JEFFERSON AND THE PROBLEMS OF TO-DAY
By Archibald Cary Coolidge, Ph.D., LL.D., of Harvard University
This spot and this occasion recall to the minds of all of us memories
of the man in whose honor we have made this pilgrimage. We are here at
the place that was dearest to him, at the home from which the influence of
his wisdom and his benign presence radiated for so many years over his
fellow countrymen. You have just heard the description of his daily life.
It is, indeed, here that his figure is most distinct to us, that we think of him
in his kindliest aspect, an object of affection as well as of admiration to
millions then and since. It was here that he planned and dreamed and
brought into being the University of Virginia. To us this visit to Monticello
is in itself a source of inspiration. It brings us once more under the
spell of a lofty character and master mind whose influence has not been
confined to one party, but has extended over the whole people and has been
felt even by those who opposed him most, and it has not been effaced by the
lapse of time. Thomas Jefferson still holds his place as one of the guides of
our republican ideals and citizenship. His words are still quoted and the
truths that he expressed are still held sacred.
And if this be so, is it not natural for us when we feel ourselves in the
shadow of his presence to turn to him for counsel and help in dealing with
some of the momentous problems which beset our paths as American citizens?
May we not obtain guidance from his wisdom even under circumstances
which he himself never could have foreseen? At least one may
speculate as to what he would have thought of them, and such fancy need
not be idle. It is true there are dangers in such a course. We must be careful
how we apply any one concrete pronouncement on the part of Jefferson
to an altered situation; what was a wise decision under former conditions is
not necessarily the one that he would now make.
We know, too, that like every mortal he was not always consistent;
that in his long career he was deeply involved in the strife of his times and
that he used terms and expressed opinions which reflect rather the passions
or the prejudices of the moment than the mature judgments of his riper
thought.
Nevertheless, while making all such allowances, we may feel that Jefferson
entertained certain ideals, certain visions, certain fundamental beliefs,
to which we may turn and apply the inspiration we drew from them to
problems of our own times.
Let us look at some of these beliefs.
Would it not be fair to say that the first and foremost article in Jefferson's
political creed was his unshakable faith in democracy and particularly
in American democracy?
We may quibble as we please over the exact meaning of the term
"democracy" but no one can deny that Thomas Jefferson was a democrat
in the best sense of the word and we may well rejoice at the extent that his
ideals have prevailed and are prevailing far and wide.
Rank and title mean little enough to-day. Universal suffrage has been
broadened to include those whom it has always been the privilege of man to
love and to protect but to whom he has never before admitted a right to rule
equal to his own.
Has then democracy triumphed so that we have no fears for the future
save such as may arise from its own excesses?
No one should assert this. Here as elsewhere there is still a long gap
between theory and practice. The power of wealth, inherited and acquired,
still counts for much in the world, the conscienceless capitalist too often is
the successor of the robber baron, and modern economic development with
its tremendous accumulation of capital, its infinite ramifications and its
necessary concentration of authority has seemed to threaten us with a
servitude as real as any which has existed under crown or aristocracy. But
this peril is not new, and provided we maintain our honesty, we can achieve
the new freedom as well as the old. Vigilant as we must be to defend our
heritage against the insidious power of corporate wealth, it is not from that
quarter that the ideals of Jeffersonian democracy are most undermined at
the present moment. Our liberties may be imperilled but the menace has
taken on new forms. For instance we can see that society is in danger of
becoming the slave of its own development. In the endless meshes of the
modern state and of modern industrial and economic conditions the individual
can hardly aspire to be as free as were his ancestors. The "sum of
good government" has increased in a formidable manner since the days
when Jefferson was at the helm of the state. It looks almost as if in the
future the existence of the American citizen from the cradle to the grave will
be regulated by prescriptions. They are perhaps necessary for the welfare
of our wondrously organized system. But we are in danger of paying a
heavy price in the sacrifice of the freedom of the individual citizen which
Jefferson regarded as one of the highest privileges of mankind. If the march
of civilization appears to demand that sacrifice, let us at least trust that it
may not be too complete and refuse to make it save when there is real
necessity. We shall do well to remember that in creating the most perfect
machine, when its parts are human beings, the more scope we can safely
give to each to think, act, and even make mistakes for himself, the more we
do to preserve what has been one of the best characteristics of the American.
Even efficiency may be bought at too high a price.
But slavery to the machine which we ourselves have helped to create
is not the only menace to our liberties. The democracies of free people are
now being compelled to face the threat of a new despotism. Just when it
has seemed that the idea of equal opportunity to all and the right of the
majority to prevail were becoming the acknowledged basis of society for the
whole civilized world, we have witnessed a sudden reaction towards a new
oligarchy. The claim of one class to dominate regardless of the rest has been
set forth from a new quarter in startling form. The red apostles of communism
have declared ruthless war against the whole conception of true democracy
and in order to secure their sectarian triumph they are prepared to shed
torrents of blood and if need be to stamp out civilization itself. They have
established their rule in the largest continuous empire in the world and by
terror they hold to-day under their control a hundred million of their fellow
beings. They have sent their emissaries abroad and they have their followers
in all lands, even in our own, appealing by every argument to the
ignorant, to the dreamer, and to the discontented, to all indeed who have
suffered under our present system of society and can be deluded into imagining
that its overthrow would bring about a millennium.
In combating the infection of such ideas the strong and healthy democratic
beliefs of Jefferson, his confidence in the essential goodness of human
nature if given a free chance to develop, his doctrine of the utmost liberty to
the individual compatible with the welfare of the state, and of the safety
with which error may be tolerated when reason is left free to combat it, offer
us the best grounds on which to take our stand. It is true that society must
defend itself when attacked, that we cannot allow conspiracies to be hatched
in our midst against all we hold most dear, that the right to poison the public
mind is not a God given one. But though alien and sedition bills may be
more necessary now than they were in the early days of the republic, it is
not by blind repression alone any more than it was then that perils can be
conjured. We must avoid panic and reaction and all that savors of persecution
unless we wish to give to whatever revolutionary spirit there is in our
midst a moral force which now it lacks. Against the perils of revolutionary
propaganda and discontent, it is not enough to fall back on mere measures
of repression. The counsels of terror are seldom wise, and the ultra conservative
breeds the revolutionary. While striving to right the many evils that
exist in our own as in every other social system, we must have faith not only
in the virtue of our institutions but in their strength and in the spirit which
they are meant to express. The calm broad vision of the sage of Monticello
is often sadly lacking among us. The excesses and horrors that accompanied
the French Revolution did not shake his trust in popular government
and the progress of humanity. Those of the Russian one would not do so
were he alive to-day.
Turning from our domestic situation to our foreign one, where the
difficulties if of less fundamental magnitude are even more pressing, what
lessons has Jefferson to teach us there? A famous passage from his first
inaugural address comes to our minds: "peace, commerce, and honest friendship
with all nations—entangling alliances with none." Surely, we say, a
wise principle, one well tested in the history of this country and one that it
would be folly to abandon now. But are we so certain of what should be its
present interpretation? Has it been in no way modified or broadened by the
enormous changes that for good and for ill have brought all parts of the
globe so infinitely nearer to one another than they were a century ago? Do
we even know what we mean by "entangling alliances?" Is not an international
convention of any kind, whether it deals with commerce or patents,
or with rules relating to the Red Cross, an entanglement in the sense that it
is a limitation to our complete freedom of isolated action? Has not the
whole development of the last hundred years tended to emphasize the
necessity of coöperation in all good works between nations as well as between
individuals? Is there any reason in the nature of things why such cooperation
should not be beneficial in political affairs as well as in economic
or in sanitary ones, and is an alliance anything but a promise of mutual
coöperation? All these considerations are not to be lightly dismissed in
favor of a literal interpretation of a maxim enunciated in a very different
world.
To many of his contemporaries, Thomas Jefferson seemed what today
would be called a pacifist. At one time he appeared to submit with
tameness to buffets at the hands of both England and France. But he was a
statesman not a mere theorist. His conduct of this country's disputes at
that juncture may not be a brilliant page in his career, but under extreme
difficulties he made no sacrifice of principle and each year that he preserved
peace the country gained in strength. He showed more than once in his
career that when the moment came for decisive action he could be resolute,
and he did not shrink from the gravest responsibilities. As the last resort he
was ready to take up arms if the honor of his country demanded it. Even
expeditions overseas had no terrors for him. By dispatching an American
fleet to wage war on Tripoli he set Christian Europe an example of how to
put an end to the shameful tribute it had been the custom to pay to a nest of
pirates in order to be spared from their depredations.
Everything we know of the character and views of Jefferson makes us
confident that if he had been alive at the time of the Great War he would
have approved of the sending of our soldiers to lay down their lives for their
country and its cause on the battlefields of France. The sympathy which
he felt for the first French republic would have gone out in far larger measure
to the present one and none would have felt more than he that the liberties
of mankind would be menaced by the triumph of military imperialism. He
would have known, too, that our task would not be finished or our burden
be lifted by the close of hostilities, but that we must and shall share in the
vast work of the reconstruction of the world. Duty like charity begins at
home, it does not end there.
We may perhaps doubt just what form of league or association or
brotherhood of peoples Thomas Jefferson would now wish to see established,
a brotherhood in which this country of ours should hold its proper place.
But we cannot doubt that with his whole heart and soul he would have been
devoted to some such ideal of fraternity. The "Parliament of man," the
"federation of the world" would be for him no mere empty phrase. Undismayed
by the cataclysms which we have just witnessed and are still
witnessing, he would put his faith in his fellow creatures, and particularly
in his fellow countrymen. He would believe it to be their proud privilege
to lead rather than to follow in all movements for the common welfare.
While condemning visionary crusades or neglect of our own problems he
would recognize our obligations to struggling humanity at home or abroad.
We who honor his name, let us live true to his spirit. We have proved as a
nation that we could fight for our ideals. Now that peace has come we must
beware "lest we forget, lest we forget."
