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Timeline
1797 Detail
March 4, 1797 - John Adams succeeds George Washington as
president of the United States.
We take it for granted, that our democracy every four or eight years
sees a peaceful transition of power, often between different parties
with different visions for the nation. On March 4, 1797, George
Washington may have laid the blueprint for the most remarkable feat in
American or modern democratic history in the world, when he stepped
aside from power and handed it to the second President of the United
States of America, John Adams.
Yes, democracy had been around for awhile, taking different forms, and
there were transitions of power within each. Ancient Greece,
Mesopotamia, the Virginia House of Burgesses, set examples of republics
or democracies with tenants that would take root in the American
system. But George had been the General who'd led his new nation to
victory over Great Britain, and although reluctant, had become its
first president. Yes, he had been reluctant, going back to Mount
Vernon after resigning his war commission on
December 23, 1783 and reluctantly heading back to the Constitutional
Convention in Philadelphia in 1787. Once there, he was elected
president of the convention and advocated for a strong federal
government, considering the Articles of Confederation weak. The public
did not want a strong federal government, and the delegates took that
into consideration when voting for a Constitution, supported by
Washington, that had many checks and balances on the office of the
Presidency, one that it was assumed Washington would get. The
Constitution was ratified on June 21, 1788.
The U.S. Constitution was to take force on March 4, 1789, with a
Presidential election to be held prior from December 15, 1788 to
January 10, 1789. Although there was a popular vote in some states, six
of the ten that ended up voting in the Electoral Colldge, the
eligibility was a hodge podge of rules and regulations. In the end,
only 1.8% of the public voted in the election. Three states did not
participate in the Electoral College at all. New York's legislature
could not decide on its electors and abstained. North Carolina and
Rhode Island had not yet ratified the Constitution and were ineligible.
The Electoral College at the time included an arcane system of giving
two votes for each elector, one of which had to be cast for someone not
from their home state. There was agreement that all would use one vote
to insure Washington's election as President. The person who came in
second place would be Vice President; that became John Adams.
Washington was paid $25,000 per year for his duties.
Washington would win reelection in the same manner, by a unanimous vote
in the Electoral College in 1793. John Adams would again finish second
and be selected as Vice President.
Washington Prepares to Leave Office
With George Washington adamant about not seeking a third
term, the race for the Presidency and any subsequent transition would
set a precedent. Washington had been careful throughout his two terms
to consider precedence in many of his actions, tolerating dissent,
refusing to join a political party, and advocating they not be formed.
Others in his cabinet did not hold the same view, with Secretary of the
Treasury Alexander Hamilton, a Federalist, and Secretary of State,
Thomas Jefferson, a Jeffersonian Republican coming to loggerheads
often. Washington favored Hamilton, and Jefferson, who would resign
from the cabinet, it is said never spoke to Washington again after
leaving.
Two months prior to the election, George Washington would give his
farewell address to the nation by letter, September 19, 1796.
Washington's Farewell Address, 1796
Friends and Citizens: The period for a new election of a citizen to
administer the executive government of the United States being not far
distant, and the time actually arrived when your thoughts must be
employed in designating the person who is to be clothed with that
important trust, it appears to me proper, especially as it may conduce
to a more distinct expression of the public voice, that I should now
apprise you of the resolution I have formed, to decline being
considered among the number of those out of whom a choice is to be made.
I beg you, at the same time, to do me the justice to be assured that
this resolution has not been taken without a strict regard to all the
considerations appertaining to the relation which binds a dutiful
citizen to his country; and that in withdrawing the tender of service,
which silence in my situation might imply, I am influenced by no
diminution of zeal for your future interest, no deficiency of grateful
respect for your past kindness, but am supported by a full conviction
that the step is compatible with both.
The acceptance of, and continuance hitherto in, the office to which
your suffrages have twice called me have been a uniform sacrifice of
inclination to the opinion of duty and to a deference for what appeared
to be your desire. I constantly hoped that it would have been much
earlier in my power, consistently with motives which I was not at
liberty to disregard, to return to that retirement from which I had
been reluctantly drawn. The strength of my inclination to do this,
previous to the last election, had even led to the preparation of an
address to declare it to you; but mature reflection on the then
perplexed and critical posture of our affairs with foreign nations, and
the unanimous advice of persons entitled to my confidence, impelled me
to abandon the idea.
I rejoice that the state of your concerns, external as well as
internal, no longer renders the pursuit of inclination incompatible
with the sentiment of duty or propriety, and am persuaded, whatever
partiality may be retained for my services, that, in the present
circumstances of our country, you will not disapprove my determination
to retire.
The impressions with which I first undertook the arduous trust were
explained on the proper occasion. In the discharge of this trust, I
will only say that I have, with good intentions, contributed towards
the organization and administration of the government the best
exertions of which a very fallible judgment was capable. Not
unconscious in the outset of the inferiority of my qualifications,
experience in my own eyes, perhaps still more in the eyes of others,
has strengthened the motives to diffidence of myself; and every day the
increasing weight of years admonishes me more and more that the shade
of retirement is as necessary to me as it will be welcome. Satisfied
that if any circumstances have given peculiar value to my services,
they were temporary, I have the consolation to believe that, while
choice and prudence invite me to quit the political scene, patriotism
does not forbid it.
In looking forward to the moment which is intended to terminate the
career of my public life, my feelings do not permit me to suspend the
deep acknowledgment of that debt of gratitude which I owe to my beloved
country for the many honors it has conferred upon me; still more for
the steadfast confidence with which it has supported me; and for the
opportunities I have thence enjoyed of manifesting my inviolable
attachment, by services faithful and persevering, though in usefulness
unequal to my zeal. If benefits have resulted to our country from these
services, let it always be remembered to your praise, and as an
instructive example in our annals, that under circumstances in which
the passions, agitated in every direction, were liable to mislead,
amidst appearances sometimes dubious, vicissitudes of fortune often
discouraging, in situations in which not unfrequently want of success
has countenanced the spirit of criticism, the constancy of your support
was the essential prop of the efforts, and a guarantee of the plans by
which they were effected. Profoundly penetrated with this idea, I shall
carry it with me to my grave, as a strong incitement to unceasing vows
that heaven may continue to you the choicest tokens of its beneficence;
that your union and brotherly affection may be perpetual; that the free
Constitution, which is the work of your hands, may be sacredly
maintained; that its administration in every department may be stamped
with wisdom and virtue; that, in fine, the happiness of the people of
these States, under the auspices of liberty, may be made complete by so
careful a preservation and so prudent a use of this blessing as will
acquire to them the glory of recommending it to the applause, the
affection, and adoption of every nation which is yet a stranger to it.
Here, perhaps, I ought to stop. But a solicitude for your welfare,
which cannot end but with my life, and the apprehension of danger,
natural to that solicitude, urge me, on an occasion like the present,
to offer to your solemn contemplation, and to recommend to your
frequent review, some sentiments which are the result of much
reflection, of no inconsiderable observation, and which appear to me
all-important to the permanency of your felicity as a people. These
will be offered to you with the more freedom, as you can only see in
them the disinterested warnings of a parting friend, who can possibly
have no personal motive to bias his counsel. Nor can I forget, as an
encouragement to it, your indulgent reception of my sentiments on a
former and not dissimilar occasion.
Interwoven as is the love of liberty with every ligament of your
hearts, no recommendation of mine is necessary to fortify or confirm
the attachment.
The unity of government which constitutes you one people is also now
dear to you. It is justly so, for it is a main pillar in the edifice of
your real independence, the support of your tranquility at home, your
peace abroad; of your safety; of your prosperity; of that very liberty
which you so highly prize. But as it is easy to foresee that, from
different causes and from different quarters, much pains will be taken,
many artifices employed to weaken in your minds the conviction of this
truth; as this is the point in your political fortress against which
the batteries of internal and external enemies will be most constantly
and actively (though often covertly and insidiously) directed, it is of
infinite moment that you should properly estimate the immense value of
your national union to your collective and individual happiness; that
you should cherish a cordial, habitual, and immovable attachment to it;
accustoming yourselves to think and speak of it as of the palladium of
your political safety and prosperity; watching for its preservation
with jealous anxiety; discountenancing whatever may suggest even a
suspicion that it can in any event be abandoned; and indignantly
frowning upon the first dawning of every attempt to alienate any
portion of our country from the rest, or to enfeeble the sacred ties
which now link together the various parts.
For this you have every inducement of sympathy and interest. Citizens,
by birth or choice, of a common country, that country has a right to
concentrate your affections. The name of American, which belongs to you
in your national capacity, must always exalt the just pride of
patriotism more than any appellation derived from local
discriminations. With slight shades of difference, you have the same
religion, manners, habits, and political principles. You have in a
common cause fought and triumphed together; the independence and
liberty you possess are the work of joint counsels, and joint efforts
of common dangers, sufferings, and successes.
But these considerations, however powerfully they address themselves to
your sensibility, are greatly outweighed by those which apply more
immediately to your interest. Here every portion of our country finds
the most commanding motives for carefully guarding and preserving the
union of the whole.
The North, in an unrestrained intercourse with the South, protected by
the equal laws of a common government, finds in the productions of the
latter great additional resources of maritime and commercial enterprise
and precious materials of manufacturing industry. The South, in the
same intercourse, benefiting by the agency of the North, sees its
agriculture grow and its commerce expand. Turning partly into its own
channels the seamen of the North, it finds its particular navigation
invigorated; and, while it contributes, in different ways, to nourish
and increase the general mass of the national navigation, it looks
forward to the protection of a maritime strength, to which itself is
unequally adapted. The East, in a like intercourse with the West,
already finds, and in the progressive improvement of interior
communications by land and water, will more and more find a valuable
vent for the commodities which it brings from abroad, or manufactures
at home. The West derives from the East supplies requisite to its
growth and comfort, and, what is perhaps of still greater consequence,
it must of necessity owe the secure enjoyment of indispensable outlets
for its own productions to the weight, influence, and the future
maritime strength of the Atlantic side of the Union, directed by an
indissoluble community of interest as one nation. Any other tenure by
which the West can hold this essential advantage, whether derived from
its own separate strength, or from an apostate and unnatural connection
with any foreign power, must be intrinsically precarious.
While, then, every part of our country thus feels an immediate and
particular interest in union, all the parts combined cannot fail to
find in the united mass of means and efforts greater strength, greater
resource, proportionably greater security from external danger, a less
frequent interruption of their peace by foreign nations; and, what is
of inestimable value, they must derive from union an exemption from
those broils and wars between themselves, which so frequently afflict
neighboring countries not tied together by the same governments, which
their own rival ships alone would be sufficient to produce, but which
opposite foreign alliances, attachments, and intrigues would stimulate
and embitter. Hence, likewise, they will avoid the necessity of those
overgrown military establishments which, under any form of government,
are inauspicious to liberty, and which are to be regarded as
particularly hostile to republican liberty. In this sense it is that
your union ought to be considered as a main prop of your liberty, and
that the love of the one ought to endear to you the preservation of the
other.
These considerations speak a persuasive language to every reflecting
and virtuous mind, and exhibit the continuance of the Union as a
primary object of patriotic desire. Is there a doubt whether a common
government can embrace so large a sphere? Let experience solve it. To
listen to mere speculation in such a case were criminal. We are
authorized to hope that a proper organization of the whole with the
auxiliary agency of governments for the respective subdivisions, will
afford a happy issue to the experiment. It is well worth a fair and
full experiment. With such powerful and obvious motives to union,
affecting all parts of our country, while experience shall not have
demonstrated its impracticability, there will always be reason to
distrust the patriotism of those who in any quarter may endeavor to
weaken its bands.
In contemplating the causes which may disturb our Union, it occurs as
matter of serious concern that any ground should have been furnished
for characterizing parties by geographical discriminations, Northern
and Southern, Atlantic and Western; whence designing men may endeavor
to excite a belief that there is a real difference of local interests
and views. One of the expedients of party to acquire influence within
particular districts is to misrepresent the opinions and aims of other
districts. You cannot shield yourselves too much against the jealousies
and heartburnings which spring from these misrepresentations; they tend
to render alien to each other those who ought to be bound together by
fraternal affection. The inhabitants of our Western country have lately
had a useful lesson on this head; they have seen, in the negotiation by
the Executive, and in the unanimous ratification by the Senate, of the
treaty with Spain, and in the universal satisfaction at that event,
throughout the United States, a decisive proof how unfounded were the
suspicions propagated among them of a policy in the General Government
and in the Atlantic States unfriendly to their interests in regard to
the Mississippi; they have been witnesses to the formation of two
treaties, that with Great Britain, and that with Spain, which secure to
them everything they could desire, in respect to our foreign relations,
towards confirming their prosperity. Will it not be their wisdom to
rely for the preservation of these advantages on the Union by which
they were procured ? Will they not henceforth be deaf to those
advisers, if such there are, who would sever them from their brethren
and connect them with aliens?
To the efficacy and permanency of your Union, a government for the
whole is indispensable. No alliance, however strict, between the parts
can be an adequate substitute; they must inevitably experience the
infractions and interruptions which all alliances in all times have
experienced. Sensible of this momentous truth, you have improved upon
your first essay, by the adoption of a constitution of government
better calculated than your former for an intimate union, and for the
efficacious management of your common concerns. This government, the
offspring of our own choice, uninfluenced and unawed, adopted upon full
investigation and mature deliberation, completely free in its
principles, in the distribution of its powers, uniting security with
energy, and containing within itself a provision for its own amendment,
has a just claim to your confidence and your support. Respect for its
authority, compliance with its laws, acquiescence in its measures, are
duties enjoined by the fundamental maxims of true liberty. The basis of
our political systems is the right of the people to make and to alter
their constitutions of government. But the Constitution which at any
time exists, till changed by an explicit and authentic act of the whole
people, is sacredly obligatory upon all. The very idea of the power and
the right of the people to establish government presupposes the duty of
every individual to obey the established government.
All obstructions to the execution of the laws, all combinations and
associations, under whatever plausible character, with the real design
to direct, control, counteract, or awe the regular deliberation and
action of the constituted authorities, are destructive of this
fundamental principle, and of fatal tendency. They serve to organize
faction, to give it an artificial and extraordinary force; to put, in
the place of the delegated will of the nation the will of a party,
often a small but artful and enterprising minority of the community;
and, according to the alternate triumphs of different parties, to make
the public administration the mirror of the ill-concerted and
incongruous projects of faction, rather than the organ of consistent
and wholesome plans digested by common counsels and modified by mutual
interests.
However combinations or associations of the above description may now
and then answer popular ends, they are likely, in the course of time
and things, to become potent engines, by which cunning, ambitious, and
unprincipled men will be enabled to subvert the power of the people and
to usurp for themselves the reins of government, destroying afterwards
the very engines which have lifted them to unjust dominion.
Towards the preservation of your government, and the permanency of your
present happy state, it is requisite, not only that you steadily
discountenance irregular oppositions to its acknowledged authority, but
also that you resist with care the spirit of innovation upon its
principles, however specious the pretexts. One method of assault may be
to effect, in the forms of the Constitution, alterations which will
impair the energy of the system, and thus to undermine what cannot be
directly overthrown. In all the changes to which you may be invited,
remember that time and habit are at least as necessary to fix the true
character of governments as of other human institutions; that
experience is the surest standard by which to test the real tendency of
the existing constitution of a country; that facility in changes, upon
the credit of mere hypothesis and opinion, exposes to perpetual change,
from the endless variety of hypothesis and opinion; and remember,
especially, that for the efficient management of your common interests,
in a country so extensive as ours, a government of as much vigor as is
consistent with the perfect security of liberty is indispensable.
Liberty itself will find in such a government, with powers properly
distributed and adjusted, its surest guardian. It is, indeed, little
else than a name, where the government is too feeble to withstand the
enterprises of faction, to confine each member of the society within
the limits prescribed by the laws, and to maintain all in the secure
and tranquil enjoyment of the rights of person and property.
I have already intimated to you the danger of parties in the State,
with particular reference to the founding of them on geographical
discriminations. Let me now take a more comprehensive view, and warn
you in the most solemn manner against the baneful effects of the spirit
of party generally.
This spirit, unfortunately, is inseparable from our nature, having its
root in the strongest passions of the human mind. It exists under
different shapes in all governments, more or less stifled, controlled,
or repressed; but, in those of the popular form, it is seen in its
greatest rankness, and is truly their worst enemy.
The alternate domination of one faction over another, sharpened by the
spirit of revenge, natural to party dissension, which in different ages
and countries has perpetrated the most horrid enormities, is itself a
frightful despotism. But this leads at length to a more formal and
permanent despotism. The disorders and miseries which result gradually
incline the minds of men to seek security and repose in the absolute
power of an individual; and sooner or later the chief of some
prevailing faction, more able or more fortunate than his competitors,
turns this disposition to the purposes of his own elevation, on the
ruins of public liberty.
Without looking forward to an extremity of this kind (which
nevertheless ought not to be entirely out of sight), the common and
continual mischiefs of the spirit of party are sufficient to make it
the interest and duty of a wise people to discourage and restrain it.
It serves always to distract the public councils and enfeeble the
public administration. It agitates the community with ill-founded
jealousies and false alarms, kindles the animosity of one part against
another, foments occasionally riot and insurrection. It opens the door
to foreign influence and corruption, which finds a facilitated access
to the government itself through the channels of party passions. Thus
the policy and the will of one country are subjected to the policy and
will of another.
There is an opinion that parties in free countries are useful checks
upon the administration of the government and serve to keep alive the
spirit of liberty. This within certain limits is probably true; and in
governments of a monarchical cast, patriotism may look with indulgence,
if not with favor, upon the spirit of party. But in those of the
popular character, in governments purely elective, it is a spirit not
to be encouraged. From their natural tendency, it is certain there will
always be enough of that spirit for every salutary purpose. And there
being constant danger of excess, the effort ought to be by force of
public opinion, to mitigate and assuage it. A fire not to be quenched,
it demands a uniform vigilance to prevent its bursting into a flame,
lest, instead of warming, it should consume.
It is important, likewise, that the habits of thinking in a free
country should inspire caution in those entrusted with its
administration, to confine themselves within their respective
constitutional spheres, avoiding in the exercise of the powers of one
department to encroach upon another. The spirit of encroachment tends
to consolidate the powers of all the departments in one, and thus to
create, whatever the form of government, a real despotism. A just
estimate of that love of power, and proneness to abuse it, which
predominates in the human heart, is sufficient to satisfy us of the
truth of this position. The necessity of reciprocal checks in the
exercise of political power, by dividing and distributing it into
different depositaries, and constituting each the guardian of the
public weal against invasions by the others, has been evinced by
experiments ancient and modern; some of them in our country and under
our own eyes. To preserve them must be as necessary as to institute
them. If, in the opinion of the people, the distribution or
modification of the constitutional powers be in any particular wrong,
let it be corrected by an amendment in the way which the Constitution
designates. But let there be no change by usurpation; for though this,
in one instance, may be the instrument of good, it is the customary
weapon by which free governments are destroyed. The precedent must
always greatly overbalance in permanent evil any partial or transient
benefit, which the use can at any time yield.
Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity,
religion and morality are indispensable supports. In vain would that
man claim the tribute of patriotism, who should labor to subvert these
great pillars of human happiness, these firmest props of the duties of
men and citizens. The mere politician, equally with the pious man,
ought to respect and to cherish them. A volume could not trace all
their connections with private and public felicity. Let it simply be
asked: Where is the security for property, for reputation, for life, if
the sense of religious obligation desert the oaths which are the
instruments of investigation in courts of justice ? And let us with
caution indulge the supposition that morality can be maintained without
religion. Whatever may be conceded to the influence of refined
education on minds of peculiar structure, reason and experience both
forbid us to expect that national morality can prevail in exclusion of
religious principle.
It is substantially true that virtue or morality is a necessary spring
of popular government. The rule, indeed, extends with more or less
force to every species of free government. Who that is a sincere friend
to it can look with indifference upon attempts to shake the foundation
of the fabric?
Promote then, as an object of primary importance, institutions for the
general diffusion of knowledge. In proportion as the structure of a
government gives force to public opinion, it is essential that public
opinion should be enlightened.
As a very important source of strength and security, cherish public
credit. One method of preserving it is to use it as sparingly as
possible, avoiding occasions of expense by cultivating peace, but
remembering also that timely disbursements to prepare for danger
frequently prevent much greater disbursements to repel it, avoiding
likewise the accumulation of debt, not only by shunning occasions of
expense, but by vigorous exertion in time of peace to discharge the
debts which unavoidable wars may have occasioned, not ungenerously
throwing upon posterity the burden which we ourselves ought to bear.
The execution of these maxims belongs to your representatives, but it
is necessary that public opinion should co-operate. To facilitate to
them the performance of their duty, it is essential that you should
practically bear in mind that towards the payment of debts there must
be revenue; that to have revenue there must be taxes; that no taxes can
be devised which are not more or less inconvenient and unpleasant; that
the intrinsic embarrassment, inseparable from the selection of the
proper objects (which is always a choice of difficulties), ought to be
a decisive motive for a candid construction of the conduct of the
government in making it, and for a spirit of acquiescence in the
measures for obtaining revenue, which the public exigencies may at any
time dictate.
Observe good faith and justice towards all nations; cultivate peace and
harmony with all. Religion and morality enjoin this conduct; and can it
be, that good policy does not equally enjoin it - It will be worthy of
a free, enlightened, and at no distant period, a great nation, to give
to mankind the magnanimous and too novel example of a people always
guided by an exalted justice and benevolence. Who can doubt that, in
the course of time and things, the fruits of such a plan would richly
repay any temporary advantages which might be lost by a steady
adherence to it ? Can it be that Providence has not connected the
permanent felicity of a nation with its virtue ? The experiment, at
least, is recommended by every sentiment which ennobles human nature.
Alas! is it rendered impossible by its vices?
In the execution of such a plan, nothing is more essential than that
permanent, inveterate antipathies against particular nations, and
passionate attachments for others, should be excluded; and that, in
place of them, just and amicable feelings towards all should be
cultivated. The nation which indulges towards another a habitual hatred
or a habitual fondness is in some degree a slave. It is a slave to its
animosity or to its affection, either of which is sufficient to lead it
astray from its duty and its interest. Antipathy in one nation against
another disposes each more readily to offer insult and injury, to lay
hold of slight causes of umbrage, and to be haughty and intractable,
when accidental or trifling occasions of dispute occur. Hence, frequent
collisions, obstinate, envenomed, and bloody contests. The nation,
prompted by ill-will and resentment, sometimes impels to war the
government, contrary to the best calculations of policy. The government
sometimes participates in the national propensity, and adopts through
passion what reason would reject; at other times it makes the animosity
of the nation subservient to projects of hostility instigated by pride,
ambition, and other sinister and pernicious motives. The peace often,
sometimes perhaps the liberty, of nations, has been the victim.
So likewise, a passionate attachment of one nation for another produces
a variety of evils. Sympathy for the favorite nation, facilitating the
illusion of an imaginary common interest in cases where no real common
interest exists, and infusing into one the enmities of the other,
betrays the former into a participation in the quarrels and wars of the
latter without adequate inducement or justification. It leads also to
concessions to the favorite nation of privileges denied to others which
is apt doubly to injure the nation making the concessions; by
unnecessarily parting with what ought to have been retained, and by
exciting jealousy, ill-will, and a disposition to retaliate, in the
parties from whom equal privileges are withheld. And it gives to
ambitious, corrupted, or deluded citizens (who devote themselves to the
favorite nation), facility to betray or sacrifice the interests of
their own country, without odium, sometimes even with popularity;
gilding, with the appearances of a virtuous sense of obligation, a
commendable deference for public opinion, or a laudable zeal for public
good, the base or foolish compliances of ambition, corruption, or
infatuation.
As avenues to foreign influence in innumerable ways, such attachments
are particularly alarming to the truly enlightened and independent
patriot. How many opportunities do they afford to tamper with domestic
factions, to practice the arts of seduction, to mislead public opinion,
to influence or awe the public councils. Such an attachment of a small
or weak towards a great and powerful nation dooms the former to be the
satellite of the latter.
Against the insidious wiles of foreign influence (I conjure you to
believe me, fellow-citizens) the jealousy of a free people ought to be
constantly awake, since history and experience prove that foreign
influence is one of the most baneful foes of republican government. But
that jealousy to be useful must be impartial; else it becomes the
instrument of the very influence to be avoided, instead of a defense
against it. Excessive partiality for one foreign nation and excessive
dislike of another cause those whom they actuate to see danger only on
one side, and serve to veil and even second the arts of influence on
the other. Real patriots who may resist the intrigues of the favorite
are liable to become suspected and odious, while its tools and dupes
usurp the applause and confidence of the people, to surrender their
interests.
The great rule of conduct for us in regard to foreign nations is in
extending our commercial relations, to have with them as little
political connection as possible. So far as we have already formed
engagements, let them be fulfilled with perfect good faith. Here let us
stop. Europe has a set of primary interests which to us have none; or a
very remote relation. Hence she must be engaged in frequent
controversies, the causes of which are essentially foreign to our
concerns. Hence, therefore, it must be unwise in us to implicate
ourselves by artificial ties in the ordinary vicissitudes of her
politics, or the ordinary combinations and collisions of her
friendships or enmities.
Our detached and distant situation invites and enables us to pursue a
different course. If we remain one people under an efficient
government. the period is not far off when we may defy material injury
from external annoyance; when we may take such an attitude as will
cause the neutrality we may at any time resolve upon to be scrupulously
respected; when belligerent nations, under the impossibility of making
acquisitions upon us, will not lightly hazard the giving us
provocation; when we may choose peace or war, as our interest, guided
by justice, shall counsel.
Why forego the advantages of so peculiar a situation? Why quit our own
to stand upon foreign ground? Why, by interweaving our destiny with
that of any part of Europe, entangle our peace and prosperity in the
toils of European ambition, rivalship, interest, humor or caprice?
It is our true policy to steer clear of permanent alliances with any
portion of the foreign world; so far, I mean, as we are now at liberty
to do it; for let me not be understood as capable of patronizing
infidelity to existing engagements. I hold the maxim no less applicable
to public than to private affairs, that honesty is always the best
policy. I repeat it, therefore, let those engagements be observed in
their genuine sense. But, in my opinion, it is unnecessary and would be
unwise to extend them.
Taking care always to keep ourselves by suitable establishments on a
respectable defensive posture, we may safely trust to temporary
alliances for extraordinary emergencies.
Harmony, liberal intercourse with all nations, are recommended by
policy, humanity, and interest. But even our commercial policy should
hold an equal and impartial hand; neither seeking nor granting
exclusive favors or preferences; consulting the natural course of
things; diffusing and diversifying by gentle means the streams of
commerce, but forcing nothing; establishing (with powers so disposed,
in order to give trade a stable course, to define the rights of our
merchants, and to enable the government to support them) conventional
rules of intercourse, the best that present circumstances and mutual
opinion will permit, but temporary, and liable to be from time to time
abandoned or varied, as experience and circumstances shall dictate;
constantly keeping in view that it is folly in one nation to look for
disinterested favors from another; that it must pay with a portion of
its independence for whatever it may accept under that character; that,
by such acceptance, it may place itself in the condition of having
given equivalents for nominal favors, and yet of being reproached with
ingratitude for not giving more. There can be no greater error than to
expect or calculate upon real favors from nation to nation. It is an
illusion, which experience must cure, which a just pride ought to
discard.
In offering to you, my countrymen, these counsels of an old and
affectionate friend, I dare not hope they will make the strong and
lasting impression I could wish; that they will control the usual
current of the passions, or prevent our nation from running the course
which has hitherto marked the destiny of nations. But, if I may even
flatter myself that they may be productive of some partial benefit,
some occasional good; that they may now and then recur to moderate the
fury of party spirit, to warn against the mischiefs of foreign
intrigue, to guard against the impostures of pretended patriotism; this
hope will be a full recompense for the solicitude for your welfare, by
which they have been dictated.
How far in the discharge of my official duties I have been guided by
the principles which have been delineated, the public records and other
evidences of my conduct must witness to you and to the world. To
myself, the assurance of my own conscience is, that I have at least
believed myself to be guided by them.
In relation to the still subsisting war in Europe, my proclamation of
the twenty-second of April, I793, is the index of my plan. Sanctioned
by your approving voice, and by that of your representatives in both
houses of Congress, the spirit of that measure has continually governed
me, uninfluenced by any attempts to deter or divert me from it.
After deliberate examination, with the aid of the best lights I could
obtain, I was well satisfied that our country, under all the
circumstances of the case, had a right to take, and was bound in duty
and interest to take, a neutral position. Having taken it, I
determined, as far as should depend upon me, to maintain it, with
moderation, perseverance, and firmness.
The considerations which respect the right to hold this conduct, it is
not necessary on this occasion to detail. I will only observe that,
according to my understanding of the matter, that right, so far from
being denied by any of the belligerent powers, has been virtually
admitted by all.
The duty of holding a neutral conduct may be inferred, without anything
more, from the obligation which justice and humanity impose on every
nation, in cases in which it is free to act, to maintain inviolate the
relations of peace and amity towards other nations.
The inducements of interest for observing that conduct will best be
referred to your own reflections and experience. With me a predominant
motive has been to endeavor to gain time to our country to settle and
mature its yet recent institutions, and to progress without
interruption to that degree of strength and consistency which is
necessary to give it, humanly speaking, the command of its own fortunes.
Though, in reviewing the incidents of my administration, I am
unconscious of intentional error, I am nevertheless too sensible of my
defects not to think it probable that I may have committed many errors.
Whatever they may be, I fervently beseech the Almighty to avert or
mitigate the evils to which they may tend. I shall also carry with me
the hope that my country will never cease to view them with indulgence;
and that, after forty five years of my life dedicated to its service
with an upright zeal, the faults of incompetent abilities will be
consigned to oblivion, as myself must soon be to the mansions of rest.
Relying on its kindness in this as in other things, and actuated by
that fervent love towards it, which is so natural to a man who views in
it the native soil of himself and his progenitors for several
generations, I anticipate with pleasing expectation that retreat in
which I promise myself to realize, without alloy, the sweet enjoyment
of partaking, in the midst of my fellow-citizens, the benign influence
of good laws under a free government, the ever-favorite object of my
heart, and the happy reward, as I trust, of our mutual cares, labors,
and dangers.
Geo. Washington.
1796 Election
With George Washington already penning his farewell, the
Presidential Election of 1796 ensued. To be held from November 4 to
December 7, 1796, the Federalists chose Vice President John Adams to
head their slate, with Governor Thomas Pinckney of South Carolina as
its second. Thomas Jefferson would lead the Democratic-Republicans,
with Aaron Burr preferred for Vice President. There was no formal idea
of a running mate, and each candidate campaigned alone. It was an
acrimonious affair. Democratic-Republicans accused the Federalists of
wanting an aristocracy; Federalists stated that the other side was
aligned with the French Revolution.
In the Electoral College, still using the arcane two votes for each
elector system, without measurement for President or Vice President,
John Adams won 71 Electors with Thomas Jefferson 68. For the only time
in history, the President, John Adams, a Federalist, would have a Vice
President from another party.
John Adams recieved the Oath of Office in Congress Hall, Philadelphia
from the Chief Justice Oliver Ellsworth, the first time a Supreme Court
Chief Justice administered it. Adams relayed to his wife that he was a
nervous wreck, but gave a well thought speech that paid homage to the
U.S. Constitution, his time as Vice President, and the importance of
the Electoral Process. In attendance, George Washington, and his Vice
President from another party, Thomas Jefferson, who would run against
him in four years again, and win after a tie in the Electoral College,
with his Vice President Burr, that sent the election to the House of
Representatives.
Photo above: John Adams proposing George Washington as
Commander-in-Chief of the Continental Army, 1913 reproduction of a
painting by John Ward Dunsmore. Courtesy Library of Congress. Photo
below: John Adams, Gouverneur Morris, Alexander Hamilton, and Thomas
Jefferson at Continental Congress. Courtesy Library of Congress. Source
info: Wikipedia Commons; Today in history: One of the greatest
inaugural addresses in American history, West Wing Reports;
Papermasters.com.
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