What was the originating idea behind this conference? The simplest answer is that the ideas of Thomas Jefferson were so far ahead of his time that it is important to explore their relevance to contemporary problems, domestic and foreign. This means that history matters, although we often do not think so: when we want to dismiss an opposite viewpoint, we say, "It's history!"

Nevertheless, today we aim at exploring the nexus between the Jeffersonian ideas of education and diplomacy as they relate to the challenges facing the United States in the world arena. Being familiar with the Middle East, I will suggest at the end of my remarks that the relationship between these two ideas is important to understanding the so-called Arab Spring.

To Jefferson, the education of all American citizens was a great responsibility of a republican government. He drafted a "Bill for the More General Diffusion of Knowledge" in the House of Burgesses in 1778. The bill failed to pass, but in spite of personal, political, factional and, in his words, "fanatical opposition," he continued to press for public education in Virginia.

As the head of a 21-member commission, he prepared a plan in 1818 for higher education. The commission met in a tavern in Rockfish Gap, some 40 miles from here. The plan led to the establishment of the University of Virginia in 1825, about a year before he died in 1826, and his plan for public education became an object of emulation: in France, for example, Instruction Publique was essentially the same as Jefferson's.

To Jefferson, higher education, like education at any level, should be "liberal." By liberal he meant that institutions of higher learning should aim "to develop the reasoning faculties of our youth, enlarge their minds, cultivate their morals, and instill into them the precepts of virtue and order." Furthermore, they should aim "to form the statesmen, legislators and judges on whom public prosperity and individual happiness depend." Jefferson believed U.S. officials as well as citizens should have a liberal education.

I think Jefferson would be disappointed to see the sorry quality of education in our country today. About 60-85 percent of young adults cannot find Iraq on a map, and few can identify any world leader. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan complained about the want of quality education in America on May 26, 2010, in these words: "We have not been compelled to meet our global neighbors on their own terms and learn about their histories, values and viewpoints. I am worried that in this interconnected world, our country risks to be disconnected from the contributions of other countries and cultures."