In a message dated 3/29/2002 5:25:59 PM Eastern Standard Time,
[log in to unmask] writes:

> Why are you directing this comment to me?
>
Professor Hardwick:
Perhaps the thread has been lost. My focus was intended to be the
assumptions, possibilities and the maybes that have, to my amazement,
constituted the "proof" of the paternity claim against Jefferson, accepted
and argued by the academic community in the same way they might the winter at
Valley Forge, or Jackson's victory at New Orleans. Slavery is the inevitable
backdrop of any discussion of Jefferson, and my comment was to deny the
inclusion of slavery as part of the evolutionary thought that culminated in
the concepts of the Founding Fathers. Obviously, slavery was a part of the
culture of America, and a critical issue at the Convention in 1787. However,
a study of constitutional thought in England as it translated to the colonies
does not include slavery of Africans as a consideration in the relationship
of the people to the monarchy, nor was it necessary to include them in the
"people" that entered into the contract to form the United States.
____________________________________________________________________
Richard E. Dixon
Attorney at Law
4122 Leonard Drive
Fairfax, VA 22030
703-691-0770 fax 703-691-0978
____________________________________________________________________

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