Jefferson and Slavery DBQ
President Thomas Jefferson has recently been described as “the American Sphinx” by author Dr. Joseph Ellis in his book entitled American Sphinx: The Character of Thomas Jefferson. A sphinx is defined as an enigmatic or puzzling person. The statement that Jefferson was “the American Sphinx” is largely true when it comes to Jefferson’s hypocritical position on the American policy of slavery. Foremost, Jefferson was a slave-owner who wrote the Declaration of Independence. In it he wrote, “that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.” This excerpted line at the time written does not mean to include slaves in the definition of “all men”, just free-white citizens of the thirteen colonies. In Jefferson’s original draft, he accused the English king of being “determined to keep an open market where MEN should be bought and sold…and he is now exciting those very people to rise up in arms among
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Some common words found in the essay are:
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Approximate Word count = 689
Approximate Pages = 3 (250 words per page double spaced)
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