Jefferson's Declaration of Independence in the Spanish Political Tradition

Abstract

The American Declaration of Independence has never been very popular in Spain. This is somewhat surprising since one of the basic Jeffersonian ideas is an old and accepted Spanish thesis: in De Rege et Regis Institutione (On kings and kingship), published in 1598, the Spanish Jesuit Juan de Mariana maintains that under conditions the overthrow of a tyrant and even killing him is justifiable. Since Mariana is no revolutionary, he does not make it easy for would-be tyrannicides. But neither does Thomas Jefferson, who certainly was a revolutionary: He not only calls for prudence Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes but also reminds us that all experience has shown that mankind are more disposed to suffer than to recur to expedited ways of righting their wrongs. Jefferson did know of Mariana; a copy of Mariana's Historia de Espana appears among the many books in Spanish listed by E. Millicent Sowerby in the catalog of Jefferson's library. And there is no doubt that Jefferson was able to read Spanish, as he himself said, but it is doubtful that he knew of Mariana's defense of tyrannicide. At least, I have never found any indication of it, and I have been working on Jefferson's knowledge of Spain and Spanish culture for the last few years.1 That the Declaration of Independence was so seldom translated into Spanish may be due to various causes. One might be Jefferson's inclusion of the pursuit of Happiness among the certain unalienable rights, which goes against the Spanish understanding of the Catholic teaching on happiness, since this was always understood as attainable only in the other world. This world, as a popular Catholic prayer says, is only a valley of tears through which we are only transients on our way to the other world. Even Spaniards who profess to be outside the church and her teach-