As the author of the Declaration of Independence and many memorable
state papers, Thomas Jefferson was, with Abraham Lincoln, one of our two
greatest presidential writers. The following speech, which he delivered
on March 4, 1801, is an eloquent statement of democratic principles.
Jefferson approached the office of President with humility and a
conciliatory attitude towards his opponents. The simplicity and
directness of his prose contrast greatly with the flowery and lengthy
eloquence of most speakers in his day.
Friends and Fellow Citizens:
Called upon to undertake the duties of the first executive office of
our country, I avail myself of the presence of that portion of my
fellow citizens which is here assembled to express my grateful thanks
for the favor with which they have been pleased to look towards me, to
declare a sincere consciousness that the task is above my talents and
that I approach it with those anxious and awful presentiments which
the greatness of the charge and the weakness of my powers so justly
inspire.
A rising nation spread over a wide and fruitful land, traversing all
the seas with the rich productions of their industry, engaged in
commerce with nations who feel power and forget right, advancing
rapidly to destinies beyond the reach of mortal eye; when I
contemplate these transcendent objects and see the honor, the
happiness, and the hopes of this beloved country committed to the
issue and the auspices of this day, I shrink from the contemplation
and humble myself before the magnitude of the undertaking.
Utterly indeed should I despair, did not the presence of many whom I
here see remind me that in the other high authorities provided by our
Constitution, I shall find resources of wisdom, of virtue, and of
zeal, on which to rely under all difficulties.
To you then, gentlemen, who are charged with the sovereign functions
of legislation and to those associated with you, I look with
encouragement for that guidance and support which may enable us to
steer with safety the vessel in which we are all embarked amidst the
conflicting elements of a troubled sea.
During the contest of opinion through which we have passed, the
animation of discussions and of exertions, has sometimes worn an
aspect which might impose on strangers unused to think freely and to
speak and to write what they think.
But this being now decided by the voice of the nation, announced
according to the rules of the Constitution, all will of course arrange
themselves under the will of the law, and unite in common efforts for
the common good. All too will bear in mind this sacred principle, that
though the will of the majority is in all cases to prevail, that will,
to be rightful, must be reasonable: that the minority possess their
equal rights, which equal laws must protect, and to violate would be
oppression.
Let us then, fellow citizens, unite with one heart and one mind; let
us restore to social intercourse that harmony and affection, without
which liberty and even life itself are but dreary things.
And let us reflect that having banished from our land that religious
intolerance under which mankind so long bled and suffered we have yet
gained little, if we countenance a political intolerance as despotic,
as wicked, and capable of as bitter and bloody persecution.
During the throes and convulsions of the ancient world, during the
agonized spasms of infuriated man, seeking through blood and slaughter
his long lost liberty, it was not wonderful that the agitation of the
billows should reach even this distant and peaceful shore; that this
should be more felt and feared by some, and less by others, and should
divide opinions as to measures of safety.
But every difference of opinion is not a difference of principle. We
have called, by different names, brethren of the same principle. We
are all republicans: we are all federalists.
If there be any among us who wish to dissolve this union, or to change
its republican form, let them stand undisturbed, as monuments of the
safety with which error of opinion may be tolerated where reason is
left free to combat it.
I know indeed that some honest men have feared that a republican
government cannot be strong; that this government is not strong
enough. But would the honest patriot, in the full tide of successful
experiment abandon a government which has so far kept us free and
firm, on the theoretic and visionary fear that this government, the
world’s best hope may, by possibility, want energy to preserve itself?
I trust not. I believe this, on the contrary, the strongest government
on earth.
I believe it the only one where every man, at the call of the law,
would fly to the standard of the law; would meet invasions of public
order, as his own personal concern.
Sometimes it is said that man cannot be trusted with the government of
himself. Can he then be trusted with the government of others? Or have
we found angels in the form of kings to govern him? Let history answer
this question.
Let us then pursue with courage and confidence our own federal and
republican principles, our attachment to union and representative
government.
Kindly separated by nature, and a wide ocean, from the exterminating
havoc of one quarter of the globe; too high-minded to endure the
degradations of the others; possessing a chosen country, with room
enough for our descendants to the thousandth and thousandth
generation; entertaining a due sense of our equal right, to the use of
our own faculties, to the acquisitions of our own industry, to honor
and confidence from our fellow citizens resulting not from birth, but
from our actions and their sense of them, enlightened by a benign
religion, professed indeed and practiced in various forms, yet all of
them inculcating honesty, truth, temperance, gratitude, and the love
of man, acknowledging and adoring an overruling providence, which by
all its dispensations proves that it delights in the happiness of man
here and his greater happiness hereafter.
With all these blessings, what more is necessary to make us a happy
and a prosperous people? Still one thing more, fellow citizens, a wise
and frugal government, which shall restrain men from injuring one
another, shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own
pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the
mouth of labor the bread it has earned.
This is the sum of good government, and this is necessary to close the
circle of our felicities.