On
April 30, 1789, George Washington, standing on the balcony of Federal Hall on
Wall Street in New York, took his oath of office as the first President of the
United States. "As the first of every thing, in our situation will serve to
establish a Precedent," he wrote James Madison, "it is devoutly wished
on my part, that these precedents may be fixed on true principles."
Born
in 1732 into a Virginia planter family, he learned the morals, manners, and body
of knowledge requisite for an 18th century Virginia gentleman.
He
pursued two intertwined interests: military arts and western expansion. At 16 he
helped survey Shenandoah lands for Thomas, Lord Fairfax. Commissioned a
lieutenant colonel in 1754, he fought the first skirmishes of what grew into the
French and Indian War. The next year, as an aide to Gen. Edward Braddock, he
escaped injury although four bullets ripped his coat and two horses were shot
from under him.
From
1759 to the outbreak of the American Revolution, Washington managed his lands
around Mount Vernon and served in the Virginia House of Burgesses. Married to a
widow, Martha Dandridge Custis, he devoted himself to a busy and happy life. But
like his fellow planters, Washington felt himself exploited by British merchants
and hampered by British regulations. As the quarrel with the mother country grew
acute, he moderately but firmly voiced his resistance to the restrictions.
When
the Second Continental Congress assembled in Philadelphia in May 1775,
Washington, one of the Virginia delegates, was elected Commander in Chief of the
Continental Army. On July 3, 1775, at Cambridge, Massachusetts, he took command
of his ill-trained troops and embarked upon a war that was to last six grueling
years.
He
realized early that the best strategy was to harass the British. He reported to
Congress, "we should on all Occasions avoid a general Action, or put
anything to the Risque, unless compelled by a necessity, into which we ought
never to be drawn." Ensuing battles saw him fall back slowly, then strike
unexpectedly. Finally in 1781 with the aid of French allies--he forced the
surrender of Cornwallis at Yorktown.
Washington
longed to retire to his fields at Mount Vernon. But he soon realized that the
Nation under its Articles of Confederation was not functioning well, so he
became a prime mover in the steps leading to the Constitutional Convention at
Philadelphia in 1787. When the new Constitution was ratified, the Electoral
College unanimously elected Washington President.
He
did not infringe upon the policy making powers that he felt the Constitution
gave Congress. But the determination of foreign policy became preponderantly a
Presidential concern. When the French Revolution led to a major war between
France and England, Washington refused to accept entirely the recommendations of
either his Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson, who was pro-French, or his
Secretary of the Treasury Alexander Hamilton, who was pro-British. Rather, he
insisted upon a neutral course until the United States could grow stronger.
To
his disappointment, two parties were developing by the end of his first term.
Wearied of politics, feeling old, he retired at the end of his second. In his
Farewell Address, he urged his countrymen to forswear excessive party spirit and
geographical distinctions. In foreign affairs, he warned against long-term
alliances.
Washington
enjoyed less than three years of retirement at Mount Vernon, for he died of a
throat infection December 14, 1799. For months the Nation mourned him.