新闻周刊:接下去是否还要拆除华盛顿和杰斐逊的雕像(5)

Owens wrote on the page that Jefferson's values "aided in the construction of institutionalized racism¹ and justified² the subjugation³ of black people in the United States."

欧文斯在请愿书上写道，杰斐逊的价值观“会助长制度化的种族主义的建立，并认为美国黑人的征服合理。”

But historian Annette Gordon-Reed, who was the first African American to win the Pulitzer Prize for history for her work on Jefferson, says the Founding Fathers should not be lumped together with Confederate generals.

但是历史学家安妮特·戈登·里德表示不应该把开国元勋和南部邦联的将军们放在一起。安妮特是第一位因研究杰斐逊获得普利策历史奖的非裔美国人。

"Members of the Founding generation should occupy a different place in our minds than the Confederates," she told Newsweek. "There is a big difference between being a person who helped create the United States, and being a person who worked to destroy the United States."

她对新闻周刊说：“在我们的心中，建国一代的成员们应该占据一个不同于南部邦联的位置。”“帮助创造美国的人和致力于摧毁美国的人存在很大区别。”

Dr Clarence Jones—who helped Martin Luther King Jr. write his "I Have A Dream" speech—has taken a similar stance. Neither Washington nor Jefferson should be judged as harshly as Confederate figures because they devoted⁴ their lives to "saving and founding this country," he told the BBC in 2017.

帮助马丁·路德·金撰写“我有一个梦想”演讲稿的克拉伦斯·琼斯博士也采取了类似的立场。华盛顿和杰斐逊都不应该像南部邦联的人物那样受到严厉的评价，因为他们献身于“拯救和建立这个国家，”他在2017年对英国广播公司表示。

"Sure, George Washington and Thomas Jefferson owned slaves," he said.

“当然，乔治·华盛顿和托马斯·杰斐逊拥有奴隶，”他说。

There was no question, he added, that they were "morally compromised" in their efforts to build a nation based on the principles enshrined in the Declaration of Independence.

他补充道，毫无疑问，他们致力于根据《独立宣言》所载原则来建设一个国家的行为是“道德败坏的”。

"But neither of those two persons led the nation in treasonous insurrection to overthrow⁵ the government they had formed in order to preserve the institution of slavery. Period."

“但这两个人都没有领导国家进行叛国暴动，推翻他们为维护奴隶制制度而组建的政府。”

"He did not live up to the ideals of the Declaration."

“他没有实现宣言的理想。”

It was Jefferson who penned the famed words in the Declaration of Independence—ones that most Americans know by heart: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness."

正是杰斐逊在《独立宣言》中写下了大多数美国人心中都知道的名言：“我们认为下述真理是不言而喻的：人人生而平等，造物主赋予他们若干不可剥夺的权利，其中包括生命、自由以及追求幸福的权利”

But those rights weren't extended to all and Jefferson certainly didn't believe all men were equal—and that is something that is rarely touched on in classrooms.

但这些权力并未普及到所有人，杰斐逊当然也不相信所有人都是平等的，这是课堂上很少涉及的问题。

1 racism   

n.民族主义；种族歧视(意识)

参考例句：

• He said that racism is endemic in this country.他说种族主义在该国很普遍。
• Racism causes political instability and violence.种族主义道致政治动荡和暴力事件。

2 justified   

a.正当的，有理的

参考例句：

• She felt fully justified in asking for her money back. 她认为有充分的理由要求退款。
• The prisoner has certainly justified his claims by his actions. 那个囚犯确实已用自己的行动表明他的要求是正当的。

3 subjugation   

n.镇压，平息，征服

参考例句：

• The Ultra-Leftist line was a line that would have wrecked a country, ruined the people, and led to the destruction of the Party and national subjugation. 极左路线是一条祸国殃民的路线，亡党亡国的路线。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》
• This afflicted German intelligence with two fatal flaws: inefficiency, and subjugation to a madman. 这给德国情报工作造成了两个致命的弱点，一个是缺乏效率，另一个是让一个疯子总管情报。 来自辞典例句

4 devoted   

adj.忠诚的，忠实的，热心的，献身于...的

参考例句：

• He devoted his life to the educational cause of the motherland.他为祖国的教育事业贡献了一生。
• We devoted a lengthy and full discussion to this topic.我们对这个题目进行了长时间的充分讨论。

5 overthrow   

v.推翻，打倒，颠覆；n.推翻，瓦解，颠覆

参考例句：

• After the overthrow of the government,the country was in chaos.政府被推翻后，这个国家处于混乱中。
• The overthrow of his plans left him much discouraged.他的计划的失败使得他很气馁。