Mr. Dixon:  I think I see the fundamental disagreement here -- you
maintain that ideas have an existence apart from any particular social
context; I disagree with that and I expect we will all have to learn to
agree to disagree on this point.  I think that chattel slavery's
existence made palpable the abstraction of the loss of liberty that
colonial political thinkers feared, just as the tyranny of George III
made real the abstraction of political despotism.  In other words, their
debates with the British government took that form, used those terms, for
the very reason that their social reality contained actual experiences of
tyranny and slavery.  If they had not, their constitutional debate would
have progressed along different lines -- rights talk, for instance.

As for Jefferson being a product of his social condition -- that he could
not be Jefferson without slavery -- I think this is a issue of contigency
or counter-factual thinking.  Jefferson's social background as a
privileged member of the slaveholding elite shaped his educational
opportunities, granted him the access into the polite intellectual
society of the Virginia capitol, was the basis of his entry into
political life, and provided him with the income to support his appetite
for books and ideas.  Jefferson's efforts to build a legal practice,
which might have provided an alternative path to social and political
prominence, were not successful.  The material lifestyle of the
slaveholder agreed with him.  I'm not sure how granting this reality
takes Jefferson off any pedestal one might wants to put him on.

David Kiracofe
College of Charleston

On Thu, 04 Apr 2002 15:21:30 -0500 (EST) "Richard E. Dixon" wrote:

> In a message dated 4/4/02 2:12:13 PM Eastern Standard Time,
> [log in to unmask] writes:
>
> << your point about slavery not being a
>  defining issue in the land of Adams, Otis, or Dickinson is weak. >>
>
> Mr. Kiracofe:
> I agree that statement was not well thought and the rest of your post
> accurately states the historical circumstances. This issue arose from
> Professor Hardwick's assertion that Jefferson could not have been
> Jefferson
> without slavery. I was challenging that assertion on the basis that the
> intellectual thought of the colonies was reached without regard to
> slavery,
> and in fact, it was reached in spite of slavery. There was slavery
> throughout
> the world in the 18th century of both white and black with a most grievous
> form in the English colonies. But the evolution of law and thought in
> Britain
> and the impact of the Enlightenment was Jefferson's intellectual
> heritage and
> the slavery of that thought was political and economic, not the chattel
> slavery of the Africans and others. Indeed, Locke acknowledges that
> slavery
> fits within his natural rights concept. The colonists railed against
> Parliament for attempting to "make them slaves" all the while owning
> slaves,
> so African slavery in the colonies was not in any way the genesis of that
> political philosophy, although my three examples, Adams, Otis and
> Dickinson,
> came to include them in the sweep of that concept,  as did Jefferson.
> To pose
> it another way, had there been no slavery in British America, the
> history of
> intellectual thought for  Adams, Otis and Dickinson and Jefferson
> would have
> been the same, the period of conflict from 1763 to Lexington would
> have been
> the same and Jefferson would still have written the Declaration of
> Independence.
> _____________________________________________________________________
> Richard
> E. Dixon
> Attorney at Law
> 4122 Leonard Drive
> Fairfax, VA 22030
> 703-691-0770
> fax 703-691-0978
> ______________________________________________________________________
>
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David Kiracofe

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