The Birmingham age-herald., 1912-08-27
Animus Against Jefferson

The chief object of his incorporate, if not vicious animosity seems to have been Thomas Jefferson, hated dead al-
 most as much as he was when alive, in that respect differing from other great Americans; especially the hatred of the so-called better element, because Jeffer-
 son incurred the hatred of classes rather than of individuals. Individual hatrrd ceases with the life of it's object; class hatred never. Roosevelt could not write book without paying his slanderous respects to MT. Jefferson. In his Win ming of the West in his Naval War. of | 1s12,' in his Life of Thomas H. Benton, the followingi adjectives are to be found l as expressing the late Presidents con tempt and hatred of Jefferson. In one place he calls him 'vacillating.' in an- other timid in another incompetent in another 'ungrateful,' and this celebrated phrasemonger denounced him in triguing against Washington, as secretly aiding the French as exercising 'an n- fiuence distinctly. evil, and fnaliy-prob- ably shaking his right hand with his left and congratulating himself upon the Iphrase-pronounced Jefferson to be the most incapable executive that ever filled the presidntial chair and then, to cap
 the climax, this man whose phrase-mak- ing ability is at least equal to his love or truth, probably superior to it, studies out another phrase. whose cunning dia- bolism of untruth he expected all pos terity to applaud when he says that Jef- ferson was constitutonally unable to put the proper value on trutnfulness.
 II will not stop to remind American listeners that the man of whom he spoKe was the author of The Summary State, ment of the Rights of British North America the author of the Declaration of Independence, of the first state stat ute of Religious Freedom, of the first in- augural address, contra distinguished | from d semimonarchial speech from the | throne, which has constituted since then l a sermon upon the mount. to all men | who love democratic institutions. nor to
 remind the nearer that Jeffersons photo | graph was hung up at the late bull moose convention, while professions of faith to 'Jeffersonian democracy, were being loud voiced, nor will I stop to re- mind the nearer that Senator Hoar said, 1 When we recall Jefferson, we recall him | with the Declaration of Independence in one hand and the treaty for the annex ation of the Louisiana Territory in the
 other"
 Views on Madison
 MT. Roosevelt Is not quite as hard on
 Madison but he applies to him the ad- jective 'timid. and the adjective. 'incap-
 able the adjective feeble and accuses him of imbecile incapacity' and of DliEElHs oiio uSSioNt to <Nhiti IT l ca
 q will not stop to remind the nearer | that Madison was The Father of the Constituton' one of the three authors of tn. Federalist: one of the best educated men of his day: admitted on all hands to be the most learned of all men of his
 time in past and current political his tory
 Mfr. Roosevelt says of Monroe hat he possessed no especial ability and, with his love of phrase coining, regardless of historical veracity, says that he was. as secretary of war, triumph of imbecil- lity to the last When he wrote that phrase have no doubt that he shook his left hand with his right and said. De llightfu. Then he calls Monroe s figure head He evidently has two distinct ideas of what the word 'fgurehead means. because in another place he calls Andrew Jackson a iigurehead' --Ja ckson 1.-the man who in his. day and generation was sometimes accused of bullhead edness of. arbitrariness. of being guided by no
 body and of wanting to run everything, but never accused of being a .fsurehead. It was left to MT. Roosevelts wild anti
 democratic partisan hate. stimulated bs Ia brilliant imagination. to couple tha
 noun with the name of Old Hickory. u