I've made corrections Dr. Magee asked me to make. Couple of comma splices, run-ons, minor stuff. Mostly stylistic issues. Make no mistake - there were very few errors in this paper. The big deal? This paper will be used in the future as a model paper. It was not meant to be a thoroughly supported essay. Instead, Dr. Magee wanted us to have a base essay upon which we could build. Basically all I should have to do to turn this into a thoroughly supported essay is to now add some outside source support. I've already got that support lined up. I will have to change some things to make it fit. Sources for the subject of this essay are RAMPANT. If you really want to impress a professor in a Lit, History, or Poli-Sci class, I highly recommend you do what I did here - go against the grain. There's some powerful counter-evidence to my thesis in this essay. As you will see in the paper that follows up to this one, I take that counter-evidence head on. In fact, that's the only reason the paper is not yet finished - I may be coming on too strongly against the opposing view. I'll be talking to Dr. Magee tomorrow night to get his opinion. I have a feeling he's going to tell me to throw it all out there. I hope so because I take issue with some fairly established experts. It'll be interesting to see how this plays out. But right now? This paper not only scored an A, it will be used as a sample of an ideal paper in the future. This is the second time since late January a professor has sought to use my work as an example to other students. To have a professor want your work as an example only once is rare. Twice?? Better yet, the two professors are from two different divisions! That's not only strong writing and research - that's flexibility!

1. Wischnewsky 1
Louis Wischnewsky
Dr. D.B. Magee
English 221
20 March 2012
This New Man
Among the debates of the last fifty or so years there has been a consistent risk to those
suggesting major social change and a new way of looking at society's structure.While having a
view opposing gay marriage, for example, is mostly frowned upon today, that sentiment comes
only at a cost to countless individuals' reputations, fortunes and lives. This is true of the push
toward racial equality, as well. Indeed, perhaps more lives have been lost in pursuit of the latter.
Unfortunately, it is also common to criticize those who start such movements for either not doing
“enough” or for being hypocritical by not sacrificing all toward the ideal. Historically this is
nothing new. A look at an excerpt titled “The Declaration of Independence” from The
Autobiography of Thomas Jefferson provides strong clues that at least one of the founding
fathers of the United States sought to look genuinely at the idea that all human beings are equal.
Jefferson gives clues this new idea in several ways. First, one needs to consider the tone
in his account.After independence there still existed a quasi-caste system in the new country, yet
Jefferson files grievances against England on behalf of the labor class. One of these crimes is
particularly atrocious. Furthermore, the ruling class in England should have been considered
above the ruling class of the colonies, yet Jefferson sees his American yeomen and gentry as
equals to the peers and nobility across the pond. Finally, he considers the slaves from Africa a
“people,” placing them on the same level as the king himself, perhaps even higher. All of these
clues, taken into consideration with the norms of Jefferson's day, show a distinct pattern of
covertly redefining man's relationship among other men.

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Jefferson's tone is evident in his opening statements. He writes, “[some of the colonies]
were not yet matured for falling from the parent stem” (340). Undoubtedly time had tempered
Jefferson's attitude toward the hesitation by some of his colleagues to join the separatist
bandwagon. It is doubtful, however, that the men of his day would have been less offended at
being considered “not yet matured,” or childish, than the brightest minds of America today. The
tone indicates dissatisfaction with the status quo. This is important to bear in mind because what
Jefferson is proposing not only to his compatriots, his colleagues, his friends, but to the world in
the Declaration, is a damnation of the entire social order of the caste system – including the
concept of divine right. This renunciation is greatly overlooked and deemphasized when scholars
consider him hypocritical for continuing to keep slaves himself. The man not only placed himself
at risk with England, but also placed himself at risk among his fellow mutineers. Had he freed
his slaves, it can only be doubtful that anyone in his day would have taken him seriously. Rather,
in keeping his slaves he at least gives the impression that he is not condemning anyone for
owning other people and that he is rational. Still, he does firmly plant in the minds of Americans
a second-guessing of that “peculiar institution” by his mere tone, a tone conveyed in numerous
instances in the original penning of the Declaration.
Yet the tone Jefferson takes in the document merely raises a red flag that he firmly doubts
the current social structure of his day. Post-revolution, one of the greatest grievances the United
States had against England (and France, as well) was that American merchant ships were being
hailed and boarded by the British navy. Even today this is not an unheard of practice (The U.S.
Navy does this in the several oceans to combat piracy and drug trafficking.) However, what the
colonists found reprehensible was that this often resulted in American sailors being impressed
into British naval service. Jefferson pointing this out in the Declaration is compelling. It was not
the gentry being impressed into naval service; rather, it was the lowest, working-class members

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of the social order, essentially serfs who were impressed into naval warfare. Observe how
Jefferson brands these fellow colonists: “He has constrained our fellow citizens taken captive on
the high seas, to bear arms against their country, to become executioners of their … brethren, to
fall themselves by their hands” (344). The emphasis is added for two reasons. First, not a single
letter of the passage is suggested for editing by Jefferson's co-conspirators at the Continental
Congress. Obviously no one had any reservations with the grievance. That is telling and points to
the second reason for the emphasis: the men that would sign the Declaration considered serfs –
commoners, nothing more – their brothers, their equals.
Impressively, that is not the boldest instance of Jefferson bringing men to an equal
station.When he directly addresses the British people, he writes, “Nor have we been wanting in
attention to our British brethren” (345). Again, as a brother, Parliament (whom he is actually
addressing) is an equal, not a superior. The gravity of doing so has been lost over the years. At
best, the wealthy members of the Continental Congress would have held the social rank of
gentry. They would not have been Peers or nobility, the ruling class.What's more, this
assimilation comes shortly after several dauntless cases against the king. It is no wonder that
Jefferson's colleagues saw need to bring such heated rhetoric down a notch in yet another
instance of proclaiming no one group of superior value. “[N]o one of which could warrant so
strange a pretension: that these were effected at the expense of our own blood and treasure,
unassisted by the wealth or the strength of [a lazy, lucky system of birthright that is] Great
Britain,” (345) scolds Jefferson. Here, he slaps British high society, telling them that, were they
to toil for their own wealth instead of inheriting it, they would likely have nothing at all. On the
flip side, when free men are not bound to the quasi-slavery that is Georgian-era Britain, men can
excel to greater heights than that of “old money.” Jefferson wanting to proclaim this view to the
world is telling of his vision and infers an egalitarian America. This is especially true given the

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previous example.
Alas, although it is removed from what became the “legal” document, Jefferson's lengthy
protestation against the practice of slavery should be considered as much a part of the official
historical record as every other word of the Declaration: Jefferson argues, “He has waged war
against human nature itself, violating the most sacred rights of life and liberty” (344). “Human
nature,” he says! This is one of the most moving phrases in the Declaration.What else could be
taken from those words? Black or white, European or African, Jefferson declares, all are people,
human beings. As human beings, no one deserves to be enslaved, ripped from their homelands
and families, and degraded to something less than an animal. He considers the practice more
savage than anything cutthroats would do. Jefferson pens, “This piratical warfare, the
opprobrium of INFIDEL powers, is the warfare of the CHRISTIAN king of Great Britain” (344),
insinuating that of all people on earth, King George III should be at the very front of the call to
end slavery. By highlighting “infidel” and “Christian,” Jefferson uses style to raise Africans,
slaves, to a higher status of worthiness than the white, Christian king of Great Britain.
Jefferson commanded the English language well, wisely using tone and style to move not
only his fellow Americans, but also the world into sympathizing his vision for a future of more
genuine equality. Overlooked too often in Jefferson's original penning, the peasant, the ruling,
the enslaved, and even the divine classes were of equal importance and worth. “When, in the
course of human events,” (342) people witness, firsthand, great struggles to change the social
structure of the day, it is too easy to consider their own contributions of greater sacrifice than any
other. Posterity should be hesitant to harbor such views. Rather, as Jefferson's original penning of
the Declaration of Independence shows, great weight should be given toward the social
constraints in which each pioneer proposes a bold, new idea. Understanding those constraints
just might remove hesitation from others to “mature and fall from the parent stem” of oppressive

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social orders.