Notes On The State Of Viginia And Republicanism Term paper
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Notes on the State of Virginia is an extensive work undertook by Thomas Jefferson. In this tome, Jefferson discussed his state of Virginia proudly and in great detail. The book was written in the twenty-three chapters or responses to queries from a Frenchman concerning the state of Virginia. From his writing, it is clear that Thomas Jefferson was first and foremost a Virginian. His words were a factual display of what the state, its people, and its landscape meant to him.
The term republicanism is of very vague application in every language. Jefferson proclaimed self-evident truths in that all men are created equal ; that they possess unalienable rights of Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness ; that government derives its just powers from the consent of the governed and can be overthrown if it becomes destructive of these ends . In linking these doctrines of individual liberty and popular sovereignty with independence, Jefferson established revolutionary republicanism as a defining value of the new nation.
Under the query relative to the several charters of the State and its present form of government, Jefferson presents a compact statistical view of the colony from the first settlement under the grant of Queen Elizabeth in 1584 down to the time at which he writes, gives an outline of the existing constitution, and enumerates what he considers its capital defects.
A brief notice of these defects and the remedies, which he proposed will explain more fully the opinions of Jefferson on the constitution of Virginia. Inserted in Appendix II is a new constitution prepared by himself in 1783, when it was expected the Assembly of Virginia would call a convention for remodeling the old one. Among the defects of the existing establishment he enumerates:
+ The want of universal suffrage -- or rather, such an extension of the elective franchise as would give a voice in the government to all those who pay and fight for its support . (p.124)
+ Inequality of representation. Jefferson detects and exposes the evil in a strong light, by a tabular statement of the relative number of electors and representatives in each county, and calls the attention of his countrymen to the subject in an impressive manner. According to his statement, the county of Warwick, with only one hundred fighting men, has an equal representation with the county of Loudon, which has 1746. So that every man in Warwick has as much influence in the government as 17 men in Loudon. (p.124) Taking the State at large, 19,000 men in one part were enabled to give law to upwards of 30,000 in the remaining part.
+ The Senate is necessarily too homogeneous with the House of Delegates. Being chosen by the same electors, at the same time, and out of the same subjects, the choice falls of course on the same description of men, defeating thereby the great purpose of establishing different houses of legislation, which is to introduce the influence of different interests or different principles.
+ The want of a sufficient barrier between the legislative, judiciary, and executive powers of the government. The concentration of these in the same hands constituted, in his opinion, precisely the definition of despotic government . (p. 126)
+ Finally, Jefferson argued that the constitution itself was a mere legislative ordinance, enacted at a critical time for a temporary purpose, not superior to the ordinary legislature, but alterable by it, and that the Assembly possessing the right, as they did, of determining a quorum of their own body, might convert the government into an absolute despotism at any moment by consolidating its powers and placing them in the hands of a single individual. He concludes his remarks upon the constitution by a solemn appeal to the people for their speedy interposition:
"Our situation is indeed perilous, and I hope my countrymen will be sensible of it, and will apply, at a proper season, the proper remedy; which is a convention to fix the constitution, to amend its defects, to bind up the several branches of government by certain laws, which, when they transgress, their acts shall become nullities; to render unnecessary an appeal to the people, or in other words, a rebellion, on every infraction of their rights, on the peril that their acquiescence shall be construed into an intention to surrender those rights." (p. 135-136)
Under the enquiry concerning The Administration Of Justice And Description Of The Laws, Jefferson presents a view of the judicial system of Virginia, with a description of the laws. He writes that the object of the revisal is to, diffuse knowledge more generally through the mass of people. This bill proposes to lay off every county into small districts of five or six miles square, called hundreds, and in...
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