Thomas Jefferson believed Indians could be the equal of whites if they abandoned their communal ideas of land ownership.

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Thomas Jefferson did hold this belief, as reflected in his 1785 letter to George Rogers Clark where he stated, "To cultivate the love of science [among the Indians] instead of war, we should prefer establishing some lecture on anatomy, medicine, and surgery; to promote industry instead of war, they should be taught to divide and subdivide their lands & cultivate, and thereby make want unknown among them." However, this view reflects an ethnocentric perspective on land ownership and fails to acknowledge the complexity and importance of communal land tenure systems for Indigenous peoples.

Thomas Jefferson Believed Indians Could Be the Equal of Whites