WEBVTT NOTE The Use of George Washington in the Statist Offensive 1 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:20.000 In these Clinton-esque times, I think it's very important to realize that if we look at the period when the United States was founded as a country in 1780, matters were very different in the way the president was regarded. 2 00:00:20.000 --> 00:00:31.000 The president about whom I'm speaking, George Washington, had a nearly universal outstanding reputation. 3 00:00:31.000 --> 00:00:38.000 This was based primarily, of course, on his victory against the British. 4 00:00:38.000 --> 00:00:46.000 Remember, the British were the most powerful army in the world. 5 00:00:46.000 --> 00:01:02.000 In Washington, especially in his victory in October 1781, the Battle of Yorktown against Lord Cornwallis had defeated the British Army. 6 00:01:02.000 --> 00:01:13.500 This was, you have to imagine the situation, even less than third rate power had defeated the greatest army in the world. 7 00:01:13.500 --> 00:01:22.000 Now, one could, and some people have, raise questions about how good Washington really was as a general. 8 00:01:22.000 --> 00:01:29.500 Thomas Paine wrote an open letter to Washington in September 1796. 9 00:01:29.500 --> 00:01:39.000 He was very angry at Washington because Paine had been a delegate to the French National Convention, 10 00:01:39.000 --> 00:01:45.760 He had been imprisoned and was faced execution by the Jacobins. 11 00:01:45.760 --> 00:01:50.080 Payne was a member of the somewhat more moderate Girondist party. 12 00:01:50.080 --> 00:01:54.920 He blamed Washington for not doing enough to get him out. 13 00:01:54.920 --> 00:02:02.120 So in his open letter, he said that what Washington had done as a general was essentially to do nothing. 14 00:02:02.120 --> 00:02:06.640 He had simply stayed away from the British as much as possible. 15 00:02:06.640 --> 00:02:13.040 But one could argue against Payne that that was actually his great virtue that he had avoided, 16 00:02:13.040 --> 00:02:23.040 although he had only one decisive victory, that was really enough, and he'd done a great deal to defeat the British. 17 00:02:23.040 --> 00:02:29.640 But his prestige didn't rest only on his military attainments. 18 00:02:29.640 --> 00:02:43.680 Even more important at that time was that after winning the war, he went to the Continental Congress of Annapolis and resigned his commission. 19 00:02:43.680 --> 00:02:47.760 He didn't seek any power but simply went into retirement. 20 00:02:47.760 --> 00:02:58.440 And at that time in American history, people tended to draw parallels with classical antiquity. 21 00:02:58.440 --> 00:03:04.640 they were extremely important and Washington was compared with the Roman 22 00:03:04.640 --> 00:03:10.880 soldier Cincinnati's who had been a farmer and then he had been called by 23 00:03:10.880 --> 00:03:20.440 the Romans that they rescued a blockaded Roman army in 458 BC to become 24 00:03:20.440 --> 00:03:26.120 temporarily dictator but after winning the battle he resigned his dictatorship 25 00:03:26.120 --> 00:03:32.880 and simply went back to his form. So Washington was viewed as, like 26 00:03:32.880 --> 00:03:39.520 Cincinnati, as a great, very virtuous person. He had had a chance to, since he 27 00:03:39.520 --> 00:03:44.280 was commander of the army, he had had a chance possibly to establish himself as a 28 00:03:44.280 --> 00:03:49.360 monarch, but instead of doing that, he said to the Congress he had fulfilled his 29 00:03:49.360 --> 00:03:54.680 mission and now was going into retirement. And Lord Byron called him 30 00:03:54.680 --> 00:04:03.520 in Washington, the Cincinnati of the West. Now, given this very high prestige for Washington, 31 00:04:03.520 --> 00:04:09.260 it led people to what I think is a rather strange argument, people of time. They said 32 00:04:09.260 --> 00:04:16.140 something like this, if Washington supports a particular measure, a particular act, then 33 00:04:16.140 --> 00:04:22.020 it must be good, it must have something in it, or at least if we have doubts about this 34 00:04:22.020 --> 00:04:35.020 in this measure, we should overlook them, or at least downgrade them, because after all Washington, who is the greatest and most virtuous man of his time, is supporting these measures. 35 00:04:35.020 --> 00:04:48.020 Well, you can see this is not a terribly good argument, because even if it's true that Washington was such an outstanding person in virtue of matter, 36 00:04:48.020 --> 00:05:18.020 I'm not going to really get into in this talk. It still wouldn't follow that his, the measures of the government he supported were good ones. I mean, we couldn't imagine a very virtuous person or a very outstanding military leader who really had bad ideas about politics and government and so that if people supported him on the grounds of that argument, they would be making a big mistake. But nevertheless, that was an extremely popular 37 00:05:18.020 --> 00:05:48.020 at that time. So it becomes very important then, given that people had this view, namely if Washington supports a measure or supports some plan, they were themselves inclined to support it, to ask what was Washington's view of government. Now in the, here again we have to remember the 1780s was a very different time from the present. Nowadays people who favor strictly 38 00:05:48.020 --> 00:05:55.420 government or the free market tend very often to say they support strictly constitutional 39 00:05:55.420 --> 00:06:02.940 government. They favor, say, strict construction of the Constitution versus the very loose 40 00:06:02.940 --> 00:06:09.020 construction of the Constitution favored by the modern Supreme Court. We must remember 41 00:06:09.020 --> 00:06:17.380 in the 1780s before the Constitution was enacted, the Constitution was not a move in the direction 42 00:06:17.380 --> 00:06:22.340 of Limited Government was a move very much towards centralized power. 43 00:06:22.340 --> 00:06:30.220 Under the Articles of Confederation, which was in effect before the Constitution was established, 44 00:06:30.220 --> 00:06:35.300 the states were virtually sovereign bodies. 45 00:06:35.300 --> 00:06:40.580 You remember, in fact, in the Treaty of Peace ending the war in 1783, 46 00:06:40.580 --> 00:06:45.500 the former colonies are listed separately in the treaty 47 00:06:45.500 --> 00:06:51.060 as the Great Britain is said to have made an agreement with each of the separate colonies, 48 00:06:51.060 --> 00:06:54.180 not with the United States as a whole. 49 00:06:54.180 --> 00:07:02.300 And under the Articles of Confederation, the Congress could not tax without consent of 50 00:07:02.300 --> 00:07:03.300 the states. 51 00:07:03.300 --> 00:07:08.780 All money had to be voted by the states themselves to Congress. 52 00:07:08.780 --> 00:07:15.380 Further, any changes in the Articles of Confederation had to be made by unanimous consent of the 53 00:07:15.380 --> 00:07:23.980 of the States, and it was almost always impossible to get all the states to agree. Rhode Island 54 00:07:23.980 --> 00:07:30.500 was one state that almost never agreed to any changes that the other states wanted. 55 00:07:30.500 --> 00:07:38.380 Now Washington thought this was a very bad system, and he favored a much more centralized 56 00:07:38.380 --> 00:07:43.720 System. He played a crucial role in getting together the 57 00:07:43.720 --> 00:07:50.440 Constitutional Convention. He had been in the early planning even before the 58 00:07:50.440 --> 00:07:58.980 Annapolis Convention of 1786. He had been, which only five 59 00:07:58.980 --> 00:08:05.380 states participated in, he had been at a preliminary meeting in Mount Vernon, his 60 00:08:05.380 --> 00:08:10.980 This Home Designed to Get Together Plans for a More Centralized Government. 61 00:08:10.980 --> 00:08:19.140 If we look at what happened at the Constitutional Convention, again, Washington, when the convention 62 00:08:19.140 --> 00:08:27.340 opened in May 1787, was immediately elected president unanimously, again, Washington was 63 00:08:27.340 --> 00:08:33.100 far and away the most revered figure of the time. 64 00:08:33.100 --> 00:08:40.780 favorite him although he didn't say much at the convention he was very much in on 65 00:08:40.780 --> 00:08:46.700 the major planning particular of his fellow delegates from Virginia and James 66 00:08:46.700 --> 00:08:52.980 Madison who is the generally called the father of the Constitution when he was 67 00:08:52.980 --> 00:08:59.740 proposing his famous Virginia plan for the Constitution wrote out a summary of 68 00:08:59.740 --> 00:09:05.300 The Theory of the Plan prepared it for Washington and got Washington's approval in advance. 69 00:09:05.300 --> 00:09:10.340 And we can see what is this Virginia Plan that Washington approved of. 70 00:09:10.340 --> 00:09:16.620 It was a much more radical plan than what was actually put into effect in the Constitution 71 00:09:16.620 --> 00:09:25.180 itself of the states tremendously and established a much more centralized government. 72 00:09:25.180 --> 00:09:43.800 Of course, this was not voted for by the Constitutional Convention, but you can see that the plan that Madison had in Washington proved it was very much in favor of a centralized government. 73 00:09:43.800 --> 00:09:50.500 I should mention the historian Lance Banning, who's probably the top authority on Madison, 74 00:09:50.500 --> 00:09:57.400 in his recent book, Sacred Fire of Liberty, argues that this plan wasn't so centralized at all. 75 00:09:57.400 --> 00:10:03.200 He says, and I think his argument strikes me as very much going against his conclusion, 76 00:10:03.200 --> 00:10:13.000 he says, well, this wasn't that centralized a plan because, after all, the power to veto any state law 77 00:10:13.000 --> 00:10:19.600 was similar to the power that the British monarch had through the privy council of vetoing any 78 00:10:19.600 --> 00:10:26.040 measure of the colonies, but one might ask, well, why isn't this just an example showing 79 00:10:26.040 --> 00:10:33.280 it was centralized, that the powers of the national government would be equivalent to 80 00:10:33.280 --> 00:10:39.960 those of the British monarchs, similar to those that the United States, the colonies 81 00:10:39.960 --> 00:10:47.400 that Madison seemed to want to re-establish and Washington accepted. 82 00:10:47.400 --> 00:10:54.520 Further, Washington favored a very strong executive power. 83 00:10:54.520 --> 00:10:59.680 In the American Revolution, there had been, of course, a great movement against a strong 84 00:10:59.680 --> 00:11:00.680 executive. 85 00:11:00.680 --> 00:11:07.580 Remember, in the Declaration of Independence, there's a long list of grievances directed 86 00:11:07.580 --> 00:11:12.700 specifically against the king, George III, that said he has done such and such. 87 00:11:12.700 --> 00:11:17.820 So then there are other grievances that start for having done such and such, and those refer 88 00:11:17.820 --> 00:11:22.820 to parliament, but there are a whole lot directed specifically at the king. 89 00:11:22.820 --> 00:11:29.140 So the movement in the colonies, I mean during the revolution, was completely away from strong 90 00:11:29.140 --> 00:11:37.380 executive power, and in fact in the Articles of Confederation, the president of the Continental 91 00:11:37.380 --> 00:11:43.700 The Federal Congress virtually had no power at all, but Washington very much went against 92 00:11:43.700 --> 00:11:51.660 this and he favored an extremely strong executive, and again, the delegates at the convention 93 00:11:51.660 --> 00:11:57.820 went along with this to a great extent because of Washington himself. 94 00:11:57.820 --> 00:12:03.380 They realized that the first president, if there was going to be a president, would be 95 00:12:03.380 --> 00:12:08.420 Washington, of course, since he was such a great and virtuous person, there wouldn't 96 00:12:08.420 --> 00:12:18.580 be any question of abuse of power under him. So they voted for a rather stronger executive 97 00:12:18.580 --> 00:12:26.540 than they perhaps would have voted for had this figure of such tremendous prestige not 98 00:12:26.540 --> 00:12:42.540 When Washington became President, he was very much in the line of a strong ruler. 99 00:12:42.540 --> 00:12:48.780 He had almost all the cabinet departments directly under his control. 100 00:12:48.780 --> 00:12:55.140 The officers would have to report directly to him in written reports on all matters except 101 00:12:55.140 --> 00:13:02.780 Financial and Economic, which I'll get into a bit later. He had to approve everything the government did. 102 00:13:02.780 --> 00:13:13.800 He was also, in spite of his having earlier rejected the chance to become king, if indeed there was such a possibility when he 103 00:13:13.800 --> 00:13:22.800 given up command of the army, he was at least somewhat monarchical in his approach to the president. 104 00:13:22.800 --> 00:13:29.440 He wanted to be called, his mightiness, the President of the United States. 105 00:13:29.440 --> 00:13:33.840 He only abandoned this when people laughed at him. 106 00:13:33.840 --> 00:13:38.240 I think he never forgave the Speaker of the House for laughing at this title. 107 00:13:38.240 --> 00:13:45.440 But he, at first, there was, John Adams was very much one who supported strong court 108 00:13:45.440 --> 00:13:53.360 Ceremony. At first, it seemed as if the presidency would be almost a replica of the British 109 00:13:53.360 --> 00:14:04.720 court, although this was later abandoned. Now, things, as I say, thus moved so far 110 00:14:04.720 --> 00:14:09.560 with Washington's favor to a much more centralized government, but unfortunately, 111 00:14:09.560 --> 00:14:20.560 This doesn't come to the end of Washington's moves in the direction of a more powerful and less limited government. 112 00:14:20.560 --> 00:14:33.560 Remember I said that he had direct control over everything in his administration, particularly the War Department, 113 00:14:33.560 --> 00:14:38.240 Department, which he was a genuine expert, and also State Department and Diplomacy, 114 00:14:38.240 --> 00:14:43.640 which he considered himself an expert, but with one exception, this was Finance 115 00:14:43.640 --> 00:14:50.480 and Economics, and here the control was exercised by his former military aide, 116 00:14:50.480 --> 00:14:58.360 who was also his most influential advisor, Alexander Hamilton. Now, Hamilton 117 00:14:58.360 --> 00:15:05.940 Washington was a strong supporter of an even more centralized government than Washington. 118 00:15:05.940 --> 00:15:12.180 During the Constitutional Convention, he had said that he supported monarchy as the best 119 00:15:12.180 --> 00:15:20.840 form of government, which was not a position likely to win in much popularity. 120 00:15:20.840 --> 00:15:25.680 After he gave that speech, he didn't say much more on the topic, but that accurately 121 00:15:25.680 --> 00:15:32.480 reflected his views. So, he was an extraordinarily intelligent person. The 122 00:15:32.480 --> 00:15:40.800 historian, Forrest MacDonald, who's a great admirer of Hamilton, calls Hamilton 123 00:15:40.800 --> 00:15:48.520 in the most brilliant bastard in American history. Now, what Hamilton's 124 00:15:48.520 --> 00:15:53.960 policy was, which again had the approval of Washington, and again once Washington 125 00:15:53.960 --> 00:16:23.960 One example of this came out in 1790, in the proposal to assume the state debts. During the Revolutionary War, you'll recall, most of the state's 126 00:16:23.960 --> 00:16:30.160 The states had run up enormous debts, and they had a great deal of trouble paying them. 127 00:16:30.160 --> 00:16:35.800 There was a great deal of controversy over what was to be done about these debts, should 128 00:16:35.800 --> 00:16:44.320 they be paid off in full, which is what the Washington favorites, should they be paid 129 00:16:44.320 --> 00:16:52.320 in part with sort of the present value to certain of the bondholders, which was Jefferson 130 00:16:52.320 --> 00:16:57.520 in Madison favored all sorts of other plans. There were some who favored a kind of Rothbardian 131 00:16:57.520 --> 00:17:03.480 policy of total repudiation of the debt, but this was a very unpopular one. Now, the key 132 00:17:03.480 --> 00:17:11.080 here to Hamilton's policy is not so much that he wanted to assume the state debt, but it 133 00:17:11.080 --> 00:17:17.800 was that he didn't want to pay off the debt and then just have the government, the state 134 00:17:17.800 --> 00:17:24.520 Government or the National Government just operate on a balanced budget. He thought that 135 00:17:24.520 --> 00:17:31.000 they should fund the debt, which is the government would give, pay people the interest on the 136 00:17:31.000 --> 00:17:37.520 bonds, but then would continue more and more borrowing. Hamilton initiated the policy of, 137 00:17:37.520 --> 00:17:43.800 it's been so popular ever since, of having government deficit finance. He thought the 138 00:17:43.800 --> 00:17:51.280 Debt was a very good thing and American Keynesians such as Alvin Hansen and others have recognized 139 00:17:51.280 --> 00:17:58.720 that Hamilton was an important predecessor of their views. Further, Hamilton favored 140 00:17:58.720 --> 00:18:06.520 strong protective tariffs using the so-called infant industries argument and again Washington 141 00:18:06.520 --> 00:18:12.320 went along with this. One of the actual disadvantages of the Articles of Confederation had been 142 00:18:12.320 --> 00:18:18.840 that the states could impose taxes and tariffs on each other's goods, but this of 143 00:18:18.840 --> 00:18:23.600 course might have been remedied by other means in the Constitution such as a free 144 00:18:23.600 --> 00:18:28.120 trade agreement, but even though now one of the genuine advantages of the 145 00:18:28.120 --> 00:18:32.880 Constitution was that there was free trade among the states, the states can't 146 00:18:32.880 --> 00:18:40.240 impose duties on each other's goods, Hamilton and with Washington backing him 147 00:18:40.240 --> 00:18:47.080 came up, partly negated the value of this by having the policy of protective tariffs. 148 00:18:47.080 --> 00:18:53.040 This of course played a crucial role much later on in leading to the Civil War because 149 00:18:53.040 --> 00:19:00.160 of southern resentment against tariffs that benefited the northern states. 150 00:19:00.160 --> 00:19:13.260 But this, it was an even more basic assault on limited government that came later by Hamilton. 151 00:19:13.260 --> 00:19:19.320 And this involved his proposal of a national bank for the United States. 152 00:19:19.320 --> 00:19:25.800 The crucial fact here, I think, is not so much the economic particulars of having a 153 00:19:25.800 --> 00:19:51.300 and National Bank, but the constitutional issue that this raised, there appears to be an overwhelming objection to the government establishing a national bank, which is that the Constitution says nothing at all about Congress or any other part of the government having the power to establish such a bank. 154 00:19:51.300 --> 00:20:01.780 Further, the 10th Amendment and the Bill of Rights which the states insisted on for ratification 155 00:20:01.780 --> 00:20:06.260 seems specifically to prohibit the government from assuming new powers. 156 00:20:06.260 --> 00:20:14.940 It says all powers not delegated by this constitution to the government nor prohibited by it to 157 00:20:14.940 --> 00:20:19.460 the states are reserved to the states respectively or to the people. 158 00:20:19.460 --> 00:20:26.020 This seems to rule out a national bank altogether, even if one took the view, which I think is 159 00:20:26.020 --> 00:20:30.420 a wrong one, that a national bank was desirable, it seemed that there would be nothing one 160 00:20:30.420 --> 00:20:37.260 could do about it, short of having a constitutional amendment to establish it. 161 00:20:37.260 --> 00:20:46.380 But Hamilton would not let anything like the Constitution stand in his way, and a request 162 00:20:46.380 --> 00:20:54.900 West of Washington, he submitted an analysis, a report on the constitutionality of the bank 163 00:20:54.900 --> 00:21:02.640 and he advanced in this some arguments that have been crucial to the subsequent development 164 00:21:02.640 --> 00:21:06.100 of statism in our country. 165 00:21:06.100 --> 00:21:14.500 One was he said that he used the famous argument of the elastic clause, that Congress has, 166 00:21:14.500 --> 00:21:26.500 One phrase of the Constitution has the power to enact all measures necessary and proper to establishing, to putting into effect whatever powers they've been granted. 167 00:21:26.500 --> 00:21:37.500 So he took this necessary and proper clause to mean that the Congress could establish even measures that aren't specifically mentioned. 168 00:21:37.500 --> 00:22:01.500 Even though there's nothing said about a bank, as long as it was thought necessary and proper to establish some sort of governmental function, which he took in a very broad way, Congress could do it, so there would be practically no limitation at all on the power of the government if this interpretation was accepted. 169 00:22:01.500 --> 00:22:16.500 Now, you might think, well, how would Hamilton get around the 10th amendment, which seems to say, go against us, and say, no, no, any power is not delegated to the government or reserved to the states or to the people. 170 00:22:16.500 --> 00:22:21.500 How would he get around that? Well, he was a very good lawyer. 171 00:22:21.500 --> 00:22:31.500 and the barrier. Again, he resembles the present occupant of the White House in his ability to come up with unexpected nuances of words. 172 00:22:31.500 --> 00:22:42.500 And he pointed out that the 10th Amendment doesn't say all powers expressly delegated by the government to the Constitution are reserved, 173 00:22:42.500 --> 00:22:50.500 not expressly delegated or reserved to the states or to the people. It just says all powers delegated. 174 00:22:50.500 --> 00:22:58.300 So this left it open for these indirect powers, the powers that weren't specifically mentioned 175 00:22:58.300 --> 00:23:02.420 to be given to the central government. 176 00:23:02.420 --> 00:23:11.380 In Hamilton's view, the 10th Amendment virtually did nothing, it really had almost no limitations 177 00:23:11.380 --> 00:23:16.220 at all, imposed no limitations at all on the power of the government. 178 00:23:16.220 --> 00:23:23.540 So this very expansive interpretation of the power of the national government and this 179 00:23:23.540 --> 00:23:31.660 evisceration of the 10th Amendment was accepted by Washington when he signed the bill authorizing 180 00:23:31.660 --> 00:23:35.460 the Bank of the United States in February 1791. 181 00:23:35.460 --> 00:23:47.060 So Washington then accepted the basic premise that has been crucial for the subsequent development 182 00:23:47.060 --> 00:23:54.060 of statism, namely that the Constitution doesn't impose extremely strict limits on Congress, 183 00:23:54.060 --> 00:23:58.940 but through the necessary and proper clause, Congress is in a position to do much more 184 00:23:58.940 --> 00:24:08.340 more than one might have imagined just by reading the specific language of the Constitution. 185 00:24:08.340 --> 00:24:16.100 Now I should mention there's an obvious objection to my argument, I'm sure you all thought of, 186 00:24:16.100 --> 00:24:23.700 that when I've been arguing that Washington's prestige led people to accept or at least not 187 00:24:23.700 --> 00:24:28.540 to object to as much as they otherwise might have to state its measures. 188 00:24:28.540 --> 00:24:36.220 What about the farewell address? Isn't this sort of the founding document of a non-interventionist 189 00:24:36.220 --> 00:24:44.660 foreign policy? And indeed it is, and I think one must give credit here to Washington for, 190 00:24:44.660 --> 00:24:53.020 in this sense, his policies moved strongly in the direction that supported limited government. 191 00:24:53.020 --> 00:25:19.020 The policy in the Farewell Address, I should say the Farewell Address is not an actual speech, it's an article that Washington drafted in September 1796 and was published in the American Gazette, which was the official newspaper setting forward certain principles of government that he was giving when he retired from the presidency. 192 00:25:19.020 --> 00:25:25.100 Policy. There's a lot of controversy on who helped in the draft. Some people think that 193 00:25:25.100 --> 00:25:31.540 Hamilton really wrote most of the farewell address, but this has been disputed. But in 194 00:25:31.540 --> 00:25:41.500 this address, Washington gives some principles that I think very much move in an anti-status 195 00:25:41.500 --> 00:25:47.180 direction, foreign policy. He warns against what he calls inveterate antipathies toward 196 00:25:47.180 --> 00:25:55.420 Particular States or attachments to other states and he suggests that Europe has a 197 00:25:55.420 --> 00:26:00.740 set of concerns that are very distinct from those of the United States and the 198 00:26:00.740 --> 00:26:06.660 United States should avoid intervention in these concerns. The European 199 00:26:06.660 --> 00:26:12.260 politics, power politics, are essentially not an American concern. We should stay 200 00:26:12.260 --> 00:26:23.020 out of them and, as he said, avoid permanent alliances. So his policy there, as I say, 201 00:26:23.020 --> 00:26:28.920 has had very beneficial results in the sense that throughout American history, people have 202 00:26:28.920 --> 00:26:36.140 appealed to Washington's farewell address as a reason to avoid entering the war, even 203 00:26:36.140 --> 00:26:43.140 down to World War II, Opponents of American Intervention of the War, Appeal to the Principles 204 00:26:43.180 --> 00:26:49.140 of the Farewell Address. Unfortunately, since I like to spoil everything, I must say there's 205 00:26:49.140 --> 00:26:56.140 a problem in this use of this argument. Again, we have the fundamental, what I think is fallacious 206 00:26:56.700 --> 00:27:03.540 argument, since Washington supported a policy, therefore it must be a good one. Again, people 207 00:27:03.540 --> 00:27:09.140 People sometimes seem to argue, since Washington favored non-intervention, then we ought to 208 00:27:09.140 --> 00:27:14.420 support this policy, but I think at least it's a less bad argument in that it has good 209 00:27:14.420 --> 00:27:15.420 consequences. 210 00:27:15.420 --> 00:27:21.100 Maybe it's all right to use bad arguments if they have beneficial consequences, but 211 00:27:21.100 --> 00:27:31.100 more seriously, Washington in the farewell address actually gave good arguments for non-interventionism, 212 00:27:31.100 --> 00:27:42.740 The kind I mentioned specifically that the U.S. had separate interests from those of Europe and should avoid interferences in European affairs. 213 00:27:42.740 --> 00:27:54.940 And it's interesting, if we look at later presidents who have gone against Washington's non-interventionist policy, they have the farewell addressed very much in mind. 214 00:27:54.940 --> 00:28:06.060 For example, Harry Truman, in his memoirs, of course, helped inaugurate the Cold War, 215 00:28:06.060 --> 00:28:11.980 expresses very much resentment against the fact that it's a tradition for a member of 216 00:28:11.980 --> 00:28:17.660 the Senate to read the farewell address every year. 217 00:28:17.660 --> 00:28:24.300 He said he was pretty sick of this, and he said this was used by organizations such as 218 00:28:24.300 --> 00:28:27.500 The American First Committee and the Ku Klux Klan. 219 00:28:27.500 --> 00:28:30.460 You notice how with typical subtlety, 220 00:28:30.460 --> 00:28:33.060 Truman links these two organizations. 221 00:28:33.060 --> 00:28:35.220 So he said, this, of course, was outdated. 222 00:28:35.220 --> 00:28:37.060 We couldn't use this now. 223 00:28:37.060 --> 00:28:44.380 And he recognizes the great prestige even then of Washington's policies. 224 00:28:44.380 --> 00:28:48.380 But even though, as I say, we have to give Washington credit 225 00:28:48.380 --> 00:28:52.900 for the non-interventionist policy of the farewell address, 226 00:28:52.900 --> 00:28:57.900 I think on balance he was still very much a supporter of centralized government. 227 00:28:57.900 --> 00:29:10.400 We can see in later American history how much appeals to Washington helped support the moves towards centralization. 228 00:29:10.400 --> 00:29:21.100 For example, Daniel Webster in his 1832 address on the centenary of Washington's birth very much opposed sectionalism 229 00:29:21.100 --> 00:29:51.100 and the moves by various southern states to claim they had the power to nullify state laws on the grounds that Washington had favored a strong national union. Again, as if this were the decisive consideration. Again, during the Lincoln-Douglas debates in 1858, Lincoln was very clear that slavery should be imposed in part because Washington, although himself a slave owner, had been opposed to slavery. Since Washington 230 00:29:51.100 --> 00:29:56.360 Washington, who was the great leader and founder of our country that opposed the slavery, therefore 231 00:29:56.360 --> 00:30:04.300 the sort of policy Lincoln favored of having the forcible intervention against the southern 232 00:30:04.300 --> 00:30:12.780 states was also desirable. He was in the Washingtonian tradition, at least so he pictured himself. 233 00:30:12.780 --> 00:30:21.160 So although then the picture is not an entirely unmixed one because of the farewell address, 234 00:30:21.160 --> 00:30:28.100 I think we can say on balance that Washington was a strong supporter of centralism within 235 00:30:28.100 --> 00:30:33.740 the context of his time and an opponent of limited government. James Madison, who somewhat 236 00:30:33.740 --> 00:30:41.020 repented of his earlier strongly centralist views, predicted once that there would be 237 00:30:41.020 --> 00:30:47.020 There would be a crisis in American government because of the growth of caesarism or dictatorship 238 00:30:47.020 --> 00:30:52.740 and he predicted that this crisis would come about somewhere around 1930. 239 00:30:52.740 --> 00:30:59.220 His prediction proved to be accurate and in part because of Washington's advocacy of centralism, 240 00:30:59.220 --> 00:31:02.220 we've been involved in that same crisis ever since. 241 00:31:03.220 --> 00:31:10.220 Thank you very much.