As any casual visitor to the University can see, Jefferson’s name and face are omnipresent on Grounds. The Jefferson Scholars, the Jefferson Society and the statue of Jefferson on the Lawn demonstrate how his legacy lives on at the University he founded. Yet a recent article in The Cavalier Daily by fellow Viewpoint writer Alexander Adames questions this adoration of Jefferson on the grounds that “such sycophancy ignores the fact that Thomas Jefferson was a racist and slave owner.” Adames makes a valid point: to venerate Jefferson as a demigod would be to accept his ideas as flawless. However, Adames is wrong to say we can only “extol his ideas… instead of the man.” There is a middle road between the extremes of deification and rejection, one in which we accept Jefferson’s flaws as congruent with the flaws of the society he lived in, yet still admire him as a man for his intellectual contributions, leadership and the creation of the University we now attend.
Looking back at history through the lens of modern morality, it’s easy to see the cracks in the glorified historical leaders we have been shown. Many acted in a manner we would consider despicable today. George Washington was a slaveowner, Franklin Roosevelt was anti-semitic and Theodore Roosevelt was a eugenicist — to name a few. There were even some who acted immorally by the standards of their times. Both John F. Kennedy and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. were adulterers, and Dr. King plagiarized parts of his sermons and speeches. Despite their glaring flaws, these men still feature prominently in our society, with monuments and memorials to their names. This is because for the most part their beliefs and actions are considered a byproduct of the unenlightened times they lived in, or inconsequential compared to the enormous positive changes they wrought on this nation. Jefferson should not be any different.
As Adames points out, Jefferson was far from perfect. He was a racist and a slaveholder even though he claimed to believe in freedom and equality. But we base our admiration of a person on his accomplishments, not just the sins he refrains from committing, and the echoes of Jefferson’s accomplishments still resonate today. As president, he doubled the size of the United States with the acquisition of the Louisiana Territory and helped map the North American continent by commissioning the Lewis and Clark Expedition. Earlier, while a leader of the Enlightenment, he was a proponent of the ideas of self-government and freedom of religion, ideas which became cornerstones of the Declaration of Independence. As an architect, he designed his home, Monticello and the University, which was noteworthy for his idea of an “academical village.” Through these actions, Jefferson’s legacy lives on both physically and intellectually, and it is a legacy that makes him worthy of our admiration.
While Jefferson’s actions certainly make him praiseworthy, Adames is right to note that saying Jefferson was “holistically a noble, benevolent or great man is misguided.” Where Adames goes wrong, however, is saying that praising “Jefferson as a person” suggests “appreciation for everything about the man, including his personality and practices.” Jefferson was flawed, to be sure, but his sins were the sins of his time, and did not belong to him alone. Our praise for Jefferson as a man in no way suggests we approve of all that he did, only that we admire his exceptional leadership, intellectual abilities and the contribution he made to forming our nation.
Alex Mink is a Viewpoint writer.
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