Awards

• Long-listed for George Washington Book Prize 2025 (United States)
• Short-listed for Herbert J. Storing Book Prize 2026 (United States)

Overview

The first full account of the relationship between George Washington and Thomas Jefferson, countering the legend of their enmity while drawing vital historical lessons from the differences that arose between them. Martha Washington's worst memory was her husband's death. Her second worst was Thomas Jefferson's awkward visit to pay respects to his estranged friend. Yet this estrangement has obscured the fact that for three decades prior, the two men enjoyed a productive relationship. Precisely because they shared so much, their disagreements have something important to teach us. While Washington favored a traditional aristocracy, Jefferson preferred a more meritocratic approach whereby elites would vie for elected office on the basis of education and skills. And while Washington emphasized strong central government, Jefferson sought to diffuse power across the states. Still, as Francis Cogliano argues, common convictions equally defined their relationship: a passion for American independence and republican government, as well as commitments to commerce and westward expansion. Both men also developed skeptical views of slavery, even as they did little to abolish it. The differences between the two statesmen mirrored political fissures of the early United States, as the unity of the revolutionary moment gave way to competing visions for a new nation. A Revolutionary Friendship captures the dramatic and unsettling reality that there was no single founding ideal-only compromise between friends and rivals.

Full Product Details

9780674304994

Table of Contents

Reviews

[This] lively book offers a brilliant introduction to two superstars of the founding of America, to the dramatic events they lived through and to the conflicts that shaped their interactions.--Max Edling ""History Today"" (9/1/2024 12:00:00 AM) Cogliano considers the relationship between George Washington and Thomas Jefferson in this measured and clarifying account...This deeply researched and accessible narrative sheds new light on a consequential friendship.-- ""Publishers Weekly"" (11/17/2023 12:00:00 AM) Looks at the evolving nature of the friendship between George Washington and Thomas Jefferson...reminds readers that, unfortunately, bitter partisanship can break even the strongest bonds.--William K. Bolt ""Journal of Southern History"" (5/1/2025 12:00:00 AM) Perhaps the most profound feature of Mr. Cogliano's book is his treatment of how Washington and Jefferson developed their anti-slavery positions without ever, in fact, freeing their slaves while the two men were alive...[his] method is another vindication of Plutarch's understanding of what is to be gained by juxtaposing one biography against another. The balance Mr. Cogliano maintains between the personalities and politics of Washington and Jefferson is pitch perfect.--Carl Rollyson ""New York Sun"" (7/4/2024 12:00:00 AM) Shows how [Washington and Jefferson] in different ways, struggled with moral hypocrisy--the conflict between their lofty ideals and the fact that their elevated social positions depended on slave labor. They both sought a republic of liberty in America but disagreed over what it should look like. As we know too well today, friendships become fragile when political differences are unbridgeable.--William Anthony Hay ""Wall Street Journal"" (3/22/2024 12:00:00 AM) Takes the reader through the early years of Washington and Jefferson's interactions, their many similarities, their differences, how they eventually met, and how the American Revolution brought them together in a way that never would have happened without the military conflict.--Dustin Bass ""Epoch Times"" (7/23/2024 12:00:00 AM) A fantastic work of comparative history. Washington and Jefferson's collaboration endured for three highly productive decades, but then, as now, even the warmest friendships sometimes got pulverized by politics. Cogliano's poignant reminder that Washington and Jefferson never reconciled inspires me, as it may you, to try to rebuild bridges.--Woody Holton, author of Liberty Is Sweet: The Hidden History of the American Revolution A persuasively argued, well-written biography that illuminates and enlivens its subjects and their relationship. Avoiding the pitfalls of both the celebratory national narrative and its revisionist counterpoint, Cogliano enables readers to make better sense of the complicated circumstances--and complicated people--who revolutionized America, for better and for worse.--Peter S. Onuf, author of Jefferson and the Virginians: Democracy, Constitutions, and Empire It is hard to believe no one has written a detailed account of the difficult friendship between the two Virginian revolutionaries George Washington and Thomas Jefferson. We now have Cogliano's meticulously researched, insightful, and fluidly written account of their history with each other. This book is just what we need as we approach the 250th anniversary of what these two men helped put in motion, the American Revolution.--Annette Gordon-Reed, author of The Hemingses of Monticello: An American Family Superb, compelling history. Deftly interweaving the personal and the political, Cogliano shows that Washington and Jefferson had a much closer relationship than is typically acknowledged, first as political allies, then as trusted friends and confidants, but the party strife of the young republic made them bitter opponents.--Eliga H. Gould, author of Among the Powers of the Earth: The American Revolution and the Making of a New World Empire

Author Information

Francis D. Cogliano is the author of numerous books, including Emperor of Liberty: Thomas Jefferson’s Foreign Policy and, with Peter S. Onuf, Thomas Jefferson Survives: American Independence in His Time and Ours. A Fellow of the Royal Historical Society and cohost of the American history podcast The Whiskey Rebellion, he is Professor of American History at the University of Edinburgh.

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