Thomas Jefferson: Scientist, Inventor, Gadgeteer

Hugh Pickens writes "Thomas Jefferson, the author of the Declaration of Independence, whose signing we celebrate today, was considered an expert in architecture, civil engineering, geography, mathematics, ethnology, anthropology, mechanics, and the sciences. Although Jefferson never failed to acknowledge that in science he was 'an amateur,' Jefferson's home at Monticello was filled with examples of his scientific philosophy. An inventor and gadgeteer of great ingenuity, Jefferson's practical innovations or improvements on others inventions included: the swivel chair, the polygraph, letter press, hemp break. pedometer, mouldboard plow, sulky, folding chair, dumb-waiter, double acting doors, and a seven day clock. Throughout his life Jefferson experimented in agriculture with studies in crop rotation, soil cultivation, animal breeding, pest control, agricultural implements and improvement of seeds. Jefferson promoted science as President by recommending to Congress a coast survey to accurately chart the coast of America that later evolved into the United States Coast and Geodetic Survey. Jefferson's expert testimony before Congress led to the establishment of the Naval Observatory and the Hydrographic Office and Jefferson's report to Congress on a plan of coinage and weights and measures based on the decimal system was expanded into the National Bureau of Standards. Jefferson never applied for a patent, which was consistent in his belief in the natural right of all mankind to share useful improvements without restraint."

Comments

Swivel Chairs

[TemperedAlchemist]

Now I know who to blame for my dizziness. Damn you and your fun contraptions!

Re:Swivel Chairs

[piripiri]

Fortunately he also invented the hemp break, so relax!

Thank Jebus he can't see the US today

[Swampash]

"It does me no injury for my neighbor to say there are twenty gods or no God. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg."

"Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between man and his God, that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship, that the legislative powers of government reach actions only, and not opinions, I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should 'make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,' thus building a wall of separation between church and State."

"Christianity neither is, nor ever was a part of the common law."

"And the day will come when the mystical generation of Jesus, by the supreme being as his father in the womb of a virgin will be classed with the fable of the generation of Minerve in the brain of Jupiter."

"I do not find in orthodox Christianity one redeeming feature."

-- Thomas Jefferson

Re:Thank Jebus he can't see the US today

[PRMan]

Thomas Jefferson went to church regularly inside the House of Representatives building, where he had built a non-denominational church. http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/religion/rel06-2.html

It is no exaggeration to say that on Sundays in Washington during the administrations of Thomas Jefferson (1801-1809) and of James Madison (1809-1817) the state became the church. Within a year of his inauguration, Jefferson began attending church services in the House of Representatives. Madison followed Jefferson's example, although unlike Jefferson, who rode on horseback to church in the Capitol, Madison came in a coach and four. Worship services in the House--a practice that continued until after the Civil War--were acceptable to Jefferson because they were nondiscriminatory and voluntary. Preachers of every Protestant denomination appeared. (Catholic priests began officiating in 1826.) As early as January 1806 a female evangelist, Dorothy Ripley, delivered a camp meeting-style exhortation in the House to Jefferson, Vice President Aaron Burr, and a "crowded audience." Throughout his administration Jefferson permitted church services in executive branch buildings. The Gospel was also preached in the Supreme Court chambers. Jefferson's actions may seem surprising because his attitude toward the relation between religion and government is usually thought to have been embodied in his recommendation that there exist "a wall of separation between church and state." In that statement, Jefferson was apparently declaring his opposition, as Madison had done in introducing the Bill of Rights, to a "national" religion. In attending church services on public property, Jefferson and Madison consciously and deliberately were offering symbolic support to religion as a prop for republican government.

He also granted federal money to spread the gospel to Indians http://vftonline.org/EndTheWall/indian_evangelization.htm

Notice that during his administration, Jefferson appropriated funds for Christian missionaries to evangelize the heathen, as Justice Rehnquist noted: As the United States moved from the 18th into the 19th century, Congress appropriated time and again public moneys in support of sectarian Indian education carried on by religious organizations. Typical of these was Jefferson's treaty with the Kaskaskia Indians, which provided annual cash support for the Tribe's Roman Catholic priest and church. The treaty stated in part: "And whereas, the greater part of said Tribe have been baptized and received into the Catholic church, to which they are much attached, the United States will give annually for seven years one hundred dollars towards the support of a priest of that religion . . . [a]nd . . . three hundred dollars, to assist the said Tribe in the erection of a church." 7 Stat. 79.

Re:Thank Jebus he can't see the US today

[140Mandak262Jamuna]

Art. 11. As the Government of the United States of America is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion,—as it has in itself no character of enmity against the laws, religion, or tranquility, of Mussulmen [Muslims],—and as the said States never entered into any war or act of hostility against any Mahometan [Muslim] nation, it is declared by the parties that no pretext arising from religious opinions shall ever produce an interruption of the harmony existing between the two countries.

Treaty of Tripoli. Passed unanimously by the Senate. Three newspapers printed it whole. Each Senator got a printed copy. Not a single letters to the editor in protest. Not a single sermon recorded anywhere in protest. No protest from anyone in the USA. Almost all the founding fathers were still alive. No concern about it even in their private correspondence. John Adams made a special signing statement about this treaty. Against such specific and unambiguous statements, you look for symbolic meaning on their various acts.

I am a Hindu. I am here. I have as much rights and as much American as you are. Deal with it.

Re:Thank Jebus he can't see the US today

[the eric conspiracy]

The word "God" does not appear in the US Constitution, nor is there any other reference to a deity except in the date on the document "In the year of our Lord 1787".

Jefferson and Madison (primary author of the Constitution) had the opinion that there needed to be a very strong separation between state and religion. Madison wrote a famous petition when Virginia was considering the issue of state support of religion which included the phrase "not three pence" which has been cited in several Supreme Court decisions regarding the state support of religion.

The concept of Jefferson granting money to missionaries to spread the gospel to Indians is a MAJOR distortion of the intent. Jefferson needed to convert the Indians from hunter-gatherers to farmers to be able to use the land they owned for the growth of the United States. This required educating the Indians in a new way of life. The fact that the money was granted to missionaries is simply because they were the low bidders; that is they were willing to take less money than anyone else to undertake the job because they had an ulterior motive.

> It is no exaggeration to say that on Sundays in Washington during the administrations of Thomas Jefferson (1801-1809) and of James Madison (1809-1817) the state became the church

Actually that is a gross exaggeration and something both Jefferson and Madison would have been horrified with if anyone had suggested it.

One needs to understand the physical realities of Washington DC in the early days of the Republic. It was in fact generally a wilderness with a few large buildings dropped in. It wasn't a developed city with substantial infrastructure. If you wanted to hold services the only physical structures available were in fact the government buildings.

Also - are you aware that Jefferson and Madison were Deists who denied the divinity of Christ and much of the Bible?

And yet...

[cardpuncher]

... he was never able to satisfactorily distinguish between "principle" and 'practice".

As in the principle of being opposed to slavery while in practice shagging the property.

Jefferson's Opinion of Patents Changed

[drcln]

Jefferson's position on the granting of patents [1]changed through the years. In his article "Godfather of American Invention," Silvio Bedini notes that in 1787 Jefferson's opposition to monopoly in any form led him to oppose patents.[2] But by 1789, Jefferson's firm opposition had weakened. Writing to James Madison, Jefferson said he approved the Bill of Rights as far as it went, but would like to see the addition of an article specifying that "Monopolies may be allowed to person for their own productions in literature, and their own inventions in the arts, for a term not exceeding --- years, but for no longer term and for no other purpose."[3] Also in 1789, while Jefferson was still in Paris, the first patent act was introduced during the first session of Congress and enacted into law April 10, 1790. Under the new law, the Secretaries of War and State and the Attorney General constituted a three-man review board, with the Secretary of State (Jefferson), playing the leading role. Two months after the law was passed, Jefferson remarked it had "given a spring to invention beyond his conception."[4]

http://www.monticello.org/site/research-and-collections/patents

Thomas Jefferson was the first patent examiner and granted quite a few patents.

Metric System

[the eric conspiracy]

The Constitution contains a clause empowering the government to establish a system of weights and measures.

Jefferson, in part because of his experience as a surveyor using chains divided into 100 links, and also from reading 'Disme: the art of tenths by Simon Stevin' was familiar with the benefits of doing measurement calculations in decimal units, and proposed that the US adopt a decimal system of weights and measures.

Unfortunately Congress did not appreciate the usefulness of this idea and failed to act on the proposal setting a really bad precedent.

As ambassadors to France he and Ben Franklin had access to French intellectuals and brought up this topic to the French. Whether the French would have developed this independently or not I don't know. Certainly they may have known about the idea from other sources.

But if Congress had heeded his ideas the US would have had a decimal measurement system before any other nation. Jefferson may also have been the catalyst for the French adoption of their decimal measurement system.

Because of Jefferson the US had the first decimal system of any type in its currency thanks to Jefferson, predating the metric system.

So please add this quote to your list:

  ⦠every branch to the same decimal ratio, thus bringing the calculations of the principal affairs of
life within the arithmetic of every man who can multiply and divide plain numbers.
                      - Thomas Jefferson