I seem to recall that Garry Wills also had some useful things to say about
the phrase's eighteenth-century meanings in his book Inventing America. 
Sorry that I'm not in a position to check that at the moment, but it might
be worth a look.

-- Jurretta Heckscher



On Tue, 17 Jul 2007 13:18:32 -0400, Jon Kukla <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

>Robin,
>  I _think_ it was Howard Mumford Jones, in a book entitled The Pursuit of
>Happiness, who observed that in Jefferson's day the sense of "pursuit"
>was not a chasing after something - as in chasing after happiness - but
>rather "pursuit" more in the sense of pastime or activity, so that the
>sense of the phrase was akin to 'the enjoyment of happiness.'  A
>pleasant thought for our multi-tasking age.
>
>   When I checked the Library of Congress catalogue to help recollect the
>author, I also noticed a 1794 lecture on the Pursuit of Happiness by
>Caroline Robbins : I don't know the lecture, but her scholarship was
>splendid and well-informed and might be worth a look.
>
>   In drafting the Declaration, Jefferson substituted the phrase for
>"property" in John Locke's trio: life, liberty, and property.
>
>All the best,
>Jon
>
>> Does anyone know what exactly "pursuit of hapiness" meant to the founding
>> fathers and people of the revolutionary era?  I guess my larger question
>> is how
>> did the phrase come to be written into the Declaration of Independence?
>>
>> Thanks,
>> Robin Gabriel
>> Monticello Education Department
>>
>>
>Dr. Jon Kukla, Executive Vice-President
>Red Hill - The Patrick Henry National Memorial
>1250 Red Hill Road
>Brookneal, Virginia 24528
>www.redhill.org
>Phone 434-376-2044 or 800-514-7463
>
>Fax 434-376-2647
>
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