My opinion on this whole matter is I don't know and don't really care. I think evidence shows it is POSSIBLE but that is all. I have not came down on either side and again I think it is possible and that is it.
This site actually argues more for the possiblitly then against it but still shows some different viewpoints.
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However, Foster and his colleagues noted that they could not "completely rule out other explanations of our findings" based in "various lines of descent."
They concluded that "a male-line descendant of Field Jefferson could possibly have illegitimately fathered an ancestor of the presumed male-line descendant of Eston. But in the absence of historical evidence to support such possibilities, we consider them to be unlikely."
The Evidence Falls Short
In response to the question of paternity, the answer is no, DNA testing has not proven that Thomas Jefferson had at least one child with Hemings.
The data merely suggest that a number of males related to Thomas Jefferson could have fathered Eston. In other words, Jefferson was not the sole guardian of his genetic makeup; the XY chromosome is a DNA "family fingerprint" shared by some of his male relatives, any one of whom could have been the father of Hemings's son, Eston, or later fathered male descendants of Eston.
Because only living persons were tested, the Jefferson XY chromosome could have entered the lineage from several of Thomas Jefferson's contemporary male relatives or at any point in the almost 200 years since the rumor started.
Soon after the Foster article was published,
Nature received letters, from scientists as well as nonprofessionals, disagreeing with the study results and, especially, disagreeing with the way they were reported.
In a letter to
Nature that appeared in the January 1999 issue, David M. Abbey, MD, chief of medicine at Poudre Valley Hospital, Fort Collins, Colorado, and associate clinical professor of medicine at the Health Sciences Center at the University of Colorado, responded to the Foster study. "The DNA analysis of Y chromosome haplotypes used by Foster, et al to evaluate Thomas Jefferson's alleged paternity of Eston Hemings Jefferson is impressive," wrote Abbey. "However, the authors did not consider all the data at hand in interpreting their results. No mention was made of Jefferson's brother Randolph (1757-1815) or of his five sons. Sons of Sally Hemings conceived by Randolph (or by one of his sons) would produce a Y chromosome analysis identical to that described by Foster, et al." Abbey recommended that more data are needed to confirm Thomas Jefferson's paternity.
Could Jefferson's younger brother, Randolph, be considered an equal (if not better) candidate for being Eston's father? According to historian Eyler Robert Coates, records show that Randolph Jefferson was invited to Monticello in August 1807, about nine months before Eston was born in May 1808. Coates adds that Randolph had become a widower in 1806 and did not remarry until 1809; Coates speculates that Randolph was more likely in this period to be "susceptible to a sexual liaison." Of course, speculation over whether Randolph Jefferson, rather than Thomas Jefferson, was Eston's father is not a fact verifiable by science. He, like some other Jefferson males, was simply in the right place at the right time bearing the family XY chromosome.
Gary Davis, another letter correspondent, added in a letter to
Nature (January 7, 1999), that "any male ancestor in Thomas Jefferson's line, black or white, could have fathered Eston Hemings. Plantations were inbred communities," wrote Davis, "and mixing of racial types was probably common .. . it is possible that Thomas Jefferson's father, grandfather or paternal uncles fathered a male slave whose line later impregnated another slave, in this case, Sally Hemings. Sally herself was a light mulatto, known even at this time to be Thomas Jefferson's wife's half sister."
Willard Randall, author of
Thomas Jefferson: A Life and member of the God and Country Foundation, a group that seeks to safeguard the reputations of the founding fathers, said that at the time in question there were "20 to 25 men within 25 miles of Monticello who were all Jeffersons and had the same Y chromosome. Of them, 23 were younger than 65 year old Jefferson."
Shortcomings Are Acknowledged
Even the study's lead author, Foster, admits the evidence is not in any way conclusive about Thomas Jefferson's alleged relationship to Eston. After the controversy over his findings erupted, Foster said in a response letter to
Nature (January 7, 1999): "It is true that men of Randolph Jefferson's family could have fathered Sally Hemings later children … . we know from the historical data and the DNA data that Thomas Jefferson can neither be definitely excluded nor solely implicated in the paternity of illegitimate children with his slave Sally Hemings."
As Abbey added, "a critical issue always facing science is confounding variables. It is the scientific standard to comment on such variables when presenting a study, and especially to note how such variables could impact results. It is surprising that the authors (in their original paper) did not even address other conclusions. Too, when the public is presented with authors disagreeing with the title of their own paper, and the press reports conflicting accounts as to the validity of the results, public confidence in the scientific process may be eroded and create unnecessary skepticism toward DNA research in general."
As reported in an article in the
Washington Post (January 6, 1999), editors at
Nature admitted that the headline was "unintentionally misleading" and confessed as well that more "alternative explanations" should have been included in their conclusions.
Foster was quick to point out the inconsistencies between the data, the conclusions, and the headline. In a follow-up letter in response to letters from Abbey and Davis, he reminded readers of their original objective: "When we embarked on this study, we knew the results could not be conclusive, but we hoped to obtain some objective data that would tilt the weight of evidence in one direction or another."
According to Jefferson historian and genealogist Barger, the evidence for Jefferson's paternity is not tilted in any direction by the data. In conclusion, the DNA XY chromosome testing shows only that Thomas Jefferson could have fathered Eston, but so could any of several of his male relatives. The science is inconclusive, putting the speculation about Jefferson and Hemings back into the category of gossip.
On April 8, 2000, the University of Richmond hosted an all-day symposium on the Jefferson-Hemings dispute. Although no publications came out of that symposium, the discussion was videotaped. The tape is at the University of Richmond. Eugene A. Foster, author of the
Nature article, was among the participants.
Read more: http://www.scienceclarified.com/dis...f-his-slaves-Sally-Hemings.html#ixzz1tJLV0D00
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[quote name='dohdough'].[/QUOTE]
As I thought you are just playing games. Put that with the fact you are basically saying I am a racist or fringed wingnut along with anyone else that does not see the ABSOLUTE PROOF where there is NO ABSOLUTE PROOF is disturbing. By your reasoning all the people invovled in this RESEARCH must be racist as well.
I knew you wouldn't answer the SIMPLE question. You are so full of IT.
"the one drop rule" you used it incorrectly and I will gladly debate and SHOW ALL of your posts on that and how you used it incorrectly. Want to start a thread on that too? I'll be there and post your incorrect use of it.
edit: I meant that her letter and her represtation of it in the book was fraud or extremely bad editing. I retracted that part and to be clear said that I think the book is deceptive fraud. I was wrong about the letter since I can only find one crazy souce for it. See I can admit I am wrong. Try it on for size!!
ing embarrassing.