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Since 1998, when the science journal Nature released DNA findings that proved the author of the Declaration of Independence fathered his slave's children, the Westerinen family of Staten Island have been subject to ignorance -- mostly coming from the direct descendants of Jefferson and his wife -- they never thought possible in the 1990s. But they dismiss the ignorance, instead focusing on their new family and opening a discussion across race and class through a college lecturing tour.

"Emotionally, I felt a little of what my African-American cousins must have endured in their lifetimes -- being refused service at restaurants, forced to sit in the back of the bus, stopped by police for no reason and generally treated as second-class citizens," said Westerinen of being ejected from the Monticello Association meeting.

The 700-member Association controls the burial rights to the Jefferson family cemetery and was to decide if the Hemings descendants would be allowed in. The vote was postponed and rescheduled for May because, according to Julia Jefferson Westerinen, 65, the family matriarch, the descendants of the president and his wife do not want to taint the legacy of their ancestor.

"Jefferson is an icon and they do not want to tarnish the reputation of their precious icon," she said. "But it is nothing to be ashamed of. The law forbade him to marry her, but I think he was in love with her because he could have stopped the affair at any time."

But the Jefferson/Hemings descendants are not too concerned about their final resting place.

"I don't want to be buried there," Julia Jefferson Westerinen said. "I applied for membership because of the principal, not because I want to be buried there. I want to be cremated and thrown in the ocean. I don't know many Hemings that want to be buried there. The Association members don't want to be buried next to a black. Some of them are obsessed with this. Some are racially biased and they give a bad name to the whole group."

Westerinen stressed that there are members of the Association who are welcoming and are fighting for the rights of the Hemings descendants.

For the Hemings descendants, it is about blood, not race.

"We're still going to be a family, regardless of what the Monticello Association does," said Hemings descendant Shannon Lanier, 18, of Cincinnati, Ohio.

"We've always known it, since we were kids, that we were a family. You see features in them, and say, hey, you look just like my aunt. You can tell we're cousins."

Westerinen looks at everything as a learning experience, a way to see something that was always there, but that she never noticed.

"I can't pretend to know what it's like to be African-American and the challenges they face," Julia Jefferson said. "My experience has been that of a white woman. It has been an enriching experience. It taught me a lot of things I didn't pay attention to such as the difference between the races and the sameness. I thought I knew a lot about it as a white liberal, but I didn't. Like a lot of people, I walked around unconscious as to what was going on, but I began to pay attention. It was both horrifying and gratifying at the same time.

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