Jefferson, Thomas (1743-1826)

3rd president of the USA 1801-09, founder of the Democratic Republican Party. He published A Summary View of the Rights of America (1774) and as a member of the Continental Congresses of 1775-76 was largely responsible for the drafting of the Declaration of Independence. He was governor of Virginia 1779-81, ambassador to Paris 1785-89, secretary of state 1789-93, and vice-president 1797-1801.

Jefferson was born in Virginia into a wealthy family, educated at William and Mary College, and became a lawyer. His interests included music, painting, architecture, and the natural sciences; he was very much a product of the 18th-century Enlightenment. He designed the Capitol at Richmond, Virginia, (1785-1809), and the University of Virginia, Charlottesville (opened 1825). His political philosophy of ‘agrarian democracy’ placed responsibility for upholding a virtuous American republic mainly upon a citizenry of independent yeoman farmers. Ironically, his two terms as president saw the adoption of some of the ideas of his political opponents, the Federalists. In January 2000 the Thomas Jefferson Memorial Foundation announced that after DNA tests had been carried out on the descendants of Jefferson's slave Sally Hemings, it had found that there was a strong likelihood that Jefferson had fathered at least one, and probably all six, of her children. Such a relationship with his slave adds a controversial element to the acceptance of Jefferson's opposition to slavery.

He was supportive of the French Revolution and spent four years in France while dispatching advice through his ally James Madison on the proposals for a Constitutional Convention. Upon his return to the political scene, he carried on his battle with Alexander Hamilton, who held views of America directly opposed to his own agrarian, democratic inclinations. Jefferson was instrumental in the establishment of the US capital (now Washington, DC) on the banks of the Potomac River, and he was the first president inaugurated there. Notable achievements of his presidency include the public land system, the Bill of Rights, and the Louisiana Purchase.