An Age of Revolution Returns
About this episode
The episode discusses the radical ideas of Thomas Jefferson and other founding figures regarding revolution and government.
The most radical political prose ever written into a founding document of a nation is found in the Declaration of Independence, written by Thomas Jefferson; “That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it.” He went further, and wrote that when a government pursues a “long train of abuses and usurpations” it’s the people’s duty to “throw off such government.” In a 1787 letter to James Madison, Jefferson wrote, “I hold it that a little rebellion now and then is a good thing... It prevents the degeneracy of government.” In another letter he wrote, “God forbid we should ever be 20 years without such a rebellion.” In a letter to William Stephens Smith he wrote, “The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is its natural manure.” Thomas Jefferson was not the only radical poet of individual freedom. The words of James Madison, Samuel Adams, Patrick Henry, Benjamin Franklin, and others, lit the flames for the Age of Revolution. Starting in 1775 with the American Revolution, which inspired the French Revolution in 1789, the Haitian revolution in 1791. And…
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