Your personal favorite Founding Father

Who is your personal favorite founder?

  • George Washington

    Votes: 15 9.6%
  • Thomas Jefferson

    Votes: 59 37.8%
  • Benjamin Franklin

    Votes: 15 9.6%
  • Thomas Paine

    Votes: 16 10.3%
  • Patrick Henry

    Votes: 18 11.5%
  • John Adams

    Votes: 5 3.2%
  • James Madison

    Votes: 11 7.1%
  • Samuel Adams

    Votes: 5 3.2%
  • Alexander Hamilton

    Votes: 2 1.3%
  • Other (Comment)

    Votes: 10 6.4%

  • Total voters
    156
No jefferson would be of a neocon beliefs in modern day. Jefferson like the modern neocon was not satified with the borders of the United States and had visions of a grander country just like modern neocons are not satified with modern US bounderies and hav vision of a grander empire.
Foreign policy was different in those days, and besides, Jefferson was the one who said "commerce with all nations, but entangling alliance with none".
 
The national bank was more Hamilton's influence, not Washington himself. Don't blame solely Washington for it. And besides, everyone on this list is imperfect.
Yeah, but the whiskey rebellion, excise taxes and a couple more things completely disqualify Washington. Hamilton isn't even on the table.
 
Foreign policy was different in those days, and besides, Jefferson was the one who said "commerce with all nations, but entangling alliance with none".
Why was foreign policy different? Every bit of human nature true then is true now.
 
Yeah, but the whiskey rebellion, excise taxes and a couple more things completely disqualify Washington. Hamilton isn't even on the table.

I have to disagree. Economics was only a budding field at that time and things like the excise tax and its impact wasn't fully understood. Washington did far more good than his few negatives.
 
I have to disagree. Economics was only a budding field at that time and things like the excise tax and its impact wasn't fully understood. Washington did far more good than his few negatives.
You can defend Washington's morality and argue that he may not have had enough information to make the right decisions, and this may be true. But his actions stand objectively.
 
Thomas Jefferson was the most brilliant philosopher.

Franklin had a remarkably well rounded life. One of the most well rounded lives in history.

But really, I would say John Jay is being criminally overlooked in this poll. He was one of the writers of the Federalist Papers.

He was an abolitionist and non-interventionist, and proponent of a strong currency.

He served as the 6th President of the Continental Congress, 2nd U.S. Secretary of Foreign Affairs, the 2nd Governor of New York, and the 1st Supreme Court Justice of the United States.
 
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John Adams.

As a Founding Father he was the intellectual and passionate drive behind the Revolution. Long before Jefferson wrote the Declaration, long before Washington fielded an army, long before Independence became an acceptable ideal, Adams was calling for it. It was Adams who had Henry Lee of Virginia propose his (Adam's) article on independence from England. It was Adams who saw the genius in appointing a second rate Colonel from Virginia as commanding General of the Continental Army. It was Adams who knew Jefferson had the poet's soul and could articulate the argument for liberty more than any other person could. The man was the driving dynamo of the Revolution, he was the tireless irate minority that spoke for liberty.
 
Foreign policy was different in those days, and besides, Jefferson was the one who said "commerce with all nations, but entangling alliance with none".

Said and did are two different things. We learned that with Reagan.
 
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