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Jefferson Warned Us on Debt · Commentary - TJ Meadows

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  Speaker 1: Thomas Jefferson tried to warn us. We didn't listen. In 1789,
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  Speaker 1: while serving as America's minister to France, Jefferson wrote to
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  Speaker 1: James Madison, quote, The earth belongs in usufruct to the living,
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  Speaker 1: an old term meaning to borrow temporarily. The dead have
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  Speaker 1: neither powers nor rights over it. The language is old.
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  Speaker 1: The warning is timeless. Jefferson believed one generation had no
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  Speaker 1: right to bind together. the next. And he applied that
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  Speaker 1: principle in part to public debt. Debt, he argued, allows
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  Speaker 1: the wishes of the past to tie the hands of
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  Speaker 1: the future. On that point, he could not have been
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  Speaker 1: more right. We often hear that we are burdening our
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  Speaker 1: children with debt, but we rarely describe what that burden
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  Speaker 1: really means. It means limiting their freedom. It means forcing
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  Speaker 1: future generations to pay for decisions they didn't make. to
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  Speaker 1: serve priorities they didn't choose. Talking heads like me share
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  Speaker 1: some of the blame. We focus on the staggering size
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  Speaker 1: of the national debt. We talk about annual deficits, economic instability,
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  Speaker 1: the future of the dollar, and America's influence abroad. Those
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  Speaker 1: concerns are real, but they can also feel distant. Most
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  Speaker 1: Americans will never handle a million dollars, much less a trillion.
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  Speaker 1: It's difficult to feel the weight of a number that
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  Speaker 1: large or to fear economic consequences that seem far removed
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  Speaker 1: from everyday life. So yes, we agree the debt is
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  Speaker 1: out of control, but we don't care quite enough to
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  Speaker 1: demand change. Now consider it another way. Previous generations are
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  Speaker 1: spending part of your future. They're narrowing your ability to
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  Speaker 1: decide what matters most. In your time and how the
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  Speaker 1: priorities of your generation should shape our politics and public policy.
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  Speaker 1: In effect, the past is deciding what is best for you.
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  Speaker 1: If Americans understood the debt in those terms, I suspect
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  Speaker 1: we'd be much angrier. Jefferson's argument survives in a letter
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  Speaker 1: few people will ever read. It deserves a prominent place
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  Speaker 1: in our national conversation. At this point, arguing over who's
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  Speaker 1: to blame matters. only gets us so far. Responsibility is
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  Speaker 1: widely shared. No party, almost no political leader, is innocent.
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  Speaker 1: The question is whether we'll become concerned enough to act.
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  Speaker 1: Those of us who care about this crisis must make
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  Speaker 1: Jefferson's warning clear. The living should be free to choose
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  Speaker 1: their own future, a future fitted to their time, not
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  Speaker 1: one molded and mortgaged by generations now gone.