Visiting the Founders' Dilemma

“I can only say that there is not a man living who wishes more sincerely than I do to see a plan adopted for the abolition of slavery.”  ~ George Washington

“21 Aug. 1805…bought a negro woman Lucretia Jame’s wife, her 2. sons John & Randall and the child of which she is pregnant, when born, for £180.”  ~ Thomas Jefferson’s Memorandum Book  

We traveled the Old Dominion from the northeast corner at Arlington over the state line from DC to the southwest corner at Abingdon, just a tobacco spit away from the Tennessee border.  Along our route we made house calls on some former presidents.  The presidents are long since gone but their homes, from Washington’s Mount Vernon just south of DC to Jefferson’s Monticello on the eastern edge of the Blue Ridge, all remain in magnificent restoration.  Four of our nation’s first five presidents hailed from Virginia, George Washington (1) Thomas Jefferson (3) James Madison (4) and James Monroe (5) and we visited the homes of all four. 

 

Reproduced Slave's Cabin at Mount Vernon

Independence Day Musings

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. ~ The Declaration of Independence

“The greatness of America lies not in being more enlightened than any other nation, but rather in her ability to repair her faults.” ~ Alexis de Tocqueville

July 4^th, 2014.  After taking my usual sunrise run I was surprised, and disappointed, to see that my coffee house haunt was open at 6, the usual time for a weekday.  Not so disappointed that I boycotted coffee for the day but enough so that it gave pause to note that another holiday was passing with business as usual.  Workers were arriving at Home Depot to start the day and the Big Lots folks were putting out their Independence Day displays; sadly they aren't independent from work on what should be one of the most significant holidays in America’s calendar year.

It was 238 years ago that the Declaration of Independence from the British crown was adopted.  It was, for all intents and purposes already a done deal.  Two days prior the 2^nd Continental Congress had approved Richard Henry Lee’s resolution declaring independence.  And this certainly didn't mark the day that the colonists took up arms.  The revolution had been going on since April of the preceding year and the colonists had been raising bloody hell (As King George might have said) for some time before that.  The Declaration of Independence wouldn't even be signed until the following month.  But I’m splitting hairs, aren't I?