Mr. Dixon--
As an attorney, do you think you could persuade a jury to believe the
allegations against Jefferson? In as much as the most persuasive arguments
on the issue on both sides have been produced by lawyers and not academic
historians, my guess is that it is not entirely implausible to imagine
juries that *would* convict. If so, are academic historians any worse than
Americans in general?
While the particular question of whether or not Jefferson had a liason with
Hemings has obvious interest to Jefferson and Hemings decendents, I find it
a distraction from the larger issue of Jefferson's moral complicity with
slavery itself. We have a great deal of information, much of it quite
direct and incontrovertible, that on the larger issue of slavery,
Jefferson's behavior was in direct contradiction with his own principles.
The proper historical standard by which to judge Jefferson, after all, is
the standard he himself established. But here, he was *at best* a
hypocrite (in a way, for example, that can not be said of either Patrick
Henry or George Washington). This remains true whether or not Jefferson
had sex with Sally Hemings.
Best,
Kevin
--On Thursday, March 28, 2002 12:26 PM +0000 "Richard E. Dixon"
<[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> In a message dated 3/28/02 11:20:05 AM Eastern Standard Time,
> [log in to unmask] writes:
>
> << Jefferson never
> really went public in his denials, so is that any more misleading than
> any other presidential philanderer >>
>
> My goodness, Jefferson did not publish a full page denial of the third
> party hearsay that plagued him about Sally Hemings. Would that have made a
> difference in the predisposition of many academics unaffected by the
> absence of any direct evidence?
> _____________________________________________________________________
> Richard E. Dixon
> Attorney at Law
> 4122 Leonard Drive
> Fairfax, VA 22030
> 703-691-0770
> fax 703-691-0978
> ______________________________________________________________________
>
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--
Kevin R. Hardwick, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor
Department of History, MSC 2001
James Madison University
Harrisonburg VA 22807
Phone: 540/568-6306
Email: [log in to unmask]
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