George
E. Washington's Farewell Address
(September 17, 1796)

To the People of the United States.
FRIENDS AND FELLOW-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 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 apprize 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 Issues 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;
than, 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 tranquillity 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 apoIssues and unnatural connexion 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 neighbouring countries not tied together by
the same governments, which their own rivalships 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 endeavour 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 endeavour 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 heart-burnings, 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 every thing
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 alliances, 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 Issues, 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 our 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 Issues, 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 find 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 intrusted 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 depositories, 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 connexions
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
exertions in time of peace to discharge the debts, which
unavoidable wars may have occasioned, not ungenerously
throwing upon posterity the burthen, which we ourselves
ought to bear. The execution of these maxims belongs
to your representatives, but it is necessary that public
opinion should cooperate. 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
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. 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 practise 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 defence 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 connexion
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.
4Harmony, 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 22d of April 1793,
is the index to 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 any thing 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 endeavour 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 it in 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.
- George Washington
US
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