Thomas Jefferson is the most researched, most written about, most referenced, and most quoted of our Founding Fathers. And yet, somehow, he remains the most stubbornly inscrutable. His life is a seemingly impenetrable thicket of contradictions: he enshrined the words “All Men are Created Equal,” and yet was a lifelong slave-owner; he was simultaneously a “man of the people” and the personification of the Virginia aristocrat; he was a die-hard American revolutionary who was also a dedicated lover of European culture and art; he advocated ruthless fiscal responsibility as president, yet his own finances were mired in debt.
