Political philosopher, US senator, and agriculturist, born in Caroline Co, Virginia, USA. He fought in the American Revolution and served several terms in the Virginia House of Delegates (1779–81, 1782–5) as well as the US Senate (1792–4, 1803, 1822–4). A Jeffersonian Democrat, he opposed the Federal Constitution because it did not sufficiently protect individual and states' rights. In 1798 he introduced the ‘Virginia Resolutions’ supporting delegated powers and asserting that states' rights take precedence in cases of the ‘dangerous exercise of other powers’. He wrote many pamphlets, books, and articles such as
An Inquiry into the Principles and Policy of the Government of the United States (1814), proposing divided powers of government to best serve the people, and opposing a permanent national debt. Owner of several plantations in Caroline Co, he also wrote a series of essays on agriculture, collected in
The Arator (1813).
User Comments