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Communion. We do not know why and Washington never discussed it. But when the priest politely recommended that he not absent himself from the Lord's Supper, Washington resolved the problem by ceasing to attend services as which Communion was served.
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    In an age when political figures routinely shake hands and slap backs, it is somewhat startling to contemplate Washington 's public appearances as president. Of course, he never campaigned for the presidency; indeed, he was probably the only American president who honestly didn't want the job. But he was a man of great personal dignity, and he attempted to invest his office with that dignity.
    At presidential receptions, Washington greeted his guests standing on a round podium that stood two feet from the floor. He was six foot one in an age when the average man was five foot eight, so the podium allowed him to tower even more dramatically over the room. He was always dressed richly in elegant 18 th century fashion, with a ceremonial sword in a scabbard belted and buckled around his waist. When a guest was presented to him—yes, presented to him—he waited for the guest to bow, and he then responded with a slight nod.
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    Jefferson 's lack of humor does not detract from his other formidable qualities. In addition to his political activities, he was an author, scholar, linguist, architect, inventor, geographer, botanist, horticulturalist, zoologist, meteorologist, educator, and philosopher. In a famous comment, John F. Kennedy, when hosting a White House dinner for all living American Nobel laureates, began his after-dinner remarks by saying, "I think this is the most remarkable collection of talent and knowledge that has ever been gathered at the White House—except on those occasions when Thomas Jefferson dined alone."
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    As for Jefferson's opinion of himself and his legacy, all we need refer to is the epitaph on his tomb at Monticello , an epitaph he composed himself. Jefferson, it must be remembered, had b een a member of the Virginia House of Burgesses and the Continental Congress, Governor of Virginia, ambassador to France, our first secretary of state, our second vice-president, and president for two terms, during which time he doubled the size of the country. But his epitaph reads as follows:
    Here was buried Thomas Jefferson
    Author of the Declaration of Independence
    Of the Statute of Virginia for Religious Freedom
    And Father of the University of Virginia
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    The politics of the late 18 th and early 19 th centuries had made Jefferson and Adams adversaries and rivals, but they were finally reconciled in their old age. They carried on a lively and interesting correspondence towards the ends of their lives, ends which came within hours of each other on the same day, and that day was the Fourth of July. In Virginia, by what seems to have been a sheer act of will, the dying Jefferson held on until his last words, "Is it the fourth?" received an affirmative response. On his own deathbed in Massachusetts , Adams ' last words reportedly were, "Thomas Jefferson still survives." Then he died, not knowing that Jefferson himself had died a few hours earlier. The date was July 4, 1826, the fiftieth anniversary of the Declaration of Independence.
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    The practice of slinging dirt and ruining reputations in campaigns for public office is nothing new in American politics. In the campaign of 1828 the Democrats, led by Andrew Jackson, feared that incumbent president John Quincy Adams might carry the state of Pennsylvania and thus win reelection. Though Jackson seemed popular among many people in the rural areas of the state, the Democrats were taking no chances. They knew that two major groups whose votes might be swayed by rumor and innuendo were the Pennsylvania Dutch and the Quakers, so they started a salacious rumor. When Adams was U.S. ambassador to the Netherlands , they claimed, he brought two mistresses, one French and one German, home to the embassy