I hope the moderators will allow this thread to run its course yet again
because every time it surfaces something new comes out.  Harold Forsythe
made an excellent observation about TJ's household, for example; and Mr.
Dixon's comments are deeply revealing of the mindset of the Deniers.
I'm writing a book about George Washington and his slaves, and it is
very helpful for me to read the arguments of thoughtful people, such as
Mr. Dixon, with whom I disagree completely.

Mr. Dixon writes, "I fail to see why you, and in general, the academic
community, sees more in slavery other than a historical fact."  My guess
is that "historical fact" here means something that is done, dead,
immutable, and pointless to argue about.  However, the "facts" of
slavery have changed completely.  To wit: The Wall Street Journal
editorial, posted here the other day, asserts that Thomas Jefferson's
brother fathered children by Sally Hemings and, thus, that Thomas
Jefferson enslaved his own blood kin at Monticello.  When I was in
school we were never taught that.  I think that's news.  I think this
new fact completely changes our understanding of what slavery was--the
revelation of that fact makes me realize that the oral histories of
generations of African- Americans were more accurate than the writings
of generations of mainstream white historians.  That's amazing to
someone, like me, brought up to trust the authority of established
scholars.  I was always taught that slavery was a relatively benign
institution, that the masters took good care of their slaves, that there
was often a close bond of affection between master and slave, and that,
in the Revolutionary era, the Founders really had no inkling that
slavery was evil.  Now we learn--from The Wall Street Journal!--that
when Jefferson wrote "all men are created equal" he was holding his own
kin in slavery.  I think that fact, at the very least, calls for a
reexamination of Jefferson's character, and for a reexamination of the
reasons why the southern Founders saved slavery when many voices,
including that of Franklin, called for its abolition.  And then we learn
that a member of Jefferson's own class, George Washington, said that
slavery was "repugnant" and freed his slaves--at the very time when, we
are told, nobody thought slavery was wrong--so it makes you think that
maybe we don't understand slavery as well as we thought we did.  Maybe
it's not just "a historical fact."  Maybe these waters are much, much
deeper than white folks ever thought.  Certainly the implications of
these new facts are so disturbing that The Wall Street Journal cannot
allow its readers to think that Thomas Jefferson was the responsible
party.

Henry Wiencek
Charlottesville

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