George Washington’s Farewell Address
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Application Deadline 11/01/2025–less than two months!!! - Test #1 on Thursday–NO CLASS MEETING
- Opens 7am on Thursday, 9/11
- Take it wherever you have access to Canvas
- No lockdown browser stuff, eye-tracking cameras, or breathalyzer
- Early Alert Grades–Friday @ Noon {this is a reminder for me}
- D and F grades get alerts on Friday
Plan for the Day
- Finish up any Constitution stuff from Tuesday
- Move on to Alexis de Tocqueville’s Ch. 9 (from Thursday, 9/4)
- George Washington’s Farewell Address
- No Discussion Post this week–set your reminder for next week
- Democracy/Liberty/Freedom/ETC. quotation:
- George Washington provides us with this quotation on liberty:
“The unity of government which constitutes you one people is also now dear to you….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.”
–Washington’s Farewell Address, September 19, 1796 [United States Senate]
- George Washington provides us with this quotation on liberty:
Washington’s Farewell Address
Let’s set this up with some information on George Washington, THE founding father and first President of the United States of America.
- Born in Virginia
- No formal education (why James Madison and Alexander Hamilton helped with the farewell address)
- Officer in the Virginia Militia during the French and Indian War
- First President 1789 – 1797 {his farewell address came out in papers months before leaving office}
- Three main themes of the address
1) Be patriotic; preserve the union; protect liberty
2) Avoid permanent foreign entanglements
3) Factions (political parties) are bad for a republic
- Three main themes of the address
- Mount Vernon, home and resting place
George Washington wasn’t in the best of health later in life. He contracted smallpox in 1751 and pneumonia in 1790. It’s amazing he lived to age 67 because either of those were usually death sentences. He voluntarily decides not to seek a third term, but has parting advice for the young nation. The farewell address was never a speech Washington gave; instead, it was published in newspapers throughout the country. It isn’t the longest “speech,” but it is an example of long-winded prose. Consider the first paragraph and the proposed revision below:
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. (1)
Translation: You will soon elect a new President. Here are the reasons I’m not running.
Washington’s Ethos
As mentioned earlier this semester, the classical definition of ethos refers to the credibility a speaker/writer conveys during the speech. Obviously, everyone knew George Washington, so his reputation preceeded him. However, he makes appeals of ethos:
- p. 1: “…binds a dutiful citizen to his country…”
- p. 2: “[my serving twice as President] have been a uniform sacrifice of inclination to the opinion of duty and to a deference for what appeared to be your desire.”
- I wasn’t going to run for a second term, but others convinced me to remain.
- p. 3: “…while choice and prudence invite me to quit the political scene, patriotism does not forbid it.”
- I can step down and still be patriotic.
- p. 4: “…the constancy of your support was the essential prop of the efforts, and a guarantee of the plans by which they were effected.”
- pp. 4-5: Washington’s advice for the “people”
- “…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.”
- He’s no longer seeking poweror a new station in life–non biased, friendly advice.
- p. 23: “In offering to you, my countrymen, these counsels of an old and affectionate friend…”
Preserve the Union to Protect Liberty
- p. 5: In addition to the daily Democracy/Liberty/Freedom/ETC. quotation above, he warns the country to be on guard for attacks against liberty.
- “…you should properly estimate the immense value of your national Union to your collective and individual happiness…accustoming yourselves to think and speak of it as of the palladium of your political safety and prosperity.“
- p. 6: Washington implores readers to think of themselves as Americans with much in common.
- “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 councils and joint efforts—of common dangers, sufferings, and successes.”
- Although a long quotation, it is quite succinct.
- p. 8: “…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…exhibit the continuance of the Union as a primary object of patriotic desire.”
- p. 9: “…there will always be reason to distrust the patriotism of those who in any quarter may endeavor to weaken its bands.”
- p. 10: “To the efficacy and permanency of your Union, a government for the whole is indispensable. No alliances, however strict, between the parts can be an adequate substitute.”
- Washington points out the Articles of Confederation weren’t effective but a “first essay”–a first draft.
- “…a Constitution of government better calculated than your former for an intimate Union and for the efficacious management of your common concerns.”
- p. 11: “the Constitution…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.”
- Consider this in terms of “rule of law” messages, both contemporary and historic.
- p. 25: Conclusion
- “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.”
On Regional Differences
- pp. 6-7: “The North,” uses the South’s “great additional resources”; whereas, “The South in the same intercourse, benefitting by the agency of the North, sees its agriculture grow and its commerce expand.”
- p. 7: “The East…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…directed by an indissoluble community of interest as one nation.”
- p. 8: “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!”
Warning against Factions/Parties
- p. 9: “One of the expedients of party to acquire influence within particular districts is to misrepresent the opinions and aims of other districts.”
- p. 11: “All obstructions to the execution of the laws….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…”
- p. 12: “However combinations or associations…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…”
- p. 13: “I have already intimated to you the danger of parties in the state, with particular reference to the founding of them on geographical discriminations.”
- “The alternate domination of one faction over another, sharpened by the spirit of revenge natural to party dissension…is itself a frightful despotism. But this leads at length to a more formal and permanent despotism.”
- p. 14: Warns of a party leader out for personal gain
- “…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.”
Religion and the Republic
George Washington was Anglican but held the belief that freedom of religion–and no State religion–was important. He invokes divinity and Providence in his address.
- p. 16: “Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable supports.”
- Protection of Oaths…rhetorical question
- “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.”
- On Education…National Morality
- “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.”
- Remember, Washington had no formal education and no college.
- Protection of Oaths…rhetorical question
- p. 18: “Observe good faith and justice towards all nations; cultivate peace and harmony with all—religion and morality enjoin this conduct…”
Public Credit & Taxes & Wars
It appears in this farewell address that Washington believes the Nation should only go into debt for war and should repay the debts as quickly as possible.
- p. 17: “As a very important source of strength and security, cherish public credit.”
- “…use it as sparingly as possible, avoiding occasions of expense by cultivating peace…”
- “…avoiding likewise the accumulation of debt, not only by shunning occasions of expense, but by vigorous exertions 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.”
- Don’t burden the next generation with debt!
- “The execution of these maxims belongs to your representatives, but it is necessary that public opinion should cooperate.”
- p. 18: “that to have revenue there must be taxes; that no taxes can be devised which are not more or less inconvenient and unpleasant…”
- This paragraph has very dense prose, but Washington claims implementing taxes needs to be transparent (“candid”) and based on public needs (“exigencies”).
Foreign Entanglements
He’s against these…they need to be temporary
- p. 19: “The nation which indulges towards another an habitual hatred or an 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.”
- pp. 19-20: Washington explains that allies will expect you to do things, and your allies’ enemies will be jealous of you support for the other nation.
- p. 20: “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…”
- “Such an attachment of a small or weak towards a great and powerful nation dooms the former to be the satellite of the latter.”
- Great Britain was a “superpower” at the time
- pp. 20-21: 18th century wokeism…
- “Against the insidious wiles of foreign influence…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.”
- p. 21: Being susceptible to the rhetoric of those you have affinity towards
- “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.”
- Translation: Real patriots don’t fall for sophistry like the “tools and dupes” who vote against their interests.
- Europeans have many controversies, so “[o]ur detached and distant situation invites and enables us to pursue a different course.”
- “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.”
- p. 22: “It is our true policy to steer clear of permanent alliances with any portion of the foreign world…”
- “…we may safely trust to temporary alliances for extraordinary emergencies.”
- Remember, in relationships and war, you always need an exit strategy. Avoid permanent entanglements.
- p. 23: Washington also discussed commerce and trade policies in free market terms.
- “…commercial policy should hold an equal and impartial hand: neither seeking nor granting exclusive favors or preferences; consulting the natural course of things…”
- “…in order to give to trade a stable course, to define the rights of our merchants, and to enable the government to support them…”
- All deals should be “temporary, and liable to be from time to time abandoned or varied, as experience and circumstances shall dictate…”
- James Madison definitely had read Adam Smith’s The Wealth of Nations prior to this farewell address.
- p. 24: Washington’s “proclamation of the 22nd of April 1793” was to keep the United States out of the European wars, including the French Revolution.
Other Important Quotations
- p. 13: Compare to James Madison’s quotation from last Tuesday, 9/2
- “Liberty itself will find in such a government, with powers properly distributed and adjusted, its surest guardian.”
- p. 17: “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.”
- Time permitting: Isaac Asimov’s “A Cult of Ignorance”
- p. 16: Amendments based on deliberations are fine, “[b]ut 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.”
- p. 22: Compare to Alexis de Tocqueville’s discussion of religion attached to the State (p. 288). What happens to State religion when the State fails?
- “Why forgo 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?”
- What is the problem of tying oneself to the “destiny” of Europe?
- p. 25: “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.”
- Instant gratification wasn’t an American value at the time: slow and steady.
- pp. 25-26: “I fervently beseech the Almighty to avert or mitigate the evils to which [my errors] may tend.”
Next Class
Remember, we aren’t meeting as a class on Thursday, 9/11. You’ll take TEST #1 wherever you have internet access. We don’t have a Discussion Post this week, but you’ll have one next week. We’ll be back to class on Tuesday, 9/16. We’ll be taking a philosophical turn (and a 250-year jump) by reading Jeffrey Rosen’s “Order,” which is on Canvas.