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Jefferson on the Middle East
On July 20, 2010, the New York Times published a thoughtful essay on Jefferson’s lessons for relating to the Middle East Ted Widmer of the John Carter Brown Library at Brown University.{READ MORE}
Featured Topic: Jefferson and Nullification
… it is important to strengthen the State governments; and as this cannot be done by any change in the Federal Constitution (for the preservation of that is all we need contend for), it must be done by the States themselves …
—Thomas Jefferson to Archibald Stuart, December 23, 1791 {More}
On the role of government:
The Nullifiers {4}
The curious current trend among a particular group of state officials to invoke Jeffersonian “states’ rights” principles to “nullify” federal laws with which they disagree would be amusing for its sheer misguided quaintness if it was not such a rank misuse of Jefferson’s fundamental hopes for the U.S. Constitution and his vision of the relation [...]
the increase of [federal] revenue … hastens the moment of liberating our revenue, and of permitting us to begin upon canals, roads, colleges, &c.
—Thomas Jefferson to Albert Gallatin, May 29, 1805 {More}
On Jefferson and Health Care:
Pursuing their Happiness {3}
Would Jefferson have supported the current health care reform? It’s hard to know.
As one of America’s most prominent critics of corporations, he would have welcomed the legislation’s curtailment of the insurance industry’s most egregious abuses, though he would also have worried about requiring citizens to purchase insurance from those same corporations.
But Jefferson may have supported [...]
