Thomas Jefferson

As we come to the 4th of July, lets look at one of our founding fathers - Thomas Jefferson. First of all - overrated. Thats not altogether a bad thing. You have to be pretty highly thought by quite a few people to begin with that rate you highly. Nobody ever calls Millard Fillmore overrated. 

Lets start with his bad points. For people he didn't like, e.g., Alexander Hamilton, he would anonymously write terrible things and have them printed in newspapers. He owned slaves - hundreds of them. As governor, when his capitol was under attack, he literally ran for the hills. Louisiana Purchase? A good deal, but its not like he had a lot to do with it. Napoleon was having a liquidation sale and Jefferson said OK to the deal. 

His good points - He was a great writer - The Declaration of Independence, etc. And I can almost give him a pass on the hypocritcal "All men are created equal part". I read somewhere that when he sent out Lewis and Clark, one of the things he wanted them to find out is - were the Indians fully human or something closer to animals. If that was truly how he viewed his slaves, he doesn't seem quite as morally bankrupt. Still a really bad look for him, but perhaps somewhat understandable.  

Very smart. He was a really creative scientist and inventor. He was a backstabber at times, but actually I prefer that to front stabbing. For people he liked, I think he was very kind and personable. He has a really cool house. There is the Sally Hemmings issue, but they say he had a sleazy brother living with him for a time who would have had similar DNA, so maybe he gets acquited on that issue.

I think I need to read another book about him and give him another shot.