Abstract
Thomas Jefferson was a Virginia slaveholder (1743–1826), the author of the American Declaration of Independence (1776), and the third president of the United States (1801–1809). He was also the leader of the early Democratic-Republican party, which opposed the Alexander Hamilton-led Federalist party in the late 1790s – all this to the effect that the period of American history after his election to the presidency in 1800 is known as the Jeffersonian Era. Jefferson can also be characterized as the very embodiment of the American Enlightenment, because alongside his impressive political career, he was a cosmopolitan intellectual, a famous architect, an amateur botanist and anthropologist, and a champion of religious freedom. Particularly, he is known for his inveterate, even if typically eighteenth-century optimism about human progress in sciences, in morality, and in material welfare.
Originally published in Mortimer Sellers and Stephan Kirste, Encyclopedia of the Philosophy of Law and Social Philosophy, © Springer Nature B.V. 2020, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-6730-0_681-1.
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Helo, A. (2023). Jefferson, Thomas. In: Zanetti, G., Sellers, M., Kirste, S. (eds) Handbook of the History of the Philosophy of Law and Social Philosophy. Studies in the History of Law and Justice, vol 23. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-19546-4_23
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