Thomas Jefferson and Slavery (open access)

Thomas Jefferson and Slavery

Throughout the history of American slavery and abolitionist activities Jefferson was a key figure. Because he so clearly and fervently denounced slavery as inconsistent with natural rights and the ideology of the Revolution, he has been hailed by many as a champion of equality. On the other hand, Jefferson owned many slaves during his lifetime, and he freed only seven, five of these being emancipated through his will. This fact has made him vulnerable to attacks from modern historians. The critics have oversimplified and distorted matters relating to slavery as they applied to Jefferson and his time. Slavery during his lifetime was not the dramatic issue that it has been made out to be. The major passion of Jefferson's generation was the establishment of a sound Union for whites, based on general principles of republicanism. Specifically, for Jefferson, this meant the establishment of a nation for self-governing, self-sufficient white farmers. In his Notes on Virginia, Jefferson declared that "those who labor in the earth are the chosen people of God if ever he had a chosen people."2 The Creator had deposited in these people, to a greater extent than in any other group, a large amount of true virtue. Looking …
Date: December 1973
Creator: Beatty, James Paul
System: The UNT Digital Library
The Secret Six and Their Theory of Autonomous Individualism (open access)

The Secret Six and Their Theory of Autonomous Individualism

This paper focuses on the Secret Six who consisted of Theodore Parker, Thomas Wentworth Higginson, Franklin Benjamin Sanborn, Samuel Gridley Howe, George Luther Stearns, and Gerrit Smith, and the concepts that these men believed in regarding the type of society they wanted established in the United States. The dominant theme in the minds of this Secret Six was the romantic belief in the free individual. The belief in the free individual living in a free, progressive society held out the promise that America could become a perfect community of autonomous individuals and an example for all the world. But the Secret Six realized that for America to be this perfect community of autonomous individuals, America had to be freed of any determinism in its institutions. These six crusaders had such faith in their theories of individualism, that they abandoned moral persuasion and accepted violence as the principal means of establishing their society. These men believed that only the type of an individual who was willing to use violence if necessary and to die for the dictates of his conscience, could reform America into a community that exemplified to the world a belief in the free individual.
Date: December 1973
Creator: Tatom, E. Lynn
System: The UNT Digital Library
Martin Luther's View of Woman (open access)

Martin Luther's View of Woman

The concept which Martin Luther had of the nature of woman did a great deal to intensify the idea of woman's inferiority in the modern world. Framed by an investigation of the traditional and unique aspects of that concept and speculation about its effect on succeeding generations, a delineation of Luther's view will reveal his contribution to the concept of female inferiority and evil. As a formulator of religious and ethical concepts for modern man, Luther insured the continuance of this idea in the modern world. While it has adapted to changes in society's forms, the whole fabric of Luther's view of the female remains. Though some of his ideas remain as remnants reduced to truisms, the impact which they still have on human relationships and societal structure cannot be taken lightly.
Date: December 1973
Creator: Behrens, Martha Skeeters
System: The UNT Digital Library
Marijuana and Crime: A Critique and Proposal (open access)

Marijuana and Crime: A Critique and Proposal

Of the plethora of social problems with which government has had to contend in recent history, few have generated more controversy than the non-therapeutic use of drugs. Many of those which are currently in common use did not exist fifty years ago; but the most dramatic growth in non-therapeutic use has been experienced with a drug that man has known for centuries: marijuana.1 Known generically as Cannabis sativa, internationally as Indian hemp, popularly as marijuana, and in American slang as "pot" or "grass," the drug was introduced to the United States as an intoxicant by itinerate Mexican farm workers in the early decades of this century. The acknowledged use of marijuana in the ghettos and communities of ethnic minorities for several decades stimulated no public outcry with the exception of the sensational press campaigns which led to the passage of the Marihuana Tax Act of 1937.
Date: December 1973
Creator: Jones, Urban Lynn
System: The UNT Digital Library
Some Women in Dreiser's Life and Their Portraits in His Novels (open access)

Some Women in Dreiser's Life and Their Portraits in His Novels

The rise of naturalism in American letters was born out of a reaction against romanticism by writers such as Theodore Dreiser, Hamlin Garland, Stephen Crane, Frank Norris, Jack London, Upton Sinclair and Robert Herrick, who attempted to rid the American novel of romanticism by delving deeper into life's truths than did the realists Mark Twain, William Dean Howells and Henry James. The naturalists objected to the limited subject matter of the realists; they focused their attention on "slums, crime, illicit sexual passions, exploitation of man by man"2 and other actualities of the world. George Perkins outlined other distinctions between realism and naturalism in American literature.3 He describes nineteenth-century realism, 1870-1890, as represented by writers who created a world of truth by keeping actuality clearly in mind. The emphasis was on the following: 1. Using settings that were thoroughly familiar to the writer. 2. Emphasizing the norm of daily experience in plot construction. 3. Creating ordinary characters and studying them in depth. 4. Adhering to complete authorial objectivity. 5. Accepting their moral responsibility by reporting the world as it truly was.
Date: December 1973
Creator: Crimmings, Constance Deane
System: The UNT Digital Library
Mythological Implications in Navajo and Pueblo Art (open access)

Mythological Implications in Navajo and Pueblo Art

An exhibition catalog was chosen as the problem for this study, for it provided a practical means for an art historian to experience the problems associated with assembling material for an exhibition and catalog. These problems included researching background material, locating and coordinating a unified collection of artifacts, working with museum and research center staffs, plus the experience of photographing, editing, arranging lay-outs and writing in the format of an exhibition catalog.
Date: December 1973
Creator: Pate, Agatha Gail
System: The UNT Digital Library
James Madison and the Patronage Problem, 1809-1817 (open access)

James Madison and the Patronage Problem, 1809-1817

Historians and political scientists have written prodigiously on the long, versatile, and at times brilliant political career of James Madison, who, as a politician from Virginia, prolific writer, and an incisive thinker, became Thomas Jefferson's secretary of state, and president of the United States from 1809 to 1817. Over the years, however, there has been little consensus in American historiography concerning the effectiveness of Madison's career as president. This widespread divergence of opinion among scholars relating to his presidency is largely centered on the seemingly complex nature of Madison.
Date: December 1973
Creator: Asberry, Robert Lee
System: The UNT Digital Library
A Theoretical Framework for a Program of Graduate Education for Teachers and Administrators in Nursing Education (open access)

A Theoretical Framework for a Program of Graduate Education for Teachers and Administrators in Nursing Education

The problem with which this investigation is concerned is the development of a theoretical framework for a program of graduate education for the preparation of teachers and administrators in nursing education. The theoretical framework for the program was developed after extensive research of the literature concerning graduate education generally and nursing specifically. Additional data were obtained from four different questionnaires sent to the presidents, chairmen, and faculty of all Texas colleges with programs for an Associate Degree in Nursing as well as to 100 students and 100 graduates representing all Texas programs for the Associate Degree in Nursing. The purpose of the study was to review the history of nursing, its development as a profession, and its system of education, including past, present, and future trends in each category of education. This survey gave a perspective to the graduate program proposed in this study. hen all fifty-seven accredited graduate nursing programs in the United States were analyzed to determine the current nature of graduate education in nursing and innovations initiated by specific graduate programs, as substantiated by the literature. The data from the questionnaires sent to all the Texas programs for the Associate Degree in Nursing paralleled the developments and …
Date: December 1973
Creator: Bulbrook, Mary Jo Trapp
System: The UNT Digital Library