This Years April Mention: Thomas Jefferson

Thomas Jefferson,  April Birthday 

Thomas Jefferson, born April 13,1743, has his picture on the U.S. $2 bill.  This miraculous man began, at age 5, studying under his cousin’s tutor  and, at age 9, studied Latin, Greek and French.  At 14, he began classical literature and additional languages. At 16, he entered the College of William and Mary in Virginia near his home. At 19, he studied law under George Wythe; at 23  he  started his own law practice  and at 25 was elected to the Virginia House of Burgesses. At age 31 he wrote the widely circulated “Summary Views of the Rights of British America”. He then retired from his law practice. At 32,  he was a Delegate to the 2nd Continental Congress and at 33 wrote the Declaration of Independence while also revising Virginia’s legal code and wrote a Public Education bill and a statute for Religious Freedom. At 36, he was elected as second Governor of Virginia, succeeding Patrick Henry. At 40, he served in Congress for two years; at 41, he was the American Minister to France and negotiated treaties with European nations   along with Benjamin Franklin and John Adams; at 53,  he served as Vice President and was elected President of the American Philosophical Society; at 55, he drafted the Kentucky Resolutions (1798) and became active head of the Republican Party ( c.1791).  At age 57, he was elected the third President of the United States (1800). At age 60, he obtained the Louisiana Purchase, doubling the nation’s size.  At 61, he was elected to a second term as President. At 65, he retired to Monticello; at 80, he helped President Monroe shape the Monroe Doctrine; at 81 he almost single-handedly created the University of Virginia and became its first President.  At age 83 he died on the anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence - the same day John Adams died.

John Kennedy once held a dinner in the White House for a group of the brightest minds in the nation at that time.  He said, “This is perhaps the assembly of the most intelligence ever to gather at one time in the White House with the exception of when Thomas Jefferson dined alone.”

It is incumbent on every generation to pay it’s own debts as it goes.  A principle which, if acted on, wou(ld)  save one half the wars of the world; and  justifies, I think our present circumspection                                                       

To take from one, because it is thought that his  own industry and that of his fathers has acquired too much,  in order to spare to others, who, or whose fathers  have not exercised equal industry and skill, is to violate arbitrarily the first principal of association, - the guarantee to every one of a free exercise of his industry,  & the fruits acquired by it.                                                   

Thomas Jefferson

If we can but prevent  the government from wasting the labours of the people, under the pretence of taking care of them, they must become happy.            

And I  sincerely believe, with you, that banking establishments are more dangerous  than standing armies; and that the principle of spending money to be paid by posterity, under the name of funding, is but swindling futurity on a large scale.           

The tree of liberty  must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants.  

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Thomas Jefferson knew because  he himself studied previous failed attempts at government. He understood actual history, the nature of God, His laws and the nature of man. That happens to be way more than what most of us understand today.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY THOMAS JEFFERSON.      

Submitted by Bev Smith and Eljorie Mason.