Research Paper on "Thomas Jefferson and His View of Education"

Research Paper 15 pages (4481 words) Sources: 15

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Jefferson Education

The Influence of Personal Biography on National Policy: The Life of Thomas Jefferson and His Views on Education

Thomas Jefferson is most famously remembered for his role in drafting the Declaration of Independence, a document that was essential in the foundation of the United States of America. This is somewhat ironic because this document did not, in fact, establish any national government but rather abolished the one (that of the British Crown) that existed in the colonies during the warfare that became the American Revolution. This Declaration was eventually ratified unanimously by the delegations of the thirteen colonies in the First Continental Congress, and had this been the limit of Jefferson's contributions to the founding of the United States his place in this nation's history books would certainly have been secured.

The authoring of the Declaration of Independence was, however, only one milestone in the long career of policy formation, leadership, and outspoken political philosophy that Jefferson made for himself. Serving as Secretary of State, Vice President, and President during the first three administrations following 1789's Constitutional Convention, Jefferson remained intimately involved in the shaping and the running of the United States' federal government for the majority of his adult life. There was one area of social policy that was of great importance to the leader that he was not able to work as directly towards, yet an examination of his writings and of his more direct views on policy demonstrates his passion for this area.

Education and the methods of its provision were hugely important to Jefferson, and though his official positions in the early government of the United States did not really provide a direct avenue for him to direct or achieve his policies in this area as desired, his thoughts on the subject have continued to shape educational policy in some ways and remain highly relevant today. Jefferson was concerned with many social policy issues that he saw alternatively as a necessity for decent government, and yet something that the federal government should not necessarily involve itself in directly and with abundant regulation and definition. His views on the issue of education and its provision in the United States -- or indeed, in any nation -- were thus quite complex, and it can be difficult to summarize these views in a way that treats them comprehensively and does justice to the thought processes and the brilliant mind that lay behind their formation and their eventual promulgation.

In some writings, Jefferson asserts that there can be no true political freedom without education -- that it is necessary for a person and a people to be educated before they can reasonably expect to shape their government in a way that provides them both the securities and the liberties to which they are entitled by natural right. At the same time, he stresses elsewhere the importance of keeping education out of the fundamental structures of government itself, as this would defeat the purpose of a free education able to question the powers of that government. While this might seem contradictory at first, Jefferson's desired educational policy in fact walks a fine balance between ensuring opportunity without defining goals.

This paper will examine the influence that Jefferson's own experiences throughout the various stages of his life had on his views of education. Through his own childhood in the colony of Virginia, his young adulthood as a member of the colonies' aristocracy, his time spent in Europe as a diplomat with varying titles and responsibilities, and finally in his direct role in American politics and policy formation, his ideas on a wide variety of subjects -- including education -- continued to be shaped and to solidify. The connection between his life events and his writings on education cannot always be tied together in an entirely direct and concrete manner, yet an overall view and analysis of these periods in his life and the social and intellectual forces he encountered in them provides a clear general idea of the influences on his views on education and the manner and timing of the way they developed.

Childhood

Though the eldest son of a quite well-off family in the colony of Virginia, Thomas Jefferson did not exactly have the plush and favored childhood that would be expected of a member of the aristocracy. His first memory, at the age of two years old, was of a fifty-mile journey from the home in which he was born on his parent's estate to the house of one of his father's friends, which was to become the new home for the entire Jefferson family as this friend had recently died and left his children orphans. Jefferson's father was keeping a promise by managing the estate and parental duties and Jefferson found himself in the position of being the youngest son in a home that was not truly his own (Brodie 1974, pp. 47-8).

Despite the bullying that he almost experienced at the hands of his new "brother" Thomas Mann Randolph, who was several years Thomas Jefferson's senior and would have been a most unusual child had he managed to survive the deaths of both of his parents and the intrusion of this new family into his house without some level of aggression. It is certain the two Thomases had a rather adversarial relationship in their adulthood, and this could be an indicator of the type of relationship they had during their childhood, as well (Brodie 1974, pp. 48). The early part of Jefferson's childhood, then, was one in which the issues of power and its physical aspects, as well as concepts of fairness and of rationalization (a tool commonly employed by bullies in getting away with their exploits) were rendered in sharp relief (Brodie 1974; Hayes 2008). This was not the most formative relationship of which Jefferson was a part at this time, however, despite its certain impact on his thought and character.

Peter Jefferson, Thomas' father, was by all accounts an imposing figure both in terms of his physical and his intellectual prowess (Hayes 2008; Monsell & Wagner 1989; Parton 1874; Schouler 2005). He was also a very benevolent force in his young son's life, taking a great deal of care and time to ensure that his son received the attention and the education that he saw as necessary to the lad's development -- more than he had received in his own childhood, it is certain (Monsell & Wagner 1989, pp. 54-5). Though Peter died relatively young at the age of fifty, when Thomas Jefferson was only fourteen years old, much of the adolescent's education and character formation had already been molded by this man (Schouler 2005, pp. 21-2).

This is clearly evidenced in Thomas Jefferson's own later recollections of both his father's own educational and intellectual achievements and the ways in which his father made great efforts to transfer this knowledge to Thomas. In his 1821 autobiography, Jefferson makes mention of his father having been selected for making the first map of Virginia and the fact that he was only the third or fourth settler to arrive in the area of Virginia which the Jefferson family continued to occupy, and the success that came of these ventures despite his father's lack of true schooling and overall limited education (Jefferson 1821, par. 3). Also mentioned is the fact that Jefferson himself was made to commence formal schooling at the age of five with an English grammar school, moving to Latin at the age of nine under the tutelage of a Scottish-born clergyman, Mr. Douglas, who was expressly chosen by Peter Jefferson (Jefferson 1821, par. 3). This early introduction to formal education was coupled by an obvious love for learning in the Jefferson household, where Shakespeare was held in great reverence and the basics of reading, writing, and arithmetic were taught to all of the Jefferson children at a very young age (Schouler 2005).

The young Thomas Jefferson was also instructed in areas of the arts from a young age, learning how to play the "fiddle" (Parton 1874, pp. 13). This massive emphasis on learning of all sorts undoubtedly had an impact on Jefferson's views on education throughout the rest of his life, and not least because of the clarity with which his father's lack of schooling was made explicit (Monsell & Wagner 1989). Education was important for all, as it determined future successes especially for people without the natural faculties possessed by Peter Jefferson.

Jefferson's democratic impulses towards education and learning can be easily observed in even a vague detail of his life -- the manner in which he marked his books as his own. At a time when books were relatively scarce and highly valuable commodities, especially in the still-developing New World, many of the gentry in Jefferson's circle ordered specially made engraved plates for each of their books to denote the books' belonging to their personal library. While it seems that Jefferson considered this and could certainly have afforded it, he eschewed this… READ MORE

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