Charlottesville, Virginia, has
declared independence from Thomas Jefferson.
April
13th, Jefferson’s birthday, will no longer be a
holiday in the city considered by many to be Jefferson’s hometown. City
officials voted to marginalize the author of the Declaration of Independence,
the man who literally changed the world with his mind and pen, in favor of
Liberation and Freedom Day, to be observed on March 3rd. The new
holiday recognizes the date in 1865 that Union Army forces arrived in Virginia,
according to The Washington Times.
These
are tough times for the man who wrote: “When
in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve
the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among
the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of
Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of
mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the
separation.” Last March, students at Hofstra
University outside New York City demanded the removal of a Jefferson statue
from that school’s campus, while in May, Democratic presidential candidate Pete
Buttigieg went on record as supporting the Indiana Democratic Party’s decision
to rename its traditional Jefferson-Jackson
Dinner.
So,
what were the causes that impelled Charlottesville to dissolve the political
bands connecting it to Thomas Jefferson? The fact that he owned slaves, of
course, as many did—around the world—at the time. The facts that he spoke out
against the institution in general and that his words have helped free
millions-- if not billions-- of people since The Declaration were not taken
into consideration. The desire to relegate Jefferson to the ash-heap
of history has grown steadily amongst progressives over the last several
years. It is now approaching a fever pitch. In days of yore, Democrats proudly
asserted that Jefferson was the First Democrat, the founder of their party, an
egalitarian genius who was the driving force behind the American Colonies’
decision to sever the chains of their bondage to Not-so-jolly-old England. (The
Democrats claim to Jefferson was always absurd, at least insofar as Jefferson’s
biggest fear was of a massive federal government. He was essentially okay with
the Articles of Confederation, and
was desperately afraid of a large, centralized government that could take power
away from the states—or the people).
On
April 29th, 1962, at a dinner honoring Nobel Prize winners, then
President Kennedy said: “I think this is the most extraordinary collection of
talent, of human knowledge, that has ever been gathered together at the White
House, with the possible exception of when Thomas Jefferson dined alone.”
Jefferson wrote the most consequential
and uplifting words strung together since the time of Christ: “We hold these truths to be self-evident,
that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with
certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit
of Happiness.” With this proclamation, and the passage of time, much of a
planet was freed. Without these words, men and women can possess only the worth
that others, or government, “grant” them.
Against
all odds, the Founders declared—and won—independence from Britain. Against all
reason, leftists have declared their independence from—and loathing of—the
United States.
Jefferson
once stated: “I have sworn, upon the altar of God, eternal hostility against
every form of tyranny over the mind of man.” If he were alive today, he would
detest the party who once claimed him as their own. And its Orwellian assault
on free speech…and independent thought.
Incredibly,
Jefferson, the nation’s third president, died on July 4th, 1826, the
50th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence. Even more
preposterously, so did America’s second president, John Adams. They were the
only two presidents to sign the Declaration. Care to figure the odds?
Adams
died first, but before he passed, he exclaimed: “Jefferson lives!” Perhaps he
meant that Jefferson’s idea lived on
in the form of the United States of
America, the only country in the history of the world that was defined at its birth.
Would
that he were right.
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