Jeffersonian Republicans in Power, 96.

“IF THE MEMBERS ARE TO KNOW NOTHING” Ibid., 90.

“WHAT SORT OF GOVERNMENT” Margaret Bayard Smith, First Forty Years, 397.

“ONE, SIRE” Ibid.

VISITED JEFFERSON IN THE CABINET ROOMIbid., 396.

“WHY ARE THESE LIBELS ALLOWED?” Ibid., 397.

“PUT THAT PAPER IN YOUR POCKET” Ibid.

“MR. JEFFERSON HAS PUT ASIDE” Louis-André Pichon to Minister of Foreign Affairs, Les Archives Diplomatiques-P19506.

JEFFERSON WORE DIFFERENT COMBINATIONSJHT, IV, 371.

FOUND THAT THE PRESIDENT “BEHAVED VERY CIVILLY” Augustus Foster to Elizabeth Cavendish, December 30, 1804, Augustus Foster Papers, LOC.

“HE IS DRESSED” Ibid.

JOSEPH STORY OF MASSACHUSETTSJHT, IV, 373.

THE “LEVELING SPIRIT” OF REPUBLICANISMEdward Thornton to Lord Hawkesbury, December 9, 1801, FO 5/32, National Archives of the United Kingdom, Kew.

JOHN QUINCY ADAMS BELIEVEDMemoirs of John Quincy Adams, I, 403.

“YOU WILL FIND [IT]” PTJ, XXXVI, 20.

AT A CABINET MEETINGIbid., XXXIV, 114–15.

TO “SEARCH FOR AND DESTROY” Abraham D. Sofaer, War, Foreign Affairs, and Constitutional Power: The Origins (Cambridge, Mass., 1976), 209.

TO “PLACE [HIS] SHIPS” Ibid., 210.

“TOO LONG … HAVE THOSE BARBARIANS” PTJ, XXXVI, 3.

JEFFERSON DESCRIBED THE AMERICAN VICTORYSofaer, War, Foreign Affairs, and Constitutional Power, 212.

ASKED CONGRESS TO AUTHORIZEIbid. “I communicate all material information on this subject, that, in the exercise of this important function confided by the Constitution to the Legislature exclusively, their judgment may form itself on a knowledge and consideration of every circumstance of weight,” he told Congress. (Ibid.)

CONGRESS FELL INTO JEFFERSON’S HANDSIbid., 214–16.

JEFFERSON ATTEMPTED AN ELABORATE OPERATIONIbid., 216–21.

FIRST ANNUAL MESSAGE TO CONGRESS PTJ, XXXVI, 52–68.

SAVE FOR THE BARBARY STATESIbid., 58.

“A TESTIMONY TO THE WORLD” Ibid., 59.

“NOTHING CAN EXCEED” John Taylor to John Breckinridge, December 22, 1801, Breckinridge Family Papers, LOC.

“VIRGINIA LITERALLY DOMINATES” Life and Correspondence of Rufus King, IV, 103. Troup also said: “Congress are now engaged in repealing almost all the internal taxes, and the whiskey drinkers particularly will be in spirits.” (Ibid.)

“UNDER THIS ADMINISTRATION” Cunningham, Jeffersonian Republicans in Power, 10.

SHOULD “ALARM ALL WHO ARE” Bowers, Jefferson in Power, 90.

“MINE IS AN ODD DESTINY” Ibid., 94–95.

“EVERY DAY WE SEE VANISH” Louis-André Pichon, P19507 États-Unis 1802–1803 (an XI), Les Archives Diplomatiques. In political terms, President Jefferson’s personality projected a prevailing sense of calm except in the chambers or newspaper offices of unforgiving Federalists. “The two parties … at least are not here as they are in Europe, the haves and the have-nots; it’s rather the division into two great interests, maritime and agricultural; the first has dominated since independence, and the second dominates in turn. But Mr. Jefferson, although leader of the second, will do nothing which might displease the friends he has in the first group, or make his enemies there revolt,” wrote Pichon. “He will be able to indulge in some manias which offend conventions and shock the ideas of the most educated men of the East; but at bottom, his administration will certainly be prudent, economic, [and] conservative at home and abroad.” (Ibid.)

A VAST CHEESE ARRIVEDPTJ, XXXVI, 246–52. Jefferson understood from whence it came. “It is an ebullition of republicanism in a state where it has been under heavy oppression,” he wrote John Wayles Eppes on January 1, 1802. (Ibid., 261.)

THE DANBURY BAPTIST ASSOCIATION HAD ASSEMBLEDIbid., 253–58.

“BELIEVING WITH YOU” Ibid., 258.

“I AGREE WITH YOU” Ibid., XXXII, 205.

“THE TERRIBLE EVILS OF DEMOCRACY” Life and Correspondence of Rufus King, IV, 11.

ABOLISH ALL INTERNAL TAXESIbid., 388.

DECLARE WAR ON TRIPOLIIbid.

EASE NATURALIZATION RULES Ibid.

REPEAL THE JUDICIARY ACT OF 1801 Ibid., 168.

“WOULD TO GOD” Life and Correspondence of Rufus King, IV, 109.

BURR’S “DIFFIDENCE” IN FAILING TO COMBATIsenberg, Fallen Founder, 230. “Burr was not immediately abandoned by the Jefferson administration,” wrote Isenberg. “It happened gradually over the first year of the president’s term.” (Ibid., 229.)

THE COMPLICATIONS OF NEW YORK STATE POLITICSIbid., 226–31.

JEFFERSON CHOSE TO THWART BURR’S AMBITIONSIbid., 231.

ONE BURRITE, MATTHEW L. DAVIS, CALLED ON THE PRESIDENTGustavus Myers, The History of Tammany Hall (Ann Arbor, Mich., 2005), 15. In Myers’s version of the story, Davis had been talking about the “immense influence” of New York in the moments before Jefferson caught the fly. The president then asked Davis if he had ever noticed the difference in size between “one portion of the insect and its body.” As Myers has it, “The hint was not lost on Davis, who, though not knowing whether Jefferson referred to New York or to him, ceased to talk on the subject.” (Ibid.) My own view is that snatching a fly out of the air would leave a distinct enough impression even without additional commentary.

“THERE IS HARDLY A MAN” Isenberg, Fallen Founder, 231.

“THERE IS CERTAINLY” Ibid., 133.

“MR. BURR WILL SURELY ARRIVE” Louis-André Pichon to Minister of Foreign Affairs, Les Archives Diplomatiques-P19506. “He is a man against whom you know all there is to say, but what is certain is that he would take the reins of business; if the Federalists consent, you can rely that this nation takes on an appearance that it has not had before,” Pichon added. (Ibid.)

A CELEBRATORY FEDERALIST DINNERLife and Correspondence of Rufus King, IV, 103.

ON THE FOURTH PTJ, XXXVIII, 121.

“THE SPECIAL FEASTS” Ibid., 89.

“THE PRINCIPLES WHICH DIRECT IT” Louis-André Pichon to Minister of Foreign Affairs, Les Archives Diplomatiques-P19506.

“THAT WOULD SCARCELY HAPPEN” Ibid.

“JEFFERSON IS THE IDOL” Life and Correspondence of Rufus King, IV, 103–4.

A DECADE LATERPTJ, XXV, 75–84.

A THREAT FROM THE BRITISH James P. Ronda, Jefferson’s West: A Journey with Lewis and Clark (Charlottesville, Va., 2000), 26–27. For a standard account of Jefferson and the Lewis and Clark expedition, see Donald Jackson, Thomas Jefferson and the Stony Mountains: Exploring the West from Monticello (Norman, Okla., 1993).

“IT REQUIRES ONLY THE COUNTENANCE” Alexander Mackenzie, Voyages from Montreal, on the River St. Laurence: Through the Continent of North America, to the Frozen and Pacific Oceans; in the Years 1789 and 1793 (New York, 1814), 388.

“MANY POLITICAL REASONS” Ibid., 392.

“I AM AFRAID” Ronda, Jefferson’s West, 21.

A THEATER OF CONTENTIONIbid., 33–37, describes some of the political and diplomatic factors at work, including counsel from Gallatin and Attorney General Levi Lincoln.

MERIWETHER LEWIS, HIS PRIVATE SECRETARYTJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/research-and-collections/meriwether-lewis (accessed 2012).

BORN IN 1774 AT LOCUST HILLIbid.

TEN MILES FROM MONTICELLOIbid.

HIS OWN “NEIGHBORHOOD” Ibid.

BLUE-EYEDMarshall Smelser, The Democratic Republic, 1801–1815 (New York, 1968), 125.

A LIEUTENANT IN THE U.S. ARMYTJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/research-and-collections/meriwether-lewis (accessed 2012).

“KNOWLEDGE OF THE WESTERN COUNTRY” Ibid.

APPARENTLY DREW ON LEWIS’S SENSEIbid.

CONGRESS SECRETLY AGREEDPTJ, XXXIX, 588. “You know we have been many years wishing to have the Missouri explored and whatever river, heading with that, runs into the Western ocean,” Jefferson wrote Benjamin S. Barton from Washington in February 1803. “Congress, in some secret proceedings, have yielded to a proposition I made them for permitting me to have it done. It is to be undertaken immediately with a party of about ten, and I have appointed Capt. Lewis, my secretary, to conduct it.” (Ibid.)

THE PRESIDENT ASKED FORTJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/jefferson/jeffersons-confidential-letter-to-congress (accessed 2012).

FIFTEEN TIMES THAT AMOUNTJackson, Letters of Lewis and Clark, II, 428. The best estimate of the cost is $38,722.25. I am grateful to Barbara Oberg and to Gary Moulton for their help on this point.

“CAPT. LEWIS IS BRAVE” PTJ, XXXIX, 599.

LEWIS ASKED WILLIAM CLARKTJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/jefferson/expedition-timeline (accessed 2012).

THIRTY-FOUR · VICTORIES, SCANDAL, AND A SECRET SICKNESS

“BY THIS WENCH SALLY” PTJ, XXXVIII, 324.

IT WAS AN IDEAL OF THE AGEWood, Radicalism of the American Revolution, 298–301.

HAD WARNED AGAINST PARTISAN SPIRITGeorge Washington, Writings, ed. John H. Rhodehamel (New York, 1997), 962–77.

WERE NEVER TO BE REALIZED Jefferson himself came to see that total unity of interest was simply not an element of the political condition. He would later tell John Adams that all societies in all times had been divided roughly along Whig and Tory (or Republican and Federalist) lines. In his Origins of American Politics, Bernard Bailyn quotes a 1733 essay in the New York Gazette on the practicalities of partisanship. “I may venture to say that some opposition, though it proceed not entirely from a public spirit, is not only necessary in free governments but of great service to the public. Parties are a check upon one another, and by keeping the ambition of one another within bounds, serve to maintain the public liberty. Opposition is the life and soul of public zeal which, without it, would flag and decay for want of an opportunity to exert itself.… It may indeed proceed from wrong motives, but still it is necessary.” (Ibid., 126.)

Bailyn found a Pennsylvania writer saying much the same thing in 1738 and a New York writer in 1748 arguing that “regard for liberty has always made me think that parties in a free state ought rather to be considered as an advantage to the public than an evil. Because while they subsist I have viewed them as so many spies upon one another, ready to proclaim abroad and warn the public of any attack or encroachment upon the public liberty and thereby rouse the members thereof to assert those rights they are [entitled?] to by the laws.” (Ibid., 127.) Such sentiments were the exception, not the rule, but Jefferson articulated similar views.

“YOU MAY SUPPOSE” Cunningham, Jeffersonian Republicans in Power, 102.

“THE MEN OF THE DIFFERENT PARTIES” Ibid.

“NO TAVERN OR BOARDING HOUSE” Ibid., 103.

“NOTHING SHALL BE SPARED” Ibid., 8.

“THE ATTEMPT AT RECONCILIATION” Ibid., 9.

“THERE IS NOTHING TO WHICH A NATION” PTJ, XXXIII, 234.

“REIGN OF WITCHES” Ibid., XXX, 389.

“THE COUNTRY IS SO TOTALLY” Diary of John Quincy Adams, 1794–1845: American Political, Social, and Intellectual Life from Washington to Polk, ed. Allan Nevins (New York, 1969), 21.

“MR. JEFFERSON DOESN’T AT ALL” Louis-Andre Pichon, Les Archives Diplomatiques.

THE NEW JUDICIARY ACT OF 1802 See, for instance, Richard E. Ellis, The Jeffersonian Crisis: Courts and Politics in the Young Republic (New York, 1971), and Johnstone, Jefferson and the Presidency, 164–80.

PROCEEDED WITH CAUTIONJohnstone, Jefferson and the Presidency, 170–73. While Richard E. Ellis argued that Marbury v. Madison triggered Jefferson’s push for judicial reform (Ellis, Jeffersonian Crisis, 40–45), Johnstone believed that “the little evidence available … seems to point to the conclusion that while the Marbury ‘show cause’ order did galvanize Republicans into demands for immediate action and may well have convinced Jefferson to agree to put repeal first on the Senate’s agenda at the December session of Congress, the president’s basic commitment for repeal had already been made.” (Johnstone, Jefferson and the Presidency, 172.)

“IN PURSUANCE OF THE RECOMMENDATION” Ibid., 173. On Saturday, February 20, 1802, in a seven-hour speech, James Bayard attacked the repeal of the 1801 act. (PTJ, XXXVI, 618–19.) “There are many,” he said, “very many who believe, if you strike this blow, you inflict a mortal wound on the Constitution. There are many now willing to spill their blood to defend that Constitution. Are gentlemen disposed to risk the consequences?” (Ibid., 619.) Jefferson reacted coolly—and hoped his equanimity would be noticed. “They expect to frighten us: but are met with perfect sangfroid,” Jefferson told Thomas Mann Randolph, Jr., the day after Bayard’s remarks. (Ibid., 618.)

THE REPEAL PASSEDPTJ, XXXVII, 72–74.

THE HOUSE VOTE REFLECTEDJohnstone, Jefferson and the Presidency, 175.

A SINGLE VOTEIbid.

THE FEDERALISTS WERE HORRIFIED“If the principle becomes settled which is established by this decision of the Legislature, I shall hereafter consider the Constitution of no value,” Roger Griswold wrote on Friday, March 5, 1802. (Letter of Roger Griswold, March 5, 1802, William Lane Griswold Memorial Collection, Yale University.)

“THE JUDGE’S INVETERACY IS PROFOUND” Henry Adams, History, 132.

THE CASE OF MARBURY V. MADISONSimon, What Kind of Nation, 173–90.

PICKERING WAS UNSTABLE Irving Brant, Impeachment: Trials and Errors (New York, 1972), 46–57, is good on Pickering’s alcoholism. Also see Lynn W. Turner, “The Impeachment of John Pickering,” American Historical Review 54 (April 1949), 485–507, and Eleanore Bushnell, Crimes, Follies, and Misfortunes: The Federal Impeachment Trials(Urbana, Ill., 1992), 43–55.

THE EFFORT AGAINST CHASEBrant, Impeachment, 58–83, and Richard Ellis, “The Impeachment of Samuel Chase” in American Political Trials, ed. Michael R. Belknap (Westport, Conn., 1981), 57–78.

“WHERE THE LAW IS UNCERTAIN” Henry Adams, History, 402.

“OUGHT THIS SEDITIOUS AND OFFICIAL ATTACK” Ibid., 402–3.

“I ASK THESE QUESTIONS” Ibid.

THE SENATE CONVICTED JOHN PICKERINGEOL, 422.

THE HOUSE IMPEACHED SAMUEL CHASEIbid., 422–24.

AN ACQUITTAL FROM THE SENATE Ibid., 424.

AN “ELECTIONEERING PARTISAN” Henry Adams, History, 456.

HOPES “THAT YOUR EXCELLENCY” PTJ, XXXV, 477.

ASKED “TO GO TO WASHINGTON” Ibid., XXXVI, 581.

“YOU ARE IN DANGER” Ibid., 641.

“AN ENERGETIC TONE” Ibid., XXXIII, 257.

“AT LENGTH THE POOR ARTS” Ibid., 208. See also The Hutchinson Illustrated Encyclopedia of British History, ed. Simon Hall (Chicago, 1999), 224, and Edward Hale, The Fall of the Stuarts and Western Europe from 1678 to 1697 (New York, 1913), 36–37.

A MODERATE TONEIbid., 208–9.

“WE MUST BE EASY” Ibid., 423.

HE DID NOT FAIL TO TAKE DECISIVE ACTION Carl E. Prince, “The Passing of the Aristocracy: Jefferson’s Removal of the Federalists, 1801–1805,” The Journal of American History 57, no. 3 (December 1970): 563–75. See also Carl Russell Fish, “Removal of Officials by the Presidents of the United States,” in Annual Report of the American Historical Association for the Year 1899, I (Washington, D.C., 1900), 67–70.

HE DISPLACED ABOUT 46 PERCENT Prince, “Passing of the Aristocracy,” 565–66.

THE STRONG MAJORITY OF WHOMIbid.

THE HISTORICAL COMPANY OF ANDREW JACKSONIbid., 566.

HARD ON ADAMS’S LAST-MINUTE DECISIONSPTJ, XXXIII, 428. “The nominations crowded in by Mr. Adams after he knew he was not appointing for himself, I treat as mere nullities,” Jefferson said on March 24, 1801. (Ibid.)

THAT OF ELIZUR GOODRICHIbid., XXXIV, 90–94.

A REMONSTRANCE AGAINST GOODRICH’S REMOVALIbid., 381–84. Also see ibid., 301–2.

“DECLARATIONS BY MYSELF” Ibid., 555–56.

THE NATURE OF THE ENTERPRISE Louis-André Pichon, Les Archives Diplomatiques. From the perspective of an outsider, Louis-André Pichon clearly got the message Jefferson was sending. “Mr. Jefferson doesn’t at all hesitate to say that the previous administration conducted itself under anti-republican maxims” and that he was going to correct such “inequalities and errors.” To Pichon, the New Haven matter left “no doubt about the course which he proposes to follow during his administration.” (Ibid.)

“THE INFAMOUS AND SEDITIOUS LIBELS” PTJ, XXXIX, 473.

“ON THE SUBJECT OF PROSECUTIONS” Ibid., 553.

“IT IS WELL KNOWN THAT” PTJ, XXXVIII, 323–25. The editors of PTJ cite: Richmond Recorder, 15, 22, 29 Sep., 20 Oct., 10, 17 Nov., 8 Dec. 1802; anb, s.v. “Hemings, Sally”; Durey, Callender, 157–63; Annette Gordon-Reed, Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings: An American Controversy (Charlottesville, Va., 1997), 59–77; Joshua D. Rothman, “James Callender and Social Knowledge of Interracial Sex in Antebellum Virginia,” in Jan Ellen Lewis and Peter S. Onuf, eds., Sally Hemings & Thomas Jefferson: History, Memory, and Civic Culture (Charlottesville, Va., 1999), 87–113.

HE CORRECTED THOSE HE MISSEDIbid., 325.

“THE LICENSE THAT HAS BEEN INDULGED” Louis-André Pichon, P19507 États-Unis 1802–1803 (an XI), Les Archives Diplomatiques.

AN 1805 LETTERThomas Jefferson to Robert Smith, Washington, July 1, 1805, Huntington Library, San Marino, Calif.

IT IS POSSIBLE, THOUGH, THAT JEFFERSON WAS NOT ADDRESSINGTJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/plantation-and-slavery/iii-review-documentary-sources (accessed 2012).

“CALLENDER AND SALLY” McCullough, John Adams, 581. Jefferson’s friends hurried to reassure him. “I would at this time only remark that as to the case of the lady there is not a gentleman in the U. States of either party who does not hold in detestation the pitiful propagations of so pitiful a tale,” Smith replied from Baltimore on July 4, 1805. “Your country by their approving voice at the last election have passed sentence on all the allegations that malice has exhibited against you.”

Of Callender in particular, John Quincy Adams wrote Rufus King on October 8, 1802: “He writes under the influence of personal resentment and revenge, but the effect of his publications upon the reputation of the President has been considerable.” (Life and Correspondence of Rufus King, IV, 176.)

WAS FOUND DROWNEDLewis and Onuf, Sally Hemings and Thomas Jefferson, 104.

IN THREE FEET OF WATER Hyland, In Defense of Thomas Jefferson, 9–10.

OBSERVED WANDERING DRUNKENLY Ibid.

THE INQUEST FOUND NO EVIDENCEIbid.

IN 1806, THOMAS MOORE, AN IRISH POET Stanton, “Those Who Labor for My Happiness,” 27–29.

“THE WEARY STATESMAN” Ibid., 29.

PATSY AND A FORMER SECRETARYIbid., 30.

“OBNOXIOUS PASSAGES” Ibid.

LAUGHED THEM OFFIbid. Patsy and Burwell, it was reported, ultimately “joined heartily in the merriment.” (Ibid.)

“MY HEALTH HAS ALWAYS BEEN” PTJ, XXXVI, 178.

“I HAVE SAID AS MUCH” Ibid.

THE COMPLAINT WAS DIARRHEAJHT, IV 186.

A “DISEASE CHARACTERIZED BY” Robley Dunglison, Medical Lexicon: A Dictionary of Medical Science (Philadelphia, 1846), 244.

“MRS. EPPES IS BEAUTIFUL” Margaret Bayard Smith, First Forty Years, 34.

“GAVE ME AN ACCOUNT” Ibid., 35.

“I HAVE ONLY TIME” Mary Jefferson Eppes to John Wayles Eppes, November 25, 1802. Extract published at Papers of Thomas Jefferson Retirement Series Digital Archive, http://retirementseries.dataformat.com (accessed 2012).

“ADIEU ONCE MORE” PTJ, XXXIX, 309–10.

JEFFERSON SET ABOUT ACQUIRINGTJ to Martha Jefferson Randolph, May 6, 1805, Pierpont Morgan Library.

OBSERVED THE PRESIDENT SITTINGMargaret Bayard Smith, First Forty Years, 396.

“I WILL CATCH YOU” PTJ, XXXVIII, 111.

“I HAVE WROUGHT” Ibid., XVIII, 499–500.

SEEKING CONGRESSIONAL SEATS TJ to Mary Jefferson Eppes, (RC [Gabriel Wells, New York City, 1946]; at foot of text: “Mrs. Eppes.” PrC (CSmH).

THIRTY-FIVE · THE AIR OF ENCHANTMENT!

“THE NEWS OF THE CESSION” Margaret Bayard Smith, First Forty Years, 38.

“THE FAME OF YOUR POLITICAL WISDOM” Horatio Gates to TJ, July 7, 1803, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

THE THIRD TREATY OF SAN ILDEFONSOSee Walter Nugent, Habits of Empire: A History of American Expansionism (New York, 2008), 57.

GLORIOUS EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY PALACEInternational Dictionary of Historic Places, III, eds. Trudy Ring and Robert M. Salkin (Chicago, 1995), “La Granja de San Ildefonso (Segovia, Spain),” Elizabeth Brice, 300–3.

“WORKS MOST SORELY” PTJ, XXXVII, 264.

“I AM WILLING TO HOPE” Joseph J. Ellis, American Creation, 212–13.

“I BELIEVE THAT THE DESTINIES” PTJ, XXXVII, 298.

“THERE IS ON THE GLOBE ONE SINGLE SPOT” Ibid.

IN A CONVERSATION “OF SOME LENGTH” Edward Thornton to Lord Hawkesbury, March 6, 1802, FO 3/35, National Archives of the United Kingdom, Kew.

“THE OCCUPATION OF THIS COUNTRY” Ibid.

“THE INEVITABLE CONSEQUENCES” Ibid.

“THE DAY THAT FRANCE TAKES POSSESSION” PTJ, XXXVII, 264–66.

WILLING TO SHIFT HIS SYMPATHIES Joseph J. Ellis, American Creation, 213.

“FRANCE PLACING HERSELF” PTJ, XXXVII, 264.

A COPY OF A SUBSEQUENT TREATYNugent, Habits of Empire, 57.

A TUTORIAL ON THE PRACTICALITIES OF POWERPTJ, XXXVII, 372–75.

“A MOST IMPORTANT PIECE OF POLITICAL BUSINESS” Selected Letters of Dolley Payne Madison, 52.

“IN THIS SITUATION” TJ to James Monroe, January 10, 1803, James Monroe Papers, LOC.

A SNOWSTORM AND UNFAVORABLE WINDSJames Monroe to TJ, March 7, 1803, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

“I HOPE THE FRENCH GOVT.” Ibid.

A DRAWING ROOM GATHERING IN PARISRobert R. Livingston to TJ, March 12, 1803, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

“WHEN THE FIRST CONSUL” Ibid.

“YOU MAY EASILY SURMISE THE SENSATION” Ibid.

“I RENOUNCE LOUISIANA” Joseph J. Ellis, American Creation, 220–21.

NAPOLEON WAS IN HIS BATHIbid.

“YOU WILL HAVE NO NEED” Ibid.

“THE FIELD OPEN TO US” Ibid.

HE AND MONROE NEGOTIATED A TREATY Jon Kukla, A Wilderness So Immense: The Louisiana Purchase and the Destiny of America (New York, 2004), 265–83.

WORD REACHED JEFFERSONIbid., 285.

A TREATY WITH FRANCE ON APRIL 30 TJ to Thomas Mann Randolph, Jr., July 5, 1803, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

“IT IS SOMETHING LARGER” Ibid.

“THIS REMOVES FROM US” Ibid.

“IT MUST … STRIKE” Horatio Gates to TJ, July 7, 1803, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

“EVERY FACE” Andrew Jackson to TJ, August 7, 1803, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

“THE THING IS NEW” Arthur Campbell to TJ, January 17, 1804, Letters of Application and Recommendation, 1801–1809, General Records of the Department of State, National Archives.

HE WROTE MERIWETHER LEWISTJ to Meriwether Lewis, July 4, 1803, Clark Family Collection, Missouri Historical Society, St. Louis. Jefferson wrote:

In the journey which you are about to undertake for the discovery of the course and source of the Mississippi, and of the most convenient water communication from thence to the Pacific ocean, your party being small, it is to be expected that you will encounter considerable dangers from the Indian inhabitants. Should you escape those dangers and reach the Pacific ocean, you may find it imprudent to hazard a return the same way, and be forced to seek a passage round by sea, in such vessels as you may find on the Western coast. But you will be without money, without clothes, and other necessaries; as a sufficient supply cannot be carried with you from hence. Your resource in that case can only be in the credit of the U.S. for which purpose I hereby authorize you to draw on the Secretaries of State, of the Treasury, of War and of the Navy of the U.S. according as you may find your draughts will be most negotiable, for the purpose of obtaining money or necessaries for yourself and your men: and I solemnly pledge the faith of the United States that these draughts shall be paid punctually at the date they are made payable. I also ask of the Consuls, agents, merchants and citizens of any nation with which we have intercourse or amity to furnish you with those supplies which your necessities may call for, assuring them of honorable and prompt retribution. And our own Consuls in foreign parts where you may happen to be, are hereby instructed and required to be aiding and assisting to you in whatsoever may be necessary for procuring your return back to the United States. And to give more entire satisfaction and confidence to those who may be disposed to aid you, I, Thomas Jefferson, President of the United States of America, have written this letter of general credit for you with my own hand, and signed it with my name. (Ibid.)

JEFFERSON HAD WRITTEN DETAILED INSTRUCTIONSRonda, Jefferson’s West, 36–39.

FILLED WITH FESTIVE CALLERSMargaret Bayard Smith, First Forty Years, 38–39.

“ENLIVENED TOO BY THE PRESENCE” Ibid., 39.

“THE FUTURE INHABITANTS” TJ to John Breckinridge, August 12, 1803, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

“I VERY EARLY SAW” TJ to Joseph Priestley, January 29, 1804, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

“HAVE YOU SEEN THE NEW WORK OF MALTHUS” Ibid.

HAD TO BE RATIFIED BY SUNDAY, OCTOBER 30, 1803 The Louisiana Historical Quarterly, XXXI (New Orleans, 1948), 269.

“GREAT AND WEIGHTY MATTERS” Proclamation for Special Session of Congress, 1803, LOC: Broadside Collection, portfolio 227, no. 3.

REQUIRED A CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENTPTJ, XXXIX, 327–28. “There is no constitutional difficulty as to the acquisition of territory: and whether, when acquired, it may be taken into the union by the constitution as it now stands, will become a question of expediency,” Jefferson had written Gallatin in January 1803. “I think it will be safer not to permit the enlargement of the Union but by amendment of the constitution.” (Peterson, Jefferson and the New Nation, 770.) Ibid.

“THIS TREATY MUST OF COURSE” TJ to John Breckinridge, August 12, 1803, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

“THE EXECUTIVE IN SEIZING” Ibid.

“IT IS THE CASE” Ibid.

“I WROTE YOU” TJ to John Breckinridge, August 18, 1803, Breckinridge Family Papers, LOC.

THE UNWELCOME LETTER OF AUGUST 17 TJ to Albert Gallatin, August 23, 1803, Gallatin Papers, New-York Historical Society, New York City. The letter itself is Robert R. Livingston to TJ, June 2, 1803, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

“YOU WILL FIND THAT” Ibid.

“WHATEVER CONGRESS SHALL THINK” TJ to Wilson Cary Nicholas, September 7, 1803, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

“IS THERE NOT DANGER” PTJ, XXXIX, 304.

THOMAS PAINE SUGGESTED Thomas Paine to TJ, September 23, 1803, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC. Paine also wrote Jefferson a compelling brief against seeking an amendment for Louisiana. “It appears to me to be one of those cases with which the Constitution had nothing to do, and which can be judged of only by the circumstances of the times when such a case shall occur,” Paine wrote from Stonington, Connecticut, on September 23, 1803. (Ibid.)

“I CONFESS … I THINK IT” TJ to Wilson Cary Nicholas, September 7, 1803, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC. He also had to figure out how to pay the bills. To Robert Smith, he wrote:

You know the importance of our being enabled to announce in the message that the interest of the Louisiana purchase (800,000.d) can be paid without a new tax, and what advantage the necessity of a new tax would give the opposition to the ratification of the treaty, where two or three desertions would reject it. To avoid a new tax we had a deficiency (on the estimates as given in) of about 400,000. D. Our colleagues have set their shoulders heartily to the work: Mr. Madison has struck us off 100,000. D. Genl Dearborn something upwards of that, and we still want 180,000. D. to be quite secure. The estimate received from your office, which I enclose you, amounts probably to 770, or 780. And were it possible to reduce it to 600. it would place us at ease. (TJ to Robert Smith, October 10, 1803, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.)

UP TO TWO HUNDRED THOUSAND SQUARE MILESWallace, Jefferson and the Indians, 239.

ENCOURAGE WHITE SETTLEMENT Ibid., 206–7.

THE INDIANS “WILL IN TIME” Ibid., 273.

ANY ATTACKING TRIBES BY “SEIZING” Ibid.

“OUR BUSINESS IS TO MARCH” TJ to George Clinton, December 31, 1803, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

“THE [REPUBLICANS] HAVE” Gouverneur Morris to Roger Griswold, November 25, 1803, William Lane Griswold Memorial Collection, Yale University. Of a planned festival to celebrate the Purchase, Simeon Baldwin wrote on January 22, 1804: “It will be a great day among the Democrats here. Few or none of the Federalists will join them—they are not yet satisfied there is occasion for joy—They fear the effect of so great an extension of our territory.… They fear the easy introduction of French men, French politics and French intrigue. Northern men fear the influence of such an additional weight to the politics of the South.”

“IF, I SAY, FEDERALISM IS CRUMBLING” Pickering to George Cabot, January 29, 1804, Henry Adams, ed., Documents Relating to New-England Federalism: 1800–1815 (Boston, 1905), 341.

“A REUNION OF THE NORTHERN STATES” Ibid., 357.

“THE PEOPLE OF THE EAST” Ibid., 339.

“MANY PERSONS ARE AT THIS MOMENT” Letter of Roger Griswold, January 10, 1804, William Lane Griswold Memorial Collection, Yale University.

THIRTY-SIX · THE PEOPLE WERE NEVER MORE HAPPY

“IF WE CAN KEEP” TJ to Elbridge Gerry, March 3, 1804, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

“I THINK YOU OUGHT” Anonymous to Thomas Jefferson, on or before June 15, 1804, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

AROUND THREE THIRTY OR FOUR O’CLOCKJHT, IV, 370.

HE ENTERTAINED CONSTANTLYMerry Ellen Scofield, “The Fatigues of His Table: The Politics of Presidential Dining During the Jefferson Administration,” Journal of the Early Republic 26, no. 3 (Fall 2006): 449–69. Scofield made a particular study of records of Jefferson’s dinner guests from 1804 to 1809.

SOCIABILITY WAS ESSENTIALSee, for instance, Wood, Revolutionary Characters, 105–7.

JEFFERSON DISLIKED CONFRONTATIONScofield, “Fatigues of His Table,” 465–66.

HE PREFERRED “PELL-MELL” Selected Letters of Dolley Payne Madison, 44.

REVELED IN HIS FIRST DINNER TJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/research-and-collections/dinner-etiquette (accessed 2011). Louisa Catherine Adams, wife of John Quincy, was also impressed. “The entertainment was handsome,” she said. “French servants in livery, a French butler, a French cuisine, and a buffet full of choice wine.” (JHT, IV, 374.) Margaret Bayard Smith saw the Jefferson dinners as democratic metaphors. “At Mr. Jefferson’s table the conversation was general; every guest was entertained and interested in whatever topic was discussed,” she wrote. “To each an opportunity was offered for the exercise of his colloquial powers and the stream of conversation thus enriched by such various contributions flowed on full, free and animated.” (Margaret Bayard Smith, First Forty Years, 389.)

“IT IS A LONG TIME SINCE” TJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/research-and-collections/dinner-etiquette (accessed 2011).

THE RAPIDLY DEPLETING NUMBER OF TREESMargaret Bayard Smith, First Forty Years, 11.

“SUCH AS GREW” Ibid.

“HOW I WISH” Ibid.

“AND HAVE YOU NOT” Ibid., 12.

“NO,” SAID JEFFERSON Ibid.

HAD BEGUN HIS WASHINGTON CAREERLynn W. Turner, “Thomas Jefferson Through the Eyes of a New Hampshire Politician,” Mississippi Valley Historical Review 30, no. 2 (September 1943): 205–14, charts Plumer’s shifting opinion of Jefferson. “At the end of his five years in Congress,” Turner writes, “he had sloughed off most of [his] bias and was, indeed, about to transfer his political allegiance to Jefferson’s party. Because he recorded this transformation in shrewd and faithful detail, Plumer’s story provides an interesting study of the impact of Jefferson’s personality upon his own.” (Ibid., 206.)

“I HAVE A CURIOSITY” Ibid., 211.

JEFFERSON GAVE PLUMER SOME “ILLINOIS NUTS” Ibid., 210.

“I SHALL, THEN” Ibid., 211.

THE WIFE OF THE MAYOR OF GEORGETOWNMargaret Bayard Smith, First Forty Years, 390.

SHE ASKED JEFFERSON IF HE LIVED NEAR CARTERS MOUNTAINIbid.

“VERY CLOSE” Ibid.

“I SUPPOSE IT’S” Ibid.

“WHY, YES” Ibid., 391.

DESCRIBED AS “DISTINGUISHED PERSONS” Ibid., 389.

“EARNEST AND ANIMATED” Ibid.

ONE GUEST, WHO HAD LIVED IN EUROPEIbid.

“SILENT AND UNNOTICED” Ibid.

“A STRANGER IN HIS OWN COUNTRY” Ibid.

“TO YOU, MR. C., WE ARE INDEBTED” Ibid. The guest was Nathaniel Cutting.

SUDDENLY ATTENTION WARMED Ibid., 389–90.

“YES, SIR” Ibid., 390.

“A PERSON OF IMPORTANCE” Ibid.

ANTHONY MERRY, THE NEW MINISTER FROM BRITAINJHT, IV, 367–92, covers the Merry affair.

THE PRESIDENT’S RECEPTIONHenry Adams, History, 549–51.

MRS. MADISON WAS THE HOSTESSIbid., 551–52.

“A VIRAGO, AND IN THE SHORT COURSE” TJ to James Monroe, January 8, 1804, James Monroe Papers, LOC. The Madisons asked the Merrys to dinner after the evening at the president’s; the secretary of state also practiced “pell-mell,” but the Merrys were not to be stymied a second time. As Jefferson heard the story, Mrs. Merry was “not to be the foremost,” prompting her husband to action. Merry “seized her by the hand, led her to the head of the table, where Mrs. Gallatin … politely offered her place to Mrs. Merry, who took it without … apology.” That was enough for Mrs. Merry, who thereafter, Jefferson said, “declined dining, except at one or two private citizens’, where it is said there were previous stipulations.” TJ to William Short, January 23, 1804, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore.

“WE SAY TO THEM, NO” Ibid.

“WE ARE NOT AS FRIENDLY NOW” TJ to James Monroe, January 8, 1804, James Monroe Papers, LOC.

“THIS IS TOTALLY WITHOUT FOUNDATION” Ibid.

HE WAS RENOMINATED APE, I, 83.

SENATOR PICKERING OF MASSACHUSETTS SAT DOWNTimothy Pickering to Theodore Lyman, February 11, 1804, Timothy Pickering Papers, Massachusetts Historical Society.

“TO RESIST THE TORRENT” Ibid.

“IT IS NOT UNUSUAL FOR TWO FRIENDSIbid.

“WE ARE DEMOCRATIC ALTOGETHER” Adams, Documents Relating to New-England Federalism, 346.

“I AM DISGUSTED” Life and Correspondence of Rufus King, IV, 364.

“THAT THE SHORTEST AND BEATEN ROAD” Ibid., 438.

“OUGHT TO FIX THE ATTENTION” Henry Adams, History, 422. On the evening of Sunday, April 8, 1804, John Quincy Adams called on King in New York. There he joined King and Pickering in King’s library. The subject was separation. Pickering took his leave; afterward, King made himself clear to Adams. “I disapprove entirely of the project; and so, I am happy to tell you, does General Hamilton.” (Ibid., 425.)

MERRY HEARD THEM AND REPORTEDJHT, IV, 406.

“THE POSSIBILITY OF A DIVISION” Augustus Foster to mother, June 30, 1805, Augustus Foster Papers, LOC.

BURR CALLED ON JEFFERSON“Notes on a Conversation with Aaron Burr,” January 26, 1804, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC. “He began by recapitulating summarily that he had come to N. Y. a stranger some years ago, that he found the country in possession of two rich families, (the Livingstons and Clintons), that his pursuits were not political and he meddled not,” Jefferson wrote of their conversation. “When the crisis however of 1800 came on, they found their influence worn out, and solicited his aid with the people. He lent it without any views of promotion that his being named a candidate for V.P. was unexpected by him. He acceded to it with a view to promote my fame and advancement, and from a desire to be with me whose company and conversation had always been fascinating to him.”

Jefferson drily observed later, “Col. Burr must have thought I could swallow strong things in my own favor, when he founded his acquiescence in the nomination as V.P. to his desire of promoting my honor, the being with me whose company and conversation had always been fascinating to him etc. I had never seen Col. B. till he came as a member of Senate. His conduct very soon inspired me with distrust.” Ibid.

“MANY LITTLE STORIES” Ibid.

JEFFERSON’S REPLY Ibid.

“THAT GREAT OPPOSITION” TJ to Thomas McKean, January 17, 1804, Historical Society of Pennsylvania.

A FIRE HAD DEVASTATED NORFOLKTJ to Thomas Newton, March 5, 1804, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

“A THOUSAND JOYS TO YOU” TJ to Mary Jefferson Eppes, February 26, 1804, University of Virginia.

HIGH WINDS AND ICEJohn Wayles Eppes to TJ, March 9, 1804, Edgehill-Randolph Papers, University of Virginia.

“I FEEL DREADFULLY” John Wayles Eppes to TJ, March 19, 1804, Edgehill-Randolph Papers, University of Virginia.

THE U.S. FRIGATE PHILADELPHIA In his Message to Congress on March 20, 1804, Jefferson said: “I communicate to Congress a letter received from Capt. Bainbridge Commander of the Philadelphia frigate informing us of the wreck of that vessel on the coast of Tripoli and that himself, his officers and men had fallen into the hands of the Tripolitans. This accident renders it expedient to increase our force and enlarge our expenses in the Mediterranean beyond what the last appropriation for the Naval service contemplated. I recommend therefore to the consideration of Congress such an addition to that appropriation as they may think the exigency requires.” Thomas Jefferson to Congress, March 20, 1804, DLC. http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.mss/mtj.mtjbib013280.

STEPHEN DECATUR LED A COURAGEOUS EXPEDITIONLambert, Barbary Wars, 142–44. See also EOL, 637–39.

“THE MOST BOLD AND DARING” Sofaer, War, Foreign Affairs, and Constitutional Power, 217.

“IN GENERAL I AM MORTIFIED” TJ to James Madison, April 15, 1804, James Madison Papers, LOC.

TOOK CHARGE OF HER CARE TJ to James Madison, April 9, 1804, James Madison Papers, LOC. Jefferson wrote Madison:

I found my daughter Eppes at Monticello, whither she had been brought on a litter by hand; so weak as barely to be able to stand, her stomach so disordered as to reject almost everything she took into it, a constant small fever, and an imposthume rising in her breast. The indulgence of her friends had permitted her to be uninformed of the importance of strict attention to the necessity of food, and its quality. I have been able to regulate this, and for some days she has taken food enough to support her, and of the kind only which her stomach bears without rejection.… Her spirits and confidence are favorably affected by my being with her, and aid the effects of regimen. (Ibid.)

“OUR SPRING IS REMARKABLY” TJ to James Madison, April 13, 1804, James Madison Papers, LOC.

JEFFERSON WROTE TO DEARBORNTJ to Henry Dearborn, April 17, 1804, Coolidge Collection of Thomas Jefferson Manuscripts, Massachusetts Historical Society.

POLLY DIEDCappon, Adams-Jefferson Letters, 265.

“HOW THE PRESIDENT” Thomas Mann Randolph, Jr., to Caesar A. Rodney, April 16, 1804, Andre De Coppet Collection, Princeton University.

“A LETTER FROM THE PRESIDENT” Selected Letters of Dolley Payne Madison, 53.

“I ARRIVED HERE” TJ to Martha Jefferson Randolph, May 14, 1804, Pierpont Morgan Library, New York City.

“IT HAS BEEN SOME TIME” Abigail Adams to TJ, May 20, 1804, Pierpont Morgan Library, New York City. The complete correspondence between Abigail Adams and Jefferson, along with editorial commentary, can be found in Cappon, Adams-Jefferson Letters, 265–82. Jefferson sent the letter to John Wayles Eppes, saying that it proved the enduring attachment between the two families—and that he was going to reply to express his own esteem and “with a frank declaration that one act of his life, and never but one, gave me personal displeasure, his midnight appointments.” (TJ to John Wayles Eppes, June 4, 1804, Huntington Library, San Marino, Calif.) Eppes wrote his father-in-law a warm, insightful reply. “I re-enclose to you Mrs. Adams’s letter—If I may judge of its excellence from the sensibility excited by its perusal, it contains the generous effusions of an excellent heart… . In expressing towards her the sentiments of your heart you will of course know no limit but the extent of your feelings.” Eppes’s political counsel, however, echoed what Madison had advised Jefferson six years before, in the aftermath of the 1796 election. “How far under existing circumstances it may be prudent to indulge in the expression of any private feeling towards Mr. Adams is to me extremely doubtful—No possible event could I imagine excite in his bosom sympathy towards you—The thread of friendship between you is on his part broken never more to be united—He is extremely odious to your warmest friends and admirers.” (John Wayles Eppes to TJ, June 14, 1804, Coolidge Collection of Thomas Jefferson Manuscripts, Massachusetts Historical Society.)

JEFFERSON REPLIED, POLITELYCappon, Adams-Jefferson Letters, 269–71.

ABIGAIL ADAMS WROTE HIM AGAINIbid, 271–74.

JEFFERSON REPLIEDIbid., 275.

JOHN ADAMS LEARNED OF ITCappon, Adams-Jefferson Letters, 282. On November 19, 1804, Adams wrote: “The whole of this correspondence was begun and conducted without my knowledge or suspicion. Last evening and this morning at the desire of Mrs. Adams I read the whole. I have no remarks to make upon it at this time and in this place.” (Ibid.)

IN WEEHAWKEN, NEW JERSEYChernow, Alexander Hamilton, 700–5.

THE PUBLIC REACTION TO HAMILTON’S DEATHIbid., 710–14.

“THE GREATEST AND MOST VIRTUOUS” JHT, IV, 425–26.

HIS HUGE NEW YORK FUNERALChernow, Alexander Hamilton, 711–13.

“SEIZED THE MOMENT” Cappon, Adams-Jefferson Letters, 488.

“WE HAD INDEED” JHT, IV, 430.

MORE IMMEDIATE ISSUE WAS BURRDavid O. Stewart, American Emperor: Aaron Burr’s Challenge to Jefferson’s America (New York, 2011), 124–33.

BURR WANTED TO “EFFECT” Anthony Merry to Lord Hawkesbury, August 6, 1804, FO 5/42, National Archives of the United Kingdom, Kew.

“I SINCERELY REGRET” TJ to Elbridge Gerry, March 3, 1804, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC; at foot of text: “Elbridge Gerry esq.”

GEORGE CLINTON REPLACED BURRAPE, I, 82–83.

THE CHILD OF IRISH IMMIGRANTS Bowers, Jefferson in Power, 257–58.

FIELDED CHARLES COTESWORTH PINCKNEY APE, I, 83–84.

THE PRESIDENT WAS REELECTEDIbid.

“THERE IS A PLOT” “A Friend of the Constitution” to TJ, December 6, 1804, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

“THE POWER OF THE ADMINISTRATION” Bowers, Jefferson in Power, 266.

“WE HAVE BUT FEW” TJ to Martha Jefferson Randolph, January 7, 1805, Pierpont Morgan Library, New York City.

“WE ENTERED YOUNG” TJ to John Langdon, January 9, 1805, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

WAS DRESSED WELLWilliam Plumer’s Memorandum of Proceedings in the United States Senate, 1803–1807, ed. Everett Somerville Brown (New York, 1969), 211–13.

“HE WAS TODAY RESERVED” Ibid.

“WE DROVE THEM” Augustus Foster to Elizabeth Cavendish, December 2, 1805, Augustus Foster Papers, LOC.

VICE PRESIDENT BURR TOOK HIS LEAVE Isenberg, Fallen Founder, 279–82.

“HE CAN NEVER” William Plumer’s Memorandum, 213.

“ALL IS NOW BUSINESS” TJ to John Glendy, March 3, 1805, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

“THE SUCCESSOR OF MONTEZUMA” Augustus Foster to Frederick Foster, July 1, 1805, Augustus Foster Papers, LOC.

DRESSED IN BLACKIbid.

ON HORSEBACKIbid.

SPEAKING TOO SOFTLYIbid.

“DURING THIS COURSE” Inaugural Address, March 4, 1805, LOC.

“ALL THOSE WHO CHOSE ATTENDED” Augustus Foster to Frederick Foster, July 1, 1805, Augustus Foster Papers, LOC.

SOME MUSIC CAPPED THE DAYIbid.

“MY OPINION ORIGINALLY” TJ to John Taylor, January 6, 1805, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

“I HAVE SINCE BECOME” Ibid.

“IT BEING THE WISH” William Clark to TJ, April 3, 1805, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

“I CAN FORESEE NO MATERIAL” Meriwether Lewis to TJ, April 7, 1805, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

A COLLECTION OF ARTIFACTSThomas Jefferson’s List of Items Sent by William Clark, November 10, 1807, Coolidge Collection of Thomas Jefferson Manuscripts, Massachusetts Historical Society.

“THE VOYAGE OF DISCOVERY” William Eustis to TJ, August 17, 1805, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

CLARK STAKED THE CLAIMThe Journals of Lewis and Clark, ed. John Bakeless (New York, 2002), 283. See also Smelser, Democratic Republic, 128.

FROM LONDON HE ORDEREDList of Items to be Acquired in London, 1805, The Huntington Library, San Marino, Calif.

A ROOM IN THE MANSION FOR FOSSILSTJ to Caspar Wistar, Jr., March 20, 1808, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

SKULLS, JAWBONES AND TEETHIbid.

“ONE HORN OF A COLOSSAL ANIMAL” Ibid.

“THE BONES ARE SPREAD” Ibid.

PURCHASED TWO BABY BEAR CUBS Zebulon Pike to TJ, February 3, 1808, Editorial Files, Papers of Thomas Jefferson, Princeton University.

“I WOULD RECOMMEND IF PRACTICABLE” Ibid.

“I PUT THEM TOGETHER WHILE HERE” TJ to Charles Willson Peale, February 6, 1808, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

“WE CERTAINLY ARE NOT TO DENY” TJ to Daniel Salmon, February 15, 1808, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

“THE ACTUAL PRESIDENT” Life and Correspondence of Rufus King, IV, 509.

“A JEALOUS SENSE OF PRAISE AND CENSURE” Edward Thornton to Lord Hawkesbury, August 4, 1802, FO 5/35, National Archives of the United Kingdom, Kew.

“WELL-PLACED TO BE CONSIDERED” Ibid.

“I REALLY BELIEVE” Ibid.

“WILL YOU COME AND TAKE” TJ to John Breckinridge, March 5, 1806, Whelpley Collection, Cincinnati Historical Society.

THE CROAKING OF FROGSJHT, V, 122–24.

“AGRICULTURE, GARDENING” Margaret Bayard Smith, First Forty Years, 50.

“WHAT WOULD YOU THINK” TJ to James Madison, Albert Gallatin, and Henry Dearborn, February 28, 1806, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

SUGGESTIONS FOR THE YOUNGTJ to John Carr, April 28, 1807, University of Virginia.

TENSIONS WITH SPAINEOL, 374–75.

THE FATE OF THE FLORIDAS Ibid.

FINANCIAL CLAIMSHarry Ammon, James Monroe, (Charlottesville, 1990), 238–44.

MISSION OF MONROE’S TO THE SPANISH CAPITALMessage to Congress on Spanish and French Spoliations, December 6, 1805, LOC.

RISK A BROADER WARIbid. See also EOL, 375.

“OUR CONSTITUTION IS” JHT, V, 76.

HARASSING AMERICAN SHIPSJohn M. Murrin et al., Liberty, Equality, Power, 6th ed. (Boston, 2012), 218.

VICTORY AT AUSTERLITZEOL, 621.

TRIUMPH AT TRAFALGARIbid.

ALLEGEDLY PLOTTING AGAINST THE UNITED STATESIsenberg, Fallen Founder, 271–316. “Personal friendship for you and the love of my country induce me to give you a warning about Col. Burr’s intrigues,” an anonymous correspondent wrote Jefferson in a letter received on the first day of December 1805.

You admit him at your table, and you held a long, and private conference with him a few days ago after dinner at the very moment he is meditating the overthrow of your administration and what is more conspiring against the state. Yes, sir, his aberrations through the Western states had no other object. A foreign agent, now at Washington, knows since February last his plans and has seconded them beyond what you are aware of. Mistrust Burr’s opinions, and advice: be thoroughly persuaded B. is a new Catilina. Watch his connections with Mr. M——y and you will find him a British pensioner, and agent. Anonymous to TJ, received December 1, 1805, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

A related development was the arrival in New York of the Spanish officer Francisco de Miranda, a Venezuelan-born adventurer who dreamed of building a New World empire out of all the Spanish territories. A second note from the “Friend” said:

I had forgot in my last to mention the arrival at N. York of General Miranda. This event forms a link in Burr’s maneuvers. His instructions like those of Burr come from the same source … the same plans, or others similar in their tendency are to be offered to you … Be careful; although ostensibly directed against a foreign power, the destruction of our government, your ruin, and the material injury of the Atlantic states are their true object. “A Friend” to TJ, received after December 1, 1805, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

“WHAT AN AWFUL SPECTACLE” TJ to Thomas Lomax, January 11, 1806, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

THIRTY-SEVEN · A DEEP, DARK, AND WIDESPREAD CONSPIRACY

“THE DESIGNS OF” TJ to Caesar A. Rodney, December 5, 1806. Grata Collection, Historical Society of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia.

BRIGHTENED BY PATSY’S FAMILY’SJHT, V, 65.

DOLLEY MADISON HAD HELPED PATSYMartha Jefferson Randolph to TJ, October 26, 1805, Coolidge Collection of Thomas Jefferson Manuscripts, Massachusetts Historical Society.

TO TEND TO HIS CELLAR TJ to Jean P. Reibelt, November 16, 1805 Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

RANDOLPH OF ROANOKE BROKE WITH JEFFERSONSee, for instance, EOL, 375.

A LONGSTANDING DISPUTE INVOLVINGCunningham, Jeffersonian Republicans in Power, 78–79. See also EOL, 128–29.

“HE CONSIDERED GREAT BRITAIN” William Plumer’s Memorandum, 443–44.

STRUCK AGAIN THE NEXT DAY Ibid., 444.

“SIT DOWN, SIR, I SAY SIT DOWN” Irving Brant, James Madison, IV (New York, 1961), 316.

“ASTONISHED ALL HIS HEARERSIbid., 315.

AS EITHER THE “QUIDS” EOL, 428. The new division in Washington worried some Republicans. “ ‘We are all Republicans, we are all Federalists’ read extremely well at the time, and I thought much good would come out of it, but I have found none,” Thomas Leiper wrote Jefferson from Philadelphia in March 1806. “Everything you do is wrong with the Leaders of that party and John Randolph.” (Thomas Leiper to TJ, March 23, 1806, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.) Jefferson refused to overreact to the Randolph defection. “The H. of R. is as well disposed as I ever saw one,” He wrote Wilson Cary Nicholas in April. “The defection of so prominent a leader threw them into dismay and confusion for a moment, but they soon rallied to their own principles, and let him go off with 5 or 6 followers only.” (TJ to Wilson Cary Nicholas, April 13, 1806, Pierpont Morgan Library, New York City.)

OR THE “OLD REPUBLICANS” JHT, V, 150.

“NEVER, IN MY OPINION” John Randolph to James M. Garnett, Jr., October 28, 1806, John Randolph Papers, LOC.

“SECRET ENEMIES” Ibid.

‘DAMNING WITH FAINT PRAISE’ Ibid. “What a tissue of intrigue, conspiracy and cabal does every day open to our view!” Randolph added.

“IS THE PRESENT EXECUTIVE PERFECT?” Ibid.

“THE MASK WHICH AMBITION HAS WORN” John Randolph to James M. Garnett, Jr., September 4, 1806, John Randolph Papers, LOC.

“THE OLD REPUBLICAN PARTY” John Randolph to James Monroe, March 26, 1808, John Randolph Papers, LOC.

THE TELLTALE HEADACHE WAS BACKJHT, V, 143.

HMS LEANDER WAS SCREENING Ibid., 115. “A letter from the Mayor of N.Y. complains of the murder lately committed, and the trespasses by the Leander, Cambrian and Driver, and asking for a naval force,” Jefferson wrote in his notes on a cabinet meeting where the administration formulated a response. Notes on a Cabinet Meeting, May 1, 1806 [LOC?].

ORDERING THE THREE Ibid.

CALLED FOR THE ARRESTIbid.

“MY PRESENT MALADY” TJ to George Logan, March 12, 1806, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

“A LAMENESS IN THE KNEE” TJ to Lucy Lewis, May 26, 1806, Coolidge Collection of Thomas Jefferson Manuscripts, Massachusetts Historical Society.

“I HAVE GOTTEN” TJ to John Wayles Eppes, May 24, 1806, Huntington Library, San Marino, Calif.

HAD RISEN AS USUALChadwick, I Am Murdered, 3. See also Gordon-Reed, Hemingses of Monticello, 592–94.

EATEN BREAKFASTIbid., 14–15.

SICK TO HIS STOMACHIbid., 15.

A MIXED-RACE TEENAGER NAMED MICHAELIbid., 16.

WAS SUSPICIOUS AND ORDERED AN AUTOPSYWilliam Duval to TJ, June 4, 1806, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

“I AM MURDERED” Chadwick, I Am Murdered, 16.

WYTHE “MENTIONED NO NAME” William Duval to TJ, June 8, 1806, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

WYTHE’S PRIVATE LIFEI am indebted to Gordon-Reed, Hemingses of Monticello, 592–94, for this account.

LYDIA BROADNAX, A FREE WOMAN OF COLORIbid., 592.

IN WYTHE’S WILLIbid., 592–93. Wythe had also left “property to another former slave Benjamin, who predeceased Wythe.” (Ibid., 592.)

PROVISIONS ASKING JEFFERSON TO OVERSEE THE EDUCATIONIbid., 593. Wythe also left Brown “bank stock.” (Ibid.)

THAT BROWN WAS THE SON OF BROADNAX AND WYTHEIbid. “The exact nature of Michael Brown’s connection to Wythe and Broadnax is unknown,” wrote Gordon-Reed. “It has often been assumed that he was Wythe’s son and that Broadnax was his mother. No evidence exists to support either conclusion, however, though Wythe’s treatment of the pair was extraordinary.” (Ibid.)

“WHETHER BROWN” Ibid.

WYTHE LEFT JEFFERSON Chadwick, I Am Murdered, 162.

“GRATIFIED ME UNCEASINGLY” Gordon-Reed, Hemingses of Monticello, 593.

“SUCH AN INSTANCE OF DEPRAVITY” TJ to William Duval, June 14, 1806, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC. Violence had cost him his friend. Soon it threatened to strike even closer to home. One day in the House of Representatives, where Thomas Mann Randolph, Jr., had kept largely to himself, speaking rarely, a quarrel sprang up involving—unsurprisingly—John Randolph of Roanoke. Words were exchanged, and Thomas Mann Randolph, Jr., believed himself so insulted that only a duel could resolve matters. (TJ to James Ogilvie, June 23, 1806, Coolidge Collection of Thomas Jefferson Manuscripts, Massachusetts Historical Society.) The possibility both horrified and terrified Jefferson.

“It is with an aching heart I take up my pen, and this circumstance must apologize for my interference in the present case but where everything which I hold dear in this world is at stake, where the future happiness of our whole family, or their future misery unmixed and unabating, are hanging in even suspense, it must be justifiable to urge our rights to a due share of weight in your deliberations,” Jefferson wrote his son-in-law on June 23. (TJ to Thomas Mann Randolph, Jr., June 23, 1806, University of Virginia.)

A duel was madness, Jefferson believed, sheer madness, but he understood he had to be delicate with his sensitive son-in-law. “Certainly I would not wish you to do what might lessen you in the esteem of the world,” Jefferson said. “But I wish you to estimate correctly the public opinion in such a case, and not to volunteer beyond what that might require or approve.” He could not keep his own emotions in check. “How different is the stake which you two would bring into the field!” Jefferson said. “On his side, unentangled in the affections of the world a single life, of no value to himself or others. On yours, yourself, a wife, and a family of children all depending, for all their happiness and protection in this world on you alone.” (Ibid.)

Finally tempers cooled sufficiently, and the matter went away. But for a time it had been yet another source of stress and strain for Jefferson—a cause of personal worry at a time of public anxiety.

A DEBILITATING DROUGHT TJ to James Madison, July 26, 1806, James Madison Papers, LOC.

“BURR IS UNQUESTIONABLY” TJ to Thomas Mann Randolph, Jr., November 3, 1806, Massachusetts Historical Society.

HE WAS ALLEGEDLY Stewart, American Emperor, 134–42. “We learn that he is actually building 10 or 15 boats able to take a large gun and fit for the navigation of those waters. We give him all the attention our situation admits: as yet we have no legal proof of any overt act which the law can lay hold of.” TJ to Thomas Mann Randolph, Jr., November 3, 1806, Coolidge Collection of Thomas Jefferson Manuscripts, Massachusetts Historical Society.

“THIS IS INDEED” James Wilkinson to TJ, November 12, 1806, in Report of the Committee Appointed to Inquire into the Conduct of General Wilkinson (Washington, D.C., 1811), 425–28.

TO ISSUE A PROCLAMATIONProclamation on Military Expeditions against Spain, November 27, 1806, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

WHAT WAS BURR DOING? For details, see Isenberg, Fallen Founder, and Stewart, American Emperor.

PLUMER DINED WITH JEFFERSONWilliam Plumer’s Memorandum, 543–44.

INCRIMINATING PAPERSJHT, V, 264.

DRAFTED A BILL “AUTHORIZING” TJ to John Dawson, December 19, 1806, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC. “On the whole, this squall, by showing with what ease our government suppresses movements which in other countries requires armies, has greatly increased its strength by increasing the public confidence in it,” Jefferson said in February 1807. “It has been a wholesome lesson, too, to our citizens, of the necessary obedience to their government.” (Johnstone, Jefferson and the Presidency, 198.)

“STRICT LINE OF THE LAW” Message to Congress, January 22, 1807, LOC.

“GUILT IS PLACED BEYOND QUESTION” Sofaer, War, Foreign Affairs, and Constitutional Power, 191.

JEFFERSON PAID CAREFUL ATTENTIONTJ to Caesar A. Rodney, March 22, 1807 private collection of William I. Davis, Newark, Ohio. “Burr, as a prisoner under a guard of 10 men, passed Coweta 800 miles from here, on the 3d inst.,” Jefferson wrote Rodney on Sunday, March 22, 1807.

At 30 miles a day he will be at Cartersville on James River on Thursday the 26th. There is not therefore one moment to be lost in deciding and acting on these questions. 1. Must he not be ordered from Cartersville down to Richmond for trial? 2. Should not an express go off instantly to meet him at Cartersville? Will Mr. Rodney be so good as to call on me between 8. and 9. this morning to consult on the above? I ask him thus early, because between 9 and 10 my headache comes on which renders me incapable of business. (Ibid.)

“NO MAN’S HISTORY” TJ to Levi Lincoln, March 25, 1807, Massachusetts Historical Society.

“LEAVES ME BUT AN HOUR” Ibid.

IN THE EAGLE TAVERNJoseph Wheelan, Jefferson’s Vendetta: The Pursuit of Aaron Burr and the Judiciary (New York, 2006), 6–7.

FILIBUSTERS WERE NOT ILLEGALSimon, What Kind of Nation, 232–33.

MESSENGER FROM RICHMONDJHT, V, 320–25.

SUBPOENAING THE PRESIDENTTJ to George Hay, June 20, 1807, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

MARSHALL’S DECISIONS AND DEMEANOREOL, 439–40.

“THE NATION WILL JUDGE” TJ to William Branch Giles, April 20, 1807, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

“I AM NOW IN THE 7TH DAY” TJ to Martha Jefferson Randolph, March 20, 1807, University of Virginia.

“I AM TIRED OF” TJ to John Dickinson, January 13, 1807, Historical Society of Pennsylvania,

“THE BRITISH COMMISSIONERS” TJ to James Monroe, March 21, 1807, James Monroe Papers, LOC.

JEFFERSON INVITED JOHN WAYLES EPPESTJ to Thomas Mann Randolph, Jr., February 18, 1807, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

“WHAT ACTS OF MINE” Ibid.

“YOUR RETURN TO THE HOUSE” Ibid.

“REALLY LOVING YOU” TJ to Thomas Mann Randolph, Jr., February 19, 1807, University of Virginia.

DISPATCHED A RETAINERTJ to Thomas Mann Randolph, Jr., February 28, 1807, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

“I CERTAINLY WOULD NOT” Ibid.

JEFFERSON KEPT TRACK TJ to Martha Jefferson Randolph, March 12, 1807, Pierpont Morgan Library, New York City.

THIRTY-EIGHT · THIS DAMNED EMBARGO

“NEVER SINCE” TJ to Pierre-Samuel du Pont de Nemours, July 14, 1807, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

“SOMETHING NOW OCCURS” TJ to Albert Gallatin, July 10, 1807, Gallatin Papers, New-York Historical Society, New York City.

ATTACK ON THE USS CHESAPEAKE Bowers, Jefferson in Power, 427–28.

“AFTER I HAD READ” John Keehmle to TJ, June 29, 1807, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC. The correspondent, John Keehmle, added: “This unexpected attack on one of our national vessels, has realized my anticipations and fears of the hostile disposition of the British Government toward us. They have now cast the die, and struck the blow; it rests with you as the head of our nation to resent the unexpected murder of our citizens, in a spirited and manly manner, and you may rely and depend on the hearty support and approbation of all true Americans.” (Ibid.)

“I AM SORRY TO BE” Bowers, Jefferson in Power, 428.

“I AM SO MUCH FATIGUEDIbid.

OF APPEARING AT JEFFERSON’S ANNUAL LEVEEIbid., 431.

PATRIOTIC TOASTSIbid.

BANNING ARMED BRITISH SHIPSProclamation on British Armed Vessels, July 2, 1807, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC. “At length a deed transcending all we have hitherto seen or suffered, brings the public sensibility to a serious crisis, and our forbearance to a necessary pause,” he said. (Ibid.)

HE DECIDED TO CALLNotes on Cabinet Meeting, July 5, 1807, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC. He was receiving reassuring counsel from voices outside the administration. “The late outrage by the British on the Chesapeake, has produced everywhere, within our range of intelligence at this place, a degree of emotion bordering on rage,” wrote James Wilkinson from Richmond on June 29. And yet, Wilkinson wrote, “The present is no moment for precipitancy or a stretch of power. On the contrary the British being prepared for war and we not, a sudden appeal to hostilities will give them a great advantage.… The prevalent, I might say almost universal, sentiment here is embargo, and to you, Sir, every honest eye is directed in full confidence.” (James Wilkinson to TJ, June 29, 1807, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.)

ORDERED THE PURCHASEPTJRS, III, 100. “After the affair of the Chesapeake, we thought war a very possible result,” he wrote afterward. “Our magazines were illy provided with some necessary articles, nor had any appropriations been made for their purchase. We ventured, however, to provide them, and to place our country in safety.” (Ibid.)

“THE MOMENT OUR PEACE” Annual Message to Congress, October 27, 1807, President’s Messages, Records of the United States Senate, National Archives. See also Sofaer, War, Foreign Affairs and Constitutional Power, 172.

THE PRESIDENCY WAS THUS FURTHER STRENGTHENEDSofaer, War, Foreign Affairs and Constitutional Power, 172–73.

“A STRICT OBSERVANCE” PTJRS, III, 99.

A SHIP—THE USS REVENGE—WAS DISPATCHEDJon Latimer, 1812 (Cambridge, Mass., 2007), 21.

“TO THE TORIES” George Clinton to TJ, July 9, 1807, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

“THE SPIRIT AND ENTERPRISE” William Duane to TJ, July 8, 1807, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC. Still, Jefferson was determined to maintain his perspective amid the storm. He described his plan to John Page in July 1807:

1. The usage of civilized nations requires that an opportunity of reparation shall always be given. If a word and a blow were the practice there would never be peace.

2. We should procrastinate 3 or 4 months, were it only to give time to our merchants to get in their vessels, property and seamen, which are the identical materials with which the war is to be carried on.

3. It is our duty to do no act which may com[mit] the legislature to war, rather than non-intercourse or any other measure they may prefer. They will probably be called in time to receive the answer of England. Before that they would be acting in the dark. (TJ to John Page, July 9, 1807, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.)

“REASON AND THE USAGE” TJ to John Wayles Eppes, July 12, 1807, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC. A correspondent signing himself “An Indignant American” wrote: “The time will come, if it has not already, when the American people will feel indignant at the pusillanimity of their chief Magistrate. Remember Carters Mountain, and now that you have an opportunity, convince the world that you are not what you have been always supposed to be a coward.” (“An Indignant American” to TJ, July 1807, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.)

“ ‘REPARATION FOR’ ” TJ to Pierre Samuel du Pont de Nemours, July 14, 1807, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

CALLED FOR THE OCTOBER SPECIAL SESSION JHT, V, 435.

INCREASED THE MAIL SERVICEThomas Jefferson to Egbert Benson, July 31, 1807, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC. At Monticello he surveyed a world scene that seemed more and more complex and demanding. “I never expected to be under the necessity of wishing success to Bonaparte. But the English being equally tyrannical at sea as he is on land, and that tyranny bearing on us in every point of either honor or interest, I say, ‘down with England,’ and as for what Bonaparte is then to do to us, let us trust to the chapter of accidents. I cannot, with the Anglomen, prefer a certain present evil to a future hypothetical one,” he wrote Thomas Leiper on August 21. (TJ to Thomas Leiper, August 21, 1807, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.)

His trip back to Washington was something of a disaster. He nearly lost his horse crossing the Rapidan River. Then, two days after reaching the President’s House, he came down with the flu. It was going to be that kind of season. (TJ to Martha Jefferson Randolph, October 12, 1807, Pierpont Morgan Library, New York City.)

JEFFERSON HAD GUESSED TJ to Thomas Mann Randolph, Jr., July 5, 1807, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC. “The power of declaring war being in Congress,” Jefferson had written, “the Executive should do no act committing them to war, when it is very probable they may prefer a non-intercourse to war.” (Ibid.)

AT DINNER ONE DAYDiary of John Quincy Adams, 48.

“I SUPPOSE [THIS] WILL TAKE” Ibid.

“IF THERE WAS ANY SINCERITY” Ibid.

QUESTION OF THE MOMENTTJ to Thomas Mann Randolph, Jr., November 30, 1807, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

“THE MEMBERS, AS FAR AS” TJ to Thomas Mann Randolph, Jr., October 26, 1807, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

NEWS FROM PARIS AND LONDON JHT, V, 481.

JEFFERSON PROPOSEDMessage to Congress, December 17, 1807. See also JHT, V, 482.

“MAKING EVERY PREPARATION” Ibid.

“THE WAR FEVER IS PAST” TJ to Martha Jefferson Randolph, November 23, 1807, Pierpont Morgan Library, New York City.

“IN EVERY POINT OF VIEW” Albert Gallatin to TJ, December 18, 1807, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

“WHAT IS GOOD” JHT, V, 476.

“THE EMBARGO KEEPING” TJ to John Taylor, January 6, 1808, Washburn Collection, Massachusetts Historical Society.

LEGISLATION HAD PASSED QUICKLYRobert W. Tucker and David C. Hendrickson, Empire of Liberty (New York, 1992), 204.

STRUCK BY “A TOOTH-ACHE” TJ to Martha Jefferson Randolph, December 29, 1807, Pierpont Morgan Library, New York City.

THE WEAPONS OF ECONOMIC WARBurton Spivak, Jefferson’s English Crisis: Commerce, Embargo, and the Republican Revolution (Charlottesville, Va., 1979), x.

“OUR PEOPLE HAVE” Ibid., 8.

“CONFIDENCE NOW SEEMS” Timothy Pickering to T. Williams, January 18, 1808, Timothy Pickering Papers, Massachusetts Historical Society.

“IMPLICIT, BLIND CONFIDENCE” Ibid.

“OUR EMBARGO, WHICH HAS BEEN” TJ to the Marquis de Lafayette, February 24, 1809, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

WARNINGS AND PROTESTSBowers, Jefferson in Power, 465–67.

ESSENTIALLY INVITED SHIPSLouis Martin Sears, Jefferson and the Embargo (Durham, N.C., 1927), 70.

SMUGGLING WAS AN ENORMOUS PROBLEMWilentz, Rise of American Democracy, 131–32.

THOSE “COMBINING AND CONFEDERATING” Proclamation on the Embargo, April 19, 1808, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

CONNECTICUT BECAME A BASTIONSears, Jefferson and the Embargo, 185–86.

“ANY OTHER MEASURE” Ibid., 142.

“THE EMBARGO IS” TJ to Benjamin Rush, January 3, 1808, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

HISTORY HAS NOT BEEN KINDSee, for instance, Henry Adams, History, 1160–252; Johnstone, Jefferson and the Presidency, 254–306; William M. Goldsmith, The Growth of Presidential Power: A Documented History, I, The Formative Years (New York, 1974), 466–81.

“I HAVE BEEN HAPPY” TJ to Thomas Leiper, May 25, 1808, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

“YOU INFERNAL VILLAIN” John Lane Jones to TJ, August 8, 1808, Huntington Library, San Marino, Calif.

“YOU ARE THE DAMDEST” Anonymous to TJ, August 25, 1808, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

“THY DESTRUCTION IS” Anonymous to TJ, on or before June 10, 1808, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

“IN AN OPEN, FREE-HEARTED” Bowers, Jefferson in Power, 432.

“SHOULD HAVE HIS HEAD” Ibid.

VILLAGERS BURNEDIbid., 450.

“THE ATTEMPT IS” James Sullivan to TJ, April 2, 1808, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC. Three days later, reporting on Federalist maneuvering, Sullivan added: “The deep-laid plot of Pickering’s letter, added to the embargo, gave them fresh confidence … and they have done the most wonderful things with them. They came out, however, openly, and avowedly upon the position of a dissolution of the national government, and a separation of the Northern from the Southern States. They expect this arrangement to be supported by the court of London, and however you may treat the idea with neglect, it is on the request of this party, in New England, that seven ships of the line, and ten thousand troops are on their way to Halifax.” (Ibid., April 5, 1808.)

MADISON WAS NOMINATED FOR PRESIDENTAPE, I, 96. See also TJ to Thomas Mann Randolph, Jr., January 26, 1808, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC. In that letter, Jefferson wrote:

A caucus was held on Saturday by the members of Congress at which 89. attended. Mr. Madison had 83. votes, Clinton 3. Monroe 3. as president, and Clinton had 79. as V. President. But one member from N. York attended, and but 1. federalist, J.Q. Adams who voted for Mr. Madison. Of the Virginia members in town J. Randolph, Garnett, Gray, Trigg and Bassett declined attending, the last because disapproving the manner of calling the Caucus, but avowedly in favor of Mr. Madison. The vote for Clinton as V.P. was under a firm belief he had declared he would not accept it. It is now believed he will accept. The Eastern members especially will be much taken in, as he would not have had their votes but for the mistake. But his acceptance will in my opinion prevent all opposition to Mr. Madison, and whether he does or not it is believed that N.Y. will vote for Mr. Madison. His election is considered as out of all question. (Ibid.)

“I SEE WITH INFINITE GRIEF” TJ to James Monroe, February 18, 1808, James Monroe Papers, LOC.

THE ELECTION OF 1808 APE, I, 92–122.

ECHOES OF OLD REFRAINSIbid., 93–94.

122 ELECTORAL VOTES TO PINCKNEY’S 47 Ibid., 92.

“THE MONARCHISTS OF THE NORTH” TJ to Thomas Mann Randolph, Jr., January 2, 1809, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC. Jefferson watched Massachusetts closely. “Their Republican members think that if we will fix by law a day when the embargo shall cease (as some day in June), that this will satisfy so great a portion of their people as to remove the danger of a convention,” he told Randolph. “This will probably be consented to with an addition that letters of marque and reprisal shall issue the same day.… For if war takes place with England, we have no security that she will not offer neutrality and commerce to N. England and that the latter will not accept it,” Jefferson said. To Charles Bankhead, Jefferson wrote: “In the mean time the disquietude in the North is extreme, and we are uncertain what extent of conflagration a spark might occasion.” (TJ to Charles L. Bankhead, January 19, 1809, Virginia Historical Society, Richmond.)

“A LINE SEEMS NOW TO BE” TJ to Charles L. Bankhead, January 19, 1809, Virginia Historical Society, Richmond.

THIRTY-NINE · A FAREWELL TO ULTIMATE POWER

“CONSIDERING THE EXTRAORDINARY CHARACTER” Annual Message to Congress, November 8, 1808, President’s Messages, Records of the United States Senate, National Archives.

“THE DISEASED JAW BONE” TJ to Martha Jefferson Randolph, January 10, 1809, Pierpont Morgan Library, New York City.

“I AM ALREADY SENSIBLE” TJ to Charles Thomson, December 25, 1808, Charles Thomson Papers, LOC.

INVENTORIED THE FURNITURETJ to Thomas Claxton, February 19, 1809, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

HOW TO PAY HIS BILLS JHT, VI, 3.

ARGONAUTS OF OLD TJ to John Adams, March 25, 1826. Cappon, Adams-Jefferson Letters, 614.

“NATURE INTENDED ME” TJ to Pierre-Samuel du Pont de Nemours, March 2, 1809, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

HE INSPIRED AS MUCH DIVISIONPositive verdicts, of course, pleased Jefferson. “It is a common observation that the present is a time of political phenomena,” wrote William Jarvis from Lisbon on February 18, 1809. “The extraordinary events which have occurred within the last thirty years, on both sides of the Atlantic, will without doubt amply justify the assertion: but the United States has been the only country during this period and unhappily for mankind almost any other where the good of the people has been the sole seed of government. In the attainment of this philanthropic object, your administration will perhaps stand unrivalled in the history of the world.” (William Jarvis to TJ, February 18, 1809, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.)

“A FEW FLEETING” Allegany County, Maryland, Citizens to TJ, February 20, 1809, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

“THOU STRANGE INCONSISTENT MAN!” William Penn to TJ, February 24, 1809, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

“YOU HAVE BROUGHT” “Cassandra” to TJ, February 28, 1809, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

“I SUPPOSE INDEED” TJ to Richard M. Johnson, March 10, 1808, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC. Jefferson’s recommended books:

Volney’s Lessons of history.

Millot’s antient history.

Anacharsis

Middleton’s life of Cicero.

Gibbon’s decline of the Roman empire.

Millot’s Modern history.

Russel’s history of Modern Europe.

Millot’s history of France.

Davila’s history of the civil wars of France.

Sully’s Memoirs.

The French revolution by Rabaut and La Cretelle.

The Revolution of France by Desodards.

Voltaire’s historical works.

Robertson’s Charles V.

Historical works of Frederic king of Prussia.

Segur’s history of Frederic William II.

Ruthere’s History of Poland.

Tooke’s life of Catharine II.

Memoires Secrets de la Russie.

Baxter’s history of England (this is Hume’s text republicanised.)

Ld. Orrery’s history of England.

Ld. Bacon’s history of Henry VIII.

Macaulay’s history.

Ludlow’s memoirs.

Anecdotes of the life of Chatham.

Belsham’s history and Memoirs.

Robertson’s history of Scotland.

Mosheim’s Ecclesiastical history

Priestley’s corruptions of Christianity. (Ibid.)

“I BECAME OF COURSE” Ibid.

“IN THE CHARACTER OF MARCUS AURELIUS” David Bailie Warden to TJ, December 4, 1807, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

“WE ARE ALL POLITICS” TJ to Charles L. Bankhead, November 26, 1808, Coolidge Collection of Thomas Jefferson Manuscripts, Massachusetts Historical Society.

“THE CONGRESSIONAL CAMPAIGN” TJ to Levi Lincoln, November 13, 1808, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

“HERE, EVERYTHING IS” TJ to Thomas Mann Randolph, Jr., December 13, 1808, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

“NEVER WILL IT BE” JHT, V, 666.

LEFT THE PRESIDENT’S HOUSE Ibid.

DEPARTED THE MANSION QUICKLYIbid.

THOUGHT THE SETTINGBowers, Jefferson in Power, 504–5.

MRS. MADISON LOOKEDMargaret Bayard Smith, First Forty Years, 58.

STOOD AT THE DRAWING ROOM DOORIbid.

CROWDED WITH CARRIAGESIbid.

A HALF HOUR’S WAIT Ibid.

JEFFERSON SAW MARGARET BAYARD SMITHIbid.

REACHED FOR HER HANDIbid., 58–59.

“REMEMBER THE PROMISE” Ibid., 59.

MRS. SMITH, OF COURSE, REASSURED HIMIbid.

“YOU HAVE NOW RESIGNED” Ibid.

“YES INDEED” Ibid.

TOLD THAT “THE LADIES” Ibid.

“THAT IS RIGHT” Ibid.

HE JOINED CELEBRATING REPUBLICANSIbid., 60–61.

“THE CROWD WAS EXCESSIVE” Diary of John Quincy Adams, 58.

“I AM FULL OF PLANS” TJ to Charles Thomson, December 25, 1808, Charles Thomson Papers, LOC.

HE HAD SUGGESTED Martha Jefferson Randolph to TJ, March 2, 1809, Coolidge Collection of Thomas Jefferson Manuscripts, Massachusetts Historical Society.

“AS TO AUNT MARKS” Ibid.

ORDERED AN ABRIDGMENTMB, II, 1242.

SENT A GERANIUMPTJRS, I, 29.

ARRANGED PAYMENTMB, II, 1242–43.

BACON HAD COME TO WASHINGTONBear, Jefferson at Monticello, 104–8. See also MB, II, 1243.

JEFFERSON REACHED MONTICELLOMB, II, 1243.

JULIEN CAME TO TEACHIbid., 1244.

FORTY · MY BODY, MIND, AND AFFAIRS

“I STEER MY BARK” Cappon, Adams-Jefferson Letters, 467.

“AMIDST THE DIN OF WAR” PTJRS, I, 359.

RED BED CURTAINS HUNGJames A. Bear, “The Last Few Days in the Life of Thomas Jefferson,” Magazine of Albemarle County History 32 (1974): 63–79. See especially page 68.

THE ROOMS WERE PEACEFULAuthor observation. My description of Jefferson’s quarters and his routine owe much to the kindness of the president, the trustees, and the staff of the Thomas Jefferson Foundation. At my request I was granted unusual access to Monticello in the overnight and early morning hours in order to observe as closely as possible the material culture in which Jefferson lived and worked, including the sounds he heard and the possible play of light as he awoke in the mornings. I am particularly indebted to Susan R. Stein for her counsel and for her “Notes on Jefferson’s Bed Chamber,” Memorandum to author, November 10, 2011.

A 1790 CLOCK MOUNTED BETWEEN TWO OBELISKS“Notes on Jefferson’s Bed Chamber,” Memorandum of Susan R. Stein to author.

HUNG A SWORDBear, “Last Few Days in the Life of Thomas Jefferson,” 68.

“A LONG FORGOTTEN ARABIAN PRINCE” Ibid.

JEFFERSON’S UBIQUITOUS MOCKINGBIRDS“Notes on Jefferson’s Bed Chamber,” Memorandum of Susan R. Stein to author.

OVERNIGHT THE SILENCE OF THE CHAMBERAuthor observation.

THE TICK-TICK-TICK OF THE TALL CLOCKIbid.

HIS WIFE’S WALNUT DRESSING TABLE“Notes on Jefferson’s Bed Chamber,” Memorandum of Susan R. Stein to author. I am also grateful to Elizabeth Chew of the Monticello curatorial office for showing me the dresser.

JEFFERSON HAD HIS OWN PRIVY JUST STEPS AWAY Ibid.

HE USED PIECES OF SCRAP PAPERIbid.

EXAMPLES WERE COLLECTED FROM HIS PRIVYIbid.

FIVE TO EIGHT HOURS OF SLEEP A NIGHTRandall, Jefferson, III, 450.

READING FOR HALF AN HOUR Ibid.

DIFFICULTY HEARING DIFFERENT VOICESIbid.

SUFFERING FROM EXTREMELY RARE FEVERS Ibid., 451.

“NOW TO HAVE LEFT ME” Ibid.

HIS BEDTIME READINGIbid.

IN THE SUN’S DIRECT PATHAuthor observation.

MUCH OF HIS FIRST SENSE OF LIGHTIbid.

ELEVEN-THOUSAND-SQUARE-FOOT, THIRTY-THREE-ROOM HOUSETJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/house-and-gardens/monticello-house-faq#rooms (accessed 2012).

TEN OTHER ROOMS IN THE PAVILIONS AND UNDER THE SOUTH TERRACEIbid.

WALKING INTO THE ENTRANCE HALLMy descriptions of the rooms in the house are the result of my observation; Stein, Worlds of Thomas Jefferson at Monticello; and the very fine digital records and accounts at http://www.monticello.org/site/house-and-gardens (accessed 2012).

THE FLOORStein, Worlds of Thomas Jefferson at Monticello, 63. Her complete account of the entrance hall is on pages 61–71.

WHITEWASHED WITH A YELLOW-ORANGE DADOTJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/house-and-gardens/entrance-hall (accessed 2012).

ANTLERS OF MOOSE AND ELK Ibid.

THE UPPER JAWBONE OF A MASTODONIbid.

FORTY INDIAN OBJECTSIbid.

CARVED STONE SCULPTURES Ibid.

SMALL PORTRAIT OF A YOUNG SACK CHIEFIbid.

THE FRY-JEFFERSON MAP OF VIRGINIAIbid.

OF NORTH AMERICA, EUROPE, AFRICA, AND ASIAIbid.

WAS A SCALE MODEL OF THE PYRAMID OF CHEOPSIbid.

A SCULPTURE, ARIADNE Ibid.

LONG MISTOOK FOR ONE OF CLEOPATRAIbid.

ST. JEROME IN MEDITATIONAND JESUS IN THE PRAETORIUM Ibid.

“JESUS … STRIPPED OF THE PURPLE” TJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/house-and-gardens/jesus-praetorium-painting (accessed 2012).

THERE WERE PORTRAITS TJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/house-and-gardens/entrance-hall (accessed 2012).

TWO ENGRAVINGSIbid.

AND BUSTS OFIbid.

“MEMORIALS OF THOSE WORTHIES” TJ to James Bowdoin, April 27, 1805, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

A PLASTER RELIEF OF AN EAGLETJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/house-and-gardens/plaster-eagle-and-stars (accessed 2012).

UNDER A BRASS ARGAND-STYLE LAMPTJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/house-and-gardens/entrance-hall (accessed 2012).

FLOOR OF CHERRY AND BEECH TJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/house-and-gardens/parlor (accessed 2012).

JEFFERSON PERSONALLY DESIGNEDIbid.

THE PARLOR IS EIGHTEEN FEET, TWO INCHESIbid.

CARD TABLES, CHAIRS, SOFAS, A CHESS SETIbid.

“PORTRAITS—24” Ibid.

HERE HUNG PAINTINGS AND HERE SAT SCULPTURESIbid.

THE BRILLIANTLY YELLOW DINING ROOMTJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/house-and-gardens/monticello-dining-room (accessed 2012).

DOUBLE POCKET DOORS ON ROLLERS TJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/house-and-gardens/tea-room (accessed 2012).

THE SMALL OCTAGONAL TEA ROOMIbid.

HE CALLED HIS “MOST HONORABLE SUITE” Ibid.

BUSTS OF WASHINGTON, FRANKLIN, LAFAYETTE, AND JOHN PAUL JONESIbid.

PATSY HAD A BLUE SITTING ROOMTJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/house-and-gardens/monticello-south-square-room (accessed 2012).

A NORTH OCTAGONAL ROOMTJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/house-and-gardens/north-octagonal-room (accessed 2012).

DOME ROOM ATOP THE HOUSETJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/house-and-gardens/dome-room (accessed 2012).

A SERIES OF SMALL BEDROOMS Author observation.

CONSTRUCTED VENETIAN PORCHESGordon-Reed, Hemingses of Monticello, 613–14.

“IF IT HAD NOT BEEN CALLED MONTICELLO” Stein, Worlds of Thomas Jefferson at Monticello, 50. See also Andrew Burstein, “Jefferson in Retirement,” in Cogliano, ed., A Companion to Thomas Jefferson, 218–33.

HIS “CHEERFULNESS AND AFFECTION” Randall, Jefferson, III, 349.

LIKE A “PATRIARCH OF OLD” TDLTJ, 374.

“OUR MOTHER EDUCATED ALL” Ibid., 342.

THEY FOLLOWED HIM ON GARDEN WALKSRandall, Jefferson, III, 349.

“WOULD VIOLATE ONE OF HIS RULES” Ibid.

HE NEVER HAD TO RAISE HIS VOICEIbid.

HE PICKED FRUIT FOR THEMIbid.

HE ORGANIZED AND PRESIDED OVER RACESIbid.

ON SOME SUMMER NIGHTSEllen Wayles Randolph Coolidge to Henry S. Randall, February 22, 1856. Extract published at Papers of Thomas Jefferson Retirement Series Digital Archive, http://www.monticello.org/familyletters.com (accessed 2011).

IT HAD BEEN MADE BY JOHN HEMINGSIbid.

“WHEN IT GREW TOO DARK TO READ” Randall, Jefferson, III, 350.

“CROSS QUESTIONS AND CROOKED ANSWERS” Ibid.

“I LOVE MY LOVE WITH A” Ibid.

THE ARRIVAL OF CANDLESIbid.

WHEN HE WAS SNOWED IN AT POPLAR FORESTPTJRS, III, 394.

ON JOURNEYS TO BEDFORDRandall, Jefferson, III, 344.

SHE HAD NEVER HAD A SILK DRESSIbid., 350.

HE MIGHT HEAR A CHILDIbid., 348–49.

“OUR GRANDFATHER SEEMED TO READ” TDLTJ, 345.

“SO EMINENTLY SYMPATHETIC” Ibid., 348.

“MR. JEFFERSON CALLED LAST WEEK” Elizabeth Trist to [Elizabeth Kortright Monroe], April 3, 1809, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. Extract Published at Papers of Thomas Jefferson Retirement Series Digital Archive, www.monticello.org/familyletters (accessed 2011).

“THE SUN NEVER SEES HIM” PTJRS, I, 392–93.

“THERE IS A TRANQUILITY ABOUT HIM” Ibid., 395.

“WE HAVE BEEN PERMITTED” Ibid., 4.

“YOU HAVE, IN YOUR PUBLIC CAPACITY” Ibid., 69.

“THOUGH I AM CONVINCED” Ibid., 263.

“NO ONE KNOWS BETTER” Ibid., 471.

“WHAT WOULD BECOME OF MANKIND” Ibid., III, 58.

WROTE WITH HIS LEGS STRETCHED OUTI am grateful to Elizabeth Chew of the Monticello curatorial office for this detail.

“MY PRESENT COURSE OF LIFE” PTJRS, III, 304.

SAMPLINGS OF THE ENGLISH MULBERRYIbid., I, 40, 467.

“I AM NOW ON HORSEBACK” Ibid., III, 315. See also Lucia Stanton, “Jefferson: Planter and Farmer,” in Cogliano, ed., A Companion to Thomas Jefferson, 253–70.

“I FEEL A MUCH GREATER INTEREST” Randall, Jefferson, III, 450.

“IF THERE BE A GOD” PTJRS, III, 315.

HE SUBSCRIBED TO THE PAPERSIbid., I, 214. Jefferson offered counsel to Madison from time to time, but the third president’s influence over the fourth has sometimes been exaggerated. See Roy J. Honeywell, “President Jefferson and His Successor,” American Historical Review 46, no. 1 (October 1940): 64–75. They exchanged at least 39 letters in Madison’s first year as president (Madison wrote 22, Jefferson 17), but the number dropped off as the years passed. Madison appears to have written Jefferson just eight times during the second term. The two men spoke personally when they could, of course, but such contact was necessarily limited by Madison’s duties and Jefferson’s decision to stay largely at home in retirement. (Ibid., 66.)

“READING THE NEWSPAPERS” PTJRS, I, 154.

THE “INEFFABLE LUXURY” Ibid., 475.

“THE BUNDLE BEING TOO LARGE” Ibid., 327–28. See also ibid., 510, for Jefferson’s note of thanks to Clark for the sheepskin and an Indian blanket.

OVERSAW THE ENGLISH TRANSLATIONIbid., III, 3–25.

DEBATED THE ORIGINS OF THE POTATOIbid., I, 196.

WROTE FOR VINE CUTTINGSIbid., 586.

MUSED ON THE ROLE OF LIBRARIESIbid., 205.

JOHN WALKER, HIS ONETIME FRIENDIbid., 498–99.

HE SENT A GIFT OF A BASKET OF RIPE FIGSIbid., 500.

VIRGINIA HAD ALWAYS CONTRIBUTED “ABOVE PAR” Ibid., 383.

THE BRUTAL DEATH OF HIS OLD SECRETARY MERIWETHER LEWISIbid., 602–4.

AS JEFFERSON HEARD THE STORYIbid., 632–33. For a biographical sketch of Lewis, see ibid., 436.

AN UNSPARING ACCOUNT OF JEFFERSONIbid., III, 610.

RECORDED THE BIRTHS OF HEMINGS’S CHILDREN Gordon-Reed, Hemingses of Monticello, 15–16.

“HE WAS NOT IN THE HABIT” Lewis and Onuf, eds., Sally Hemings and Thomas Jefferson, 257.

“AFFECTIONATE TOWARD HIS WHITE GRANDCHILDREN” Ibid.

“THE ENJOYMENT OF” Lemire, “Miscegenation”: Making Race in America, 11.

IN A LETTER TO JAMES PARTONGordon-Reed, Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings, 254–57.

RANDOLPH “SAID IN ONE CASE” Ibid., 254.

“A GENTLEMAN DINING WITH MR. JEFFERSON” Ibid.

A THEORY ULTIMATELY DISPROVED BY DNA RESEARCH http://www.monticello.org/site/plantation-and-slavery/report-research-committee-thomas-jefferson-and-sally-hemings (accessed 2012).

“I ASKED COL. R[ANDOLPH]” Gordon-Reed, Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings, 255.

“THE SECRETS OF AN OLD VIRGINIA MANOR” Ibid., 256.

“I AM LITTLE ABLE” PTJRS, IV, 35.

“IT IS WONDERFUL TO ME” Ibid., 87–88.

“HOW DO YOU DO?” Ibid., 100.

“SUCH AN INTERCOURSE” Ibid., III, 278. See also Cappon, Adams-Jefferson Letters, 283–89.

“YOU REMEMBER THE MACHINERY” Ibid., 305.

“MANY ARE THE EVILS” Ibid., 356.

THE SECOND PRESIDENT SPENT TWO DAYSIbid., IV, 314. The ensuing scene is drawn from this source.

“THIS IS ENOUGH FOR ME” Ibid., 313.

RUSH SENT WORD OF JEFFERSON’S SENTIMENTSIbid., 389–91.

“A LETTER FROM YOU” Ibid., 428–29.

WHEN ADAMS ANSWERED Ibid., 483–85.

“ON THE SUBJECT OF THE HISTORY” Cappon, Adams-Jefferson Letters, 452.

“SO MANY SUBJECTS CROWD UPON ME” PTJRS, VI, 277.

“YOU AND I OUGHT NOT TO DIE BEFORE” Ibid., 297.

“MR. ADAMS AND MYSELF” Ibid., V, 670.

“MY REPUTATION HAS BEEN” Ibid., VI, 227.

“THE SUMMUM BONUM WITH ME” Ibid., 231.

“MEN HAVE DIFFERED” Cappon, Adams-Jefferson Letters, 335.

“AND SHALL YOU AND I” Ibid., 337.

“I BELIEVE IN THE INTEGRITY” PTJRS, V, 3.

“THE NATURAL ARISTOCRACY” Ibid., VI, 563.

“I HAVE THUS” Ibid., 566–67.

EXCHANGED A TOTAL OF 329 LETTERSCappon, Adams-Jefferson Letters, xxix.

“WE HAVE HAD A WRETCHED WINTER” PTJRS, III, 437.

“THE RANCOR OF PARTY” Ibid., 473.

“WAR HOWEVER MAY BECOME” Ibid., I, 61. As ever, Jefferson worried about Congress. “I know no government which would be so embarrassing in war as ours,” he wrote Madison on March 17, 1809. “This would proceed very much from the lying and licentious character of our papers; but much also from the wonderful credulity of the members of Congress in the floating lies of the day. And in this no experience seems to correct them. I have never seen a Congress during the last 8 years a great majority of which I would not implicitly rely on in any question, could their minds have been purged of all errors of fact.” (Ibid.)

NEWS OF A BRITISH FRIGATE AND SLOOP OF WARIbid., IV, 133.

“OUR COUNTRY HAS TWICE” Ibid., 103.

JEFFERSON RETURNED HOMEIbid., V, 82.

“YOUR DECLARATION OF WAR” Ibid.

SENT A WAR-PREPARATION MESSAGE TO CONGRESSEOL, 659–700.

“WE ARE TO HAVE WAR THEN?” PTJRS, IV, 472.

“YOUR MESSAGE HAD ALL” Ibid., 376–77.

FORTY-ONE · TO FORM STATESMEN, LEGISLATORS AND JUDGES

“IN A REPUBLICAN NATION” TJ to David Harding, April 20, 1824. Extract published at Papers of Thomas Jefferson Retirement Series Digital Archive, www.monticello.org/familyletters (accessed 2011).

AS LATE AS 1810 EOL, 667.

“THE PEOPLE WILL NOT” Ibid.

THE WAR OF 1812 WAS DISASTROUS Ibid., 659–700. See also JHT, VI, 107–36; Anthony S. Pitch, The Burning of Washington: The British Invasion of 1814 (Annapolis, Md., 1998), is a vivid account of the attack on the American capital.

“NO GOVERNMENT CAN BE MAINTAINED” PTJRS, VII, 648.

VICTORIES AT BALTIMORE AND AT PLATTSBURGHEOL, 690–91.

THE HARTFORD CONVENTION Ibid., 692–95. See also JHT, VI, 126–27. Richard Buel, Jr., America on the Brink: How the Political Struggle Over the War of 1812 Almost Destroyed the Young Republic (New York, 2005), chronicles the depth of the Federalist opposition to the Republican project in the first decade and a half of the nineteenth century.

“THE CEMENT OF THE UNION” JHT, VI, 126.

IN 1814 THE EPISCOPAL BISHOP OF SOUTH CAROLINAPTJRS, VII, 368.

PATSY GUESSEDRandall, Jefferson, III, 332.

THE SMASHING OF GLASS ALERTEDIbid., 331.

STRANGERS HOPING FOR A GLIMPSEIbid.

“APPROACH WITHIN A DOZEN YARDS” Ibid.

HENRY RANDALL ONCE WALKED OVERIbid., 332.

A VIRGINIA GENTLEMAN WHO HAD FALLEN OUTIbid., 333.

HIS HEARING WAS FAILING A BIT Ibid., 426.

ILL IN EARLY 1818 Ibid., 445.

HE WROTE WARMLY TO JOHN ADAMSIbid., 446.

CHRONIC FINANCIAL TROUBLE See, for instance, JHT, VI, 453–56.

APPEARS TO HAVE DRUNK TOO MUCHAlan Pell Crawford, Twilight at Monticello: The Final Years of Thomas Jefferson (New York, 2008), 138.

IS SAID TO HAVE GROWN JEALOUSIbid., 137–38.

THREE TERMS AS GOVERNORJHT, VI, 341. See also http://www.monticello.org/site/jefferson/thomas-mann-randolph (accessed 2012).

FELL OUT OVER THE FATE OF EDGEHILLGordon-Reed, Hemingses of Monticello, 418.

THE FATHER GREW ERRATICIbid., 416–18.

SAID HE WAS “MORE FEROCIOUS” Ibid., 417.

CHARLES L. BANKHEADPTJRS, III, 633–34. See also Anne Z. Cockerham, Arlene W. Keeling, and Barbara Parker, “Seeking Refuge at Monticello: Domestic Violence in Thomas Jefferson’s Family.” Magazine of Albemarle County History 64 (2006): 29–52.

“HE WAS A FINE-LOOKING” Bear, Jefferson at Monticello, 94.

“I HAVE SEEN HIM” Ibid.

JEFFERSON TOOK BANKHEAD TO POPLAR FORESTCrawford, Twilight at Monticello, 70–72. See also Randall, Jefferson, III, 264.

TO TREAT HIS OWN SON Ibid., 126–27. “Nothing less than his good, and the hope of restoring happiness to his family and friends and to yourself particularly could have induced me to the pain of this communication,” Jefferson wrote the senior Bankhead. Ibid., 127.

“IN A STATE APPROACHING INSANITY” Ibid., 127.

COULD BE VICIOUSCrawford, Twilight at Monticello, 127.

FOR REFUSING TO HAND OVER THE KEYSBear, Jefferson at Monticello, 94.

PATSY TRIED TO CALMIbid.

BANKHEAD GOT INTO A FIGHTCrawford, Twilight at Monticello, 166–67.

“WITH RESPECT TO BANKHEAD” Ibid., 171.

“I THINK, WITH YOU” Cappon, Adams-Jefferson Letters, 467.

“I STEER MY BARK” Ibid.

“I ENJOY GOOD HEALTH” Ibid., 484.

“I DARE NOT LOOK BEYOND” PTJRS, VII, 217–18.

“SOME MEN LOOK” TJ to H. Tompkinson (Samuel Kercheval), July 12, 1816. Extract published at Papers of Thomas Jefferson Retirement Series Digital Archive, http://retirementseries.dataformat.com (accessed 2011).

“THE FACT IS” TJ to Benjamin Waterhouse, March 3, 1818. Extract published at Papers of Thomas Jefferson Retirement Series Digital Archive, www.monticello.org/familyletters (accessed 2011).

BURNING OF THE ROUGHLY 3,000 BOOKSJHT, VI, 172.

6,487 VOLUMESIbid., 176.

“FOR ITS SELECTION” Ibid., 177.

IT WAS A UNIVERSITYRandall, Jefferson, III, 462–63, details the organizational foundations.

TO “FORM THE STATESMEN” Thomas Jefferson and the University of Virginia Commissioners: The Rockfish Gap Report, August 4, 1818. Extract published at Papers of Thomas Jefferson Retirement Series Digital Archive, www.monticello.org/familyletters (accessed 2011).

“I KNOW NO” TJ to William C. Jarvis, September 28, 1820. Extract published at Papers of Thomas Jefferson Retirement Series Digital Archive, www.monticello.org/familyletters (accessed 2011).

“I THINK BY FAR” PTJ, X, 244–45. In 1814, he told Thomas Cooper: “I have long had under contemplation, and been collecting materials for the plan of a university in Virginia which should comprehend all the sciences useful to us, and none others.” (PTJRS, VII, 127.)

“THIS INSTITUTION WILL BE” TJ to William Roscoe, December 27, 1820. Extract published at Papers of Thomas Jefferson Retirement Series Digital Archive, www.monticello.org/familyletters (accessed 2011).

“FOR HERE WE ARE NOT” Ibid.

“IF OUR LEGISLATURE” TJ to Joseph C. Cabell, January 22, 1820. Extract published at Papers of Thomas Jefferson Retirement Series Digital Archive, www.monticello.org/familyletters (accessed 2011). Jefferson initially hoped the university was the capstone of a broader system of public education, a cause to which he had been devoted for decades. “Were it necessary to give up either the Primaries or the University, I would rather abandon the last,” he said in January 1823. “Because it is safer to have a whole people respectably enlightened, than a few in a high state of science and the many in ignorance. This last is the most dangerous state in which a nation can be. The nations and governments of Europe are so many proofs of it.” Ibid., January 13, 1823.

RODE THROUGH “A PERFECT HURRICANE” Elizabeth Trist to Nicholas P. Trist, March 9, 1819. Published at Papers of Thomas Jefferson Retirement Series Digital Archive, www.monticello.org/familyletters (accessed 2011).

SAID TO HAVE INSTALLED A TELESCOPERandall, Jefferson, III, 473.

THE STATE’S RELIGIOUS WORLD REACTEDIbid., 465.

HE OFFERED A BRILLIANT PLANIbid., 468–69.

“I REJOICE THAT” TJ to Benjamin Waterhouse, June 26, 1822. Extract published at Papers of Thomas Jefferson Retirement Series Digital Archive, www.monticello.org/familyletters (accessed 2011).

“IS BECOME THE FAVORITE BEVERAGE” TJ to Edmund Rogers, February 14, 1824. Extract published at Papers of Thomas Jefferson Retirement Series Digital Archive, www.monticello.org/familyletters (accessed 2011).

“WERE I TO BE THE FOUNDER” TJ to Thomas B. Parker, May 15, 1819. Extract published at Papers of Thomas Jefferson Retirement Series Digital Archive, www.monticello.org/familyletters (accessed 2011).

“IS KNOWN TO” Randall, Jefferson, III, 440.

A FORTY-SIX-PAGE WORK The Jefferson Bible, 27. This Smithsonian edition is an elegant and engaging volume.

THE PHILOSOPHY OF JESUS Randall, Jefferson, III, 654.

A MORE AMBITIOUS WORKThe Jefferson Bible, 26–31.

“THE RELIGION OF JESUS” TJ to Jared Sparks, November 4, 1820, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

A CHURCHGOER WHO CARRIED Meacham, American Gospel, 278.

“OF A SECT BY MYSELF” Ibid., 4.

JEFFERSON HOPED THAT Johann N. Neem, “A Republican Reformation: Thomas Jefferson’s Civil Religion and the Separation of Church from State” in Cogliano, ed. A Companion to Thomas Jefferson, 91–109, is a excellent essay on the complexities of Jefferson’s thinking on these matters.

“THE TRUTH IS THAT” Cappon, Adams-Jefferson Letters, 594.

“MAY WE MEET THERE AGAIN” Neem, “A Republican Reformation: Thomas Jefferson’s Civil Religion and the Separation of Church from State” in Cogliano, ed. Companion to Thomas Jefferson, 97.

“THE DOCTRINES OF JESUS ARE SIMPLE” Ibid., 103.

“BOLD IN THE PURSUIT” PTJRS, VII, 191.

“IT IS TOO LATE IN THE DAY” Ford, Writings, IX, 412–14.

DONATED MONEY TO THE AMERICAN BIBLE SOCIETYPTJRS, VII, 178.

HE WAS FELLEDRandall, Jefferson, III, 453.

“THE BOISTEROUS SEA OF LIBERTY” TJ to Richard Rush, October 20, 1820. Extract published at Papers of Thomas Jefferson Retirement Series Digital Archive, www.monticello.org/familyletters (accessed 2011).

FORTY-TWO · THE KNELL OF THE UNION

“FROM THE BATTLE OF BUNKER’S HILL” Randall, Jefferson, III, 454. .

“I HAVE MUCH CONFIDENCE” TJ to François Barbé de Marbois, June 14, 1817. Extract published at Papers of Thomas Jefferson Retirement Series Digital Archive, www.monticello.org/familyletters (accessed 2011).

“LIKE A FIRE BELL IN THE NIGHT” TJ to John Holmes, April 22, 1820. Extract published at Papers of Thomas Jefferson Retirement Series Digital Archive, www.monticello.org/familyletters (accessed 2011).

“THE CESSION OF THAT KIND” Randall, Jefferson, III, 456.

“THE BANKS, BANKRUPT LAW” Cappon, Adams-Jefferson Letters, 548–49.

THE RESOLUTION WAS A COMPROMISEHowe, Wrought, 147–60. See also Wilentz, Rise of American Democracy, 231–40, and Robert Pierce Forbes, The Missouri Compromise and Its Aftermath: Slavery and the Meaning of America (Chapel Hill, N.C., 2007).

“IT IS NOT A MORAL QUESTION” TJ to the Marquis de Lafayette, December 26, 1820. Extract published at Papers of Thomas Jefferson Retirement Series Digital Archive, http://retirementseries.dataformat.com (accessed 2011).

“THE LEADERS OF FEDERALISM” Randall, Jefferson, III, 457. “They are taking advantage of the virtuous feelings of the people to effect a division of parties by a geographical line; they expect that this will insure them, on local principles, the majority they could never obtain on principles of Federalism,” said Jefferson. Ibid.

“A HIDEOUS BLOT” TJ to William Short, September 8, 1823. Extract published at Papers of Thomas Jefferson Retirement Series Digital Archive, http://retirementseries.dataformat.com (accessed 2011).

“THIS, MY DEAR SIR” PTJRS, VII, 604. The plan had been proposed by Edward Coles.

“THERE IS NOTHING I WOULD NOT SACRIFICE” PTJRS, VII, 652.

“NOTHING IS MORE CERTAINLY WRITTEN” Jefferson, Writings, 44.

AN INTRINSIC “DEGRADATION” PTJRS, VII, 603.

RENDERING MORAL JUDGMENTS IN RETROSPECTI am indebted to Arthur Schlesinger, Jr., for this insight. “Self-righteousness in retrospect is easy—also cheap,” he used to say.

BEGINNING WITH ROBERT CARTERSee Andrew Levy, The First Emancipator: The Forgotten Story of Robert Carter, the Founding Father Who Freed His Slaves (New York, 2005).

THE POLITICIANS OF THE NORTH Wilentz, Rise of American Democracy, 218–22. See also Eric Foner, The Story of American Freedom (New York, 1998), 84–94.

“THE SOUTHERN INTEREST” Sharp, “Unraveling the Mystery of Jefferson’s Letter of April 27, 1795,” 411–18.

“I DO NOT SAY THIS” Randall, Jefferson, III, 499.

“WHERE THE DISEASE IS MOST” Ford, Writings, IX, 516.

“THE MARCH OF EVENTS” TJ to Frances Wright, August 7, 1825. Extract published at Papers of Thomas Jefferson Retirement Series Digital Archive, www.monticello.org/familyletters (accessed 2011).

PERSONAL DEBT WAS ANOTHER ENDURING IRONYHerbert E. Sloan, Principle and Interest: Thomas Jefferson and the Problem of Debt (New York, 1995), is the standard account. See also TJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/research-and-collections/debt (accessed 2012); and Gordon-Reed, Hemingses of Monticello, 629–35.

PLANTERS OF HIS TIME AND PLACERobert E. Brown and B. Katherine Brown, Virginia, 1705–1786: Democracy or Aristocracy? (East Lansing, Mich., 1964), 96–124.

THE GROWING OF TOBACCOSee, for instance, T. H. Breen, Tobacco Culture: The Mentality of the Great Tidewater Planters on the Eve of Revolution (Princeton, N.J., 1987); and TJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/plantation-and-slavery/crops-monticello (accessed 2012).

TRIED TO MOVE AWAYIbid.

ALWAYS GREW THE CROPFB, 255–310.

A CONFLUENCE OF FACTORS TJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/plantation-and-slavery/crops-monticello (accessed 2012). See also Gordon-Reed, Hemingses of Monticello, 316–17.

WORTH £4,000 Sloan, Principle and Interest, 18.

SKYROCKETING INFLATIONIbid., 16.

“BUT A SHADOW” Ibid.

THE DEBT REMAINEDVirginia law protected him from British creditors, even under the Treaty of Paris. The signing of the Constitution, however, made him vulnerable to collection, and is probably part of the reason he asked to return from France in late 1788. At home he would be better able to manage the farming at Monticello and to bring his finances into order. (Ibid., 16–17, 21.) See also http://www.monticello.org/site/research-and-collections/debt and Gordon-Reed, Hemingses of Monticello, 629–35.

“BY THE SMOOTH HANDLE” Randall, Jefferson, III, 525.

THE PROSPECT OF RUIN WAS REAL Sloan, Principle and Interest, 3–12. See also Gordon-Reed, Hemingses of Monticello, 629–35, and JHT, VI, 301–16 and 473–78.

EVEN MORE EAGERTJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/jefferson/quotations-university-virginia.

“AS WELL AS HE DID 10 YEARS AGO” Elizabeth Trist to Nicholas P. Trist, March 9, 1819. Extract published at Papers of Thomas Jefferson Retirement Series Digital Archive, www.monticello.org/familyletters (accessed 2011).

“THE PAPERS TELL US” Randall, Jefferson, III, 476.

HE PUT A FOOT WRONG Ibid., 486–87.

“DURING SUMMER” Ibid., 476.

“LIKE OTHER YOUNG PEOPLE” Cappon, Adams-Jefferson Letters, 613–14.

“WE HAVE BEEN TOO CARELESS” Randall, Jefferson, III, 488.

CROSSING THE RIVANNA Virginia J. Randolph (Trist) to Nicholas Philip Trist, May 13, 1823. Extract published at Papers of Thomas Jefferson Retirement Series Digital Archive, http://retirementseries.dataformat.com (accessed 2011).

IN OCTOBER 1823 HE ANSWEREDRandall, Jefferson, III, 491. See also T. R. Schellenberg, “Jeffersonian Origins of the Monroe Doctrine,” Hispanic American Historical Review 14 (February 1934): 1–31.

“THE QUESTION PRESENTED” Randall, Jefferson, III, 491.

“YOU ARE NOT TO BELIEVE” IbID., 495.

JEFFERSON FAVORED CRAWFORDHowe, Wrought, 203. See also JHT, VI, 431–32.

JACKSON’S CHARGES OF A “CORRUPT BARGAIN” See, for instance, Wilentz, Rise of American Democracy, 254–57.

ARRIVING AT MONTICELLO TJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/research-and-collections/lafayettes-visit-to-monticello-1824 (accessed 2012). I am indebted to these accounts for my portrait of the visit. See also Randall, Jefferson, III, 503. For a general account of Lafayette’s journey to America, see Howe, WroughT, 304–5.

AT A BANQUET IN LAFAYETTE’S HONORRandall, Jefferson, III, 504.

“HIS DEEDS IN THE WAR” IBID.

“BORN AND BRED AMONG YOUR FATHERS” IBID.

“IN CONVERSATION” Ibid., 506.

“I FEEL MUCH ALARMED” IBID.

“I CANNOT PRETEND” IBID., 507.

COSIGNED A NOTE FOR $20,000 Ibid., 533–35. Randall is my source for the Nicholas EpISODE.

THE MARKET WAS BADFor the story of the lottery, see JHT, VI, 473–82, 488, 495–96, 511.

HE HAD BEEN, PATSY SAIDIbId., 473.

IN AN APPEAL TO THE GENERAL ASSEMBLYIbid., 473–78.

TO HIS HORRORIBID., 479.

WAS IN CHARGE OF THE ARRANGEMENTSIBId.

ASKED TO SEND COUNSEL TO A YOUNG NAMESAKE Randall, Jefferson, III, 524–25.

IN A BIZARRE EPISODEIbiD., 540.

“THE REVOLUTION IN PUBLIC OPINION” Jefferson, Writings, 1516. The occasion was a letter to James Heaton dated May 20, 1826.

“IT IS NOW THREE WEEKS” Bear, “Last Few Days in the Life of Thomas Jefferson,” 63–79.

STILL, HE REFUSED TO GIVE UPRandall, Jefferson, III, 538.

ORGANIZERS OF THE WASHINGTON CELEBRATIONSJefferson, WritingS, 1516.

“ALL EYES ARE OPENED” Ibid., 1517.

“TAKE CARE OF ME WHEN DEAD” IbId., 1515.

A DIFFERENT PASSION: WINEJ. Jefferson Looney, “Thomas Jefferson’s Last Letter,” Virginia Magazine of History and Biography 112, no. 2 (2004): 178–84.

HE CONTINUED TO READRandall, Jefferson, III, 539.

FORTY-THREE · NO, DOCTOR, NOTHING MORE

“THE LOSS OF MR. JEFFERSON” Randall, Jefferson, III, 551.

JEFFERSON PAINFULLY PUT PEN TO PAPER Bear, “Last Few Days in the Life of Thomas JefferSOn,” 65.

THE DOCTOR SAID HE WAS “APPREHENSIVE” IBID.

HIS DAUGHTER SAT WITH HIM DURING THE DAYRandall, Jefferson, III, 543.

THOMAS MANN RANDOLPH, JR., THE MAN WHOBear, “Last Few Days in the Life of Thomas JeffersON,” 66.

“HIS MIND WAS ALWAYS CLEAR” Randall, Jefferson, III, 543.

JEFFERSON TOLD HIS GRANDSONIbID., 544.

LEE WAS ON A MISSIONVTM, 108.

PATSY STOPPED LEEIbiD., 108–9.

HE WAS “NEVER MORE TO BEHOLD” IbID., 109.

JEFFERSON, LYING IN HIS BEDIBID.

“MY EMOTIONS AT APPROACHING” IBID.

JEFFERSON COULD NOT HELP LEEIbiD., 108–9.

AN INTRIGUING DETAIL Ibid., 109–10.

“MRS. RANDOLPH AFTERWARDS TOLD ME” IbId., 110.

HE SAID GOOD-BYERandall, Jefferson, III, 543–44.

“GEORGE DOES NOT” IbiD., 544.

“LORD, NOW LETTEST THOU THY SERVANT” IbID., 547.

THOMAS JEFFERSON RANDOLPH SUGGESTED IbiD., 543.

“DO NOT IMAGINE FOR A MOMENT” IBID.

“THAT ETERNAL SLEEP” TJ to William Short, May 5, 1816. Extract published at Papers of Thomas Jefferson Retirement Series Digital Archive, www.monticello.org/familyletters (accessEd 2012).

HE AWOKE TO A NOISERandall, Jefferson, III, 543.

HE HAD COMPOSED A POEMTDLTJ, 429. Also see Bear, “Last Few Days in the Life of Thomas JeffeRSON,” 73.

MUSED ABOUT THE REVOLUTIONRandall, Jefferson, III, 543.

HIS BED CURTAINS, HE NOTEDIbID.

“A FEW HOURS MORE” IBid.

AT FIVE FORTY-FIVE P.M. ON THE SECONDBear, “Last Few Days in the Life of Thomas JefferSoN,” 73.

HE SLEPT FITFULLY IBId.

THEN, ON THE EVENING OF THE THIRDRandall, Jefferson, III, 548.

JEFFERSON TOOK WHAT WOULD BEBear, “Last Few Days in the Life of Thomas JeffersOn,” 73.

“OH GOD” Nicholas P. Trist to Joseph Coolidge, “His Bedside, July 4th, 1826,” University of Virginia, Correspondence of Ellen Wayles Randolph COoliDGE.

“NO, DOCTOR, NOTHING MORE” Bear, “Last Few Days in the Life of Thomas JefferSOn,” 74.

THE REMAINING THREE HOURSIbID., 75.

“THIS IS THE FOURTH? IBID.

TRIST COULD NOT BRING HIMSELFIBID.

MURMURING ABOUT THE REVOLUTIONARY COMMITTEE OF SAFETYIbid., 74–75.

“WARN THE COMMITTEE” Randall, Jefferson, III, 546.

AT FOUR O’CLOCK IN THE MORNINGBear, “Last Few Days in the Life of Thomas JefferSoN,” 75.

AT TEN HE STIRREDIbiD.

IT WAS BURWELL COLBERTRandall, Jefferson, III, 544. Also see Gordon-Reed, Hemingses of Monticello, 650–51.

AT TEN MINUTES BEFORE ONE O’CLOCKRandall, Jefferson, III, 542.

HE DIED WITH HIS EYES OPENIbID., 544.

THOMAS JEFFERSON RANDOLPH TOUCHED IBId.

NICHOLAS TRIST QUIETLY CLIPPEDBear, “Last Few Days in the Life of Thomas JefferSOn,” 76.

THE WOODEN COFFIN BUILT BY JOHN HEMINGSGordon-Reed, Hemingses of MonticELLo, 651.

THE COFFIN WAS TAKEN TO THE PARLORBear, “Last Few Days in the Life of Thomas JeffersOn,” 77.

“TO ME HE HAS BEEN MORE” Randall, Jefferson, III, 551.

“HE LIVES AND WILL LIVE” IbiD., 550.

“HE OUGHT TO BE REVERED” VTM, 102–3.

WORMLEY HUGHES, THE GARDENER, DUGGordon-Reed, Hemingses of MonticeLLo, 652.

THE WEATHER HAD BEEN WETBear, “Last Few Days in the Life of Thomas JeffeRSOn,” 77.

GOT A LATE STARTIbID., 78.

A SMALL GROUPIbiD., 77–78.

READ THE BURIAL OFFICEIbid., 78.

“ ‘I AM THE RESURRECTION AND THE LIFE’ ” IbID.

IN HIS LIFE AND IN HIS WILL JEFFERSON Gordon-Reed, Hemingses of MonticellO, 649–51.

THE FOUR CHILDREN OF JEFFERSON AND SALLY’STJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/plantation-and-slavery/sally-hemings (accessed 2012). This article is based on the research of Lucia STANTOn.

“HARRIET MARRIED A WHITE MAN” TJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/plantation-and-slavery/harriet-hemings (accessED 2012).

MADISON WAS FREED IN JEFFERSON’S WILLTJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/plantation-and-slavery/sally-hemings (accesSED 2012).

MOVED TO OHIOIBiD.

SETTLED IN WISCONSINIBiD.

CHANGED HIS NAMEIBId.

DECLARED HIMSELF TO BE WHITE IBID.

BOTH WERE CARPENTERS AND FARMERSIbID.

IN HIS WILL JEFFERSON ALSO FREEDGordon-Reed, Hemingses of MonticELlO, 647.

NO OTHER SLAVESIBID., 657.

SOON MOVED TO CHARLOTTESVILLEIbID., 659.

JEFFERSON DID NOT NAME HER IN HIS WILL IbID., 657.

THERE IS EVIDENCE Gordon-Reed, Hemingses of Monticello, 657. “Sally Hemings’s situation was convoluted and mysterious, as it had been since her return to America, but one can piece together what happened,” wrote Gordon-Reed. “Many years later, in 1873, Israel Gillette stated that Jefferson had freed seven slaves, including Sally Hemings and all her children. Of course, he only freed five people in his will. Beverly and Harriet Hemings simply left Monticello as white people with no formal emancipation. Who were the other two? Jefferson evidently made oral bequests of freedom as well. Members of his family told Henry Randall that Jefferson had directed his daughter to free forty-five-year-old Wormley Hughes, if he wanted to be free. For very obvious reasons, no one in the family would report to a historian an oral instruction from Jefferson to free Sally Hemings if she wanted it. Eight years after her father’s death, Martha Randolph directed that two of her father’s slaves, Sally Hemings and Wormley Hughes, and one of her own Randolph slaves, Betsy, the wife of Peter Hemings, be given ‘their time,’ even though all had been living as free people since Jefferson’s death.” (IbID.)

GAVE SALLY HEMINGS “HER TIME” Ibid. “ ‘Giving time’ was a customary way of emancipation that avoided having to make a request to the legislature or county court to allow the enslaved person to remain in the state,” wrote Gordon-ReeD. (IbID.)

MADE SALLY HEMINGS’S EMANCIPATION IBID., 243.

SHE BEQUEATHED SOME SOUVENIRSIbID., 653.

THE LOTTERY HE HAD HOPEDJHT, VI, 496.

BETWEEN $1 MILLION AND $2 MILLIONTJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/research-and-collections/debt (accessED 2012).

MONTICELLO AND HIS SLAVES HAD TO BE SOLD Gordon-Reed, Hemingses of Monticello, 655–62. (Gordon-Reed rightly describes the post-Jefferson Monticello as “the final catastrophe.” [Ibid., 655.]) See also Randall, Jefferson, III, 561–63; JHT, VI, 504–14; and Crawford, Twilight at Monticello, 247–61. For an account of the fate of the Monticello mansion itself, see Marc Leepson, Saving Monticello: The Levy Family’s Epic Quest to Rescue the House That Jefferson Built (New YorK, 2001).

“VISIBLE AND PALPABLE MARKS” Diary of John Quincy ADAMs, 360.

ONE MORNING BEFORE BREAKFASTRobert V. Remini, Daniel Webster: The Man and His Time (New York, 1997), 263. Webster described how he wrote the speech to Millard Fillmore. (IBID.)

ON A BEAUTIFUL DAY IN BOSTONIbiD., 264.

“ON OUR FIFTIETH ANNIVERSARY” The Works of Daniel Webster, I, 113.

“THOMAS JEFFERSON SURVIVES” McCullough, John Adams, 646. The manuscript source is Susan Boylston Adams Clark to Abigail Louisa Smith Adams Johnson, July 9, 1826, A. B. Johnson Papers, Massachusetts HistoricaL SOCIETy.

EPILOGUE · ALL HONOR TO JEFFERSON

“JEFFERSON’S PRINCIPLES ARE SOURCES OF LIGHT” Woodrow Wilson, College and State Educational Literary and Political Papers (1875–1913), II, ed. Ray Stannard Baker and William E. Dodd (New York, 1925), 428.

HE SURVIVES AS HE LIVEDJack N. Rakove, “Our Jefferson” in Lewis and Onuf, Sally Hemings and Thomas Jefferson, 210. “Jefferson remains alive for us—‘us’ being both scholars and the public—to an extent and with an attractive power that none of his contemporaries can rival: not Madison, with his more deeply probing intellect; not Washington, struggling with the importance of being George; not even Franklin, the other self-fashioned sage whose inner life rivals Jefferson’s in its elusiveness.” (Ibid., 210.)

“TO HAVE BEEN THE INSTRUMENT” Edward Everett, An Address Delivered at Charlestown, August 1, 1826, In Commemoration of John Adams and Thomas Jefferson (Boston, 1826), 134.

“MR. JEFFERSON MEANT” Merrill D. Peterson, The Jefferson Image in the American Mind (Charlottesville, Va., 1998), 284.

ELLEN WAYLES COOLIDGE WAS EN ROUTE Ellen Wayles Coolidge to Henry S. Randall, May 16, 1857, University of Virginia. Extract published at Papers of Thomas Jefferson Retirement Series Digital Archive, www.monticello.org/familyletters (accesseD 2012).

“IF JEFFERSON WAS WRONG” Parton, LiFE, iii.

“MAN … FEELS THAT” TJ to Joseph C. Cabell, February 2, 1816, University of Virginia. Extract published at Papers of Thomas Jefferson Retirement Series Digital Archive, http://retirementseries.dataformat.com (accesseD 2012).

“THE LEADERSHIP HE SOUGHT” Henry Adams, HistoRY, 363.

“THE PRINCIPLES OF JEFFERSON” The Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln, III, ed. Roy P. Basler (New Brunswick, N.J., 1953–55), 375–76. The letter is dated April 6, 1859.

“ALL HONOR TO JEFFERSON” IbiD., 376.

“IT IS NOT NECESSARY FOR US” Franklin D. Roosevelt, “Address at Jefferson Day Dinner in St. Paul, Minnesota,” April 18, 1932, The American Presidency Project, http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid=88409 (accessEd 2012).

IN SEPTEMBER 1948, AT THE BONHAM HIGH SCHOOLHarry S. Truman, “Address at Bonham, Texas,” September 27, 1948, The American Presidency Project, http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=13021 (accessed 2012).

“I HAVE A PROFOUND FAITH” IBId.

SALUTING JEFFERSON’S “TRANSFORMING GENIUS” Ronald Reagan, “Remarks and a Question-and-Answer Session at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville,” December 16, 1988, The American Presidency Project, http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=35272 (accesseD 2012).

“PRESIDENTS KNOW ABOUT THIS” IBId.

“HE KNEW HOW” IBID.

ACHIEVEMENTS HE ORDERED CARVEDTJ, undated memorandum on epitaph, Thomas Jefferson PapeRS, LOC.

“AND I HAVE OBSERVED” TJ to William Ludlow, September 6, 1824 (LOC). Extract published at Papers of Thomas Jefferson Retirement Series Digital Archive, www.monticello.org/familyletters (accesSEd 2012).

HE WAS BORNEBear, “Last Few Days in the Life of Thomas JefferSON,” 65.

WHEN DUSK COMES I am an indebted to Fraser D. Neiman of Monticello, who generously checked my observation that the cemetery remained in sunlight longer than Shadwell, the Rivanna, Monticello itself, Mulberry Row, and the main gardens and orchards.

Fraser and his team ran a solar radiation simulation in a geographical information system (ArcGIS), using a digital elevation model of Monticello Mountain and the surrounding topography, including Montalto. The simulation took into account the effects of topography. The simulation estimated the amount of solar radiation that hit the ground surface between the hours of seven and eight p.m. on July 6, 1826. The result showed that the ground surface at the cemetery remains in direct sunlight after the ground surfaces around the mansion and around the houses on Mulberry Row have passed into shadow. The northwestern slope of the mountain is the only portion of Jefferson’s five thousand acres that remain in light after the cemetery itself passes into shaDOW.