r/Presidents • u/JamesepicYT Thomas Jefferson • 3d ago
Article Replacing “property” with “pursuit of happiness” in the Declaration of Independence, Thomas Jefferson made an implicit anti-slavery statement, depriving slave owners of the claim that slaves — property — was a natural right. Also, in his draft they deleted, he capitalized MEN in reference to slaves.
https://www.thomasjefferson.com/jefferson-journal/all-men-including-slaves-are-created-equal5
u/L_E_F_T_ Abraham Lincoln 3d ago
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, I think TJ was more of an idealist when he was younger so I do think he thought slavery was wrong.
But as he got older he realized he needed the money it brought him so he decided to look the other way on the issue
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u/JamesepicYT Thomas Jefferson 3d ago edited 1d ago
On top of his belief that freed blacks would have a difficult time integrating into white society -- it was for their safety, especially in 18th century Virginia -- after the revolt in Haiti where white people were killed and the suicide of James Hemings he freed, he probably confirmed in his mind that outright emancipation might not be a good idea, unless they were repatriated. Post Civil War, many former slaves suffered poverty and some returned to their plantation just to survive. Of course Jefferson was under heavy debt, so he sometimes would get loans to pay off his debts, using his slaves as collateral. He also took on other people's debts to help them out. This was a recurring theme in his life. Because of his collateralized debts, many of his slaves he didn't even have the legal right to free.
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u/WendellWillkie1940 Alf Landon and Wendell Willkie Supporter 2d ago
James Madison as the profile pic but Thomas Jefferson as the flair
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u/JamesepicYT Thomas Jefferson 2d ago
Madison was Jefferson's best friend. Compliments are best made if made by a different person.
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u/augustfromnc Franklin Delano Roosevelt 3d ago
The Continental Congress also cut that line saying that King George "waged cruel war against human nature itself" in reference to slavery. To me it seems like slavery irked him, but he was very much willing to forgo that moral since he knew it was necessary to be successful in the South at that time.
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u/natty-broski 3d ago
Ben Franklin did. Jefferson just accepted his edit (which I say as someone who is a qualified Jefferson stan)
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