Getting Jefferson Right: Fact Checking Claims about Our Third President

Copyright: May 1, 2012
Publisher:  Salem Grove Press

Nearly two centuries after his death, Thomas Jefferson continues to be the subject of competing claims about his public policy and his private beliefs.

In Getting Jefferson Right: Fact Checking Claims about Our Third President, two religious conservatives examines key claims frequently made by other religious conservatives about Thomas Jefferson. Using Jefferson’s correspondence, accounts of Jefferson’s contemporaries, and other original sources, Throckmorton and Coulter separate fact from fiction. Upon analysis, many claims about Jefferson made by religiously conservative culture warriors don’t hold up.

The authors examine the following questions and more.

-Was Jefferson unable to free his slaves under Virginia law?

-Did Jefferson sign his presidential documents, “In the year of our Lord Christ?”

-Did Jefferson and other Founders finance a Bible in 1798 to get the Word of God to America’s Families?

-Did Jefferson found the Virginia Bible Society?

-Was Jefferson an orthodox Christian, who only rarely expressed questions about orthodox Christian doctrine?

-Did Jefferson approve laws providing federal funds to evangelize Indians?

-Did Jefferson edit the Gospels of the New Testament to remove sections he disagreed with?

-Did Jefferson found the University of Virginia to be the first transdenominational Christian college?

The aim of the authors is to get Jefferson right.