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Prologue
On Sept. 30, 1941, Thomas Jefferson’s great-great grandson joined six other men for a private meeting at a Washington art gallery. The group’s mission was to choose quotes from the author of the Declaration of Independence to be etched into the memorial under construction at the Tidal Basin.
Inevitably, the discussion of the Thomas Jefferson Memorial Commission turned to the Declaration’s best-known and most sacred phrase, the chorus in every American songbook of liberty: “All men are created equal.”
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An avowed segregationist on the panel said the phrase should be excluded because Jefferson viewed White people as superior to Black people and Native Americans — and then complained that the quote continued to give Black Americans reason to believe they should be treated equally.
It was then, according to transcripts and diaries examined by The Washington Post, that Jefferson’s descendant, 81-year-old Jefferson Randolph Kean, made a revealing conclusion.
“I would say that I entirely agree with him that the author and signers of the Declaration did not have in mind Indians or Negroes, or other persons than the British subjects for which they had the right to speak,” said Kean, a retired U.S. Army brigadier general.
Tourists can be seen in the reflection of a panel explaining the painting, “Declaration of Independence,” by John Trumbull, in the Rotunda of the U.S. Capitol on July 9. (Matt McClain/The Washington Post)
In that exchange, the paradox of America’s founding was bluntly but privately acknowledged. The commissioners kept Jefferson’s famous phrase about equality, concluding it would be too embarrassing to delete such iconic words. But they approved a series of doctored quotes at the memorial that sought to portray Jefferson as an antislavery leader and pointedly did not mention he had enslaved more than 600 Black people in his lifetime.
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