Thomas Jefferson
Thomas Jefferson
Thomas Jeffersonwas an American Founding Father who was the principal author of the Declaration of Independence. He was elected the second Vice President of the United States, serving under John Adams and in 1800 was elected the third President. Jefferson was a proponent of democracy, republicanism, and individual rights, which motivated American colonists to break from Great Britain and form a new nation. He produced formative documents and decisions at both the state and national level...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionUS President
Date of Birth13 April 1743
CityShadwell, VA
CountryUnited States of America
History has informed us that bodies of men as well as individuals are susceptible of the spirit of tyranny.
Force cannot give right.
The execution of the laws is more important than the making of them.
No knowledge can be more satisfactory to a man than that of his own frame, its parts, their functions and actions.
That government that governs least governs best.
[States and the Federal government are] coordinate departments of one simple and integral whole... The one is the domestic, the other the foreign branch of the same government.
Amplification is the vice of modern oratory.
Experience has taught me that manufacturers are now as necessary to our independence as to our comfort.
Difference of opinion leads to inquiry, and inquiry to the truth.
Communities should be planned with an eye to the effect on the human spirit of being continually surrounded by a maximum of beauty.
A rising nation, spread over a wide and fruitful Land, traversing all the seas with the rich production of their Industry.
I am convinced that those societies (such as the Native American peoples) which live without government enjoy in their general mass an infinitely greater degree of happiness than those who live under the European governments. Among the former, public opinion is in the place of law, & restrains morals as powerfully as laws ever did anywhere. Among the latter, under pretence of governing they have divided their nations into two classes, wolves & sheep. I do not exaggerate.
Against us are all timid men who prefer the calm of despotism to the boisterous sea of liberty We are likely to preserve the liberty we have obtained only by unremitting labors and perils.
The tumults in America I expected would have produced in Europe an unfavorable opinion of our political state. But it has not. On the contrary, the small effect of these tumults seems to have given more confidence in the firmness of our governments. The interposition of the people themselves on the side of government has had a great effect on the opinion here in Europe.