Thomas Jefferson's Impact On America

One of the most influential Americans our country has ever seen, is Thomas Jefferson. He has played a paramount role in shaping America, even more so than Harriet Tubman or even Karl Marx. While Thomas Jefferson certainly wasn’t perfect, his questionable actions and decisions are far outnumbered by the sheer supply of the services he has done for our country. Well known as the author of the American Constitution, Thomas Jefferson came up with many of the key elements our country is founded upon. Jefferson wrote in the Constitution, “We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.”

Interestingly enough, his epitaph says nothing about being president. Another way that Jefferson influenced America is the Barbary wars. As American merchant ships tried to trade with European allies, Barbary Pirates would attack our defenseless ships hurting our trade economy vastly. The Barbary Pirates demanded a hefty tribute to payed for free passage and it was Thomas Jefferson who refused to pay. Realizing something needed to changed, Jefferson allied with some partnering European countries who were also being attacked by the pirates and began an American Navy to defeat the pirates, thus giving American vessels safe passage. Another great help Jefferson gave to America is the Louisiana purchase. This purchase doubled America’s size at the time and is the most fertile land on Earth, which eradicated America’s reliance on other countries’ food. Deciding that we needed to learn about as much of the land as quickly as possible, it was also Jefferson, who appointed Meriwether Lewis and William Clark to lead an expedition known as the Corps of Discovery to explore this newly acquired

With an ample infatuation with farming, Jefferson was impelled to invent the iron plow as he saw the need for stronger more durable plows. Obtaining help of his brother-in-law, Thomas Mann Randolph, Jefferson drew and labeled sketches, using complicated mathematical formulas to ensure the precision necessary that couldn’t be found on wooden plows. Furthermore, Jefferson invented the polygraph, which is a type of copying machine, the wheel cipher which was used to create codes, and The Great Clock which was extremely helpful to Jefferson and his workers in Monticello. The dumbwaiter is yet another great contraption conjured up from Jefferson’s great mind; the dumbwaiter is used to easily send wine or other products quickly and effectively from the cellar to the higher floors of the building and is used in many houses even