Emphasis Preaching Journal

Thomas Jefferson had political enemies who thought he was a faithless, lost soul who would burn all the Bibles and ruin the institution of marriage. But he had friends in the religious community who celebrated his informality and simple life. Shortly after Jefferson's inauguration of March of 1801, Baptist minister John Leland began a huge project to honor the new President. He proposed that his congregation in Cheshire, Massachusetts, make him a gift of the world's biggest cheese. Everyone who owned a cow was to give all the milk production of their cattle on a single day.