Pulitzer Prize historian Gordon S. Wood, in “Friends Divided” does a superb job of pitting the ideas, principles, and different versions of their ideal governments against one another in order to explain to the reader, why Thomas Jefferson might be more remembered and affectionately thought of today than John Adams.
Why shouldn’t these two Founding Fathers be equally remembered and the phrases from their vast trove of writings and books be equally invoked by Americans today?
Both, after all, were omnivorous readers, both well-educated and steeped in history, poetry, and the arts, both were the principal framers of the Constitution, both ministers abroad, Jefferson (France) Adams (Great Britain), and both occupied the office of the President of the United States in the early stages of the frail republic.
The answer becomes clearer to the reader as they make their way through Wood’s sharp analysis and parsing of personal letters, penned by both Adams and Jefferson. One believed all men were created equal, the other only saw the inequality in society; one yearned for a nation free of British tradition, while the other held monarchial sentiment and a troubling reverence for the British constitution.
Most importantly, the reason one is better remembered than the other, stems from one's high hopes for the Republic, especially in how all the nationalities, diversities, and religions in America would bond in one magnificent way, while the other took a dour and decidedly more pessimistic view of the diversity of America and the portents of the future. One was inspiring, the other pessimistic.
The French Revolution, religion, and spiteful partisan politics are just a few of the principle differences of opinion that would divided these intellectual firebrands over the years until Benjamin Rush would intercede, convincing both to cast aside their differences and begin corresponding together, once again. Wood reports 158 letters would be written between Jefferson and Adams.
If they had email today, you could just imagine their inboxes would be filled to the brim.
--Bill Lucey
January 28, 2018
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