Freedom of the Self-Regulating Type

I just finished watching the film Thomas Jefferson, directed by Ken Burns. It's available through netflix and I highly recommend it. According to Burns and the historians involved with his project, Thomas Jefferson was the quintessential American,a title that Jefferson deserves because he wrote the Declaration of Independence, and because his life was riddled with contradictions. The contradiction, or problem, that troubles Burns etal. the most, is Jefferson's slave ownership. How can the man who catalyzed the modern desire for freedom with the words "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness," have kept slaves? Kept them when others of his class were setting them free? Kept them when he believed that slavery was a poison in the national soul? Slavery he said, would be left to future generations to resolve.

I don't have an answer other than this: he was accountable, ultimately, solely, to his conscience and his personal notion of God, and that was not enough to compel him to do what he knew was right.

 My object here is not to trash Thomas Jefferson. The more I learn about him, the more I respect him, and the more I learn about him, the more ideas I have about our native mythology and the problems we inherited, centuries ago, from men with a vision that still inspires people today. If you know your American history, you know that debates about who should rule, about the powers of the central government and the states and individuals, about the separation of church and state, about fair courts and free markets, have continued unabated since the first Constitutional Congress. Jefferson's vision of democracy has not been realized---a country where every citizen gets fair and equal treatment under the laws, a country where every "man" has equal opportunity at a modest living.

As I watched the film, I was struck by how many times the commentators called Jefferson "optimistic," and I noted the emphasis on expansion and boundless freedom. Jefferson, who wanted a small central government, spent $15million to buy the Louisiana Territories over the objections of Congress. I think it was George Will, who noted (in the film) that Jefferson's vision of freedom was a total absence of restriction from outside forces, coupled with a dedication to self regulation. Hmm.