Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
I think it's pretty well known that TJ was in favour of the Revolution and supported its ideals at the beginning, but does anyone know what his feelings were as time went on? Did he approve/disapprove of the execution of the French royal family? What were his feelings on The Terror? Did he ever admit the Revolution had gone hideously wrong?
I'm surprised he didn't advocate something similar in America.
Most likely not possible. In France you had a powerful monarchy to abolish and a entrenched culture to overhaul, very much different circumstances in the colonies at the time. Also, the colonies had a very large body of water separating itself from the powers of Europe who where, at the time, after each others throat.
I think it's pretty well known that TJ was in favour of the Revolution and supported its ideals at the beginning, but does anyone know what his feelings were as time went on? Did he approve/disapprove of the execution of the French royal family? What were his feelings on The Terror? Did he ever admit the Revolution had gone hideously wrong?
Just curious
war is not talking.........TJ started the Marines when he was prez. and stopped paying tribute to Muslim Pirates and extracted a 5 year treaty that didn't last the tribute was I think 25% of the National Budget
yeah the world is violent and kingdoms are established by violence
And consider that they didn't have CNN with all the blood and guts to see for yourself. Reading a letter about the horror is one thing, seeing it is another. You fill in with what you understand as horror (why being less detailed in stories works so well). Jeffereson saw some terrible things, but the maw of death and horror that France became was unimagionable even for that time.
Jefferson was not opposed to violent revolution, and had lived through one. I would expect his version of excess would be far less than the reality. If CNN had been showing the heads falling and the grandmothers knitting and cheering I suspect he would have not been so enthusiastic.
Also remember the politics. Things were not going well with the British. Just because they lost there was no sense of security that the British wouldn't try again. If France was imploding and the British terrified it would spread there, they would not be looking across the sea.
Jefferson was not an advocate of the Terror so much as a person who did not want to give Anglophiles in the U.S. more of a pretext for war with France, and a person who wanted to keep all things in their proper perspective. After the downfall of Napoleon he had the following summary:
Quote:
Robespierre met the fate, and his memory the execration, he so justly merited. The rich were his victims, and perished by thousands. It is by millions that Bonaparte destroys the poor, and he is eulogized and deified by the sycophants even of science. These merit more than the mere oblivion to which they will be consigned: and the day will come when a just posterity will give to their hero the only preeminence he has earned, that of having been the greatest of the destroyers of the human race. What year of his military life has not consigned a million of human beings to death, to poverty and wretchedness! What field in Europe may not raise a monument of the murders, the burnings, the desolations, the famines, and miseries it has witnessed from him?
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
