George Washington
On April 30, 1789, George Washington, standing on the balcony of Federal Hall on Wall Street in New York, took his oath of office as the first President of the United States. "As the first of every thing, in our situation will serve to establish a Precedent," he wrote James Madison, "it is devoutly wished on my part, that these precedents may be fixed on true principles."
Born in 1732 into a Virginia planter family, he learned the morals, manners, and body of knowledge requisite for an 18th century Virginia gentleman.
He pursued two intertwined interests: military arts and western expansion. At 16 he helped survey Shenandoah lands for Thomas, Lord Fairfax. Commissioned a lieutenant colonel in 1754, he fought the first skirmishes of what grew into the French and Indian War. The next year, as an aide to Gen. Edward Braddock, he escaped injury although four bullets ripped his coat and two horses were shot from under him.
The First President of the United States, a man who have learned morals and good principles from his own family. I wonder how many US presidents have followed his example nowdays?.
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I think that all would like to think that they follow his footsteps, but George Washington, along with several other leaders of the Revolutionary War, was an incredible and unique individual.
There are many within the US today who study his philosophy, his life, writings, and actions. They want to emulate him, but are thrust out of political life by the realities of the current corrupt political system.
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Did you know that George Washington claimed to have a vision of an angel appearing to him and telling him about the future of what will be the USA as said by Anthony Sherman who said he interviewed George Washington.
George Washington (Hover)
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"My first wish is to see this plague of mankind, war, banished from the earth."
-- George Washington
"Should, hereafter, those incited by the lust of power and prompted by the supineness or venality of their constituents, overleap the known barriers of this Constitution and violate the unalienable rights of humanity: it will only serve to show, that no compact among men (however provident in its construction and sacred in its ratification) can be pronounced everlasting and inviolable, and if I may so express myself, that no wall of words, that no mound of parchment can be so formed as to stand against the sweeping torrent of boundless ambition on the side, aided by the sapping current of corrupted morals on the other."
-- George Washington
"Labour to keep alive in your breast that little spark of celestial fire, called conscience."
-- George Washington - 110 Rules of Civility and Decent Behavior in Company and Conversation, 1737
"Excessive partiality for one foreign nation, and excessive dislike of another, cause those whom they actuate to see danger only on one side, and serve to veil and even second the arts of influence on the other.
Real patriots, who may resist the intrigues of the favorite, are liable to become suspected and odious; while its tools and dupes usurp the applause and confidence of the people, to surrender their interests."
-- George Washington (1732-1799) Founding Father, 1st US President