"The story of Washington's voluntary resignation spread across the country and the globe, as he astonishingly gave up political power to return to his farm.
Across the Atlantic, upon learning of Washington's resignation from public life, King George III reportedly told the American-born artist Benjamin West: 'If [Washington] does that, he will be the greatest man in the world.'"
Mount Vernon Historical Society
Washington could have been dictator. The strong man leader of the new country. The American king.
In 1775 George Washington took command of the Continental Army in Cambridge, Massachusetts. In 1783, after the peace treaty with Britain had been signed, he returned his commission to the Congress in a ceremony at the temporary American capital in Annapolis, Maryland.
Washington understood the power of ceremony and the body language of visible gesture. He looked the part of general. He was tall, elegant, and regal in bearing. On the battlefield after the final victory he refused to accept British surrender from General Cornwallis' second in command. He delayed until Cornwallis himself did the surrender. The top man deals only with the top man. It was a matter of respect and authority.
The Newburgh Conspiracy was a threatened military coup by some of Washington's officers in 1783, late in the struggle for independence. The fighting had ended but the troops had not been paid. Washington spoke to his officers, urging patience, urging that they not "open the floodgates of civil discord." He reminded them of the supremacy of Congress, and then made a gesture. He referenced a letter from Congress. He took it out of a pocket and fumbled with it. Then he took out glasses. Few of his men had ever seen George Washington with eyeglasses.
"Gentlemen, you will permit me to put on my spectacles, for I have not only grown gray but almost blind in the service of my country."
It shocked the men. It re-established that their leader sacrificed along with them. With that, the mutiny collapsed.
George Washington arranged a ceremony for the return of his commission. He spoke, There was a dinner for 200, there were 13 toasts, he danced with every woman who wanted a brief touch of the great man. At the ceremony he said,
"Having now finished the work assigned me, I retire from the great theater of action, and bidding an affectionate farewell to their 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."
Notice something: he understood he was under orders of the Congress. He wasn't the leader. He was the agent of the people.
Washington handed the paper to the President of the Congress and bowed. The men of Congress were instructed not to bow in return. The top people don't bow; only the subordinate. And so the hierarchy and power relationship was established. Executive and military power obeyed the sovereign. It operates under orders. Temporary leaders relinquish power gracefully because power was never really theirs.
This history intersects with Donald Trump. Trump, like Washington, understands the importance of the theater of strength. It may seem laughable to some readers to liken Trump's vulgar braggadocio with Washington's regal elegance, but within the culture and media environment of each of their times, each attempts to communicate strength and personal sacrifice. Especially in the 2016 primary campaign, Trump tried to communicate sacrifice and incorruptibility because he said he self-funded his campaign. Trump's adult children and Fox now repeatedly describe what a sacrifice Trump is making on our behalf. He could be living the luxurious life of leisure, enjoying his airplane, golf courses, and gold-appointed homes. Instead he risks COVID, and gets it, his sacrifice.
Trump's supporters see him that way. In a previous post I shared the comment of one of the women buying Trump merchandise, whose primary comment about Trump was his sacrifice, with Trump giving up "anything a man would want", his golf, his leisure, his Shangri-la. His evangelical Christian supporters see Trump as suffering on a cross of media and cosmopolitan elite criticism, currently for his defense of churches that rebel at COVID restrictions on gatherings.
We do not yet know how Trump's open effort to move the question of a transfer of power from the election to the courts will work out for him. It may be too much, especially if there is an early report that he lost Florida.
But if Trump wins Florida, it is game on. It means the election will be close and the results will be determined by Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Arizona, and North Carolina, all states with Republican-majority legislatures. Trump has done the groundwork of de-legitimizing the way a majority of Democrats will vote. Polls suggest 65% of Republicans think that elections with substantial mail-in voting will be "somewhat" or "mostly fraudulent." Elections may have less credibility with Republican voters than would be a decision by the Supreme Court not to count ballots that are contested, and Trump has already announced that he will contest them.
In 2020 there was grudging respect given Al Gore for his conceding the election and accepting the decision of the Supreme Court, even when its decision was to stop counting votes. Now Democrats are more inclined to see Gore as a naive patsy, a quitter, a do-gooder who got rolled by a fake "Brooks Brothers riot" arranged by Roger Stone. Trump's legal team is open about contesting votes. After all, "the only way we're going to lose this election is if it is rigged," and rigged it will be, Trump says. Why count fake votes?
In a failed election with uncounted votes and unknown validity, Republican legislatures may be able to step in and interpret on their own the actual "will of the people." If that is successful Trump will stay in office, re-elected by an electoral college chosen by Republican legislatures, okayed by a Supreme Court whose membership was recently chosen, again openly to achieve majorities to help decide this election. This may well seem "irregular" to Republicans, but it will be arguably the outcome ordained by a quirky Constitutional set of rules. There will be litigation on all of this, but ultimately the Supreme Court would decide. A Republican win, however achieved, was a welcome one for Republicans in 2000 and likely would be again in 2020. One doesn't look a gift horse in the mouth.
There will certainly be civil unrest, but unrest would validate the need for decisive decisions by the Supreme Court, which will give the irregularities a veneer of urgency and necessity, as well as legality.
It would be civic body language, and people on both sides would learn the unmistakable lesson. It would not be the lesson of Washington, that power belongs to the people and that leadership is given up willingly. It will be that winners win, that losers lose, and one can and and should use partisan power to win and retain power at all costs. There will be a sovereign, but it will no longer be the will of the people. It will be whoever can game the system and hang on.
It isn't George Washington's country anymore.
1 comment:
It is still George Washington's country if we chose to demand it. We the people who vote. The members of Congress, who's powers are enumerated in Article One, are the authority. A strict reading of the Constitution affirms that point. To Peter's point, will the executive and military respect that relationship? They have taken an oath to uphold the Constitution but what if they don't. Return to 1859 and relive the Civil War or descend into Strongman rule. I believe there's little fight in the average American citizen to take up arms against a usurper should Trump chose that path. So what is left is to acquiesce to an increasingly authoritarian government. I would expect the first rule of business would be a rewrite of the Constitution to assure "their" (not OUR) will. The most glaring example is post-soviet Russia. Hunch that's where all this is coming from seems likely. Yes, the only way to bring down the United States of America is from within. Any other direct attack us would lead to global nuclear war.
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