Thomas Jefferson (13 April 1743 – 4 July 1826) was President of the United States from 4 March 1801 to 4 March 1809, succeeding John Adams and preceding James Madison. Jefferson was one of the writers of the US Declaration of Independence, and he served as ambassador to France during the American Revolutionary War. After the war, he emerged as the leader of the Democratic-Republican Party during the founding years of the country, and he was elected President of the United States in 1801. His tenure as president was one full of challenges, including mounting tensions with both Great Britain and France, and his involvement in slavery was controversial. However, he championed the involvement of the common man in politics, religious freedom, limited government, and natural rights, becoming the emblem of early American liberalism and founding the Jeffersonian school of democracy, which opposed the elitism and conservatism of the aristocratic Federalists. He died on 4 July 1826, the same day as his personal friend and political rival John Adams, and the fiftieth anniversary of the ratification of the Declaration of Independence.
Biography[]
American Revolution[]
Jefferson in Philadelphia, 1775
Thomas Jefferson was born on 13 April 1743 in Shadwell, Colony of Virginia, British America. In 1764, he inherited the land on which he built the Monticello plantation, and in 1767 he was admitted to the bar as a lawyer. From 1769 to 1775, he represented Albemarle County in the House of Burgesses, and he created a law giving control of the emancipation of slaves to slave masters. In 1774, in response to the Intolerable Acts, he called for a boycott of British goods, and in 1775 he was one of the delegates to the Second Continental Congress. He was chosen by John Adams to write the US Declaration of Independence in 1776 as the American Revolutionary War intensified, and on 4 July it was ratified, declaring the independence of the United States. His statement that "all men are created equal" defined the ideology of America in the following decades, although it was only applied to white men. From 1779 to 1780, he served as Governor of Virginia, changing the capital from Williamsburg to Richmond.
Cabinet member[]
A statue of Jefferson at the Virginia State Capitol
In July 1784, Jefferson became Minister to France after Benjamin Franklin left the office, and Jefferson served as the American ambassador in Paris until 1789, helping in the creation of the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen. Upon returning to America, he accepted a Senate-confirmed cabinet position as George Washington's Secretary of State, and he became the leader of the Anti-Federalists, who opposed a centralized government; most of them were southerners who wanted the South to be free of the North. He agreed to the Compromise of 1790 with Alexander Hamilton, setting the capital at Washington DC instead of New York City, and he created the Democratic-Republican Party. Jefferson supported France during the French Revolutionary Wars with Great Britain, and in 1796 he lost the presidential election to John Adams 68 to 71. He served as Vice-President due to being the runner-up, and he was opposed to the Alien and Sedition Acts that Adam passed during the Quasi-War. In 1800, he ran for President against Aaron Burr, the leader of a rival Anti-Federalist faction, in addition to Alexander Hamilton. Hamilton supported Jefferson in the election in order to prevent Burr from winning, and the Democratic-Republicans won a victory.
Presidency[]
During Jefferson's tenure as President of the United States, he negotiated the Louisiana Purchase of 1803, buying a third of America from Napoleon I of France. Jefferson had to deal with foreign issues during his tenure as President, such as the concurrent Napoleonic Wars, and after the 1807 Chesapeake-Leonard Affair, Jefferson decided to pass the Embargo Act of 1807 to outlaw exporting goods from the USA. The United Kingdom's Royal Navy and the First French Empire's navy plundered American shipping for their survival during the wars, and Jefferson's decision saved American ships from being attacked, but the economy crumbled as a result. In 1807, however, he banned the importation of slaves from Africa as Britain did the same, ending the Trans-Atlantic slave trade. Jefferson and other Republican leaders such as James Madison increasingly incorporated Federalist economic policies into the Republican praxis, resulting in intraparty clashes with John Randolph of Roanoke's ultra-liberal "Old Republicans", who opposed the growing nationalist element within their party. Jefferson's term ended in 1809, and he died on 4 July 1826, the same day as John Adams and on the fiftieth anniversary of US independence.
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