Thomas Jefferson
First Inaugural Address
Wednesday, March 4, 1801
Friends and Fellow-Citizens:
CALLED upon to undertake the duties of the first executive office of
our country, I avail myself of the presence of that portion of my
fellow-citizens which is here assembled to express my grateful thanks
for the favor with which they have been pleased to look toward me, to
declare a sincere consciousness that the task is above my talents, and
that I approach it with those anxious and awful presentiments which the
greatness of the charge and the weakness of my powers so justly
inspire. A rising nation, spread over a wide and fruitful land,
traversing all the seas with the rich productions of their industry,
engaged in commerce with nations who feel power and forget right,
advancing rapidly to destinies beyond the reach of mortal eye - when I
contemplate these transcendent objects, and see the honor, the
happiness, and the hopes of this beloved country committed to the
issue, and the auspices of this day, I shrink from the contemplation,
and humble myself before the magnitude of the undertaking. Utterly,
indeed, should I despair did not the presence of many whom I here see
remind me that in the other high authorities provided by our
Constitution I shall find resources of wisdom, of virtue, and of zeal
on which to rely under all difficulties. To you, then, gentlemen, who
are charged with the sovereign functions of legislation, and to those
associated with you, I look with encouragement for that guidance and
support which may enable us to steer with safety the vessel in which we
are all embarked amidst the conflicting elements of a troubled world.
During the contest of opinion through which we have passed the
animation of discussions and of exertions has sometimes worn an aspect
which might impose on strangers unused to think freely and to speak and
to write what they think; but this being now decided by the voice of
the nation, announced according to the rules of the Constitution, all
will, of course, arrange themselves under the will of the law, and
unite in common efforts for the common good. All, too, will bear in
mind this sacred principle, that though the will of the majority is in
all cases to prevail, that will to be rightful must be reasonable; that
the minority possess their equal rights, which equal law must protect,
and to violate would be oppression. Let us, then, fellow-citizens,
unite with one heart and one mind. Let us restore to social intercourse
that harmony and affection without which liberty and even life itself
are but dreary things. And let us reflect that, having banished from
our land that religious intolerance under which mankind so long bled
and suffered, we have yet gained little if we countenance a political
intolerance as despotic, as wicked, and capable of as bitter and bloody
persecutions. During the throes and convulsions of the ancient world,
during the agonizing spasms of infuriated man, seeking through blood
and slaughter his long-lost liberty, it was not wonderful that the
agitation of the billows should reach even this distant and peaceful
shore; that this should be more felt and feared by some and less by
others, and should divide opinions as to measures of safety. But every
difference of opinion is not a difference of principle. We have called
by different names brethren of the same principle. We are all
Republicans, we are all Federalists. If there be any among us who would
wish to dissolve this Union or to change its republican form, let them
stand undisturbed as monuments of the safety with which error of
opinion may be tolerated where reason is left free to combat it. I
know, indeed, that some honest men fear that a republican government
can not be strong, that this Government is not strong enough; but would
the honest patriot, in the full tide of successful experiment, abandon
a government which has so far kept us free and firm on the theoretic
and visionary fear that this Government, the world's best hope, may by
possibility want energy to preserve itself? I trust not. I believe
this, on the contrary, the strongest Government on earth. I believe it
the only one where every man, at the call of the law, would fly to the
standard of the law, and would meet invasions of the public order as
his own personal concern. Sometimes it is said that man can not be
trusted with the government of himself. Can he, then, be trusted with
the government of others? Or have we found angels in the forms of kings
to govern him? Let history answer this question.
Let us, then, with courage and confidence pursue our own Federal and
Republican principles, our attachment to union and representative
government. Kindly separated by nature and a wide ocean from the
exterminating havoc of one quarter of the globe; too high-minded to
endure the degradations of the others; possessing a chosen country,
with room enough for our descendants to the thousandth and thousandth
generation; entertaining a due sense of our equal right to the use of
our own faculties, to the acquisitions of our own industry, to honor
and confidence from our fellow-citizens, resulting not from birth, but
from our actions and their sense of them; enlightened by a benign
religion, professed, indeed, and practiced in various forms, yet all of
them inculcating honesty, truth, temperance, gratitude, and the love of
man; acknowledging and adoring an overruling Providence, which by all
its dispensations proves that it delights in the happiness of man here
and his greater happiness hereafter - with all these blessings, what
more is necessary to make us a happy and a prosperous people? Still one
thing more, fellow-citizens - a wise and frugal Government, which shall
restrain men from injuring one another, shall leave them otherwise free
to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall
not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned. This is the
sum of good government, and this is necessary to close the circle of
our felicities.
About to enter, fellow-citizens, on the exercise of duties which
comprehend everything dear and valuable to you, it is proper you should
understand what I deem the essential principles of our Government, and
consequently those which ought to shape its Administration. I will
compress them within the narrowest compass they will bear, stating the
general principle, but not all its limitations. Equal and exact justice
to all men, of whatever state or persuasion, religious or political;
peace, commerce, and honest friendship with all nations, entangling
alliances with none; the support of the State governments in all their
rights, as the most competent administrations for our domestic concerns
and the surest bulwarks against antirepublican tendencies; the
preservation of the General Government in its whole constitutional
vigor, as the sheet anchor of our peace at home and safety abroad; a
jealous care of the right of election by the people - a mild and safe
corrective of abuses which are lopped by the sword of revolution where
peaceable remedies are unprovided; absolute acquiescence in the
decisions of the majority, the vital principle of republics, from which
is no appeal but to force, the vital principle and immediate parent of
despotism; a well disciplined militia, our best reliance in peace and
for the first moments of war, till regulars may relieve them; the
supremacy of the civil over the military authority; economy in the
public expense, that labor may be lightly burthened; the honest payment
of our debts and sacred preservation of the public faith; encouragement
of agriculture, and of commerce as its handmaid; the diffusion of
information and arraignment of all abuses at the bar of the public
reason; freedom of religion; freedom of the press, and freedom of
person under the protection of the habeas corpus, and trial by juries
impartially selected. These principles form the bright constellation
which has gone before us and guided our steps through an age of
revolution and reformation. The wisdom of our sages and blood of our
heroes have been devoted to their attainment. They should be the creed
of our political faith, the text of civic instruction, the touchstone
by which to try the services of those we trust; and should we wander
from them in moments of error or of alarm, let us hasten to retrace our
steps and to regain the road which alone leads to peace, liberty, and
safety.
I repair, then, fellow-citizens, to the post you have assigned me. With
experience enough in subordinate offices to have seen the difficulties
of this the greatest of all, I have learnt to expect that it will
rarely fall to the lot of imperfect man to retire from this station
with the reputation and the favor which bring him into it. Without
pretensions to that high confidence you reposed in our first and
greatest revolutionary character, whose preeminent services had
entitled him to the first place in his country's love and destined for
him the fairest page in the volume of faithful history, I ask so much
confidence only as may give firmness and effect to the legal
administration of your affairs. I shall often go wrong through defect
of judgment. When right, I shall often be thought wrong by those whose
positions will not command a view of the whole ground. I ask your
indulgence for my own errors, which will never be intentional, and your
support against the errors of others, who may condemn what they would
not if seen in all its parts. The approbation implied by your suffrage
is a great consolation to me for the past, and my future solicitude
will be to retain the good opinion of those who have bestowed it in
advance, to conciliate that of others by doing them all the good in my
power, and to be instrumental to the happiness and freedom of all.
Relying, then, on the patronage of your good will, I advance with
obedience to the work, ready to retire from it whenever you become
sensible how much better choice it is in your power to make. And may
that Infinite Power which rules the destinies of the universe lead our
councils to what is best, and give them a favorable issue for your
peace and prosperity.
