impression that Thomas Jefferson was very nearly an abolitionist. In their
original contexts, the same quotations reveal a Jefferson conflicted about
slavery—at times its harsh critic, more often its apologist. Perhaps asking a
marble memorial to tell the truth is demanding too much. Should history
textbooks similarly be a shrine, however? Should they encourage students to
worship Jefferson? Or should they help students understand him, wrestle with
the problems he wrestled with, grasp his accomplishments, and also
acknowledge his failures?
The idealistic spark in our Revolution, which caused Patrick Henry such
verbal discomfort, at first made the United States a proponent of democracy
around the world. However, slavery and its concomitant ideas, which
legitimated hierarchy and dominance, sapped our Revolutionary idealism.
Most textbooks never hint at this clash of ideas, let alone at its impact on our
foreign policy.
After the Revolution, many Americans expected our example would inspire
other peoples. It did. Our young nation got its first chance to help in the 1790s,
when Haiti revolted against France. Whether a president owned slaves seems
to have determined his policy toward the second independent nation in the
hemisphere. George Washington did, so his administration loaned hundreds of
thousands of dollars to the French planters in Haiti to help them suppress their
slaves. John Adams did not, and his administration gave considerable support
to the Haitians. Jefferson’s presidency marked a general retreat from the
idealism of the Revolution. Like other slave owners, Jefferson preferred a
Napoleonic colony to a black republic in the Caribbean. In 1801 he reversed
U.S. policy toward Haiti and secretly gave France the go-ahead to reconquer
the island. In so doing, the United States not only betrayed its heritage, but also
acted against its own self-interest. For if France had indeed been able to retake
Haiti, Napoleon would have maintained his dream of an American empire. The
United States would have been hemmed in by France to its west, Britain to its
north, and Spain to its south.^47 But planters in the United States were scared by
the Haitian Revolution. They thought it might inspire slave revolts here (which
it did). When Haiti won despite our flip-flop, the United States would not even
extend it diplomatic recognition, lest its ambassador inflame our slaves “by
exhibiting in his own person an example of successful revolt,” in the words of
a Georgia senator.^48 Nine of the eighteen textbooks mention how Haitian
resistance led France to sell us its claim to Louisiana, but none tells of our