"Why did Jefferson change "property" to the ..." Topic
11 Posts
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Tango01 | 11 Feb 2023 9:00 p.m. PST |
…"pursuit of happiness"? ""The pursuit of happiness" is the most famous phrase in the Declaration of Independence. Conventional history and popular wisdom attribute the phrase to the genius of Thomas Jefferson when in an imaginative leap, he replaced the third term of John Locke's trinity, "life, liberty, and property." It was a felicitous, even thrilling, substitution. Yet the true history and philosophical meaning of the famous phrase are apparently unknown.
In an article entitled "The Pursuit of Happiness," posted at the Huffington Post July 4, 2007, Daniel Brook summed up what most of us learned in school: "The eighteenth-century British political philosopher John Locke wrote that governments are instituted to secure people's rights to ‘life, liberty, and property.' And in 1776, Thomas Jefferson begged to differ. When he penned the Declaration of Independence, ratified on the Fourth of July, he edited out Locke's right to ‘property' and substituted his own more broad-minded, distinctly American concept: the right to ‘the pursuit of happiness.' "…" Main page
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Armand
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Flashman14 | 12 Feb 2023 9:24 a.m. PST |
Jefferson's draft was edited and revised in committee to secure the necessary signatures. |
Northern Rebel | 12 Feb 2023 10:07 a.m. PST |
I agree with Flashman. Wording was particular to ensure particular ways of life were not infringed upon. |
Brechtel198 | 12 Feb 2023 11:58 a.m. PST |
Agree with Flashman and NR. |
Tango01 | 12 Feb 2023 3:31 p.m. PST |
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doc mcb | 12 Feb 2023 5:42 p.m. PST |
from the Monticello website: Thomas Jefferson never explained his use of the phrase "pursuit of happiness" in the Declaration of Independence. He was almost certainly influenced by George Mason's Virginia Declaration of Rights (adopted June 12, 1776), which referred to "the enjoyment of life and liberty, with the means of acquiring and possessing property, and pursuing and obtaining happiness and safety." |
doc mcb | 12 Feb 2023 5:43 p.m. PST |
It is also suggested that substituting "pursuit of happiness" for "property" was an anti-slavery move. Maybe. |
doc mcb | 12 Feb 2023 5:44 p.m. PST |
Of course both Mason ang TJ were borrowing from Locke. The state of nature has a law of nature to govern it, which obliges every one: and reason, which is that law, teaches all mankind, who will but consult it, that being all equal and independent, no one ought to harm another in his life, health, liberty, or possessions… (and) when his own preservation comes not in competition, ought he, as much as he can, to preserve the rest of mankind, and may not, unless it be to do justice on an offender, take away, or impair the life, or what tends to the preservation of the life, the liberty, health, limb, or goods of another. |
Bunkermeister | 12 Feb 2023 5:58 p.m. PST |
Pursuit of happiness I think today would better translate and the freedom to go about your own business with minimal infringement by the government. The would include owning property but also doing with that property what you want to do with it. Paint your house purple. Open a business. Invent something. Read a book. With the big nose of government interfering in your private and harmless affairs. Mike Bunkermeister Creek |
doc mcb | 12 Feb 2023 6:09 p.m. PST |
Yes, I think that is correct. |
Shagnasty | 13 Feb 2023 9:17 a.m. PST |
The "nose" is getting bigger. NSA is purported to be hiring laid off tech workers. |
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