SOURCE: “The Language of Improvement and the Practices of Power,” in The Unfinished Revolution: Education and Politics in the Thought of Thomas Jefferson, University of Delaware Press, 1990, pp. 119-40.

In the following essay, Hellenbrand explores the way Jefferson's thoughts on education informed his political and social philosophies.

Introduction: the Politics of Improvement

Between the publication of Notes on the State of Virginia and the end of his presidency, Jefferson devoted little time to philosophizing about education and planning free schools. In Virginia he reached an impasse. His legal project to reconceive patrimonial society in the image of benevolent paternalism did not pass the legislature intact. Its foundation, Bill 79, was not accepted until 1796 when the legislature empowered the country courts to decide on levying taxes for ward schools. (And these courts were reluctant to initiate such a tax.) Although Bill 80 failed too, Jefferson accomplished an end run around the...