George Washington and Donald Trump, or, The Great Resignation vs. The Great Insurrection
I was perusing Wikipedia the other day, and for December 23 it commemorated, in its "On This Day", the day when General George Washington—independence secured and ratified by the Treaty of Paris—resigned his commission as commander-in-chief of the Continental Army.
Washington had just led the colonies to independence, defeating the world's most powerful state. He had an army loyal to him at his disposal. The sum total of human history up to that date taught that, in general, men with that kind of power did not willingly surrender it. Indeed, it was bruited that Washington should take on some sort of royal position over the new, emerging nation.
Instead, on that December day, he went before Congress, and said this:
Happy in the confirmation of our Independence and Sovereignty, and pleased with the opportunity afforded the United States of becoming a respectable Nation, I resign with satisfaction the Appointment I accepted with diffidence.
…
I consider it an indispensable duty to close this last solemn act of my Official life, by commending the Interests of our dearest Country to the protection of Almighty God, and those who have the superintendence of them, to his holy keeping.
Having now finished the work assigned me, I retire from the great theatre of Action; and bidding an Affectionate farewell to this August body under whose orders I have so long acted, I here offer my Commission, and take my leave of all the employments of public life.
He could have been the American Caesar Augustus, strangling the Republic and ushering in Empire. Instead, like another Roman, Cincinnatus—who was a model for Enlightenment men of means like Washington—he gave up his power after securing victory, and retired to his farm. (Yes, a farm run by slaves, much like that of Cincinnatus. History is not neat and tidy, and we should always keep that foremost in our minds.) Even his erstwhile foe, King George III, had this to say, as reported by the American painter Benjamin West:
In regard to General Washington, he told him since his resignation that in his opinion "that act closing and finishing what had gone before and viewed in connection with it, place him in a light the most distinguished of any man living, and that he thought him the greatest character of the age."
Washington's actions went so against what was expected of men—and they were all men—possessed of great power that the world was astonished and confounded. By his action, Washington announced that this new nation was a very different kind of state, one where the levers of violence and power were subordinated to the dictates of the law.
Fast forward more than two centuries, and a very different and very sordid spectacle unfolded.
The central concept of American democracy is the peaceful transfer of power. A president is elected. He—and yes, so far it's been only men—may run for re-election. He may win. But if he doesn't, he willingly surrenders power to the person who won. He does so without rancor, without animus, without resistance. That is the central ritual of our government. Leaders come and go. The Republic endures.
Until the close of 2020 and the first days of 2021. Until a man named Donald Trump improbably won election to the presidency in 2016. A man against whom all the Founders had warned. A man unfit and unsuited for the immense power which had attached to the American presidency. A man who had never thought of another human being for even a single day in his life, but instead considered only his own desires, pursuing the means to attain them. This inadequate, this unsuitable man was foisted upon this nation, and for four long years he wreaked havoc upon it. Our traditions turned out to be just that: ephemeral, only as strong as those who believed in them. They were mostly unspoken, agreed-upon norms of behaving in public life. When they met a man with no scruples, with no devotion to those traditions, they buckled and came near to breaking. That they survived is a testament to their strength, and to their evolution over the centuries, so that a planter, slave republic is now a diverse, multicultural state. Out of many, one.
What Donald Trump showed is that we need firmer groundings for our democracy. The days when they could be consigned to a "gentlemen's agreement" are long gone. Too many of our fellow citizens no longer wish to abide by that agreement. They see democracy and its underpinnings as detrimental to their own power and privilege. I don't know what fashion these more concrete laws will take. We do see some movement in the Electoral College legislation which has just been passed and signed into law by Joe Biden. But never again can our democracy be held hostage by the likes of Trump. It has to be fortified to be made of sterner stuff. We must, as a free people, remove those things which would enslave us. This runs from outdated "unwritten" laws, to things like social media which seek to influence us to our detriment. We can do this. Do we have the will?