per- sonal ties of one sort or another." In place of this rigid society, the Founding Fathers proposed to create what Thomas Jefferson called a "natural aristocracy" of talented men like themselves- liberally educated gentlemen of the Enlighten- ment who had risen from modest circumstances yet had been excluded under the old order. "For many of the revolutionary leaders," Wood ob- serves, "this was the emotional significance of republicanism-a vindication of frustrated...