Thomas Jefferson, the Apostle of Americanism

by Gilbert Chinard

The originality of this theory cannot be determined without comparison with the resolutions adopted a few days before by the Assembly of Fairfax County presided over by Colonel George Washington. These came from the pen of George Mason and they stated with equal emphasis the contractual theory of the government of the British colonies. Whether Jefferson knew them or not, the similarity with the views expressed by the freeholders of Albemarle is most striking.

The first article averred the principle also found in Jefferson's "Commonplace Book" that "this colony and Dominion of Virginia cannot be considered as a conquered country, and as it was, that the present inhabitants are not of the conquered, but of the conquerors." It added that:

Our ancestors, when they left their native land, and settled in America, brought over with them, even if the same is not confirmed by Charters, the civil constitution and form of Government of the country they came from and were by the laws of nature and nations entitled to all its privileges, immunities and advantages, which have descended to us, their posterity, and ought of right to be as fully enjoyed as if we had still continued with the realm of England.

The second article enunciated the most essential and "fundamental principle of government", that the people "could be governed by no laws to which they had not given their consent by Representatives freely chosen by themselves."

The third article declared that the colonies had some duty to fulfill towards the mother country and admitted that the British Parliament might, "directed with wisdom and moderation", take measures to regulate "American commerce", although such action was in some degree repugnant to the principles of the Constitution.[32]

Whether or not Jefferson had received the Fairfax resolutions before writing the Albemarle declaration, this is the capital difference between the two documents and the two doctrines. On the one hand, George Mason accepted the theory that the first settlers had brought over with them the civil constitution and form of government of the mother country, and consequently admitted a permanent connection between the colony and the metropolis. Jefferson, on the contrary, asserted with great strength and clarity the complete independence of the colonists from the British constitution. They were subject to no laws except those they had freely adopted when they had consented to a new compact and formed a new society. He was perfectly justified when he declared in his "Autobiography":

Our other patriots, Randolph, the Lees, Nicholas, Pendleton, stopped at the half-way house of John Dickinson, who admitted that England had a right to regulate our commerce, and to lay duties on it for the purpose of regulation, but not of raising revenue. But for this ground there was no foundation in compact, in any acknowledged principles of colonisation, nor in reason; expatriation being a natural right, and acted on as such by all nations, in all ages.

This was really the core of the question. Jefferson had reached that conclusion, not from following a certain line of abstract reasoning, but after studying the history of the Greek colonies in Stanyan, and the history of the Saxon settlement of Great Britain in many authors, as may be seen in his "Commonplace Book", and he was soon to reaffirm the doctrine of expatriation as the fundamental principle on which rested all the claims of the American colonies.

The Virginia Convention was to meet at Williamsburg on August 1, to select delegates to a General Congress of the colonies. With all his books at hand, all his legal authorities, the precious "Commonplace Book" and all the repertories he had gathered in his library, Jefferson proceeded to draft a project of instructions for the future delegates. He was taken ill on his way to Williamsburg but forwarded the plan to Peyton Randolph and Patrick Henry. Henry never mentioned it; Randolph informed the convention that he had received such a paper from a member, prevented by sickness from offering it, and laid it on the table for perusal. It was read generally by the members, approved by many, though thought too bold for use at that time; but they printed it in pamphlet form, under the title of "A Summary View of the Rights of British America."

In some respects it is a more original and more important document than the Declaration of Independence itself. With the detailed account of the grievances enumerated by Jefferson we cannot deal here. A few points, however, deserve special attention. The difficulties that had arisen between the colonies and the home government had occasioned the publication of many pamphlets dealing with the situation. Most of Jefferson's predecessors, however, had attempted to define in jure the rights of the British colonies. Thus George Mason had made his "Extracts" from the Virginia charters, "with some remarks on them" in 1773, and he had come to the conclusion already given in the "Fairfax resolves", that "the ancestors of the colonists when they had left their native land and settled in America had brought with them, although not confirmed by Charters, the civil government and form of government of the country they came from."[33] But he had gone back no farther in history and had not formulated the principles of the "constitution" of England. Not so with Jefferson, who emphatically denied that the colonists had anything to do with the British constitution or with its form of government. He had studied the history of the settlement of England in Molesworth, in Pelloutier, in Sir William Temple, in Dalrymple, and had come to the conclusion enunciated in the "Rights of British America":