History Forum / General / General Topics / November 2003

Another side note, perhaps germane to the original question:

Congressman-great orator  Roscoe Bartlett in advocating the phrase "under
God"--as Republican of Maryland--is today proclaiming on the floor of the House
of Representatives that the theological-political  holdings of Washington, John
Adams, John Quincy Adams,  John Jay,  Jefferson, Lincoln, Patrick Henry, Ben
Franklin  etal as advocating an actively involved deity, which defines
"theism."

Bartlett  argues natural law & Christianity (implicitly deriving from Judaism)
as the very basis of the U.S. government.

Bartlett claims FDR's "packed" Supreme Court, circa late 1930s, overturned this
fundamental metaphysical-political understanding by the founding fathers &
Supreme Court when constructing &  interpreting law  as lasting for 160 years.

Bartlett, a gifted rhetoretician, for whatever reason does finally discuss a
little some of Protestant/Catholic nuance or dichotomy.

Bartlett is quite convincing, and as an agnostic myself, I must nevertheless
concede his excellent presentation's points.

Thus, reality to me is ambiguous, contradictory, paradoxical and dilemmical.
This is also why I cannot put myself in an extremist camp, because I am a
moderate who concedes both conservative and liberalistic perspectives as
containing valid truths.

Bartlett says that in Colonial America (Maryland & Virginia)  that Catholics
were forbidden to vote.

So, am I wrong about Lord Baltimore (?)

Bartlett further explains that the Constitution/Constitutional Amendments were
deliberately written to include Catholic believers.

Given that most of the colonists came over to escape the
government control of religion or central authority, I
would think that TJ was not prejudice in any way against
the Catholics in the colonies but was vehemently against
the authority that Rome held over them. It shows in the
basic precepts of all our founding documents as "Separation
of Church and State". Now if only modern politicians could
remember that.

William Paca and Charles Carroll of the Maryland delegation
of four that signed the Declaration of Independence were
Catholic. Indeed, Charles Carroll spent 10 years studying in
various Catholic schools including seminaries in Europe
before turning from religion to law.

Of a sorts. He was born into a colony that had a established church and
laws about supporting said church, etc.

As a yng adult he would have fit the Deist thinking  later in life, post
1800 he became more of a Unitarian of the type advocated by Dr. Priestley,
but didn't totally follow that school of thought either.
He was not a orthodox Christian.  He also was never a atheist which many
claimed he was.

Some of his views on religion can be found at

http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/jefferson/quotations/jeff1650.htm

Quite a bit in fact.

Maryland later became quite Protestant

And the point for doing this would be?

Yes I do.

I have no idea what you heard so I am unable to comment on it.

The DNA tests only tested the descendants of Thomas Woodson, the boy that
was suppose to have been fathered by Thomas Jefferson while Thomas
Jefferson was in France with Sally Hemings being there as well.

The results determined that no Jefferson fathered Thomas Woodson.
That was a major setback for the Jefferson/Hemings 200 year old rumor.
In fact the story began based on this boy that most felt was Thomas
Woodson.

The DNA used for the Jefferson side was obtained from a direct descendant
of Thomas Jefferson's Uncle, not Thomas Jefferson. Granted that probably
doesn't matter that much, but it is still a fact.

The DNA results determined that the last Son bore by Sally Hemings was
fathered by a male that carried the particular Jefferson gene.

No DNA tests were applied to any of the other known Hemings children. For
one thing the gene in question is only passed via males so the daughter of
Sally Hemings that survived to adulthood, even if any descendants of hers
could be located would add any information.
Permission was withdrawn, by the family to test another male who was a
descendent of the next to last son of Sally Hemings by the family after the
DNA results cleared Jefferson with regards to fathering Thomas Woodson.

With regards to the last son being fathered by a Jefferson, that means just
that  fathered by a Jefferson DNA qualified male.

Jefferson DNA qualified males could mean Thomas Jefferson or his bother who
evidence shows might very well have been present at Monticello during the
window of conception for Sally Hemings. The brother who drank and partied
with the slaves at Monticello.  The brother who lived nearby, the bother
who was a widow during the years that Sally Hemings was getting preggers.
She stopped having kids when he remarried.  
The male DNA qualified might have been any of the brother's adult sons who
wwere also at Monticello when Sally got preggers the last time.

In addition that male who carried that Jefferson gene could have been a blk
man a freed slave or a slave. In short, Jefferson's paternal grandfather,
any of his brothers, jefferson's father or his brothers, etc if any of them
ever fathered any males by a slave woman  those males would carry that same
"Jefferson" genes thus qualifying them as the potential sperm donor for
Sally's last child. There were dozens of known qualified Jefferson males
that would be DNA qualified as well as countless unknown males who would be
DNA qualified.

Thomas Jefferson was present at Monticello during at least part of the
window of conception for Sally that year but there is evidence that his
brother might have been there as well (a letter sent to the brother has
been found,  inviting him to visit  Tom and their sister who was also at
Monticello at that time) and one for certain and perhaps as many as four of
his adult sons of the brother were present at varying times in that same
time period.
Unknown would be how many blk males that would have been DNA qualified as
well.
Now that is a short and general summation of the results.

The evidence is that Sally Hemings had children with someone
closely related to Thomas Jefferson.  There are several other
likely candidates from the Jefferson clan.