In response to a post-election email from University President Teresa Sullivan urging “a spirit of inclusivity,” several hundred members of the University community wrote an open letter expressing disappointment and concern about Sullivan’s decision to include a quote from Thomas Jefferson, positioning him as a “moral compass.” This event has sparked a series of further responses, and we were heartened to learn that the Student Council will address this issue. As educators and alumnae of the University, we were moved to respond to and continue this important conversation. Rather than argue for or against quoting Jefferson in University communications, we want to contextualize the letters, and subsequent responses to them, in relation to the ethical and educational responsibilities of institutions like the University in this contemporary moment.
During our time as undergraduates at the University in 2007, the Board of Visitors issued an apology for the school’s “employment of enslaved persons” prior to the Civil War. Notably absent from the apology was an acknowledgement of Jefferson's institutional participation in slavery, his own role as an enslaver, his active participation as a statesman in naturalizing the colonization of the continent, his advocating for the assimilation of indigenous peoples and his rationalizing the enslavement of what he believed to be the naturally inferior black people.
The letter in response to Sullivan’s email signals a growing willingness of the University faculty and students to engage in the difficult and self-implicated conversations that are necessary for making sense of the contradictions of liberty and domination, and of equality and exclusion, that have animated this country since its inception. In many ways, Jefferson embodied these contradictions. In her response to the letter, Sullivan does acknowledge these contradictions, but she does not thoroughly consider their implications, suggesting Jefferson’s racism was a product “of his time” — we might then ask why Jefferson’s vision of American democracy is presumed to be timeless.
We note that nowhere did the letter call for censoring Sullivan, or for banning the use of Jefferson’s words. Rather, it suggests that “it is time to rethink their utility” in relation to supporting “the spirit of inclusivity” that Sullivan herself called for. We are concerned that many immediate responses to the letter have rushed to Jefferson’s defense, while ignoring its primary concern: that some members of the University community might negatively perceive the fact that a man who exhibited racist thought and action is being held up as a model for students, regardless of his other accomplishments. Responding to this concern does not require removing every trace of Jefferson from Grounds, but it does demand further reflection as to why some would refuse him as a moral compass. If the University is going to embrace Jefferson’s legacy, then it can no longer do so selectively, celebrating his achievements while ignoring the racist and sexist ideologies and actions that animated much of his public work and personal life.
This means facing up to the truth not only about Jefferson himself, but also about how the contradictory beliefs that he embodied continue to characterize this country’s society at all levels. It also means addressing the ongoing presence of white supremacy on and around Grounds, as is evident from recent events. If our responses to this exchange of letters are calibrated primarily by a concern to defend Jefferson’s legacy, including the claim “Thomas Jefferson was a racist. But he was a reluctant racist,” rather than by the need to have more honest conversations about our national and institutional histories, then we may inadvertently perpetuate harmful systems. We suggest that many of the tools and frames we have previously used to analyze and act in the world may be insufficient for contemporary contexts, and we embrace the new possibilities that might arise out of efforts to face up to the contradictions that continue to unevenly shape our relationships and experiences in the present. Rather than try to make peace with these contradictions, we need to ask what they are teaching us about how even our great institutions have been subsidized by violence, and why we continue to defend unchanging values in an ever-changing world. We read the letter to Sullivan as one example of how educational communities like the University might foster conversations that are not premised on arriving at the “right” answer, but rather on a commitment to imagining and practicing alternatives for living together in ways that Jefferson himself could not imagine.
Samantha Clarkson and Sharon Stein are 2008 graduates of the College.
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