Can you provide a source for your statement that  Thomas Jefferson "invented
Indian removal"?  I have not heard that one before.  I thought Indian
removal, voluntary or involuntary, started in the 1600's.

As to his beliefs that "blacks were mentally inferior to whites" and that he
believed "in racial subordination and slavery," are you saying that TJ was
not a man of his time and place in the world and with values of the Age of
Enlightenment?  It is not fair to judge someone in America of 200+ years ago
as if he had the values of today's American society.

TJ also believed that rocks could not fall from the sky in the 18th C.
world.  We know those rocks are meteorites.

Give TJ a break--- in spite of his wide experiences, interests, and
education, he was human and thus flawed, inconsistent, and limited, just as
we all are.

Joan Logan Brooks
a Southside Virginian through 11 proven generations

----- Original Message -----
From: "Paul Finkelman" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Sunday, December 04, 2005 3:24 PM
Subject: [SPAM] Re: "common-sense Jeffersonian conservative principles"


> Well, TJ was in favor of state's rights; using the state gov. rather
> than the national govt. to prosecute your critics (see his Kentucky
> Resolution and then the Croswell Case in the NY) but when he could not
> get the states do his bidding he was willing to use the Fed. Gov. to
> repress his critics (See U.S. v. Hudson and Goodwin); he believed in
> strict constructin of the Constitution (except when it came to buying
> Louisiana and imposing his embargo on Haiti); he was a thorough going
> racist, who believed that blacks were mentally inferior to whites, and
> he wanted to remove all Indians to someplace else (like where I live);
> he invented the Indian removal.
>
> Unlike modern conservaitves, he believed in balanced budgets and worked
> at them; he was a free trader, except when it came to the Embargo
> against Haiti and then Europe.
>
> Unlike moderns conservatives, he believed in a small military and
> avoided military adventurism whenever possible.
>
> And, unlike modern Consrvatives and  Republicnas, he did, to his great
> credit, believe in religious freedom and a strict separation of Church
> and State.
>
> Finally, of course, he believed in racial subordination and slavery.  I
> will refrain from commenting on whether that fits with the
> administration or Sen. Allen
>
> Paul Finkelman

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