RC (DLC); dateline beneath signature; at foot of text: “Thomas Jefferson Esqr”; endorsed by TJ as received 19 July 1815 and so recorded in SJL. Enclosure: Austin, An Oration, Pronounced at Lexington, Mass. in commemoration of the Independence of the United States of America, and the Restoration of Peace. 4th July, 1815 (Boston, 1815; Poor, Jefferson’s Library description begins Nathaniel P. Poor, Catalogue. President Jefferson’s Library, 1829 description ends , 13 [no. 826]; TJ’s copy at ViU), praising the patriotic efforts of the statesmen, soldiers, and ordinary citizens who helped obtain American independence; extolling the “patriotism in arms” and the “ardent and generous enthusiasm among the people” during the late war with Great Britain (p. 6); lauding President James Madison for attempting to avoid war, leading the nation to victory once war was deemed unavoidable, and signing the recent peace treaty; blaming the war on “those, who in all preliminary discussions took side with the enemy” (p. 9); calling the Hartford Convention “the most ludicrous and lamentable monument of impotent menace, and party delusion” (p. 13); condemning Great Britain, whose “true character” has been revealed as “vain-glorious, haughty, mean, profligate, unjust; uniting the barbarities of savage life to the more refined cruelties of civilized life” (p. 17); describing Napoleon as “that wonderful Corsican, who was welcomed by the affections of his people from the rocks of Elba” (p. 19); and concluding that the United States “rises with renovated fame. Its destiny is great” (p. 21).