Re-Enactors World

Shared by Allen Farley
Ministering to the Civil War Re-enacting Community Since 1984
Celebrating over 20 Years of Ministry

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 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 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 same 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 in the united mass of means and efforts cannot fail
to find greater strength, greater resource, proportionately
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 rivalries
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 discriminationsÑNorthern and Southern,
Atlantic and WesternÑwhence 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
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
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 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 councils
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.
Toward 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 find a facilitated
access to the government itself through the channels of
party passion. 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 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 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 exertions in times of peace to
discharge the debts which unavoidable wars 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 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 toward 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 our justice, shall counsel.
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?
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,
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 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 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 toward 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.
George Washington