Who had the more enduring vision of United States, Thomas Jefferson or Alexander Hamilton? I believe that Thomas Jefferson left a better vision of the U.S. rather than Hamilton. Jefferson believed that individual rights needed to be protected by laws, that our government needs to be democratic, and that more people should be eligible to vote. I agree with all three of these statements.

Individual rights were very important to Jefferson. He believed that your rights should be protected by laws because it was something this country was born from. If we didn't have individual rights that protected our voice or our opinion, then the people wouldn't be able to assemble in most cases, we wouldn't be able to practice their religion, print anything offensive against any leader, or speak out against any law. Without these things, our society wouldn't be able to function well. Since we have these rights, our lives have been much better than a life with no rights. Today we use these rights to practice any religion, print news about our government, have whistle blowers and assemble in public meetings. This impact that Thomas Jefferson made helped affect our country.

Jefferson also believed in a strong democratic government. A democratic government is a government where the people choose their leaders. On the other hand, Alexander Hamilton believed we should have a government based of the British system. If we had the same Government as the British it might lead to unfair taxes like it did before, this why I agree with Jefferson. The British Government at the time wasn't the best type of Government; the central government was too strong. America wanted a government where the people had the power. When they were colonies, they had no say in their government. This reasoning makes me pick Jefferson’s way of government rather than Hamilton. Today, many other countries base their governments off of us. That’s how much of an influence our system of government was to the world and Jefferson supported it.

Making more people eligible to vote was another thing that Jefferson wanted to do. At the time, only white land owning men were allowed to vote. What about the other people? In the U.S. presidential election of 1789 the amount of people that voted in the state was very small compared to the state population. In Delaware, out of a population of 59,000 people only 2,059 ballots were cast. This means that only 3% of the population voted. This data shows barely anyone voted and there should be at least the majority of the U.S eligible to vote. If the government wanted a better turn out of people then more people should be eligible to vote. Today the U.S Government lets any U.S citizen (of the proper age) vote which is the most of the people. Raising the voting standard, like what Hamilton wanted, would only make the numbers of the people that actually voted go down. All of these reasons make me support Jefferson’s approach to voting standards.