Thomas Jefferson Feared an Aristocracy of Corporations

[FreakinDJ]

The author of the Declaration of Independence warned against the threat to democracy posed by big banks and big corporations. Too bad the Supreme Court doesn't respect the original intent of the founders.

He was, as well, a relentless critic of the monopolizing of economic power by banks, corporations and those who put their faith in what the third president referred to as “the selfish spirit of commerce (that) knows no country, and feels no passion or principle but that of gain.

In the early years of the 19th century, as banks and corporations began to flex their political muscles, he announced that: “I hope we shall crush… in its birth the aristocracy of our moneyed corporations, which dare already to challenge our government to a trial of strength and bid defiance to the laws of our country.”

There are those who would have us believe that the founders intended for corporations to control our elections – and, tragically, five of these Tories sit on the U.S. Supreme Court, where they recently ruled that the nation’s biggest businesses may spend whatever they like to buy the results that best serve their bottom lines.

https://www.thenation.com/article/thomas-jefferson-feared-aristocracy-corporations/

Just thought I would drop this here

[Uncle Joe]

1. Kicked and recommended.

Thanks for the thread, FreakinDJ.

[LongtimeAZDem]

2. True, but his own "bottom line" was served by human slavery

so, we should be careful about how much we credit his concerns about "aristocracy".

[Uncle Joe]

4. Are you suggesting aristocracy or corporate dominance should be viewed in a positive light,

because Jefferson owned slaves?

[LongtimeAZDem]

5. No, what I said was

we should be careful about how we interpret his statements on aristocracy.

As incredible a thinker as Jefferson was, he was also a politician, and a businessman looking out for his owns interests. The corporations of the north were the socioeconomic rivals of the plantation culture, and so it is simplistic to ignore those motivations when quoting the founding fathers.

[Uncle Joe]

7. Whether it be based on self-interest or not did Jefferson have a point in regards to

the dangers of aristocracy and corporations gaining too much power?

We elevate Jefferson's "all men are created equal" maxim regardless of the author's flaws and complexities, no doubt he had self interests in regards to pushing for cutting our ties with England as well.

Why should counsel against aristocracy and out of balance corporate power be any different?

[brentspeak]

9. And then he rejected slavery, condemned it, and urged emancipation. n/t

[LongtimeAZDem]

11. He rejected sslavery in principle, but kept most of his slaves

However, that is still beside my point, which is that appeals to authority, like quoting the Founding Fathers, are fallacious in that they gloss over the motivations of the quoted.

I love Jefferson, and I understand the sensibilities of his time. But he was, as others pointed out, a study in contradictions, and practically any political persuasion can find superficial support within his public statements.

Edited to add: And, as "mahatmakanejeeves" points out below, one often cannot be sure that the statements are genuine.

[LWolf]

3. Thomas Jefferson

wanted the U.S. to be an empire. And empire of "democracy," which, for him, meant more local control by landed white men.

He was a study in contradictions. He wanted less regulation from above for those landed white men who would profit from it. He wanted empire; he wanted the world to adopt a U.S. style government. He wanted to end slavery...AND send the AA population back to Africa, rather than have them assimilate as free people here.

He was brilliant; he was troubled; he was biased, to say the least, and not above propaganda. He was accomplished at rhetoric and the manipulation of words and ideas to serve his agenda: in other words, a politician.

He hated aristocracy more than corporations, but the two were linked; that's where the wealth originally came from.

All of the above, and much more, about Jefferson can be found in this book, which I had to read for a graduate class recently.

https://books.google.com/books/about/Jefferson_s_Empire.html?id=lyj04Yksc1kC

[Adrahil]

6. Well, since the founders...

were mainly interested in the rights of landed white men, I could understand his concern!

Honestly, The founders were FINE were certain kind of elite controlling political and economic affairs.

[Igel]

8. Texas ranchers have nothing to fear from a future drought.

There's an ample supply of straw men to eat.

"Intent" matters when you write down the words and they get approved by a majority of representatives. Otherwise, Jefferson's "intent" as to his fears is every bit as useful as Pelosi's "intent" when ordering the next time she goes to a restaurant.

Esp. since things are so different from the 1790s.


I'm not sure who intends for corporations to control our elections, apart from a few narcissists that run corporations.

Perhaps you mean "corporations" like the DNC? They don't control "our" elections, if by "our" you mean the American electorate's elections. They control their internal elections. You want to run for office, go for it. Get the petitions filled out, get supporters, and run.

Perhaps you mean because they can contribute to election campaigns? Don't choose corrupt politicians. And remember that some candidates have vastly outspent their opponents and gone down in flames. Money doesn't buy elections; if the message isn't what voters want, it's not like the voters are receiving walking money. They listen, shrug, and either don't vote or vote how they'd vote anyway. This argument partly boils down to, "Sometimes my side loses; it can't be because it's not what voters want, my side is superior and virtuous and right, so the PTB must have bought the electorate." And, when on the winning side of the spending, "The electorate was wise and virtuous and agreed with us. Oh, there was campaign finance advantages? No matter, we'd have won anyway." The rest of the argument relies on low-information voters that one side or the other can convince through sheer force of repetition. I'm a democrat, but this kind of voter makes me queasy.

[TryLogic]

12. Logical gobbledygook

[mahatmakanejeeves]

10. The problem with so many Jefferson quotes

Last edited Fri Jun 24, 2016, 01:18 PM - Edit history (1)

is that, like so many Lincoln quotes, neither person said or wrote them.

A search for those words at Monticello.org comes up with this as the closest match:

The end of democracy...(Quotation)

Quotation: "The end of democracy and the defeat of the American Revolution will occur when government falls into the hands of lending institutions and moneyed incorporations."

Sources consulted:
1.Papers of Thomas Jefferson: Digital Edition
2.Thomas Jefferson: Papers collection in Hathi Trust Digital Library
3.Retirement Papers

Earliest known appearance in print: 19941

Earliest known appearance in print, attributed to Thomas Jefferson: see above

Status: This exact quotation has not been found in the writings of Thomas Jefferson. It may be a mistaken amalgamation of the author's comments in the above 1994 reference with a real Jefferson quotation. Jefferson wrote in 1825 to William Branch Giles of "vast accession of strength from their younger recruits, who having nothing in them of the feelings or principles of ’76 now look to a single and splendid government of an Aristocracy, founded on banking institutions and monied in corporations under the guise and cloak of their favored branches of manufactures commerce and navigation, riding and ruling over the plundered ploughman and beggared yeomanry."2 Chomsky's 1994 book quotes Jefferson's 1825 letter to Giles and then comments that "{Jefferson} warned that that would be the end of democracy and the defeat of the American revolution."

I can't find the passage The Nation attributes to Jefferson. The Nation also said this:

He was, as well, a relentless critic of the monopolizing of economic power by banks, corporations and those who put their faith in what the third president referred to as "the selfish spirit of commerce (that) knows no country, and feels no passion or principle but that of gain."

Monticello.org cannot find that one either.

[TryLogic]

13. I say the bottom line is that big money and corporate profiteers are an extremely serious threat

to democracy. And stupid ass justices like Alito are complicit.