February 20, 1995 The New Federalist

Page 9

Like William Tell, Like Machiavelli, Like Cincinnatus

George Washington
By Gerald M. Rose

All across the county, Washington is rememberedas this equestrian statue,

in a park in Newark, NJ., shows.
General, president, statesman. George Washington as painted by Rembrandt
Peale.

On the occasion of George Washington's birthday, we would do well to

reflect on the qualities of the man without whom there would not be a
Republic in the United States. It should not be taken for granted that the
great institutions of our government, which flowed from the ideas of
statecraft and scientific progress developed during the Italian Renaissance,
were mediated through individuals who, for unique reasons, accepted what
can only be described as the "cup of Gethsemane." It is only by reflecting
on this quality of mind, most brilliantly described by Friedrich Schiller in his
essays on aesthetics ("On the Aesthetic Education of Man"), that we can
begin to get an insight into how nation-states were really created.
Today, literally, all that is noble in us as it has been handed down from the
past to us in the present, is about to be stolen, if the course taken by the
modern Jacobins, Newt Gingrich and Phil Gramm, succeeds. It is from this

standpoint that the full horror of the Jacobin takeover of the Congress today,
in repudiation of the tradition upheld by George Washington, can and should
be understood.
When we think of George Washington, the word that is immediately exemplified in his person is a quality that was defined by Nicolo Machiavelli
(1469-1527) as virtu. This quality Machiavelli identified with the leader
who will always act with unerring judgment in order to pull a nation
together, and maintain the benefits provided only by the nation, against the
encroachments of regional or purely egoistic interests.
Creating a Nation
The great problem Italy faced at the time that Machiavelli wrote was that
Venice was playing one city-state against the other, and especially against
the papacy, to keep Italy divided. The purpose Machiavelli had in mind
when he wrote The Prince was to create a combination of cities stable
enough to create an Italian nationa problem which, to this day, Italy has
not entirely solved. It was the work of Dante and, later, Machiavelli to
create an Italian nation-state. To do this, you needed leaders committed to
act with ruthlessness to suppress the tendencies which pull countries apart
tendencies which always lead to chaos and the destruction of nations and
people.
The unique quality of the Renaissance which made possible, in years to
come, Washington's intervention, was that of making scientific progress
intelligible. This allowed the nation-state to exist based on the comprehension of laws of the universe by the majority of people in a nation. Washington exemplified political virtue, or virtu.
The most closely linked literary image associated with George Washington
would be Wilhelm Tell. This play by Friedrich Schiller identifies a man, a
Swiss farmer, who cannot help but act when he is needed. Wilhelm Tell, like
Washington, acted from a profound sense of responsibility for the Freedom,
Justice, and Happiness of his fellow man. He would have been defined in
biblical terms as a good Samaritan. He never found conflict in his personal
emotions and in acting for the good of his fellow man, no matter what the
danger. His actions were spontaneous, genuine, and without hesitation.
They flowed from a profound sense of each individual's dignity as created
imago dei.

The times that tried men's souls. In this illustration by 19th-century artist
F.O.C. Darley, Washington is shown intervening in one of many brawls that
broke out among his troops during the dreadful winter at Valley Forge.

Latter-Day Cincinnatus
Washington defined himself as the farmer of the old Roman Republic (5th
century B.C.) whose name he often signed to his public writingsCincinnatus. It was Cincinnatus who, after leaving his fields to lead the Roman army
to victory in battle, resisted all blandishments to rule, and laid down his
weapons and went back to farmingas Washington himself initially did at
the close of the Revolutionary War in 1781, having led the American states
to victory.
Washington himself truly had no ambition but the welfare of his fellow men,
and reacted angrily when it was suggested after the war that he be made
king. It was well known that he came out of retirement only to preside over
the Constitutional Convention (under his leadership, the Convention adopted
the Constitution in September 1787), and afterwards he agreed to become
the first President of the United States (1789-97) because he saw no acceptable alternative. This was a man guided by the idea that his mission on
Earth was providentialthat is, in the hands of Providence. His personal
mission was to create a nation based on the dignity of man, and not the
whim of an oligarchy. Even the British had to paint him in their portraits as
a monumental figure.

Washington's most defining quality was this: at each moment there was no
question but that he would act decisively, no matter what those around him
were willing to do. This is exactly opposite to the makeup of politicians
today. Washington understood that the opinions of the majority of the population were based on prejudice, and therefore generally wrongunless the
people were educated over time by leaders who were willing to learn and
teach out of respect for the dignity of the citizen.
The Genet Affair
These issues came to a head in his fight against the Jacobins, in what was
called the "Citizen Genet Affair." After the French Revolution, "Citizen
Genet" was sent as France's ambassador to the United States.
In 1797, a war erupted between Britain and France; Washington declared
that the U.S. would remain neutral in the conflict. Washington was well
aware that the Jacobin Terror that had convulsed France, and the related
hatred of centralized government, were nothing like the American Revolution, and he was unwilling to support the Jacobin government of France.
The situation recalls that in the play Wilhelm Tell, when the son of the hated
King, having murdered his father, comes to Tell and asks for his help. He
was told summarily that his hatred of his father had nothing to do with the
love that had allowed Tell to take up arms to defend his fellow man from the
tyrant Gessler. In the same vein, Washington told Ambassador Genet that, in
spite of the love the United States as a nation bore the French people, he
would not be provoked into a conflict not of our own making and not in our
nation's interest. Thereupon, Genet appealed directly to the Jacobin clubs in
the U.S. to actually outfit ships to seize British vessels and hale them into
U.S. ports. He also attempted to raise an army on U.S. soil to invade
Spanish territory in Florida.
This challenge to the sovereignty of the U.S. government was based on
Genet's contention that Washington had no executive authority to declare
neutrality, and that all of his decrees had to be approved by the Congress of
the U.S. and the people. Being a true Jacobin, Genet rejected the idea of the
executive leadership, and the idea that anything beyond the transient will of
the majority had the force of law.
Washington knew that hatred of England was being played upon by the
Jacobins, and that the whim of the American majority at that moment could
easily be swayed by demagogues like Genet. If Washington had acquiesced,

America would have been drawn into a war in which different oligarchies
were contending. Against the mob, Washington asserted an evenhanded
policy, and did not fall into the trap set by England, which had propagated
the Jacobin uprising in the first place.
This nation was founded on everything that Newt Gingrich and company
have flouted. It was founded by Good Samaritans dedicated to the proposition that all men have a right to dignity and justice. The very Constitution
was a commitment to the creation of a centralized government in order to
secure the benefits of Liberty to our posterity, and to form a more perfect
union.
Washington's Farewell Address speaks to us of these matters today, as if
across the centuries he has come back to remind us of these critical lessons.
From The Farewell Address
Here, perhaps, I ought to stop. But a solicitude for your welfare,
which can not 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. . . .
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 discrimination. 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. . . .
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.