A Brief Introduction to Thomas Jefferson. Thomas Jefferson - Thomas Jefferson Oral Topic in English with Translation

Thomas Jefferson was born in Shadwell, Virginia on April 13, 1743. Two years later, his family moved to Taccaho.

In 1752, the boy became a student at the local elementary school. He then studied at the James Morey Theological School, and then at the College of William and Mary, located in Williamsburg. After graduating from this institution, in 1762, the young man soon began to engage in legal activities.

Jefferson first served as a judge, then as a county lieutenant, and also gained membership in the Virginia House of Representatives. In 1776 he became one of the members of the Continental Congress chosen to draft the Declaration of Independence.

After leaving Congress, Jefferson returned to Virginia and was elected governor of that state in 1779. He remained in this position until 1781. Then the politician briefly left the civil service in order to return to it again in 1784, becoming America's trade representative in France, and then the US ambassador to this country.

Six years later, Jefferson became Secretary of State in the government of George Washington, then in 1796 he ran for the presidency for the first time, but lost. Four years later, the politician repeated his attempt to achieve the desired position, and this time he managed to win the election.

Jefferson's most significant accomplishments as the third president of the United States were support for the first overland expedition of Clark and Lewis, and the acquisition of the Louisiana Territory. In 1809, the politician left his post and went to his homeland.

Thomas Jefferson one of the American President of the past was born in Virginia in 1743. When he was 14 years old, his father died and the young boy was left to choose for himself what to do.

Jefferson studied literature and languages. He also studied to be a lawyer, and later he wrote many of the Virginia laws. One of the laws for which he worked very much was a law to allow many children to go to school free. Schools in America were only for the children whose parents were rich. When Jefferson was still a young man he was one of those who wanted freedom from England.

His most outstanding achievement was as chief author of the Declaration of Independence, a statement of human rights and liberties. It was read to the happy people on the 4th of July, 1776. Jefferson also drew up the constitution for his state, Virginia, and served as its governor. He was sent to France as the foreign minister of the United States of America and afterwards was President "s Washington secretary of state. A few years later he became the country" s third president, serving in this position for 2 terms. The author of the Declaration of Independence did another important thing for the American people.

He worked out a plan for a university where the students and teachers could live and work together in a village built for them. It was one of the first schools to teach science. Today, it is the University of Virginia. This well known man was also a self-taught architect. He introduced the simple classical design to America when he designed the Virginia State Capital Building.
He also designed his own home; he remained the most influential architect of his time. Thomas Jefferson did many useful things during his life time and he always thought of how to help ordinary people. He was a practical and theoretical scientist too. Jefferson's best traditions have been kept up by American progressive people in their struggle for peace and democracy.

Thomas Jefferson is an American statesman, politician, democratic ideologist, one of the authors of the US Declaration of Independence and the founders of the US state, the third US president, diplomat, philosopher of the Enlightenment. He was born on April 13, 1743 in the state of Virginia, on the Shadwell estate. On the maternal side, the family belonged to large slave-owning planters.

Thomas received a thorough and versatile education at home. After graduating from William and Mary College in Williamsburg (1760-1762), where he studied law among other sciences, he received admission to practical legal work. Jefferson's first job was White's office in Williamsburg, where he was hired as a lawyer.

Already at a young age, he took up a political career. So, from 1769 to 1774 he was elected to the House of Representatives of Virginia. In 1774, the lawyer was in the forefront of the patriots thanks to the pamphlet he composed, "A General Survey of the Rights of British America." In 1775, Jefferson was a delegate from his state to the Second Continental Congress, where he was commissioned to chair the committee that drafted the Declaration of Independence. It was he who became the main author of this unprecedented document, which was adopted on July 4, 1776 and was the first Declaration of the Rights of Man. Direct participation in its development brought great fame to Jefferson.

During the years 1779-1781. the politician served as governor of Virginia, but this position brought him considerable disappointment: because of it, he was almost captured by the British troops, was sharply criticized and was forced to resign. Then he made a vow to himself never to return to public service. In 1781-1782. the former governor wrote "Notes on the State of Virginia" - this work, repeatedly reprinted and translated into other languages, glorified Jefferson as a scientist, the owner of encyclopedic knowledge.

However, Jefferson did not remain outside public activity for long: already in 1783 (until 1785) he again participated in the work of the Continental Congress. In 1784, the politician took the initiative to abolish slavery in all states that would join the United States, and to nationalize the western lands. During the years 1785-1789. he was the official representative of the United States in France, in 1790-1793. served as United States Secretary of State in George Washington's first cabinet.

When political parties began to emerge, Jefferson led the ranks of Democratic-Republicans, who represented the interests of small producers and people employed in agriculture. While serving as Secretary of State, he had a bitter polemic with another well-known American politician, Alexander Hamilton, which ultimately led to his forced resignation. After leaving office, Jefferson became at the helm of an opposition Democratic-Republican party popular among the population and, with the support of society, was able to again be in power in 1796 - this time as Vice President of the United States under John Adams, the second head of the United States. The peak of his political biography was the victory in 1800 in the presidential election. He held this post for two terms - from March 1801 to March 1809.

After retiring, Jefferson retired from politics and spent the last almost two decades of his life in the Monticello estate built according to his project. During the years 1797-1815. he chaired the American Philosophical Society; the Library of Congress was created on the basis of the richest collection of Jefferson's books, but the most significant achievement of the last period of his life was the founding of the University of Virginia. Death overtook the outstanding representative of the American Enlightenment on July 4, 1826 - this year the United States celebrated the half-century anniversary of the adoption of the Declaration of Independence.

On the maternal side, the family belonged to large slave-owning planters.

However, Jefferson did not remain outside public activity for long: already in 1783 (until 1785) he again participated in the work of the Continental Congress. In 1784, the politician took the initiative to abolish slavery in all states that would join the United States, and to nationalize the western lands. During the years 1785-1789. he was the official representative of the United States in France, in 1790-1793. served as US Secretary of State in George Washington's first cabinet.

Thomas Jefferson - 3rd President of the United States- born April 13, 1743 in Virginia, died July 4, 1826 in Charlottesville. President of the United States from 1801 to 1809.

Born in Virginia to a plantation owner, Jefferson was the third of eight children in the family.

In 1752, Jefferson entered the local school, where he began to study ancient Greek, Latin and French.

After the death of his father, in 1757, Thomas inherited 5,000 acres of land and dozens of slaves, later it was on this land that the famous estate of Monticello was built.

From 1758 to 1760, he studied at the school of James Morey. Since the school was 12 miles from the Jefferson estate, he lived with a priestly family (Morey). After receiving a classical education, he enters the philosophy department of the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg. Jefferson was a conscientious student, he diligently studied French, did not part with a book on the grammar of the ancient Greek language, and learned to play the violin.

Having become acquainted with the works of Isaac Newton, John Locke and Francis Bacon, he later called them "the three greatest men that ever existed in history." In 1762, Thomas graduated with honors from the college, and in 1767 received a license to practice law.

In 1772, at the age of 37, Jefferson married the widow Martha Wayles Skelton, with whom he later had six children, four of whom died at an early age. 10 years later, Jefferson's wife also died. Martha Jefferson was the only wife in the life of the third president of the United States, although according to unofficial data, Jefferson had children from a mulatto slave.

In 1769, Jefferson was elected to the Virginia House of Representatives.

Jefferson's first book, A General Survey of Human Rights in British America, included a collection of articles on the limitation of colonial self-government and the tea monopoly. In these articles, Jefferson argued that the colonists have the right to self-government, and the English Parliament has powers only in the territory of Great Britain, and not in the territory of the colonies. This work brought popularity to Jefferson - he was dubbed as one of the thinking and patriotic politicians.

In 1775, Jefferson was elected to the Second Continental Congress. In 1776, Congress considered a resolution declaring independence, as a result, a committee was created to prepare the Declaration, it included: Roger Sherman, Benjamin Franklin, John Adams, Robert R. Livingston and the head of the committee, Thomas Jefferson. Using George Mason's Virginia Declaration of Human Rights as a model, Jefferson wrote the first draft of the United States Declaration of Independence.

On July 2, 1776, Congress voted in favor of independence and then filed the Declaration of Independence provided by Jefferson. After two days of consideration, 1/4 of the text was removed from the Declaration, mainly concerning criticism of slavery and the slave trade. Although Thomas was a slave owner, he was opposed to slavery. The final version of the Declaration of Independence was approved on July 4, 1776.

In September of that year, Jefferson returned to Virginia, where he was elected to the Virginia House of Delegates. For three years of work, he drew up 126 bills, and in 1778, on his initiative, a law was passed prohibiting the importation of slaves into the territory of Virginia.

In 1779, Jefferson became governor of Virginia, and a year later, he initiated the transfer of the capital from Williamsburg to Richmond. In 1781, Jefferson was captured by an English cavalry column, from where he soon managed to escape. That same year, Jefferson stepped down as governor.

From 1785 to 1789, Jefferson served as ambassador to France. Returning from Paris, he is appointed Secretary of State in the cabinet of US President George Washington. Jefferson held the position of Secretary of State until 1793, after which he resigned and returned to Monticello.

In the 1796 presidential election, Jefferson ran for the Democratic-Republican Party, but lost out to Federalist John Adams in a bitter struggle.

In the 1800 election, Jefferson was elected President of the United States. As president, he sought to strengthen the role of agriculture in the economy, and also supported the democratization of power. He abolished the tax on small whiskey producers, carried out a significant reduction in the US army and navy (because they cost a lot to maintain).

Even though Jefferson had the right to replace most government officials with his fellow party members, he only replaced the cabinet and judges.

The elections of 1804 were held according to a different law. The electors now cast one vote for a presidential candidate and another for a vice presidential candidate. Jefferson confidently won with 162 votes to 16 from opponent Charles Pinckney.

In 1807, Jefferson supported a proposal to abolish the slave trade, and as a result he was strongly condemned by southerners. In 1808, a compromise solution was passed prohibiting the slave trade at the federal level, but obliging the government to dispose of smuggled slaves according to the laws of this state. This led to a decrease in the slave trade.

On July 4, 1826, Thomas Jefferson died. Like his presidential predecessor, John Adams, he died on the fiftieth anniversary of independence.

Despite the fact that Jefferson was born into a wealthy family, after his death he left large debts, so his property went under the hammer. 552 acres were sold to James T. Barclay in 1882 for $7,000. Monticello Jefferson bequeathed to the state to set up a school for the children of deceased naval officers.