What is the Jefferson Memorial?

The Jefferson Memorial is a neoclassical domed monument in Washington, D.C. honoring Thomas Jefferson, the third President of the United States and principal author of the Declaration of Independence. The memorial sits on the south bank of the Tidal Basin in West Potomac Park, southeast of the National Mall, with views across the Tidal Basin toward the White House to the north. The memorial was authorized by Congress in 1934 and designed by John Russell Pope, who modeled it on the Pantheon in Rome and on Jefferson's own architectural designs at Monticello (his Virginia home) and the Rotunda at the University of Virginia.

President Franklin D. Roosevelt laid the cornerstone on November 15, 1939. The memorial was dedicated on April 13, 1943, the 200th anniversary of Jefferson's birth, with President Roosevelt presiding. The structure is built of Vermont Imperial Danby marble, with a low circular colonnade of 26 Ionic columns supporting a shallow dome 20 feet high and 95 feet in diameter.

Inside, a 19-foot bronze statue of Jefferson by sculptor Rudulph Evans stands on a 6-foot pedestal in the center, depicting Jefferson in long coat and breeches holding the Declaration of Independence in his left hand. The interior walls are inscribed with passages from Jefferson's writings: the Declaration of Independence (slightly edited for length); his Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom of 1786; his Notes on the State of Virginia (1785) on the topic of slavery and education; and a passage from his letter to Samuel Kercheval of 1816 on the necessity of constitutional reform. The inscription on the dome above the statue reads "I have sworn upon the altar of God eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man," from a Jefferson letter to Benjamin Rush of 1800.

The Tidal Basin location was chosen partly to balance the original L'Enfant plan for Washington and partly to take advantage of the cherry trees gifted by Japan in 1912, which bloom around the Memorial each spring and draw millions of visitors. The Cherry Blossom Festival each year coincides with the bloom. Major maintenance and renovation work has continued, with the dome experiencing biofilm staining problems that periodically require cleaning.

The memorial is open 24 hours a day, free of charge, and draws about 2 million visitors per year. The complicated legacy of Jefferson, who wrote that all men are created equal while owning more than 600 enslaved people during his lifetime, has prompted ongoing discussion about how the memorial should interpret his life. The memorial is administered by the National Park Service.