The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world. -Declaration of Independence 1776
Announcing to the world that King George III was a tyrant, Thomas Jefferson became a traitor to the British Crown.
Would the two ever meet on amicable terms?
INVITED TO A CONVERSATION WITH THOMAS JEFFERSON
Conversations with Thomas Jefferson is an annual time travel event, made possible by Poplar Forest, Jefferson’s private retreat.
Each year Thomas Jefferson hosts an invited guest to engage in conversation!
Imagine my surprise when I heard that Thomas Jefferson invited King George III to his private retreat.
While enjoying the lovely spring day before the program began, we noticed Thomas Jefferson and King George III coming our way!
Recognizing us, Thomas Jefferson introduced us to the reigning monarch of Great Britain, King George.
While looking directly at me, King George said he understood that I had visited the lovely town of Williamsburg a few times in the last year.
I smiled and said I had, once or twice!
For this visit, King George left his crown, scepter, and coronation robe behind in England.
Instead, he wore the Windsor uniform as he commonly wears while out and about.
Surprised to hear the king discuss the loveliness of the town, I presumed it must pale in comparison to the grand estates in England, in his eyes.
Then I realized it must be due to his pride in his former colony, when he mentioned the fact that he built Williamsburg, to which Jefferson retorted that someone else did the actual building.
As they quibbled over that, they positioned themselves for rendering opportunities as we sipped tea, after which the program began.
INTRODUCTIONS
After the introduction of King George III, we heard from the master of ceremonies: his subject, Thomas Jefferson…
{{{Oops! The Master of Cermeonies is on the king’s side even after the war!}}}
Surprisingly, the conversation opened on some of the king’s interests and histories, while Jefferson acted as a foil, comparing his similar story:
- Both had their daughters classically educated, in a time when that was rare.
- Both enjoyed listening to Classical music, as well as playing it.
- Both had interests in architecture and farming.
- Both of their fathers died when they were young teenagers.
BEFORE HE BECAME KING
Then we got to know a bit more of the personal side of King George.
While he had an extremely harsh grandfather, King George II, his doting father was a bit of a scoundrel.
The king let us know that he grew up in grand mansions, not palaces.
His father instilled in him a love of music.
At the age of 13, his father died, making him the Prince of Wales, heir to the throne.
Tying in the recent royal wedding between Prince William and Kate to this event, the moderator asked King George III about his royal wedding.
King George had an arranged marriage to Princess Charlotte from the German state of Mecklenburg.
First meeting the day she arrived, they married the next day.
She communicated in German because she did not speak English.
They had 15 children, with only two “currently” living.
Two weeks after the wedding, in 1760 King George II died, and King George III began his reign of Great Britain and Ireland.
BUILDING A PALACE AND A LIBRARY
Later, as a gift to his wife, King George III built a palace for her, Buckingham Palace, also called the Queen’s House.
Within he helped design the architecture of the octagonal library.
At this point, Jefferson bragged about his own library of 7000 books, considered quite extensive in early 19th century America.
After humoring him, King George III flatly stated that he had 65,000 books in his library!
He invited Jefferson to come peruse them anytime he wished!
JUSTIFYING TAXATION OF THE COLONIES
Then they debated the taxation issue, leading to the American Revolution.
Offended by the name tyrant, the king emotionally protested that he manages money well, without a penny allocated to personal interests or personal debt.
He also insisted that he has limited powers, instituted in the Glorious Revolution.
Insisted the imposing of taxes on America was due to Parliament, the king emphasized the overall importance for the common good of all the Empire, not individuals.
At the end, questions were open to the floor.
QUALIFICATIONS TO BE KING?
Raising my hand, the Master of Ceremonies handed me the microphone, so that I could state my name, where I was from, and then ask the question.
I stated: This question is for King George III. Since you were born into your position instead of elected, what are your qualifications for ruling the largest empire in the world?
All the men around me turned to whisper, “Great question!”
King George opened by stating he disagrees with the Divine Right of Kings.
His birth to this position, required that he responsibly maintain the tradition of the crown and represent it well.
His choices while growing up and into adulthood reflected those things which would support that tradition.
Education was also a responsibility when he was a student, to learn the history of tradition, the history of the kingdoms before him, for better or worse, so he can learn from mistakes of the past and instill good decisions as a monarch.
REBUTTAL SHOCKINGLY DENIED
Then he said the scary thing to him is this new American government, where people say that anyone can be president.
He ended by saying, “That’s the chance you take!” and everyone started laughing.
When the moderator offered Jefferson a rebuttal, he shockingly declined.
Flabbergasted by the king’s audacity to solely blame Parliament, the kids asked me what I thought.
KING ALLIED WITH PARLIAMENT
I explained that although Parliament did enact the taxes, it was with the king’s full consent, as he irresponsibly signed every act of tyrannical taxation into law.
WILLIAM PITT THE ELDER ALLIED WITH COLONIES
Also, our greatest ally in Britain was the former Prime Minister, William Pitt the Elder.
Vera Muriel White, for Britannia, writes:
His classical education made him think, act, and speak in the grand Roman manner. His favorite poet was Virgil, and he never forgot the patriotic lessons of Roman history; he constantly read Cicero, the golden-tongued orator who could yet lash offenders with his indignation. Later, in Parliament, his organ-like voice could be distinctly heard outside the House. This voice, perfect timing, and splendid gestures were worthy of David Garrick, the greatest actor of the day and a personal friend; Pitt’s lean, tall, commanding figure, combined with a Roman beaky nose and hawklike eyes—large and gray but turning black when he was roused—overwhelmed all onlookers. To his countrymen he was to become almost a divine portent, a voice from the Delphic oracle.
Lawrence W. Reed, for Foundation for Economic Education writes:
In a long public career as a Parliamentarian, he proved himself to be incorruptible, turning down positions and opportunities that others of lesser scruples eagerly grabbed for personal aggrandizement. Long after his death in 1778, he was revered in America and regarded in his own Britain as one of the country’s most distinguished statesmen. By the 1760s, Pitt the Elder had evolved into a principled devotee of liberty and an eloquent foe of concentrated political power.
WILLIAM PITT OPPOSED STAMP ACT
Sorry I am to hear the liberty of speech in this House, imputed as a crime.
I rejoice that America has resisted.
When two countries are connected together, like England and her colonies, without being incorporated, the one must necessarily govern; the greater must rule the less; but so rule it, as not to contradict the fundamental principles that are common to both.
They have been wronged. They have been driven to madness by injustice. Will you punish them for the madness you have occasioned?
Upon the whole, I will beg leave to tell the House what is really my opinion. It is, that the Stamp Act be repealed absolutely, totally, and immediately; that the reason for the repeal should be assigned, because it was founded on an erroneous principle.
WILLIAM PITT THE ELDER PROTESTED COERCIVE ACTS
Lawrence W. Reed, for Foundation for Economic Education writes:
Lawrence W. Reed, for the Foundation for Economic Education records Pitt’s speech to the House of Lords on January 20, 1775, as seen through the eyes of historian Joseph J. Ellis.
On January 20, 1775, William Pitts spoke before the House of lords his protest of the Coercive Acts against Boston, that cruelly punished innocent women and children for the Boston Tea Party.
Speaking over an hour, Pitt called the act tyranny, that “an Englishman can be deprived of the bread he eats without his consent?”
Pitt boldly asked how colonists “seemed more alive to the true spirit of English liberty than the Lords of the realm gathered in these hallowed halls?”
Let the sacredness of their property remain inviolate; let it be taxable only by their own consent, given in their provincial assemblies, else it will cease to be property…
Resistance to your acts was as necessary as it was just, and your vain declarations of the omnipotence of Parliament, and your imperious doctrines of the necessity of submission, will be found equally impotent to convince or enslave your fellow subjects in America who feel that tyranny, whether ambitioned by an individual part of the Legislature, or by the bodies which compose it, is equally intolerable to British principles…
Woe be to him who sheds the first—the inexpiable—drop of blood in an impious war with a people contending in the great cause of public liberty. I will tell you plainly, my Lords: No son of mine, nor any one over whom I have influence, shall ever draw his sword upon his fellow subjects…
I trust it is obvious to your Lordships that all attempts to impose servitude [on the American colonists], to establish despotism over such a mighty continental nation, must be vain, must be fatal. We shall be forced ultimately to retract, while we can, not when we must. I say we must necessarily undo these violent and oppressive Acts. They must be repealed!
However, Parliament refused to withdraw British troops from Boston.
WILLIAM PITT THE YOUNGER CONTINUES FATHER’S LEGACY OF FREEDOM
In 1778, William Pitt the Elder passed away, leaving a legacy for his son.
The youngest and last Prime Minister of Britian from 1783 to 1806, William Pitt the Younger, helped his friend, William Wilberforce, end the slave trade in Britain.
BRITISH COMMON LAW
They knew their history, of the Common Law, posted at the site of first representative government in the New World, in 1619 Jamestown.
Somewhere along the way, King George III either forgot his history, or he never understood it.
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