Defender of Liberty

George Mason, a member of Virginia plantation society, became a leading advocate of American independence and individual rights. George Washington regarded him as his mentor, and Thomas Jefferson called him the wisest man of his generation. Though a widower raising nine children, Mason devoted himself to the cause, helping draft the Fairfax Resolves, which recommended a continental congress to preserve colonial rights. In 1776 he wrote the Virginia Declaration of Rights, which inspired the American Declaration of Independence, France’s 1789 Declaration of the Rights of Man, and the United Nations’ 1954 Universal Declaration of Human Rights. After helping lead resistance to Great Britain, he opposed the proposed Constitution at the 1787 Constitutional Convention and refused to sign it on September 17 because it did not forbid the importation of slaves or guarantee individual human rights. After the U.S. Bill of Rights was adopted in 1791, he finally gave his heart to the new government.

Washington, District of Columbia · United States