George Washington: First Inaugural Address

About the Author

George Washington was born into a middle-gentry family in Westmoreland County, Virginia, on February 22, 1732. When he was eleven years old, his father died and his older stepbrother Lawrence became a father figure to him. When Lawrence married into the wealthy Fairfax family, opportunities opened for the young Washington. Through this connection, Washington was appointed surveyor of Culpeper County on the fringe of the Virginia frontier. The seventeen-year-old surveyor adjusted to life in the wilderness and started to build his own estate by purchasing land.

Washington decided to make the military his career, and his ultimate goal was to receive a commission in the British army. Virginia governor Robert Dinwiddie sent Washington with orders to the French to leave what was thought by Virginians to be their territory (the present-day area around Pittsburgh). After several encounters with the French, Washington triggered the beginning of the French and Indian War, which then spread to Europe. In 1755 Washington served as a volunteer aide to the British general Edward Braddock. At the battle of the Monongahela, Washington escaped unscathed when most other officers were killed. He became commander in chief of the Virginia militia at the age of twenty-two. Despite Washington's military accomplishments, the British refused to give him a commission in the regular army.

Appreciative of his service on the frontier, the western district of Frederick County elected Washington to the colonial House of Burgesses for eight years. He served another ten years as a burgess from his Fairfax County home from 1766 to 1776. In January 1759 he married the wealthy widow Martha Dandridge Custis. Her inheritance consisted of land and slaves, which after their marriage were under Washington's guardianship.

Washington opposed the new British imperial policy instituted in 1763. Elected to the First and Second Continental Congresses, he arrived at the latter dressed in the uniform of a Virginia militia colonel—the only delegate so attired. On June 15, 1775, Congress elected him commander in chief, a position he held throughout the Revolutionary War.

In March 1783 Washington suppressed an uprising among the army officers, who were angry with Congress for not fulfilling their pension promises. Three months later Washington sent his last circular letter to the states, informing them that he would retire after the cessation of hostilities and would not serve again in public office. In this letter Washington included advice that he felt was necessary to make America great. Of paramount importance, the Union had to be preserved and Congress's powers had to be increased. The country's public credit and public justice had to be maintained by paying the wartime debt both to foreign and domestic public creditors, honoring promises made to the army and its officers, and providing pensions to invalid soldiers and widows and orphans of those who had died during the war. Congress also had to provide an adequate peacetime military establishment to replace the militia, which had been largely ineffective during the war. Last, Americans had to reestablish respect for government and develop a new sense of national identity. The old sectionalism and rampant animosities existing before and during the war had to give way to a new sense of American union and citizenry.

With the British evacuation of New York City on November 25, 1783, the war for independence ended. Washington left New York to perform his last duty as commander in chief. On December 23, 1783, he surrendered his commission to Congress in Annapolis, Maryland, and then retired to Mount Vernon after an absence of eight years.

After the war America prospered until a severe postwar economic depression swept across the country. Succumbing to the demands of desperate debtors, demagogic state assemblies enacted radical anticreditor legislation. In many states debtors resorted to violence. Two courthouses were burned in western Virginia, and the civil courts were forcibly closed in western Massachusetts to stop foreclosures on farms. The Confederation Congress, without coercive powers, was unable to pass relief measures or suppress violence. Calls were issued for a general convention of the states to amend the Articles of Confederation. The Virginia legislature quickly authorized and elected its convention delegation, which included Washington. After repeatedly rejecting the appointment, primarily because of his 1783 promise not to serve again in public office, Washington yielded to pressure from friends and advisers and accepted the appointment. The convention assembled in late May 1787 in Philadelphia, where Washington was elected president. On September 17, 1787, he signed both the Constitution and a letter from the convention to the president of Congress.

Because he felt that he might have to serve as the country's first president, Washington chose not to work openly for ratification of the Constitution. Much to the chagrin of Virginia Federalists, he even refused to be a delegate to the state ratifying convention. Once the Constitution was adopted, he reluctantly accepted the unanimous election as president and was inaugurated on April 30, 1789. Washington was ready to retire after one term, but his advisers convinced him that he must continue for a second term, because political turmoil at home and a raging war in Europe required his unifying leadership. With partisan politics ever increasing, Washington decided not to stand for a third term.

Washington retired to Mount Vernon in March 1797. Although he enjoyed his long-sought private life, he still maintained a vast correspondence and enjoyed almost daily visits from friends, old army compatriots, and curious Americans and Europeans who wanted to see the man universally recognized as the father of his country.

To prepare for a possible war with France in 1798, President John Adams appointed Washington commander in chief of a provisional army that was to be raised to defend the country against an expected invasion. Washington immediately dismissed others' attempts to abandon President Adams and persuade Washington to run for a third term. Adams's peace efforts eliminated the threat of war and thus the need for the army.

Healthy and vigorous at sixty-seven, Washington contracted a severe cold on December 10, 1799, after spending hours on horseback during a torrential storm on the plantation. His illness developed into a condition in which he was unable to breathe. His attending physicians further weakened him by bleeding him of thirty-two ounces of blood, a typical treatment for the era. He died on December 14, 1799, and was buried at Mount Vernon.