Humboldt and Jefferson

Humboldt and Jefferson
Author: Sandra Rebok
Publisher: University of Virginia Press
Total Pages: 258
Release: 2014-05-05
Genre: History
ISBN: 0813935709

Humboldt and Jefferson explores the relationship between two fascinating personalities: the Prussian explorer, scientist, and geographer Alexander von Humboldt (1769–1859) and the American statesman, architect, and naturalist Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826). In the wake of his famous expedition through the Spanish colonies in the spring of 1804, Humboldt visited the United States, where he met several times with then-president Jefferson. A warm and fruitful friendship resulted, and the two men corresponded a good deal over the years, speculating together on topics of mutual interest, including natural history, geography, and the formation of an international scientific network. Living in revolutionary societies, both were deeply concerned with the human condition, and each vested hope in the new American nation as a possible answer to many of the deficiencies characterizing European societies at the time. The intellectual exchange between the two over the next twenty-one years touched on the pivotal events of those times, such as the independence movement in Latin America and the applicability of the democratic model to that region, the relationship between America and Europe, and the latest developments in scientific research and various technological projects. Humboldt and Jefferson explores the world in which these two Enlightenment figures lived and the ways their lives on opposite sides of the Atlantic defined their respective convictions.

Thomas Jefferson and the New Nation

Thomas Jefferson and the New Nation
Author: Merrill D. Peterson
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 1106
Release: 1986-09-11
Genre: History
ISBN: 0199840520

The definitive life of Jefferson in one volume, this biography relates Jefferson's private life and thought to his prominent public position and reveals the rich complexity of his development. As Peterson explores the dominant themes guiding Jefferson's career--democracy, nationality, and enlightenment--and Jefferson's powerful role in shaping America, he simultaneously tells the story of nation coming into being.

Jefferson and Hamilton

Jefferson and Hamilton
Author: John Ferling
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA
Total Pages: 465
Release: 2014-10-07
Genre: History
ISBN: 1608195430

One of America's foremost historians brilliantly brings to life the fierce struggle - both public and, ultimately, bitterly personal - between Thomas Jefferson and Alexander Hamilton - two rivals whose opposing visions of what the United States should be continue to shape our country to this day.

Thomas Jefferson: President and Philosopher

Thomas Jefferson: President and Philosopher
Author: Jon Meacham
Publisher: Crown Books for Young Readers
Total Pages: 379
Release: 2014-09-09
Genre: Juvenile Nonfiction
ISBN: 0385387512

In this special illustrated edition of the #1 New York Times bestselling Thomas Jefferson: The Art of Power by Pulitzer Prize–winning author Jon Meacham, young readers will learn about the life and political philosophy of one of our Founding Fathers. Thomas Jefferson was the third president of the United States. He was one of the authors of the Declaration of Independence. But he was also a lawyer and an ambassador, an inventor and a scientist. He had a wide range of interests and hobbies, but his consuming interest was the survival and success of the United States. This book contains a note from Meacham and over 100 archival illustrations, as well as sections throughout the text about subjects such as the Boston Tea Party, the Library of Congress, and Napoléon Bonaparte. Additional materials include a time line; a family tree; a Who’s Who in Jefferson’s world; sections on Jefferson’s original writings and correspondence, “inventions,” interests, places in Jefferson’s world, finding Jefferson in the United States today, additional reading, organizations, and websites; notes; a bibliography; and an index. This adaptation, ideal for those interested in American presidents, biographies, and the founding of the American republic, is an excellent example of informational writing and reflects Meacham’s extensive research using primary source material.

The Jefferson Lies

The Jefferson Lies
Author: David Barton
Publisher: Thomas Nelson Inc
Total Pages: 305
Release: 2012
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 1595554599

Noted historian Barton sets the record straight on the lies and misunderstandings that have tarnished the legacy of Thomas Jefferson.

Jefferson's Books

Jefferson's Books
Author: Douglas L. Wilson
Publisher: University of North Carolina Press
Total Pages: 0
Release: 1996
Genre: Book collecting
ISBN: 9781882886036

A chronicle of Thomas Jefferson's passion for reading and building his library.

Thomas Jefferson

Thomas Jefferson
Author: Christopher Hitchens
Publisher: HarperCollins UK
Total Pages: 208
Release: 2007
Genre: Presidents
ISBN: 0007213727

Hitchens brings the character of Jefferson to life as a man of his time and also as a symbolic figure beyond it. Conflicted by power, Jefferson wrote the Declaration of Independence and acted as Minister to France yet yearned for a quieter career in the Virginia legislature. Predicting that slavery would shape the future of America's development, this professed proponent of emancipation continued to own human property. He negotiated the Louisiana Purchase with France, doubling the size of the nation, and authorized the Lewis and Clark expedition, opening up the American frontier. The Barbary War, a lesser-known chapter of his political career, led to the building of the U.S. Navy and the fortification of America's reputation regarding national defense. In the background is the fledgling nation's struggle for independence, formed in the crucible of the eighteenth-century Enlightenment, and, in its shadow, the deformation of that struggle in the excesses of the French Revolution.

Jefferson's Empire

Jefferson's Empire
Author: Peter S. Onuf
Publisher: University of Virginia Press
Total Pages: 276
Release: 2000
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 9780813922041

Thomas Jefferson believed that the American revolution was atransformative moment in the history of political civilization. He hoped that hisown efforts as a founding statesman and theorist would help construct a progressiveand enlightened order for the new American nation that would be a model andinspiration for the world. Peter S. Onuf's new book traces Jefferson's vision of theAmerican future to its roots in his idealized notions of nationhood and empire.Onuf's unsettling recognition that Jefferson's famed egalitarianism was elaboratedin an imperial context yields strikingly original interpretations of our nationalidentity and our ideas of race, of westward expansion and the Civil War, and ofAmerican global dominance in the twentiethcentury. Jefferson's vision of an American "empirefor liberty" was modeled on a British prototype. But as a consensual union ofself-governing republics without a metropolis, Jefferson's American empire would befree of exploitation by a corrupt imperial ruling class. It would avoid the cycle ofwar and destruction that had characterized the European balance ofpower. The Civil War cast in high relief thetragic limitations of Jefferson's political vision. After the Union victory, as thereconstructed nation-state developed into a world power, dreams of the United Statesas an ever-expanding empire of peacefully coexisting states quickly faded frommemory. Yet even as the antebellum federal union disintegrated, a Jeffersoniannationalism, proudly conscious of America's historic revolution against imperialdomination, grew up in its place. In Onuf's view, Jefferson's quest to define a new American identity also shaped his ambivalentconceptions of slavery and Native American rights. His revolutionary fervor led himto see Indians as "merciless savages" who ravaged the frontiers at the Britishking's direction, but when those frontiers were pacified, a more benevolentJefferson encouraged these same Indians to embrace republican values. AfricanAmerican slaves, by contrast, constituted an unassimilable captive nation, unjustlywrenched from its African homeland. His great panacea: colonization. Jefferson's ideas about race revealthe limitations of his conception of American nationhood. Yet, as Onuf strikinglydocuments, Jefferson's vision of a republican empire--a regime of peace, prosperity, and union without coercion--continues to define and expand the boundaries ofAmerican national identity.

Jefferson's Religion

Jefferson's Religion
Author: Stephen J. Vicchio
Publisher: Wipf and Stock Publishers
Total Pages: 159
Release: 2007-04-01
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 1597528307

Thomas Jefferson's views have led many to conclude that he was an atheist, as recently as in the work of Christopher Hitchens. But the third President has also been labeled a deist, a Unitarian, and a Christian. Philosopher and theologian Stephen Vicchio takes on the challenge of analyzing Jefferson's writings in detail to see if any of these appellations is fitting. The author finds that Jefferson's two volumes on the New Testament Gospels (A Syllabus of an Estimate of the Merit of the Doctrines of Jesus and The Life and Morals of Jesus of Nazareth) reveal a great deal concerning the theological perspective of this famous American statesman.

Thomas Jefferson's Image of New England

Thomas Jefferson's Image of New England
Author: Arthur Scherr
Publisher: McFarland
Total Pages: 391
Release: 2016-10-03
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 1476626219

Writers often depict Thomas Jefferson as a narrow-minded defender of states' rights and Virginia's interests, despite his authorship of the Declaration of Independence and vigorous defense of the young republic's sovereignty. Some historians claim he was particularly hostile to the New England states, whose Federalist electorate he regarded as enemies of his Democratic-Republican Party. This study of Jefferson's lifelong relationship with New England reveals him to be a consistent nationalist and friend of the region, from his first visit to Boston in 1784 to his recruiting of Massachusetts scholars to teach at the University of Virginia. His nationalist point of view is most evident where some historians claim to see it least: in his opinions of the people and politics of New England. He admired New Englanders' Revolutionary patriotism, especially that of his friend John Adams, and considered their direct democracy and town-meeting traditions a model for the rest of the Union.