printI’m delighted to inform you that I will be joining the valorous VDARE.COM family with a regular monthly column.
Here is an excerpt from the first. It’s titled “A July Fourth Toast To Thomas Jefferson—And The Anglo-Saxon Tradition”:
“…Jefferson’s muse for the ‘American Mind’ is even older.”
“The Whig tradition is undeniably Anglo-Saxon. Our founding fathers’ political philosophy originated with their Saxon forefathers, and the ancient rights guaranteed by the Saxon constitution. With the Declaration, Jefferson told Henry Lee in 1825, he was also protesting England’s violation of her own ancient tradition of natural rights. As Jefferson saw it, the Colonies were upholding a tradition the Crown had abrogated.”
“Philosophical purist that he was, moreover, Jefferson considered the Norman Conquest to have tainted this English tradition with the taint of feudalism. ‘To the Whig historian,’ writes Mayer, ‘the whole of English constitutional history since the Conquest was the story of a perpetual claim kept up by the English nation for a restoration of Saxon laws and the ancient rights guaranteed by those laws.'”
“If Jefferson begrudged the Normans’ malign influence on the natural law he cherished, imagine how he’d view our contemporary cultural conquistadors from the South, whose customs preclude natural rights and natural reason! …”
Read the rest on VDARE.COM.
This fine discussion brings to mind Jefferson’s remark on revising Virginia’s law code after the Declaration of Independence:
“…it gave me great satisfaction to find that, in general, I had only
to reduce the law to its ancient Saxon condition, stripping it of all
the innovations and rigorisms of subsequent times, to make it what it
should be.” (quoted in J.C.D. Clark, The Language of Liberty, 1660-1832: Political Discourse and Social Dynamics in the Anglo-American World, p. 138)
Thank you for clearing the miasma; it’s easy to forget where we started and why we need to remember. The simple truths worked out the hard way over centuries and Mr. Jefferson wrote them clearly.
Not to be the resident grouch on this blog – I’m probably too young for that – but I would disagree on some general ideas about Jefferson.
First of all, Jefferson’s America never really came to be. The Articles were replaced by our Constitution in just a few short years, and Jefferson battled against all other forms of centralization, among which he lost nearly completely. The central bank, the idea of a strict interpretation of the Constitution, the ideal of the States being sovereign over the nation – the list goes on and on. Hamilton, a fan of the English system and even the monarchy, won nearly every time, even though Washington was supposedly non-biased. The Hamilton-Jefferson cabinet might as well have been the Hamilton-Hamilton cabinet.
Who was cheering on this expansionist central government, anyway? Why, the American people. After Shay’s Rebellion, wealthy American’s began beginning for a government stronger than the Articles gave them. Who was leading this charge? Why, two great lovers of liberty; Washington and Franklin. Remember these guys? The people who were supposed to be the ideals of classical liberalism in modern day thought?
The point is this; Jefferson’s American lasted merely several years, if at all, after being replaced by the beginnings of the new super state that we now toil for. There was never any real liberal society according to Jefferson, who lost nearly ever argument he had against the increasingly centralized state that Hamilton and the Federalists argued for.
Jefferson’s legacy is that of an ideal, something that never really full manifested itself, and something that is unlikely to ever manifest itself again. If Americans then were scared of the super state, and were dumb enough to vote still greater powers to the new central government, then we really have no hope of rallying them towards something that looks even remotely free.
The idea of a Jefferson America is a myth, and the idea of a smart American, even back then, is as well. Americans have always been, for lack of a better word, idiots.
Congrades on the VDARE spot Ilana. You will be in good company of there. And of course you start you stint with them, with another amazing column. Maybe some of the “neocons” will get a history, as well as, an econ lesson from you.
And while we are on the topic of Economics, and I hate to be off topic. But, I read in an article from the San Fran Gate, that David Friedman has come out an endorsed Sen. Obama. I was wondering what are your thoughts on that, for a lack of better words, bomb-drop.
I’ll take a monarch over Alexander Hamilton any day.
So Alex, why did Jefferson (an idiot?) run for President in 1800? He was very comfortably retired. While President why did he eliminate all internal taxes? Why did the Federalists, who were the dominant party in 1800, go out of business and become a memory during Jefferson’s Presidency?
I never called Jefferson an idiot. Do not put words in my mouth.
One of the main reasons the Federalists went away is because they did not support the War of 1812. After the war was won, the Federalists ceased to be a national party.
And if I remember correctly, the Fedealists went out of business as a national party after Jefferson left amid criticism from his embargo against France and Britian, not before. It was during Madison’s time, after the War of 1812, *not* during Jefferson’s Presidency. I’m not sure where you get your history from.
With regards to your comments, Jefferson’s America still never really existed, which was the point of my original post. The centralization and the national movement towards things such as tarriffs, central bank, loose interpretations of the constitution, etc., all happened during Jefferson’s era. This is not to say that the man himself was to blame – he argued against these things. But it is to say, with much reason, that he did not accomplish some of the most important things that he wished to achieve, and even ruminated over this after his ‘failed’ second term.
I lay the blame on the American people, as I stated in my previous post. My points still stand, as they are valid.