John Robson: What Would George Washington Say About the Current State of Affairs?

The George Washington statue in the Boston Garden in Boston, Mass., in 2017. Ryan McBride/AFP via Getty Images

Commentary

What would George Washington say? I can ask, even about modern politics, this July 4 because America’s first president was a man of such studious self-control that his answer, though furiously indignant, would be printable.

As a Canadian I should also ask what Sir John A. Macdonald would say about our southern neighbour pondering a rematch between Donald Trump and Joe Biden, and our own squalid politics. But as he’s been cancelled and thrown into the Kichi Zībī, he would just gurgle. (Which some days he did anyway.)

I could ask about the Duke of Wellington since we have yet to erase Wellington Street, possibly due to ignorance of its origins. Even I only recently discovered the Iron Duke’s striking combination of profundity and wit, including “Being born in a stable does not make one a horse,” a splendid maxim for a land of opportunity.

Which Canada once famously was, like America, before we substituted identity politics for individual merit. Wellington also cautioned, “Wise people learn when they can; fools learn when they must,” and when some chump greeted him with “Mr. Jones, I believe,” retorted, “If you will believe that you will believe anything.” But I gress.

A file photo of Canada's first prime minister, John A. Macdonald. NFB/National Archives of Canada

The victor at Waterloo was a genuine hero of staunch conservative beliefs appalled by the prospect of mob rule. (And to prove him right, a mob trashed his house over his opposition to the Reform Bill of 1832.) Were he shown the sorry state of modern politics and governance, I suspect he would claim vindication. Ditto Washington. And yes, Sir John A.

Do not suppose such people were born marble and never spat or swore. On the contrary, young Washington strove manfully to cultivate virtue, including copying out maxims like “Bedew no man’s face with your spittle.” It’s still good advice, and we’d be better off governed by people who spontaneously used “bedew” rather than babbling, “As Canadians, the principles of diversity, inclusivity, and equality is at the fabric of our values.”

Washington also left an eggnog recipe that, I’ve mentioned before, would have you throwing two silver dollars across both Rappahannocks while tumbling in. Cheers, Sir John. And of course, we remember Washington and Macdonald because they were exceptional. Many politicians from their eras, as any other, lack statues because it would have been an egregious waste of sandstone let alone marble. And many got statues that were.

The French writer André Maurois once said that “In literature as in love, we are astonished at what is chosen by others.” And sometimes, I might add, by ourselves. As I’d also add that it’s true of politics too and always was. For every Washington there’s a circus parade of popular windbags, mediocrities, and scoundrels.

Indeed if Washington were to drop by briefly today to favour us with his wisdom, he would warn first and foremost against electing persons of doubtful character. And then the baneful influence of partisanship. Before asking for what purpose the Revolution was fought given our current surrender of all liberties to a bloated, arbitrary state and all virtues to the pursuit of pleasure.

Wellington would say the same and so, believe it or not, would Sir John A. Though noted for the well-lubricated nature of his political manoeuvrings, he was also a devotee of limited government of a sort that gets called “far-right” today. But who am I to speak for Washington, you ask?

One who has read his Farewell Address, including its sentiment that no current crisis required him to cling to power by any means possible, as baffling to any modern “statesperson” as “bedew” or “specious.” As in “resist with care the spirit of innovation upon its [Constitutional] principles, however specious the pretexts.”

Likewise, he conceded that political “parties in free countries are useful checks upon the administration of the Government, and serve to keep alive the spirit of Liberty.” But “the spirit of party … demands a uniform vigilance to prevent its bursting into a flame, lest, instead of warming, it should consume.” Can Democrats who wink at Hunter Biden, or Republicans who excuse Trump, (or Canadians who cheer Trudeau, Singh, or Poilievre) look even a portrait of Washington in the face?

If so, it’s because they also forgot this piece of hate speech: “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 … 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.”

So um Happy July 4, sir. Sorry about the mess.

Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.