The Birmingham age-herald. [volume] (Birmingham, Ala.) 1902-1950, 1912-07-24
DOUBTS OF HEPBURN
STIR HORNETS NEST
He Says Jefferson Did Not
Write Famous Declaration
Y DISPUTE HIM
John Sharp Williams Says to a Man
Acquainted With History, There
Can Be No Doubt About
the Authorship
BY C. Il. STEWART

Washington, July 23.-(Special )-Senatof
Hepburn stirred up rumpus when he de-
clared that Il am not willing TO concede
that Thomas jefferson wrote the Declare
ton of independence, or that. he was in
any way responsible for It," Many prom
inent men and women in this city, adj
mirers of Jefferson, and who have been
students of the life of the sage of Mon
ticello, insist that there is no doubt about
the authorship of the declaration which
first informed the world that this was a
free country.
The statement made by the Idaho sena-
tor during the discussion in the Senate
over resolution for the investigation of
the advisability of the purchase by the
government of the home of Jefferson.
served to revive a controversy over the
authorship of the Declaration of indie
pendenee almost as old as the nation
itself. Books and endless stories have been
written about the matter. and discussion
INDUCED in from time immemorial.
Senator John Sharp Williams of Missis-
sippi, who is admitted to be one OF the
deepest students of the constitutional his
tory of the United States in Washington,
and who has read widely about the life of
jefferson as well as upon almost every
other subject and statesman prominently
connected with the early history of the
country, declared that any one who takes
the trouble to investigate the subject can
arrive at no other conclusion than that
Jefferson wrote the famous declaration
and was largely responsible for its word
ing.
1T is a question which hardly admits
of dispute said Senator Williams. JEFF
ferson says himself in his letters that he
wrote the declaration, and | hardly think
that a man who had been President and
vice president of the United States, and
who had held the other positions that he
had, would make false statement about
such thing.
1T is set forth in black and white In
numerous places that Jefferson was direct
ed by a committee of the Continental
Congress to draft the declaration, and
that after he wrote it he showed 1t to
John Adams and Benjamin Franklin.
There can be no reasonable doubt but that
Adams and Franklin each suggested
changes that were minor, which were
made, and that later Congress struck out
an entire provision relating to the King
of England and to slavery
The original of the declaration Is in
Jefferson's handwriting, and 1t is related
In many places just how he came to write
1t and what was done with it, These
facts alone, properly supported as they
are, should be sufficient proof that
Thomas Jefferson has every right to be
known as the author of the famous
paper
Mrs. Champ Clark, the wife of the
speaker of the House of Representatives.
who has also made a study of the life
and writing of Jefferson, insists that there
is absolutely no good grounds fSr the as
sertion of Senator Hepburn.
Before his death Jefferson wrote an
epitaph for his tombstone, and then he
based his claim for fame on the grounds
that he was the author of the decIara ton
and had written the statute of religious
liberty of Virginia. and was the father of
the University of Virginia. He ignored
the facts that he had been vice president
and President of the United States; that
he had been a foreign ambassador and
that he had negotiated the Louisiana pur-
chase
There have been some claims that the
instrument was taken from '1.ockes'
Treastise on Government" and that it
was written by Thomas Paine, and that
1t had been taken from various other
sources. but the we'll informed readers
of history in Washington today declare
that the great preponderant weight of
evidence goes to show that jefferson not
only penned the declaration, but that he
composed 1t without reference to any
other similar instrument.