The President’s war on Iran is not the same as Thomas Jefferson’s call for an “empire of liberty.” Jefferson argued for expanding the American ideal of a republic in which individuals could prosper, practice their chosen religion, and participate in government as citizens. Indeed, Jefferson ignored the rights of indigenous people groups in the American West and the rights of the enslaved. The third president wanted an empire of yeoman farmers spread from ocean to ocean across North America, in the context of which he wrote about an “empire of liberty.”

For twenty-eight days in June of 2003, eight teachers and 22 students set out on a journey to retrace the Lewis & Clark journey from 1803-1806. We traveled from Harrisonburg, Va., to the West Coast and back, driving over 5,000 miles. I led the history side of the camping expedition. One of the questions we worked on was to analyze Jefferson’s call for an “empire of liberty.”

Students and teachers read the primary sources, asked scholars and experts along the trail what they thought, and drew our own conclusions. I came to hold that Jefferson wanted to expand the freedoms of the country’s founding era across the continent. I did not find that Jefferson was an imperialist in the modern sense of the word. The Louisiana Purchase fell into Jefferson’s lap, and he took advantage of it, to be sure. Unfortunately, later presidents used Jefferson’s “empire of liberty” to expand and conquer in imperialistic ways.

The war of the United States against the country of Iran is of a different kind than Jefferson’s war on Tripoli or his expansionism across the North American continent in the early 1800s. In my opinion, Iran does need to be stopped from developing nuclear weapons, but the attack by the United States against Iran should be stopped. However, to use Jefferson’s war approach in the First Barbary War, 1801-1805, negotiations need to be firm and produce results that are inviolable.

When our motorcoach load of students and teachers reached the West Coast and saw the Pacific Ocean, we were giddy with excitement and happiness. We had retraced Lewis and Clark’s journey. Never mind that the Iraq War had just begun and U.S. ground troops invaded a Middle Eastern country. Lewis & Clark 2003, an expedition of learning and inquiry from our small Harrisonburg high school, had uncovered the joys of reading, studying, asking open-ended questions, and trying to determine what Jefferson meant by his “empire of liberty” phrase. When we dipped in the Pacific Ocean on June 23, 2003, we were optimistic about the country’s future. I hope and pray for a return of that euphoria we felt when sticking our toes in the Pacific Ocean. We need such optimism today.