“Thirty Lashes, Well Laid On”

This chapter begins with the first importation of African slaves into colonial Jamestown, Virginia, in 1619. As their numbers grew, and interracial sex produced mixed-race (called “mulatto”) children, White colonists responded with a law designating all mulatto children as slaves, overturning a grant of freedom to Elizabeth Key, a mulatto indentured servant who married a young English settler and had a child with him. The chapter discusses the Slave Codes that stripped Blacks of any rights. Slave states also banned the teaching of slaves to read and write, lest they read “incendiary” publications and revolt, as some did. The chapter concludes with a discussion of the personal conflicts over slavery felt by Thomas Jefferson and James Madison, and the role of Madison at the Constitutional Convention in 1787 in crafting the Great Compromise that legalized slavery as the price of creating a federal government.

Ephemeral Encounters

In this “report from the field,” we write from two perspectives, as a curator and as an advisor, on the process of interpreting Native American documents in the 2016 American Philosophical Society Museum exhibition, “Gathering Voices: Thomas Jefferson and Native America.” We share insights into our curatorial and representational goals, and reflect on the challenges of interpreting Indigenous heritage and traditional knowledges in materials that have been captured in colonial collections. We show how archival documents tend to silence as much as showcase ephemeral encounters, and how power in museum environments often remains embedded within the routine structures of colonial settler institutions and practices. We critique our own exhibition by noting how, despite our best efforts, inherent tensions among Indigenous histories, decolonizing ideals, and colonial archives shaped the process and resulted in irreconcilable omissions. Yet, we argue that cross-cultural collaboration is essential when working in colonial archives. Only by inviting Indigenous people into the process can we make progress toward restoring living relationships among past voices and contemporary communities. In concluding, we offer advice on practical approaches to working with Indigenous collaborators and advisors.

Globalizing Higher Education and its Impact on Indian Expat Students (A Case Study of Indian Expat Students Living in UAE)

Education is the backbone of a progressive society as it is clear from the statement of Thomas Jefferson “educate the masses” as he believed that in order to make changes in a society, the whole masses should be educated. The term ‘education’ is a popular and common term used by everybody but understood by very few in its right perspective. In educational text books it is defined as a purposive, conscious or unconscious, psychological, sociological, scientific and philosophical process that brings about development of the individual to fullest extent and also the maximum development of society in such a way that both enjoy happiness and prosperity. Despite the existence of infrastructural facilities, economic status and availability of various educational courses, the attitude towards higher education and learning is not found to be positive among the Indian expat students. The ultimate objective of this study is to find out the factors that influence the attitude of the students towards higher education and recommend sufficient measures to improve it.

In Usufruct to the Living

An especially underappreciated problem regarding philanthropic power concerns the way in which charitable gifts exercise control over future generations. Charitable bequests and trusts, which are popular instruments of donation, bind future generations to respect the wills of past donors. This chapter draws on views of Thomas Jefferson—noted critic of institutions that favor the dead over the living—to illustrate the problem of “dead-hand control.” Jefferson’s perspective helps us to appreciate that donations meant to benefit future persons may also mistreat them by imposing conditions on their use of resources. The chapter argues that generations have an interest in sovereignty over their common affairs that qualifies how resources can be donated across time. Though it ultimately defends the practice of intergenerational philanthropy, the chapter also shows how taking the value of sovereignty seriously recommends restrictions on the duration that donors can expect to have their wills honored.

First Peoples, First Prohibitionists

Armed with a new appreciation for prohibitionism as an anti-imperialist, anti-predatory-capitalist movement for community self-determination, Part III returns us to the United States, where prohibitionism goes back to the very first colonization of North America. Indeed, America’s first prohibitionists were its first peoples: battling against the “white man’s wicked water,” through which their sovereignty was stripped, in the same way as indigenous populations in Africa, South Asia, and Australia. Chapter 9 highlights the role of Miami chief Little Turtle in urging President Thomas Jefferson to enact, in 1802, the first federal prohibition of the trafficking of liquor to native tribes, even while liquor excises had become the primary pillar of state finance of the young republic.