Time and the institutions of democracy had not
effected that change in the practices of the people, which the
Revolution and the determination to control and direct their own
government had in their sentiments.
Mr. Jefferson affected to despise this formal ceremony, and the
distinctions in society encouraged by monarchical institutions, and
sustained by authority of law--though coming from a State and from the
midst of a people whose leading and wealthiest families had descended
directly from the nobility and gentry of England, and who affected an
aristocracy of social life extremely exclusive in its character, while
professing a democracy in political organization of the broadest and
most comprehensive type. His sagacity taught him that the institutions
of a democratic government would soon produce that social equality
which was their spirit, in the ordinary intercourse of the people--that
he who enjoyed all and every privilege, politically and legally, given
under its Constitution and laws, possessed a power which ultimately
would force his social equality with the most pretentious in the land.
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