American Sphinx: The Character of Thomas Jefferson | Joseph J. Ellis

American Sphinx: The Character of Thomas Jefferson | Joseph J. Ellis | An excellent view of Jefferson

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American Sphinx: T...

	American Sphinx: The Character of Thomas Jefferson Joseph J. Ellis Vintage, 1998 - 464 pages average customer review:based on 140 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

A Unique look at Jefferson

Prior to his Pulitzer Prize winning examination of the revolutionary generation in "Founding Brothers," Joseph Ellis tackled the biography of probably the most difficult member, Thomas Jefferson, in "American Sphinx." As Ellis points out in the beginning of the book Jefferson remains one of the most popular founders as well as one that has been adopted across the political spectrum. Ellis sets off to discover what Jefferson's actual beliefs were and how they changed during the course of his life. Rather then presenting a regular biography of Jefferson, the readers are presented with "snapshots" of Jefferson at various times in his life - in 1776 as he is preparing to write the Declaration of Independence, in the 1780s as the first United States minister to France, in the mid-1790s when he returns to Monticello after retiring as Secretary of State, in 1801 at his first inaugural and in the 1810s during his famous correspondence with John Adams. Each "snapshot" is not limited to a specific year but gives a survey of Jefferson's life during the period and how his political thought was evolving.

Ellis's "snapshots" of Jefferson give his biography a unique feel; it is more then just the re-telling of the story of Jefferson's life. Each glimpse of Jefferson that we get gives a feel for not only Jefferson the man, but Jefferson the political thinker as well. Ellis examines Jefferson's frame of mind at the time he wrote the Declaration of Independence and the many different "sources" that may have affected that writing. Ellis not afraid to stay away from the more controversial aspects of Jefferson's thinking - his views on slavery vs. his prose in the Declaration that "all men are created equal" and his affair with Sally Hemmings.

This book is an illuminating biography of an often misunderstood Founding Father. Ellis' unique format gives the book a different feel and still manages to give the reader a greater understanding of Jefferson. Readers who are looking for a more conventional, straightforward biography of Jefferson may come away disappointing. This biography is aimed at readers who already have a background understanding of the early American republic but are interested in unearthing the political ideas of one of its greatest heroes.

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An excellent view of Jefferson

Ellis's work is not a pure biography - see Dumas Malone for that - but it is a scholarly treatise that gets inside the head of Thomas Jefferson to the extent that it is possible to do so. Yes, I know some shrink from anything that even hints at psycho-history, but Jefferson left such an expansive trail of writing and interactions with others that it is reasonable. Ellis never strays from fact and always uses them to justify his conclusions. He also writes in a flowing, captivating manner that nonetheless never permits rhetoric to blockade reality. Ellis does not paint an adoring picture of Jefferson; rather, he points out the innumerable inconsistencies of a man who conceptualized at 50,000 feet and had trouble seeing the ground. Highly recommended.

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Vintage

This truly is vintage Joseph Ellis. I've enjoyed all of his books, particularly his writing. The fact you are reading this is proof you are interested in Jefferson, so you ought to get this book. Highest recommendation.

For the most unconventional book I have ever read on Jefferson, to give a little bit of contrast, also try West Point: Thomas Jefferson: Character Leadership by Norman Thomas Remick.

Jefferson Non Scio Vos

"American Sphinx" is not the place to begin a study of the life of Thomas Jefferson. In the introduction, Joseph Ellis comments that before joining the plethora of published analyses and biographies of Jefferson, the historian had better be prepared to bring some new insights to the life of this most revered of the Founders. Ellis chose for his subtitle, "The Character of Thomas Jefferson", and it is Jefferson's character that Ellis explores, in snippets that leap forward from scene to scene in Jefferson's life, as if Ellis were a time-traveler checking in periodically on his subject while Jefferson the man moves through a life that is now considered hallowed history. Ellis assumes that his reader is already familiar with the larger moments of Jefferson's life, as well as the surrounding history, and so skips over these. The reader who is new to Jefferson, therefore, should start elsewhere.

"American Sphinx" was published a few years before the DNA tests in 1998 which proved that some of Sally Hemings' children did indeed carry the Y chromosome of the Jefferson family, probably from Thomas himself or his brother Randolph. Because the DNA evidence cannot narrow the paternity of Sally Hemings' children any further, Ellis' arguments against Thomas Jefferson as their father still hold up, and remain as reasonable as they could also be inaccurate. Despite a wealth of circumstantial evidence that can swing either way, any final judgment must be taken simply on faith.

And "taken on faith" seems to be how Jefferson's life must be viewed. He represents so much to so many about the founding spirit of the United States that he is often worshipped along the lines of a Joshua or other prophet. Ellis seems to hold Jefferson up to this same hero-worship status, but through lines of often dry prose and some confusing sentence structure (Ellis does not set off his prepositional phrases with commas), the reader begins to get the queasy feeling that Jefferson may not have been the man that we have all wanted him to be. He begins to come across as petty and insecure, with a naïve outlook on humanity that carried on even into his waning years. It was always easy to write off Jefferson' sharper declarations (The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants) as youthful enthusiasm, but his convictions against a governing structure for the United States apparently never changed, leaving John Adams to question Jefferson's sanity while even James Madison had to shake his head from time to time. Ellis almost appears to have been startled by these revelations, and struggles to keep Jefferson atop a pedestal even as the evidence tries to topple the whole thing.

All in all, "American Sphinx" is a sobering exercise in the realities of greatness; that in the end the Founding Fathers--and Jefferson in particular--were all very human and just as capable of error as anyone; that the founding of the United States was neither a clear-cut goal of rationality nor even a consensus, but was rather a struggle of ideology pulled toward the center by camps who were alarmingly polarized even in the eighteenth century. But even as the dichotomies of Jefferson's life descend into disingenuousness, we can still ask with some reverence: Where would we have been without him?

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A bit of a prophet

Thomas Jefferson was a bit of a schizophrenic to say the least. His ability to act with the most contemptible conduct but to conceal the true character of his behavior from his own perceptions is remarkable. Yet, while it is easy to focus upon the frailties of his enigmatic character, it is worth also looking at some of the profound thoughts that emerged from his reactionary idealism, perfectly unsuitable for the reality of the society of mankind. (Though Washington was the most noble and remarkable of the founding fathers to be sure, Adams had the superior grasp on the nature of man and the relationship of government among the society of man) History if fraught with complex relationships when put together work out to a whole, but a bit more on that later.

Jefferson was a staunch Republican, and as such, unwittingly sowed the seeds for the confederacy time and time again as he elaborated on his ideology. The Republicanism of the day bore little relationship to the republicanism of today except for the fact that then it believed and acted upon the notion that the extreme distribution of power was in the best interest of all. The Republican of today, at least as incarnated in George Bush, bears more the mark of the Federalists of than with a verbal nod to the Republican ideals of extremely limited federal powers of Jefferson's times. Jefferson was wrong and Jefferson was right. John Adams was wrong but more often John Adams was right. Hamilton and the extreme Federalists were probably as dangerous as some suspected, even Adams, but my topic now is Jefferson.

Jefferson was firmly opposed to the formation of a standing army as he was against the formation of a Navy. What brought about his articulating this position was the debate over the Jay treaty as well as the conflict with France toward the end of the century. He never seemed to see France or its revolution for what it really was. He could not admit the tragedy and futility of the excursion into anarchy. He clung to his romantic hope that the French were essentially emancipating themselves into some romantic egalitarian democracy, which as we know today, devolved not only into almost genocidal bloodshed, but a dictatorship set upon conquest ala Napoleon. It is difficult to contrast his unrealistic interpretation of these historic events with some of the more prophetic statements he made. A good look at Jefferson would require more than a quick blog entry, so I will have to settle upon the use of his thought to make one point.

The US Constitution was both intentionally and wisely vague but direct. It laid out the system of government simplistically but avoided the activity of enacting laws or precedent. And, almost exactly according to the recommendations of Adams, who was in France at the time, it established two houses, an executive and an independent judiciary. There was little contention over the establishment of these powers, but there was rancorous debate, even fighting upon the powers of these powers. Jefferson wanted a weak executive, but then he wanted a weak federal government. He was opposed to the two houses of the legislature, but he had little issue with the creation of a judiciary. However, when it came to debating over what the powers of the judiciary were, he stood firmly opposed again to the establishment of judicial review, and for very good reason. Judicial review essentially gives the Supreme Court the power to review the laws enacted by congress against the constitution and the bill of rights or the amendments. In reviewing those laws they were able to strike them down. Jefferson saw in this the end of democracy, and his statements on the issue were prophetic and true. With a body of unelected officials with the power to interpret a concise constitution against laws passed by congress, you essentially witness the death of the republic, ala Iran today. However, without judicial review, the rule of the legislature could denigrate into rule by mob, the tyranny of the masses, especially had there only been one body as Jefferson advocated. So where is the balance? That is not easy to answer, but what is, is that the balance tipped against Jefferson and in favor of the Federalists.

So, in the end, the Supreme Court was granted the right of judicial review and this founding father forsaw the consequences.

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