The indispensable man

Washington on Washington’s birthday

“What a triumph for the advocates of despotism to find that we are incapable of governing ourselves, and that systems founded on the basis of equal liberty are merely ideal & fallacious! Would to God that wise measures may be taken in time to avert the consequences we have but too much reason to apprehend.”

— George Washington, 1786

The war was over. But the upstart Americans were losing the peace. Pre-1787, there was no Constitution to hold the country together. Instead, having just unburdened themselves of a central government in London, the Americans wanted — and got — a weak national government through the Articles of Confederation.

And a weak government it was.

The states printed their own money. Congress had a post-Revolution hissy about it, but what could Congress do to the states?

Not much. Some states had success with their paper currency. Others saw it die through hyper-inflation. It all depended on the acre of land on which you stood whether you could buy supper that night with the money in your pocket.

Officers in the old Revolutionary Army were holed up in courthouses, armed friends at the ready, to stop debt collection and foreclosure cases. In 1786, the governor of Massachusetts raised private funds to combat Shays’ Rebellion, because the governor didn’t trust the militia. Word around the campfire was that the British were behind much of the commotion in the streets — in an attempt, perhaps, to woo some states back to the fold?

It was said many times back in England that the American experiment would surely fail even if they won the war, and that the Americans would beg to come back as British subjects.

The country was in chaos, what country there was.

What it needed was an indispensable man.

He had been indispensable before, George Washington. When he took over the Continental Army, it was an army in name only. His troops left bloody footprints in the snow, because some of them couldn’t afford boots, or any kind of covering on their feet. What kind of army was this to lead?

One British general, after seeing the rebels (or at least their backs) was overheard saying “with a thousand British grenadiers, he would undertake to go from one end of America to the other, and geld all the males, partly by force, and partly by a little coaxing.”

In 1776, it would take a man of patience, ability, instincts, a commanding nature and a physical presence to . . . . To do what?

To run from the British time and time again? Until he thought it was time to strike, on his army’s terms, such as his little maneuver at Trenton and the siege of Yorktown. This general was no Patton or Grant. Maybe because he didn’t have Patton or Grant’s resources. Washington couldn’t spare a man for any kind of frontal assault on the world’s best-trained military force. One big loss of men might have meant the end of the war. And of Washington himself. (At the end of 1776, watching the British close in around him on the maps in his tent, he’s said to have muttered to an aide, while rubbing his throat: “My neck does not feel as though it was made for a halter.”)

Of all the characteristics that the father of this country had, one seems the most important during the war: perseverance.

But once his perseverance had won the war, what next?

His friends found him at his farm. Cincinnatus had given up power again. The country needed an indispensable man again, as delegates met in Philly — in secret — to set the country straight. Citizen Washington knew that the Articles of Confederation were failing his people. So he reluctantly agreed to sit in on discussions.

And that’s all the indispensable man needed to do: sit in. Let the Franklins and Adamses and Hamiltons and Madisons argue the fine points of a new constitution. His sitting at the front to “oversee” the convention would be enough to keep these men in line long enough to hammer out compromises. Then he could be free to retire. Again.

But yet again the country needed the indispensible man. This time, to be president and commander-in-chief. And when he’d done that, and showed the way, the country needed him to do it again, for a second term, to make sure the country stayed a country permanent, and didn’t fold the minute G. Washington decided to leave public office.

Ben Franklin might have been as popular as George Washington in the late 1700s, but at the time he was too old and sick to be handed a presidency. The other Founders had their many good sides, too, but each had his own disadvantages at the time. But George Washington was . . . .

Indispensible.

Author and historian John Ferling once wrote that George Washington may have never had a true friend. He wouldn’t allow people to get close to him. He was paternal, not fraternal.

Early in his life, he decided to listen rather than talk, especially when surrounded by better educated, or at least better credentialed, people who tended to gravitate toward Congress. He came across as aloof. He came across as cold.

Abigail Adams said, after meeting Washington for the first time, that he was a man of “dignity which forbids familiarity.” We’re not kidding, but in one of his biographies, a chapter is titled: “The birth of Mr. Washington.” Which makes it sound as though he was born with a powdered wig.

His gravity was an acquired characteristic. He spent the young part of his life practicing for the old part, copying out rules by which gentlemen conducted themselves, and putting those ideas into practice. (First rule: “Every action done in company ought to be done with some sign of respect to those that are present.”)

If he was a red-blooded American with impulses, he’d control those impulses, and, instead of fighting among the people and factions around him, he’d listen to them and make his best decision. Doubtless with a frown.

But if he’d been as easily approachable as Ben Franklin, would his generals have taken him seriously enough in the rough times? If he’d been as hot-headed and free-speaking as his top aide Alexander Hamilton, would all sides have rallied around his leadership at the Convention? If he’d been as ambitious as Thomas Jefferson, would he have walked away from power all those times?

There was a reason he kept having to do things first: Nobody else could. And he would be noted as being first in war, first in peace, first in the hearts of his countrymen.

Naysayers and the cancel culture spreading across the country today, like a cancer, would cancel George Washington, because he was a man of his time. They’d also cancel Abraham Lincoln and many others. These ohso-modern types don’t seem to realize that there are only a few indispensable people in American history, who come around just as needed, and although imperfect themselves, make this Union more perfect. And, let’s pray, continue to do so.

We recognize his birth today mainly because he helped birth this nation, and was instrumental in doing so at most of the early points. And he deserves much of the recognition for there being a United States of America today.

(Suggested reading: “The Return of George Washington” by Edward J. Larson, and “Almost a Miracle” by John E. Ferling.)