We can read about Mr. Jefferson’s accomplishments and failings, visit the designs he left for us, build up or tear down monuments to him and fellow founders, and do what has always been done with history: describe it through the lens of our current perspective to fulfill our current desires. But what was his perspective? Do we grasp what was happening then?
Suggested Reading: Meacham, Jon. Thomas Jefferson: President and Philosopher, 2014. Meacham, Jon. Thomas Jefferson: The Art of Power, 2013. Malone, Dumas. Jefferson and His Time: Jefferson the Virginian (Vol. 1 of a six-volume set, available individually), 2006. Gordon-Reed, Annette and Peter S. Onuf. “Most Blessed of the Patriarchs”: Thomas Jefferson and the Empire of the Imagination, 2016.
