Thomas Jefferson on “laws of necessity”
A strict observance of the written law is … one of the high duties of a good citizen, but it is not the highest. The laws of necessity, of self-preservation, of saving our country when in danger, are...
View ArticleThomas Jefferson on Indians and alcohol
I am happy to learn you have been … made sensible of those things … which are hurtful …; and particularly … the ruinous effects which the abuse of spirituous liquors have produced upon them [your...
View ArticleThomas Jefferson on capital punishment
… capital punishments, which exterminate instead of reforming … should be the last melancholy resource against those whose existence is become inconsistent with the safety of their fellow citizens …...
View ArticleDoes one lie lead to another? And another? And …
In this video post, Thomas Jefferson offers some sage advice to his 15 year old nephew. View it here. To Peter Carr, 1785, 4731 Patrick Lee’s Explanation There is none needed on the subject matter....
View ArticleHow do the poor people live?
… I fell in with a poor woman walking at the same rate with myself and going the same course. Wishing to know the condition of the labouring poor I entered into conversation with her … and thence...
View ArticleLuxury, drinking and whores! Oh, my!
But why send an American youth to Europe for education? … he learns drinking, horse racing and boxing … acquires a fondness for European luxury and dissipation, and a contempt for the simplicity of...
View ArticleCan men under God remain oppressors forever?
…There must doubtless be an unhappy influence on the manners of our people produced by the existence of slavery among us… And can the liberties of a nation be thought secure when we have removed their...
View ArticleWatch out for these folks!
Look steadily to the pursuits which have carried you to Philadelphia, be very select in the society you attach yourself to; avoid taverns, drinkers, smoakers, and idlers and dissipated persons...
View ArticleHow would you attack a great evil?
In the very first session held under republican government, the assembly [Continental Congress, 1774] passed a law for the perpetual prohibition of the importation of slaves. This will in some measure...
View ArticleDeath, chain gangs and disfigurement!
On the subject of the Criminal law, all were agreed that the punishment of death should be abolished, except for treason and murder. And that, for other felonies, should be substituted hard labor in...
View ArticleHow would you define virtue? Its opposite?
I will place under this a syllabus of the doctrines of Epicurus … Virtue consists in 1. Prudence. 2. Temperance....
View ArticleGood faith vs. bad faith
A character of good faith is of as much value to a nation as to an individual. The Anas, 1808, (# 5638, Foley’s Cyclopedia) Patrick Lee’s Explanation Good faith benefits all – individuals, leaders and...
View ArticleWhat advice does a dying man offer?
This letter will, to you, be as one from the dead, the writer will be in the grave before you can weigh it’s counsels. your affectionate and excellent father has requested that I would address to you...
View ArticleWhat kind of aristocracy would you prefer?
I obtained leave to bring in a bill declaring tenants in tail to hold their lands in fee simple … To annul this privilege, and instead of an aristocracy of wealth, of more harm and danger, than...
View ArticleOff with her head!
But he [King Louis XVI] had a Queen [Marie Antoinette] of absolute sway over his weak mind, and timid virtue … [with] some smartness of fancy, but no sound sense was proud, disdainful of restraint,...
View ArticleRight or wrong to behead the King and Queen?
The deed [beheading the king and queen] which closed the mortal course of these sovereigns, I shall neither approve nor condemn. I am not prepared to say that the first magistrate of a nation cannot...
View ArticleRight or wrong is not complicated!
Open your breast, sire, to liberal and expanded thought. Let not the name of George the third be a blot in the page of history …. The great principles of right and wrong are legible to every reader; to...
View ArticleWho exactly is in charge here? Part 11 D (OR Yours is yours. Mine is mine. We...
[This is the 14th post in a series abstracted from Jefferson’s famous “My Head and My Heart” dialogue written to Maria Cosway. This is part of Heart’s final reply.] Heart: When nature assigned us...
View ArticleWho exactly is in charge here? Part 11 E (OR Stingy people justify being...
[This is the 15th post in a series abstracted from Jefferson’s famous “My Head and My Heart” dialogue written to Maria Cosway. This is part of Heart’s final reply.] Heart: A few facts .. to prove to...
View ArticleI admit it. I was wrong.
The inclosed copy of a letter to mr Lincoln will so fully explain it’s own object, that I need say nothing in that way. I communicate it to particular friends because I wish to stand with them on the...
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