Talk:Sally Hemings

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Reference re consensus of historians[edit]

At the beginning of the article it states, "A consensus of historians believe Jefferson was the father of her five children." The sole Wikipedia reference to this claim is the link, www.monticello.org/sallyhemings/. I don't see where in this link it establishes the fact of this consensus of historians. I do see that this link does clearly note two studies, one by the Thomas Jefferson Foundation, and one by the Thomas Jefferson Heritage Society...which studies came to diametrically opposing conclusions on the matter.

I guess a sort of legalistic claim could be made that within the confines of each of these two studies an isolated consensus of historians reached their (respective, disparate) conclusions, such that it could be technically claimed that, "[One isolated] consensus of historians believe [Thomas] Jefferson was the father of her five children," but this sort of defense of the existing wording would be highly misleading, to say the least, without also noting that a different, isolated consensus of historians in the other study arrived at the polar opposite conclusion.

Another, even more cynical defense of the current wording would be that it doesn't specify Thomas Jefferson as the Jefferson, even though virtually 100% of naive readers would assume that it was referring to Thomas Jefferson in this sentence. It is technically true that the DNA evidence apparently established that one Jefferson male was a father, but therein lies the rub, as the other study concluded it was highly unlikely that this Jefferson male could have been Thomas Jefferson.

Or alternatively, perhaps I'm just missing in this monticello.org link the noting of a study of historians establishing a current consensus, in which case the article should do a better job bringing that unequivocal factual support to an interested reader's attention. Otherwise, if there is no such study or other basis of requisite academic weight establishing this "consensus of historians", it seems like the intro section of the article should simply highlight the fact that two nearly contemporaneous studies involving historians have reached opposite conclusions on the matter.

I don't care one iota whether Thomas Jefferson was the father or not, so please don't argue the case either way. I do want the article to be accurate with respect to the academic reality and to provide an appropriate reference to the existing claim that a consensus of historians supports only one conclusion. 19:45, 13 July 2018 (UTC)Bdmwiki (talk)

I changed to a more neutral newspaper source to describe the general consensus of historians on Jefferson's paternity of Hemings' children (instead of using the TJF website, which produced one of the reports). There's a reason why there's a consensus towards Jefferson's paternity (at least of the paternity of Sally's children born from 1795 - 1808, there isn't a consensus on whether Jefferson began a relationship with Hemings in Paris). The original Thomas Jefferson Heritage Society report from 2001 arguing against Jefferson's paternity was badly flawed in parts and didn't really address the written historical records/documents that built up the case for Thomas Jefferson's paternity. The male-Jefferson DNA link for Eston isn't the strongest evidence for Thomas Jefferson's paternity, it supplements the other stronger evidence. One cannot really refute an argument if you don't address its strongest parts. That is why a good deal more of historians favor Thomas Jefferson's paternity than don't. That's the best answer I can give without going more into specific evidence for and against Jefferson's paternity and the relative strengths of both reports which you don't wish to discuss. Libertybison (talk) 23:24, 15 July 2018 (UTC)
For reference, here's an article by an opponent of Jefferson's paternity who also acknowledges that most historians believe the relationship happened. Libertybison (talk) 23:38, 16 July 2018 (UTC)

Sally Hemings and her "relationship" with Thomas Jefferson[edit]

At several points in this article, a "relationship" is referred to between Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings. Any casual, regular, user of the English language knows what the word "relationship" connotes, especially in the sexual context; it connotes romance, it connotes intimacy, and above all, it connotes consent. Neither Jefferson nor Hemings commented on the nature of the sexual contact they had, unlike Hemings, Jefferson left extensive papers which reveal no evidence that he and Sally had a romantic relationship. The facts stand thus: A man who owned 600 human beings in his lifetime regularly had sex with one of them, beginning (In all probability) when she was 14 and he was 44. We have no way of knowing whether her consent was solicited or offered. We do know that her consent was not legally necessary because under Virginia law Hemings was Jefferson's chattel to use as he pleased, which in the custom of the time included using her sexually. To call this a "relationship" without significant evidence of consent on her part is ludicrous and dehumanizing to Black people, women and most especially Black women. It makes as much sense as saying Japanese soldiers "courted" captive comfort women, it makes as much sense as referring to pedophiles as having "relationships" with children. I have changed this numerous times and each time it has been reverted. The language as it exists is historiographically unjustifiable and is a holdover from a tradition of hagiography that has no place on a critical, accurate platform in this day and age. Jefferson owned her body, he owned her labor, he had as much legal "right" to make her perform the manual labor required to pick 800 pounds of tobacco as to make her satisfy his pleasure with sexual labor. Any rational, dispassionate analysis of the facts shows a widower forcing a teenager he wholly owned to submit to him sexually over the course of decades. Any other interpretation is hagiography, not history. Vicintel21 (talk) 15:30, 4 September 2018 (UTC)

What ever is said on this point, needs to be matter of fact (with citations to reliable sources) and a lot less loaded than the tone you set in the text you've tried to insert in the article and a lot less loaded than what you present in your summary above. I don't, personally, know the details of the "relationship" between Jefferson and Hemings. Hence, my suggestions, Attic Salt (talk) 16:04, 4 September 2018 (UTC)

Saying they had a "relationship" is quite loaded. "Thomas Jefferson owned Sally Hemings." That is a factual statement, it is also loaded, but it states the reality. If we were to change that to: "Sally Hemings was a woman who lived on Monticello." That would also be loaded, but in the direction of inaccuracy, just like the word "relationship" in this context. "Slave owners used the people they held for labor. Sally Hemings regularly performed sexual labor for Thomas Jefferson." What exactly is loaded, or, more to the point, inaccurate about such a statement? My commentary above was "loaded" in order to reveal the absurdity of referring to the sexual contact between a woman and a man who held her captive as a "relationship." Being "loaded" or not "loaded" is not the issue here, the issue is one of clarity and accuracy. It is, technically speaking, accurate to refer to a "relationship" between Jerry Sandusky and the boys with whom he had sexual contact, but, it is a connotative monstrosity. To say he raped those boys, or molested them, or sexually abused them is "loaded" but accurate and more clear. I did not even suggest using the word rape, which applies; or the word pedophilia; which also applies. I don't include a source because this issue is one of language not fact. We all agree that Thomas Jefferson regularly vaginally penetrated a woman who was his property, nowhere have you offered evidence that this should logically be described as a "relationship." Vicintel21 (talk) 21:56, 4 September 2018 (UTC)

The following source (NY Times) offers a view on this subject: [1]. Attic Salt (talk) 22:02, 4 September 2018 (UTC)
Also, Annette Gordon-Reed, already cited in the article, has some interesting discussion on this subject. Attic Salt (talk) 22:24, 4 September 2018 (UTC)

I have read Reed's essay and I read the New York Times piece, I'm a graduate student in history who has written papers on slavery, I'm not coming from an uninformed place. I could make the philosophical argument that any sexual congress between a man and a woman where the woman had no legal right to withhold consent should be considered rape, but I'm not. I'm arguing that in the absence of compelling evidence to the contrary, we should describe sexual congress in this context as a labor like any other. If all we knew about Hemings was that she picked tobacco on Monticello and was Jefferson's slave, the logical presumption would be that she was being forced to do so. We would not feel the need to leave open the possibility that she might have decided, coincident with her enslaved status, that what she really wanted to do with her life was pick tobacco. The only reason we have this controversy is that forced sex makes us more uncomfortable than forced tobacco picking. I think sexual labor tells the truth that presents itself to us by a preponderance of the evidence. It is a much more connotatively neutral phrase than "relationship with Hemings." If you can suggest a better one, I'm open to it. Vicintel21 (talk) 01:16, 5 September 2018 (UTC)

There's no way to put relationships of that time into any context comparable to our current understandings of words like "relationship" and "consent". We have no name for what went on between Jefferson and Sally. What we do know is that he treated her and her children (and her siblings, but especially her) better than he treated the field slaves you keep comparing her to; she never "picked tobacco". He kept her and her family indoors as household workers, where she apparently had a room of her own in the "big house"; he made sure that her sons were taught a decent trade; and she seems to have been treated as a semi-member of the family by Jefferson's legitimate children. Certainly, after his death she was allowed to leave the slave situation (although not formally emancipated) and to retire to her son's house for the rest of her life. I'm not saying this makes his sexual treatment of her OK, but I'm saying that through the eyes of the time it seems the situation was not unpleasant for her; it was certainly better than most of her contemporaries. I don't know a better word for this than "relationship". It would be pure Original Research to describe her situation as "performing sexual labor," and I doubt if you can find any Reliable Sources using that term. --MelanieN (talk) 02:58, 5 September 2018 (UTC)

"There's no way to put relationships of that time into any context comparable to our current understandings of words like "relationship" and "consent". We're not writing in the 18th century, we are writing in the 21st century where the word "relationship" has connotations which are not typically used when a man has sex with a woman that is being legally held against her will. "What we do know is that he treated her and her children (and her siblings, but especially her) better than he treated the field slaves you keep comparing her to; she never "picked tobacco." I never compared her treatment to that of "field slaves" I said Jefferson owned her, which he did, and she performed labor for him, which she did. Picking tobacco, making tea, having sex, all three activities when done by an enslaved person for the person that owned them legally should be described as forms of coerced labor, that is my argument. Your argument about "treatment" is irrelevant to this discussion. None of what you described inherently means that the sexual contact, begun when Hemings was 14 and Jefferson was 44, was consensual. Again, my argument is that in the absence of any commentary from Hemings and the fact that she had zero legal protection against Jefferson whatsoever, it is logical to assume that everything she did for her "owner," Jefferson, was a form of coerced labor. Which is why I think "performed sexual labor" is a more logical term than "had a relationship." "through the eyes of the time it seems the situation was not unpleasant for her;" I'm not sure what that means. Whose eyes matter but hers in judging whether or not she thought the experience was unpleasant? You're accusing me of being anachronistic while presuming to know what Sally Hemings felt based on the fact that her children were not treated as poorly as they could have been. Once again, her treatment isn't really relevant, enslaved people made bargains all the time to secure slightly less horrible lives, that doesn't mean they found it "pleasant." Here's a source that uses "coerced sex" and "labor" to refer to enslaved women engaged in sexual contact with men that owned them. Cite error: There are <ref> tags on this page without content in them (see the help page). https://www.jstor.org/stable/2692741?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents Here's one that uses rape: Cite error: There are <ref> tags on this page without content in them (see the help page). https://www.lincolncottage.org/the-loathsome-den-sexual-assault-on-the-plantation-metoo/ one Vicintel21 (talk) 14:15, 5 September 2018 (UTC)

I would disagree that "we have no word" - the problem is that we do not know enough about the case to pick one of the more specific ones. "Relationship" does not, as claimed above, automatically imply romance and consent. We sometimes use the word in that specialised sense, but we also use it more generally - see "abusive relationship" or "the relationship between the president and his staff quickly broke down". It is the least specific word available, and hence the most suitable one if we lack data to be more specific. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 05:38, 5 September 2018 (UTC)
Would you refer to the "relationship" between Elizabeth Smart and her captors? Even an "abusive relationship" is consensual, as is the "relationship" between an employer and his or her staff. None of the examples you use include the "relationship" of ownership between one human being and another. Vicintel21 (talk) 14:15, 5 September 2018 (UTC)
Sure I would. I even refer to the relationship between Guantanamo inmates and their guards, or between a A Boy and His Dog. See "relationship" on Wictionary (it's similar in other dictionaries). You seem to be stuck on meaning 4. But see meanings 1 and 5. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 14:41, 5 September 2018 (UTC)
I agree with Stephan's assessment of the use of the word "relationship". I would also like to point out that the term "sexual relationship" is used these two news stories, here and here, that could hardly called consensual. As far as I can tell, everyday use of the term is like those used in those article and pretty neutral in itself and it's the rest of the wording around it that can give the situation more context. Libertybison (talk) 06:41, 5 September 2018 (UTC)

In the both stories you cite, the word "relationship" is modified by the word "inappropriate," which is very different than just using the word "sexual relationship" without immediate modification. I don't think "inappropriate" meets the standard for neutral accuracy. In addition, in these two cases, the students had recourse in the law against their teachers' advances, not having taken advantage of such recourse implies a greater degree of consent than we can find in the Hemings case. I'm all for finding an appropriate word or set of words to modify relationship, though I think that will get wordy which is why I suggest abandoning the term altogether. "Sexual relationship not legally requiring her consent," is a mouthful. Vicintel21 (talk) 14:15, 5 September 2018 (UTC)

You say you've read the book by Annette Gordon-Reed. Perhaps your recognise that her treatment of this subject is more nuanced than your preferred depiction. Attic Salt (talk) 14:24, 5 September 2018 (UTC)
Look, "consent" is a very modern concept when it applies to sex. In most of historic time, and certainly in Jefferson's time, there was no such thing as "consent" required for a man and a woman to have sex. Certainly a MARRIED woman throughout most of history had no such right; her husband was pretty much entitled to do with her whatever he wanted whenever he wanted, and for her to refuse him was a sin [2] if not actually a crime. Marital rape was legal in the U.S. until the 1970s.[3] The question of whether or not she "consented" to his advances probably never occurred to either of them - but that did not make their relationship any different from the vast majority of all sexual relationships at the time. We can't force our 21st-century viewpoint onto 18th-century situations. Their relationship was not uncommon at the time, and there is no evidence that she found it unpleasant or offensive, and quite a bit of evidence that he treated her well; they may even have developed a mutual affection. We just don't know - partly because Jefferson and his daughter Patsy did such a thorough job of destroying all written evidence of the affair. "Relationship" is the only appropriate word here; it is a neutral term meaning that there is a connection between the parties. As Stephan demonstrated, it doesn't imply any more than that. Your belief that "sexual relationship" necessarily implies consent is your belief, nothing more. --MelanieN (talk) 14:45, 5 September 2018 (UTC)

Some details about Jefferson's children[edit]

The "Hemingses in Paris" chapter of the article contains the following sentence: "After Lucy died of whooping cough in 1787, Jefferson sent for his surviving daughter, nine-year-old Maria (Polly) Jefferson, to live with him." Problem is, Lucy has not been previously mentioned in the article, so the reader will be confused on who she was. And, then, according to the Thomas Jefferson article, he had two daughters named "Lucy", both of whom died while very young. The sentence *might* be referring to "Lucy Elizabeth", but according to the Thomas Jefferson article, she died in 1785, not 1787. So we've got a few problems of detail here. Attic Salt (talk) 14:31, 12 September 2018 (UTC)

Here is the Monticello website's account of Lucy II's death. She died in October 1784, and Jefferson first received word of her death from a letter by the attending physician brought to France and delivered by Lafayette. Libertybison (talk) 15:39, 12 September 2018 (UTC)
Thank you. MelanieN and I have made some fixes. Attic Salt (talk) 12:47, 13 September 2018 (UTC)

"Owned" by Jefferson[edit]

Is saying that Hemings was "owned" by Jefferson not avoidably derogatory? I realize the woman was kept in slavery, and I have no intention of detracting from the importance and inhumanity of that act by euphemising; rather, I think instead the issue is a better word may exist that both connotes the magnitude of her slave status while still providing greater dignity to the woman in question (especially in the opening line)? I ask powers that may be better informed in this arena. Not trying to rehash the argument above; I am asking about this specific occurrence in particular. AnyyVen (talk) 02:38, 27 November 2018 (UTC)

Its the ugly truth. Its not derogatory for the victim. Creuzbourg (talk) 21:09, 11 December 2018 (UTC)
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