#1516 Books and Responsibilities
Listening to America
Listening to America
4.6 • 1.1K Ratings
🗓️ 11 October 2022
⏱️ 57 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
This week, David speaks with President Thomas Jefferson as portrayed by humanities scholar Clay S. Jenkinson. Jefferson responds to listener questions about banning books, as well as citizens' rights and responsibilities.
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Clay will be performing as Theodore Roosevelt in Downers Grove, IL on October 22nd.
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You can find Clay's books on our website, along with a list of his favorite books on Jefferson, Lewis and Clark, and other topics. Thomas Jefferson is interpreted by Clay S. Jenkinson.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Good day, Thomas Jefferson Hour podcast listeners. This week, we speak to President Jefferson. |
| 0:05.8 | It's been a while and it was just delightful. I must say before Clay begins to talk about this |
| 0:11.8 | week show, I want to thank everybody who listens and takes the time to listen. We appreciate that. |
| 0:18.0 | And also thank you so much for supporting the show. Those of you who choose to do so in whatever |
| 0:23.7 | way you wish. You can go to JeffersonHour.com, click on donate, or you can just go to JeffersonHour.com |
| 0:31.2 | and send us a letter and tell us what you think of this show, ask Jefferson or Clay a question. |
| 0:37.2 | And with that, sir, thanks for being Jefferson this week. It's fun to suit up. |
| 0:42.7 | You know, we've been increasingly doing listening to America and one-on-one and conversations |
| 0:47.6 | with Lindsay Chervinsky and conversations with our dear friend Joe, the great author of Vermont. |
| 0:57.5 | And so getting Jefferson in character with his wig and his tights on is a rarer than it once was. |
| 1:05.7 | It's fun to take listener questions because we don't rehearse, which maybe is obvious. |
| 1:13.1 | You don't need to rehearse. I can say it's like turning on the faucet and how it comes. |
| 1:19.1 | But I have to thank you because we were in a sort of a groove in years past where I would talk |
| 1:26.8 | with President Jefferson at least a couple of times a month. And it has an effect on me. |
| 1:34.4 | And I've missed it. It was great to talk to him. And with your permission, I'd like to talk to him |
| 1:39.5 | next week, particularly about a couple of subjects. And that one of them would be Christian nationalism. |
| 1:47.3 | I'd really be interested to hear what Jefferson has to say about that. So we do it again next week. |
| 1:53.2 | Of course. And in this program, we tried in a brief compass to talk about why slavery has to |
| 2:02.0 | be a conversation on the Thomas Jefferson hour, but why it cannot be allowed to be the only |
| 2:07.2 | conversation on the Thomas Jefferson hour. That's a really tough tightrope. I almost said |
| 2:13.3 | mind-field. I feel we have a responsibility to address this question because this is that moment |
| 2:18.8 | in American historiography when these questions are central and they've damaged Jefferson |
... |
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