Thomas Jefferson: The Art of Power (76 page)

“
STOOD
ARRAIGNED
”
PTJ,
VI, 185. In May 1782, Patty Jefferson gave birth to another daughter, also Lucy Elizabeth. As a result of the birth Mrs. Jefferson was quite ill. Two days before the birth of the daughter, Jefferson had informed the Speaker of the House of Delegates, John Tyler, that he declined his recent election to the House of Delegates. (See
JHT,
I, 393–97;
PTJ,
VI, 179–87; and Willard Sterne Randall,
Thomas Jefferson,
347.)

Speaker Tyler responded with a possible threat that Jefferson might be arrested and forced to attend. James Monroe also sent a letter to Jefferson on May 11, 1782, urging him to attend. According to the historian Dumas Malone's account, Jefferson wrote Monroe what Julian P. Boyd called a long “embittered” letter of May 20 spelling out in “extreme anxiety” why he would not attend. (See
JHT,
I, 394–97; and
PTJ,
VI, 184–87.)

In a footnote to this letter, the editor of the Monroe papers wrote: “Jefferson, still smarting from the criticism of his conduct as governor and gravely concerned about the dangerous state of his wife's health, declined to serve in the House of Delegates, following his election as a delegate. He used this response to JM's letter of 11 May as a means of communicating to the House the justification for his decision not to serve.” There is no indication that they actually arrested or seized Jefferson to compel his attendance. There was only the threat. Patty Jefferson, of course, died four months later on September 6, 1782. (
The Papers of James Monroe,
II, ed. Daniel Preston and Marlena C. Delong [Westport, Conn., 2003–], 36.)

“M
RS
. J
EFFERSON
HAS
ADDED
”
Ibid., 186.

FOURTEEN
·
TO BURN ON THROUGH DEATH

“
M
R
S
. J
EFFERSON
HAS
AT
LA
ST
”
Scharff,
Women Jefferson Loved,
151.

MAY
HAVE
SUFFE
RED
FROM
TUBERCULOSI
S
MB,
I, 521. See also Gordon Jones and James A. Bear, “Thomas Jefferson: A Medical History,” unpublished manuscript, Thomas Jefferson Foundation, Charlottesville, Va.

J
EFFERSON
“
WAS
NE
VER
OUT
OF
CALLING
”
TDLTJ,
63.

HELPING
HER
TAKE
MEDIC
INES
Ibid.

E
ITHER
AT
HER
BED
Ibid.

CRAVED
J
EFFERSON
'
S
COMPANY
Randall,
Jefferson,
I, 380.

SOME
L
INES
FROM
S
TERNE
PTJ,
VI, 196–97.

“I
H
AVE
BEEN
MUCH
”
Scharff,
Women Jefferson Loved,
148.

“
TH
E
HOUSE
SERVANTS
”
Bear,
Jefferson at Monticello,
99.

“
HAVE
OFTEN
TOLD
MY
WIFE
”
Ibid.

“W
HEN
SHE
CAME
TO
THE
CHI
LDREN
”
Ibid., 99–100.

HE
GAVE
HIS
P
ROMISE
Ibid., 100.

TO
HELP
THE
GRIEVING
HUSBAND
TDLTJ,
63.

“T
HE
SCENE
THAT
FOLLOW
ED
”
Ibid.

A
PALLET
TO
LIE
O
N
Ibid.

“H
E
KEPT
HIS
ROOM
”
Ibid.

“W
HEN
AT
LAST
”
Ibid.

“I
HAD
HAD
SOME
THOUGHTS
”
PTJ,
VI, 197.

R
UMOR
HAD
J
EFFERSON
Ibid., 199.

“I
EVER
THOUGHT
HIM
”
Scharff,
Women Jefferson Loved,
151.

H
IS
EPITAPH
F
OR
P
ATTY
Randall,
Jefferson,
I, 383.

THE
POSSI
BILITY
OF
SUICIDE
PTJ,
VI, 198–99.

H
E
KNEW
HIS
DUTY
Ibid. “The care and instruction of our children indeed affords some temporary abstractions from wretchedness and nourishes a soothing reflection that if there be beyond the grave any concern for the things of this world there is one angel at least who views these attentions with pleasure and wishes continuance of them while she must pity the miseries to which they confine me,” Jefferson wrote. (Ibid.)

H
E
WAS
A
LONG
WAY
Ibid., 198. He neglected Elk Hill, saying that he was “finding myself absolutely unable to attend to anything like business.” (Ibid.)

FIFTEEN
·
RETURN TO THE ARENA

“
I
KNOW
NO
DANGER
SO
DREADFUL
”
PTJ,
VI, 248.

“
T
HE
STATES
WILL
GO
TO
WAR
”
Ibid.

M
USING
ON
THE
PERILS
OF
FAME
Ibid., 204–5.

“I
F
YOU
MEAN
T
”
Ibid., 205.

ASKED
HIM
TO
SERV
E
Ibid., 202. According to James Madison, “the act took place in consequence of its being suggested that the death of Mrs. J had probably changed the sentiments of Mr. J with regard to public life, and that all the reasons which led to his original appointment still existed.” (Ibid.) See also ibid., 210–15.

“I
HAD
TWO
MONTHS
B
EFORE
”
Ibid., 210.

V
ISITING
A
MPTH
ILL
,
THE
C
ARY
PLANTATI
ON
Ibid., 206–7.

“
PURSUE
THE
OBJE
CT
OF
MY
MISSION
”
Ibid., 206.

“I
S
HALL
LOSE
NO
MOMENT
”
Ibid.

“
A
LITTLE
EMERGING
”
Ibid., 203.

PUBLISHED
A
NOTICE
IN
T
HE
V
IRGINIA
G
AZET
TE
Ibid., 210.

H
E
AND
P
ATSY
EXPECTED
TO
SAIL
Ibid., 211.

TOOK
ROOMS
AT
M
ARY
H
OUSE
'
S
MB,
I, 527.

CHARMI
NG
POLITICAL
COMPANY
Ibid.

E
LIZA
H
OUSE
T
RIST
PTJ,
VI, 375. “Your character was great in my estimation long before I had the pleasure of your acquaintance personally, for I always understood your country was greatly benefited by your counsels; and I value you now because I know you are good,” she wrote him in late 1783. (Ibid.)

M
ADISON
'
S
WOOING
OF
FIFTEEN
-
YE
AR
-
OLD
Ibid., 262–64.
See also Gordon-Reed,
Hemingses of Monticello,
309–12. Gordon-Reed made an illuminating point about the marriageable ages of women in these years, noting that men of Jefferson and Madison's generation often pursued teenaged girls. Hence Jefferson and Sally Hemings and Madison and Kitty Floyd. There are other examples: John Marshall was twenty-five when he set out to win Polly Ambler—who was fourteen at the time. (Ibid., 311.) Thomas Mann Randolph, Sr., was to marry a seventeen-year-old when he was fifty. (Ibid.) “Much as it may assault present-day sensibilities, fifteen- and sixteen-year-old girls were in Hemings's time thought eligible to become seriously involved with men, even men who were substantially older,” wrote Gordon-Reed. (Ibid., 309.)

TOOK
DET
AILED
NOTES
Ibid., 212–13.

“H
AD
I
JOI
NED
YOU
”
Ibid., 217.

“
MY
INDIVID
UAL
TRIBUTE
”
Ibid., 222. Jefferson understood, he wrote to Washington, “you must receive much better intelligence from the gentlemen whose residence there has brought them into a more intimate acquaintance with the characters and views of the European courts, yet I shall certainly presume to add my mite.” (Ibid., 222–23.)

J
EFFERS
ON
RETURNED
TO
V
IRGIN
IA
Ibid., 259–61. His mission suspended, he left Philadelphia for Virginia on April 12. Madison kept him apprised of romantic and political developments. “Before you left us,” Madison wrote of Kitty Floyd, “I had sufficiently ascertained her sentiments. Since your departure the affair has been pursued.” (Ibid., 262.) On his way home Jefferson stopped in Richmond. For two weeks he reacquainted himself with the minutiae of Virginia, “associating and conversing with as many” legislators as he could. It was his first sustained period of time among these men since the end of the gubernatorial crisis, and Jefferson seems to have hurled himself back into the action with enthusiasm. He wrote Madison with his impressions of possible candidates for the Congress—and of his sense of how the state's leadership viewed the fundamental question of national power. Jefferson confided this political intelligence in a letter written from Tuckahoe on the morning of Wednesday, May 7, 1783. (Ibid., 265–67.)

“S
HOULD
THE
CALL
BE
MADE
”
Ibid., 267.

“M
R
. J
EFFERSON
WAS
PLACED
”
Ibid.

T
HE
C
ONG
RESS
TO
WHICH
J
EFFERS
ON
WAS
ELECTED
Boyer and Dubofsky,
Oxford Companion to United States History,
51, summarizes the powers of the Confederation Congress (and the lack thereo
f
).

TO
DEVISE
A
“
VISIBLE
HEAD
”
PTJ,
VI, 516–29.

“T
HIS
WAS
THEN
IMPUTED
”
Randall,
Jefferson,
I, 394–95.

“O
UR
PLAN
BEST
, I
BELIEV
E
,
COMBINES
”
Ibid.

A
POWER
O
F
CENTRAL
PTJ,
VI, 248. “We have substituted a Congress of deputies from every state to perform this task,” Jefferson wrote, “but we have done nothing which would enable them to enforce their decisions. What will be the case? They will not be enforced.… Can any man be so puffed up with his little portion of sovereignty as to prefer this calamitous accompaniment to the parting of a little of his sovereign right and placing it in a council from all the states, … who being chosen by himself annually, removable at will?” (Ibid.)