Jefferson, Thomas

Cultural  

1. A political leader of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries; one of the Founding Fathers; the leader of the Democratic-Republican party. Jefferson was principal author of the Declaration of Independence and served as president from 1801 to 1809, between John Adams and James Madison. He arranged for the Louisiana Purchase, founded the University of Virginia, and built the mansion Monticello. Jefferson is famed as a champion of political and religious freedom, but he was also a slaveholder. (See Jeffersonian democracy; Sally Hemings.)

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Example Sentences

The choices were unpredictable even within those limited boundaries: Bartlett included Benjamin Franklin, but not Thomas Jefferson; Thomas Paine, but not John Adams; John Keats, but not Percy Bysshe Shelley; the editor and translator “Mrs. Sarah Austin,” but not Jane Austen.

From Seattle Times

Jefferson Thomas, one of nine Black students to integrate a Little Rock high school in America’s first major battle over school segregation, died in Columbus, Ohio, at age 67.

From Washington Times

In the end, there were only three colored students at Hall—Effie Jones, Elsie Robinson and Estella Thompson—and only two at Central—Carlotta Walls and Jefferson Thomas.

From Literature

That chair was for Jefferson Thomas, who died in 2010.

From Washington Times

The week after his primary victory, he said, “I’ve always described myself as a humanist, because I think it’s the greatest philosophical movement in human history. Thomas Jefferson, Thomas Paine, Benjamin Franklin, they’re my heroes. … I believe that there are humanists of every religious stripe. … I’ve met lots of Catholics who describe themselves as humanists.”

From Washington Post