Jefferson's land ethic: Environmentalist ideas in notes on the State of Virginia

Environmental Ethics

Volumn 21, Issue 1, 1999, Pages 43-57

  Browers, Michaelle L ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF MINNESOTA   (United States)

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EID: 7944219553     PISSN: 01634275     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.5840/enviroethics199921140     Document Type: Review

References (60)

1. Timothy Sweet, "American Pastoralism and the Marketplace: Eighteenth-Century Ideologies of Farming," Early American Literature 29 (1994): 59.
2. Eugene C. Hargrove, "Anglo-American Land Use Attitudes," Environmental Ethics 2 (1980): 121-48. Reprinted as chapter two in his Foundations of Environmental Ethics (Englewood Cliffs: Prentice Hall, 1989).
3. Eugene C. Hargrove, "Anglo-American Land Use Attitudes," Environmental Ethics 2 (1980): 121-48. Reprinted as chapter two in his Foundations of Environmental Ethics (Englewood Cliffs: Prentice Hall, 1989).
4. Hargrove, "Land Use Attitudes," pp. 137, 147.
5. Thomas Jefferson, Notes on the State of Virginia, ed. William Peden (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina, 1982). Page numbers in the text refer to this edition.
6. Charles A. Miller, Jefferson and Nature: An Interpretation (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1988), p. 17.
7. Thomas Philbrick, "Thomas Jefferson," American Literature, 1764-1789: The Revolutionary Years, ed. Everett Emerson (Madison: University of Wisconsin, 1977), p. 162.
8. Charles Thompson of Philadelphia, rightly remarked in a 6 March 1785 letter to Jefferson that the book comprised "a most excellent Natural history not merely of Virginia but of No. America." In The Papers of Thomas Jefferson, ed. Julian P. Boyd and Charles T. Cullen, 27 vols, to date (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1950-), 8:16.
9. David Tucker, "Jefferson's Notes on the State of Virginia" (Ph.D. diss., Claremont Graduate School, 1981), p. 26. Tucker further points to Jefferson's discussion of Indians in the first section (queries six and eleven) and his discussion of slaves in the second section (query fourteen) as following the natural/political division. Whereas Indians are said to be natural in the sense that they live outside of civil society, blacks are deemed slaves because of civil society's laws. Similarly, in the first part God is identified with the orderly workings of nature (query six), while in the second section God appears as the supreme judge of a civil religion, who cares for his children and will punish them when they transgress (queries eighteen and nineteen), p. 27. The "numerology" Tucker discusses is less interesting to me than the analytical development of Jefferson's argument.
10. Jefferson, Papers, 11:558.
11. See his Jefferson and Nature. Miller found, after conducting a systematic examination of the use of nature in the standard editions of the writings of John Adams, James Madison, George Washington, Alexander Hamilton, and Benjamin Franklin, that Jefferson displayed the most active and wide-ranging use of the term. Miller explores Jefferson's various renderings of "nature," such as natural law, natural right, natural history, natural theology, natural morality, American nature and the Natural Bridge of Virginia. However, the environmental implications of Jefferson's thoughts, though mentioned, remain undeveloped in Miller's work.
12. Jefferson to Harry Innes, 7 March 1791, in Papers, 19:521. A similar sentiment is expressed in Jefferson to Doctor Caspar Wistar, 21 June 1807, in Writings, 11:248.
13. Jefferson to Harry Innes, 7 March 1791, in Papers, 19:521. A similar sentiment is expressed in Jefferson to Doctor Caspar Wistar, 21 June 1807, in Writings, 11:248.
14. Jefferson's view of Montesquieu changed throughout his lifetime and he had always been very critical of many of Montesquieu's arguments. Nonetheless, Montesquieu's ideas about how habitat and climate influenced living beings - humans, animals and plants - and the significance of this for society remained on the whole a feature Jefferson continued to accept. A discussion of Jefferson's changing attitude toward Montesquieu appears in Gilbert Chinard's introduction to The Commonplace Book of Thomas Jefferson: A Repertory of His Ideas on Government (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University, 1926).
15. Extracts from Montesquieu take up more of Jefferson's Commonplace Book than the writings of any other author with the exception of Lord Kames.
16. Jefferson, Commonplace Book, sec. 788.
17. The method and particulars of Jefferson's critique are discussed in Ruth Henline, "A Study of Notes on the State of Virginia as an Evidence of Jefferson's Reaction against the Theories of the French Naturalists," Virginia Magazine of History and Biography 55 (1947): 233-46.
18. Fully assessing the nature of the "speech act," I assert here, requires taking up the question of Jefferson's intended audience. This question is especially important since Jefferson initially expressed reluctance to let his book meet the public and only circulated copies of it among his friends for suggestions and corrections. Early in 1784 Jefferson wrote that he intended only to have twelve or twenty copies of the Notes printed for friends. However, I think that there is a case to be made that the Notes represent considerably more than a book-length response to Marbois' questionnaire. While there is not space to take up this issue here in detail, I briefly suggest a few historical details that support my view. Prior to publishing the work Jefferson approached a member of the American Philosophical Society about including the work among its proceedings. When he did have 200 copies printed in Paris in 1785, he distributed nearly all of these copies to Americans within the first two years of publication, thus suggested that he wanted to influence an American audience. Further, Jefferson wrote to Madison on 11 May 1785, the day after the book was printed, that he wished to put his book "into the hands of the young men [at the College of William and Mary]," suggesting that it "might set our young students into a useful train of thought." Jefferson, Papers, 8:147-48.
19. Ibid., 8:426.
20. Ibid., 12:442.
21. Eisinger defines agrarianism "as an ideological complex consisting of three concepts. First, if the institution of private property is to exist in society, every man has a natural right to hold some land. Second, agriculture is the mother of organized society, for recognition of private property is impossible. Thus, in order to protect the individual's investment in private property, made in terms of agricultural labors, the state was created. Finally, American writers agree that agriculture must be the primary concern of the state." Chester Eisinger, "The Influence of Natural Rights and Physiocratic Doctrines on American Agrarian Thought during the Revolutionary Period," Agricultural History 21 (1947): 13.
22. See, for example, Sweet, "American Pastoralism and the Marketplace," and Joyce Appleby, "Commercial Farming and the 'Agrarian Myth' in the Early Republic," Journal of American History 68 (1982): 833-49.
23. See, for example, Sweet, "American Pastoralism and the Marketplace," and Joyce Appleby, "Commercial Farming and the 'Agrarian Myth' in the Early Republic," Journal of American History 68 (1982): 833-49.
24. Jefferson argues that "the loss by the transportation of commodities across the Atlantic will be made up in happiness and the permanence of government." Jefferson, Notes, p. 165.
25. Quoted in Leo Marx, The Machine in the Garden: Technology and the Pastoral Ideal in America (New York: Oxford University Press, 1964), pp. 104-05. Jefferson received Price's Observations on the American Revolution as he as preparing the Notes ready for his Paris printer. See his letter to Price on 1 February 1785 in Jefferson, Papers, 7:630-31.
26. Quoted in Leo Marx, The Machine in the Garden: Technology and the Pastoral Ideal in America (New York: Oxford University Press, 1964), pp. 104-05. Jefferson received Price's Observations on the American Revolution as he as preparing the Notes ready for his Paris printer. See his letter to Price on 1 February 1785 in Jefferson, Papers, 7:630-31.
27. Quoted in Leo Marx, The Machine in the Garden: Technology and the Pastoral Ideal in America (New York: Oxford University Press, 1964), pp. 104-05. Jefferson received Price's Observations on the American Revolution as he as preparing the Notes ready for his Paris printer. See his letter to Price on 1 February 1785 in Jefferson, Papers, 7:630-31.
28. Quoted in Leo Marx, The Machine in the Garden: Technology and the Pastoral Ideal in America (New York: Oxford University Press, 1964), pp. 104-05. Jefferson received Price's Observations on the American Revolution as he as preparing the Notes ready for his Paris printer. See his letter to Price on 1 February 1785 in Jefferson, Papers, 7:630-31.
29. Thomas Jefferson, The Writings of Thomas Jefferson, ed. Andrew A. Lipscomb, 20 vols. (Washington, D.C.: Thomas Jefferson Memorial Association, 1904), 16:390.
30. The Jeffersonian republic was sustained in part by American expansion westward. See Drew R. McCoy, The Elusive Republic: Political Economy in Jeffersonian America (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina, 1980), esp. pp. 204-08.
31. John Locke, Two Treatises of Government, ed. Peter Laslett (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1988). sec. 25.
32. Locke, Second Treatise, sec. 27.
33. Ibid..
34. Ibid., sec. 31.
35. Ibid., sec. 32.
36. Ibid., sec. 34.
37. Ibid., sec. 50.
38. C. B. Macpherson, "Property as Means or End," Theories of Property: Aristotle to the Present, ed. Anthony Parel and Thomas Flanagen (Waterloo, Ontario: Wilfred Laurier University, 1979), p. 4. Macpherson's most extensive statement of his views on Locke are found in his Theory of Possessive Individualism. For a more concise expression of his views, see "The Social Bearing of Locke's Political Theory" in Locke and Berkeley: A Collection of Critical Essays, ed. C. B. Martin and D. M. Armstrong (New York: Doubleday, 1968), pp. 199-230.
39. C. B. Macpherson, "Property as Means or End," Theories of Property: Aristotle to the Present, ed. Anthony Parel and Thomas Flanagen (Waterloo, Ontario: Wilfred Laurier University, 1979), p. 4. Macpherson's most extensive statement of his views on Locke are found in his Theory of Possessive Individualism. For a more concise expression of his views, see "The Social Bearing of Locke's Political Theory" in Locke and Berkeley: A Collection of Critical Essays, ed. C. B. Martin and D. M. Armstrong (New York: Doubleday, 1968), pp. 199-230.
40. C. B. Macpherson, "Property as Means or End," Theories of Property: Aristotle to the Present, ed. Anthony Parel and Thomas Flanagen (Waterloo, Ontario: Wilfred Laurier University, 1979), p. 4. Macpherson's most extensive statement of his views on Locke are found in his Theory of Possessive Individualism. For a more concise expression of his views, see "The Social Bearing of Locke's Political Theory" in Locke and Berkeley: A Collection of Critical Essays, ed. C. B. Martin and D. M. Armstrong (New York: Doubleday, 1968), pp. 199-230.
41. See, for example, John Locke, Some Thoughts Concerning Education, ed. John W. and Jean S. Yolton (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1989), especially secs. 103-05, sec. 110, sec. 139.
42. Kathleen M. Squadrito, "Locke's View of Dominion," Environmental Ethics 1 (1979): 255-62. For a better critique of "Macpherson's attributing to Locke a ruthless, dictatorial programme of class domination," see Alan Ryan, "Locke and the Dictatorship of the Proletariat," in Martin and Armstrong, Locke and Berkeley, pp. 231-54 .
43. Kathleen M. Squadrito, "Locke's View of Dominion," Environmental Ethics 1 (1979): 255-62. For a better critique of "Macpherson's attributing to Locke a ruthless, dictatorial programme of class domination," see Alan Ryan, "Locke and the Dictatorship of the Proletariat," in Martin and Armstrong, Locke and Berkeley, pp. 231-54 .
44. Locke, Second Treatise, sec. 42.
45. See, for example, Jefferson's 24 April 1816 letter to Monsieur Dupont de Nemours in Jefferson, Writings, 14:487-93.
46. Locke states that what he means "by the general, property," is mankind's "lives, liberties and estates" in Locke, Second Treatise, sec. 123.
47. Jefferson, Papers, 8:681-82.
48. Robert E. Goodin, Green Political Theory (Cambridge, Mass.: Polity Press, 1992), points out that "there is no necessary analytic connection between a right to destroy and any of those more standard rights of property" (p. 106). He also proposes that "there is no reason to suppose that there is any necessary conflict between property rights and preservationist duties at all" (p. 108).
49. Hargrove notes that Locke qualifies the property right by asserting that government has the responsibility to make sure destruction of property does not adversely affect the property of others in First Treatise, sec. 92 . Hargrove, "Land Use Attitudes," p. 147, claims that this qualification "is compatible with the American conception of checks and balances and it might have provided a political solution to the problem, though not a moral one. Unfortunately, however, it has not been carried over into our political and legal system as successfully as the right to destroy." In fact, it is this lack of a right to destroy nature and the moral imperative to cultivate this political resource that distinguishes Jefferson's land ethic from both Locke's view of property and Saxon land use attitudes.
50. Hargrove notes that Locke qualifies the property right by asserting that government has the responsibility to make sure destruction of property does not adversely affect the property of others in First Treatise, sec. 92 . Hargrove, "Land Use Attitudes," p. 147, claims that this qualification "is compatible with the American conception of checks and balances and it might have provided a political solution to the problem, though not a moral one. Unfortunately, however, it has not been carried over into our political and legal system as successfully as the right to destroy." In fact, it is this lack of a right to destroy nature and the moral imperative to cultivate this political resource that distinguishes Jefferson's land ethic from both Locke's view of property and Saxon land use attitudes.
51. Mark Sagoff notes that "Jefferson's reliance on virtues nourished by the land" in Economy of the Earth (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988), p. 135. Unfortunately, he does not develop this view.
52. Jefferson, Papers, 15:392.
53. Ibid., 15:395. For a critical examination of the notion of justice between generations, see Terence Ball, "The Incoherence of Intergenerational Justice," Inquiry 28 (1986): 321-27.
54. Ibid., 15:395. For a critical examination of the notion of justice between generations, see Terence Ball, "The Incoherence of Intergenerational Justice," Inquiry 28 (1986): 321-27.
55. Jefferson, Papers, 15:393.
56. Robert Gottlieb, Forcing the Spring: The Transformation of the American Environmental Movement (Washington, D.C.: Island Press, 1993). See also Gottlieb on "Reinventing Place: Community and Conflict in a Changing West," in James P. Ronda, ed., Thomas Jefferson and the Changing West: From Conquest to Conservation (Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1997).
57. Robert Gottlieb, Forcing the Spring: The Transformation of the American Environmental Movement (Washington, D.C.: Island Press, 1993). See also Gottlieb on "Reinventing Place: Community and Conflict in a Changing West," in James P. Ronda, ed., Thomas Jefferson and the Changing West: From Conquest to Conservation (Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1997).
58. See René Dubos, The Wooing of the Land (New York: Scribners, 1980) and Wendell Berry, The Gift of Good Land (San Francisco: North Point Press, 1981). In his Home Economics: Fourteen Essays (San Francisco: North Point Press, 1987), Berry argues that to cultivate the earth in ways that respect and protect its fertility and diversity is a matter of "getting along with nature."
59. See René Dubos, The Wooing of the Land (New York: Scribners, 1980) and Wendell Berry, The Gift of Good Land (San Francisco: North Point Press, 1981). In his Home Economics: Fourteen Essays (San Francisco: North Point Press, 1987), Berry argues that to cultivate the earth in ways that respect and protect its fertility and diversity is a matter of "getting along with nature."
60. See René Dubos, The Wooing of the Land (New York: Scribners, 1980) and Wendell Berry, The Gift of Good Land (San Francisco: North Point Press, 1981). In his Home Economics: Fourteen Essays (San Francisco: North Point Press, 1987), Berry argues that to cultivate the earth in ways that respect and protect its fertility and diversity is a matter of "getting along with nature."