Washington’s Farewell Relevant as it was in 1796
Submitted by Renee Parsons
Despite an effort to not allow social chaos, the uncertainty, the upheaval and suffering to become an ever present reality, it is undeniable to not think about how the country’s Founders made it through a real violent revolution with a powerful King publicly threatening to hang the revolutionaries. There were no guarantees for any of the 57 signers of the Declaration of Independence and many suffered personal and economic losses.
As the current level of chaos and collapse increases daily, the possibility of losing our precious identity as Americans as well as its freedom and liberty has become intolerable. With the thought of losing that integral part of our personal and individual identity, there has been no way to avoid introspection on what frightening possibilities the future may hold.
While attending a recent CPAC meeting, the power of el Salvador President Nayib Burkele’s words describing his country’s struggle to dispel the satanist-sponsored repression provided an additional catalyst to dig deeper to reconnect with an American cultural and political heritage. Given my prospective identity as a Daughter of the American Revolution and as a Daughter of the Confederacy (although my sister and I never applied) our family has deep roots in the history of this country.
Burkele made good use of his time reminding politically apathetic Americans of the need to “unapologetically” push back on the globalists and especially on our own home grown corrupt judges, prosecutors and attorneys as ‘dark forces are already taking over your country.’
In a remarkable similarity, Bukele, grandson of paternal Palestinian-Christian grandparents from Jerusalem and Bethlehem, described George Soros as having hit a ‘brick wall’ in his country as globalist elites and unelected bureaucrats were also no longer influential. Especially stunning was Bukele’s perspective with a paper-backed-by-paper currency and US tendency for unrestrained money printing, questioned the necessity to collect taxes from the American people which would be an eye-opening topic for Fed Bank or Treasury representatives to clarify.
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There must have been one of those weird astral coincidences in 1776 as the Founding Fathers were about to sign their names to the Declaration in July as the Illuminati Order was being founded in May of that same year in Bavaria sponsored by the Rothschild patriarch. It is therefore synchronistic to expect that the two entities would encounter each other when US Secretary of the Treasury Alexander Hamilton first proposed a national bank to Congress in 1791 based on the Bank of England.
Not surprisingly, President Thomas Jefferson opposed banks in general as “an infinity of successive felonious larcenies,” specific to a nationally-supported bank as a monopoly that would overwhelm state banks and would favor financiers when his vision for America was an agrarian society. Most importantly, Jefferson believed the bank to be unconstitutional and in 1811 Jefferson refused to renew its Charter. By 1812, the US was at war with England in what many have interpreted as a struggle for financial independence from the Crown and/or the Rothschilds.
The Fed Bank continued as a hot button political fight when President Andrew Jackson refused to renew its charter in 1833 given its ties to industry and manufacturing displaying a northern bias.
In March, 1913, President Woodrow Wilson, considered a ‘progressive reformer” was sworn in and appeared genetically unable to get anything right when he established the Federal Trade Commission and a Federal Reserve Bank in December 1913 while Congress was on a holiday recess. He supported the Sixteenth Amendment to the Constitution inaugurating a Federal income tax which once provided the country with a flawed confidence that its financial house was in order. In 1917, Wilson took the US into WW I. The Federal Reserve’s contribution to fiscal instability remains a stain on the country’s financial integrity and an object of political rectitude.
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Still somewhat obsessed with the country’s founding, President George Washington’s mostly forgotten Farewell Address found its way to be closely examined as it is a subject of annual public recitation on the Senate floor celebrating his February birthday. Originally drafted by James Madison until Washington decided to seek a second term, Alexander Hamilton expanded on Madison creating the 7,500 word version. The 1796 Farewell was not publicly delivered as a speech but rather printed in the Philadelphia Free Advertiser as it spread throughout the country. Washington’s document remains a timeless classic, nothing like a contemporary official glitzy pr with slick double entendres or mixed metaphors and few real insights.
Instead, we are treated to the personal, informal thoughts and elegant reminiscenses of an accomplished man of many endeavors, a man comfortable in his own skin, with considerable life achievements as he anticipates returning to his beautiful Mount Vernon estate – and don’t miss an opportunity to visit. What is especially striking in Washington’s Farewell is the breadth and depth of his prescient views on what are now contemporary issues that American society continues to wrestle with.
Since even a cursory review of American revolutionary history easily reveals the Founders direct experiences with divine intervention and unmistakable Acts of God that predetermined a new country being built on all the advantages and responsibilities of self-government and free speech. Whether we are up to the task remains to be determined.
No story about Washington would be complete without a review of how Patawomack became the chosen site for the Federal government’s national capitol. The original list contained more than a handful of candidates including NYC, Baltimore, New Jersey sites and of course Philadelphia as the original first Constitutional Convention. Once the power house team of Madison and Jefferson visited the Patawomack site, it was a foregone conclusion they would not be denied as its proximity to Virginia, Patawomack became the preferred site. Along a fast flowing river and the near by Catoctin Mountains, it was clearly the most environmentally beautiful location although the Pennsylvania delegation had their hearts set.
So the story goes: over the course of a number of weeks and meetings galore to narrow the selection, the final choice would be made at a dinner with all participants in attendance at Jefferson’s estate – in other words, a showdown. As expected, with Washington now joining Jefferson and Madison, there would be no serious objections. Since Washington was in charge of oversee the architect laying out the city’s blueprint; at Washington’s initiation, the consolation prize would be the main throughfare through the city with the White House located at 1600 on what now would be named Pennsylvania Avenue. There are sparse details of who’s who at the dinner finale but all parties departed in accord as the city itself would henceforth be known as Washington.
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It is difficult to read the entire Farewell without being stirred by a sentiment for the past, with a full heart at recognizing some failures and disappointments at how far the country has strayed from its founding principles and values. Here are several areas that might be of special interest:
On Foreign and International Policy
“it is our true policy to steer clear of permanent alliances with s in general 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”
“Europe’s controversies are foreign to our concerns so it is unwise to join their struggles. Our unique geographical advantages lead to independent neutrality so we will soon be immune from invasion to pursue peace or war as we alone decide best. Steer clear as much as possible from permanent alliances with foreign powers, although temporary alliances for defense in extraordinary emergencies are acceptable.”
“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.”
“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.”
On Partisan Politics
“I hope it will help to moderate partisan rivalry, warn against foreign intrigue and guard against pretended patriotism. I hope it will help to moderate partisan rivalry, warn against foreign intrigue and guard against pretended patriotism.”
“..minorities gain artificial political power over the delegated power of government. These methods aid unscrupulous politicians to subvert popular rule by usurping power.” “A wise nation will guard against partisan politics.”
“Partisan politics distracts and weakens government by agitation, fomenting riots and even insurrection that enables foreign influence and corruption. Partisanship is like fire—it is valuable for warmth, but if it gets out of control it will burn down everything.”
“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.”
“Rival factions often seek revenge producing tragedies that lead to permanent despotism and the loss of liberty as people yield absolute power to an individual so that they can be relieved of their disorder and misery.”
National Unity
“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.”
“Towards 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.”
“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.”
Encroachment of One Branch of Government
“..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.”
“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.”
“Each branch of government should confine itself to its respective constitutional sphere. When one branch seeks to consolidate power, it leads to despotism. The human love of power leads to the abuse of power and history shows this tendency of one part of government to encroach on the responsibilities of another part. Be on guard for this and be sure only to change the Constitution by constitutional means as usurpation of power will ultimately lead to evil results.”
“Obstruction of authority is destructive to constitutional government and will lead to its demise. Thereby minorities gain artificial political power over the delegated power of government. These methods aid unscrupulous politicians to subvert popular rule by usurping power. If the Constitution cannot be overthrown, some will attempt to bring innovations to weaken the Constitution. A wise nation will guard against partisan politics. “
Necessity of Religion and Morality
“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 finds 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. . . .’
“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”
“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..”
Renee Parsons served on the ACLU’s Florida State Board of Directors and as president of the ACLU Treasure Coast Chapter. She has been an elected public official in Colorado, staff in the Office of the Colorado State Public Defender, an environmental lobbyist for Friends of the Earth and a staff member of the US House of Representatives in Washington DC.