Thomas Jefferson wrote that “music is the favorite passion of my soul.” He was an avid collector of musical scores, and believed that the new republic needed to build a musical tradition. The blog “Musicology for Everyone” lists the third president as the second most musical, after Warren Harding, who played the sousaphone well enough to join the band celebrating his election.
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Thomas! Get off that mammoth right now!
Martha! I found a giant wooly horse! Look!
"I am for responsibilities at short periods, seeing neither reason nor safety in making public functionaries independent of the nation for life, or even for long terms of years. On this principle I prefer the Presidential term of four years, to that of seven years, which I myself had at first suggested, annexing to it, however, ineligibility forever after; and I wish it were now annexed to the second quadrennial election of President."
-Thomas Jefferson on presidential term limits
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"I should be a very unhappy man, if I left my tranquility at the mercy of the misinterpretations which friends as well as foes are fond of giving to my conduct."
-Alexander Hamilton to Gouverneur Morris, February 27, 1802 (via publius-report)
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"There are two or three objects which you should endeavor to enrich our country with. One is the Alpine strawberry."
-Thomas Jefferson to James Monroe
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"It happens that of all the machines which have been employed to aid human labor, I have made myself the least acquainted with (that which is certainly the most powerful of all) the steam engine. In its original and simple form indeed, as first constructed by Newcommen and Savary, it had been a subject of my early studies; but once possessed of the principle, I ceased to follow up the numerous modifications of the machinery for employing it, of which I do not know whether England or our own country has produced the greater number."
-Thomas Jefferson
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[Flash 9 is required to listen to audio.]
This Week’s Show “Jefferson’s Second”
Show 972 “Jefferson’s Second” (5-20-12)
This week Thomas Jefferson Hour again explains his views on the second amendment. The second amendment is a part of the Bill of Rights which was adopted on December 15, 1791. The amendment, as ratified by the States and authenticated by Thomas Jefferson, Secretary of State reads:A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.
(Source: jeffersonhour.com)
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"Teach all the children to venerate the mocking-bird as a superior being in the form of a bird, or as a being which will haunt them if any harm is done to itself or its eggs. I shall hope that the multiplication of the cedar in the neighborhood, and of the trees and shrubs round the house [Monticello] will attract more of them; for they like to be in the neighborhood of our habitations if they furnish cover."
-Thomas Jefferson
George Washington attacks bigotry in letter to Jewish congregation
A letter penned by George Washington that’s been locked away for a decade will be the centerpiece of an exhibit dedicated to America’s early roots in religious freedom.
The 337-word document sent to the Hebrew Congregation in Newport, R.I., in August 1790 was addressed to “the children of the stock of Abraham” and poetically quoted the Old Testament, vowing that the new government “gives to bigotry no sanction, to persecution no assistance.”
The National Museum of American Jewish History in Philadelphia, where the letter will be displayed, calls the text a defining statement of religious liberty in the new United States.
What Did Thomas Jefferson’s World Sound Like?
Despite Jefferson’s ear for music, however, little attention has been paid to what he heard and how he processed those sounds. A modern-day visitor to Charlottesville, Va. and Jefferson’s estate, Monticello, has a pretty good idea of what Jefferson’s hometown looked like 200 years ago—but what did it sound like? The modern soundscape has car alarms, construction rumble, and amplified music. The sounds of cicadas, thunder, speech, bells, and horse hooves animated early America. Music resounded in taverns, parlors, political rallies, official celebrations, and dances.
Thanks to new exhibits at Monticello and at the Smithsonian Museum of American History, we can get an idea of what life was like not just inside the white columned residence of the third president but also on Mulberry Row, in the homes of slaves who made Jefferson’s life possible. The exhibits display the fundamental Jeffersonian paradox: a man who was a champion of liberty and a slaveholder. It’s a paradox Jefferson himself seems not to have wanted to be reminded of.
Blocking unwanted sounds is easy in our iPod era. Headphones allow us to avoid crying babies, chattering passengers, and other unpleasant noise. Jefferson didn’t have such technology, but he found other ways to mute the sounds of his plantation at work. For starters, Jefferson kept “noise” outside the house. My colleague Craig Barton notes that Jefferson used architecture and landscaping to “render invisible the slaves and their place of work from the important symbolic view of the property.” Placing the slave quarters and workspaces downslope also minimized slave sounds penetrating Mr. Jefferson’s bastion—sound travels poorly uphill. What noise did arrive at Jefferson’s home was kept at bay by plate glass windows.
Outside those windows, and down the hill, Monticello reverberated with sounds of discipline and work. In the nailery, from dawn to dusk, 12 boys stood around open fires heading nails with heavy hammers. Occasionally, the overseer would beat them. All of these sounds, metal on metal and whip on flesh, punctuated the workshop even as they remained inaudible in the planation house.
In Jefferson’s day, even black music was understood as noise. Frederick Douglass’ call to listen to the meanings of slaves singing and abolitionists’ collections of slave songs were still decades away. We know Jefferson heard slaves make music, and yet he mentioned their ability to sing or play an instrument only twice in all of his writings. Their songs simply did not count as the elevated art that was the president’s favorite passion.………
Hamilton asks Washington to let him go on the expedition against the Whiskey Rebellion
Upon full reflection, I entertain an opinion, that it is adviseable for me on public ground, considering the connexion between the immediate ostensible cause of the insurrection in the western Country & my Department, to go out upon the expedition against the insurgents. In a Government like ours, it cannot but have a good effect for the person, who is understood to be the adviser or proposer of a measure, which involves danger to his fellow Citizens, to partake in that danger: while not to do it might have a bad effect. I therefore request your permission for the purpose.
My intention would be not to leave this till about the close of the month, so as to reach one of the columns at its ultimate point of rendezvous. In the mean time I take it for granted General Knox will arrive & the arrangements which will be made, will leave the Treasury Department in a situation to suffer no embarrassment by my absence, which if it be thought necessary, may terminate about or shortly after the meeting of Congress. With perfect respect &c.
A. Hamilton.
Come, on, Hamilton, we all know you just want to go because you want to go.
