The United States has, in just 2 and a half centuries, risen from the status of a backwater colony achieving its independence to the most powerful nation on the planet. To do this, we must have had some great and forward-thinking leaders. Out of our 45 presidents, we have had about 7 or 8 leaders who were the most influential in our country’s history, and then the rest who were important but simply expanded upon the ideas of their predecessors. Let’s start with the first president, and the only president who didn’t actually want to become president – George Washington.
Washington – Biography and American Revolution
In 1732, George Washington was born in Westmoreland County, Virginia. His parents were Augustine and Mary Ball Washington. He was the oldest of 6 children and grew up in a moderate plantation-owning family. While his family was well-off, they were nowhere near to the wealthiest Virginia elites – at least not yet. Augustine was a successful landowner and planter who also ran ironworks. Washington lived in Ferry Farm, a plantation near Fredericksburg, Virginia.
Now, you might think that the Father of the United States went to school – but he actually didn’t. He only received basic education in mathematics and geography – that’s it! Also, he was taught writing by local tutors and a church school, but I’m not sure that really counts as actual school. But when Washington was 11 years old, tragedy struck the family, and the fun ended. Augustine died. Washington, the oldest of the family, quickly stood up and became the head of the family, showing his fast maturity as the family leader before he was even a teenager. Some skills!
Washington’s half-brother Lawrence took the role as his father in his teen years and basically introduced him to Virginia’s elite society. I bet he never thought that he would end up the leader of this faction. Anyways, by age 16, Washington, without any school, was working as a land surveyor, mapping out lands in Western Virginia. The following year, he even became the official surveyor of Culpeper County, Virginia – when he was only 17!
However, tragedy struck again two years later when Lawrence died, and thus, Washington would inherit his brother’s wealth. He spent a long time studying farming methods and spent a lot of time trying to expand the manor itself. He failed a bunch of times, but he learned and eventually figured it out. He later married a wealthy woman named Martha Custis. She was filthy rich from her late husband Daniel Custis. Over the rest of his life, he would double all of these land holdings, and he would become one of colonial America’s wealthiest men, with approximately $500 million in net worth!
But Washington still wanted to be even more famous! At age 20, he joined the British military. His first mission was to deliver crucial information between British and French forces in the disputed Midwest. He completed the task effectively, earning fame and being promoted to Lieutenant Colonel.
However, Washington had a problem: he was young, naive, and somewhat stubborn of a man, so when he received these great roles and fame, he became overconfident of his abilities. When a native ally told him that the French were nearby, he blundered and attacked them. This ally probably told Washington this to play the British and French against each other. Washington hid in Fort Necessity. However, when the fort fell to the French, he was captured but later released.
Anyways, Washington’s actions accidentally started a global world war known as the Seven Years War, or in America, we call it the French and Indian War. Obviously, accidentally starting a war in which one million people would go on to die brought some serious controversy to his name, and he was forced to resign in disgrace. He realized that he knew very little, and thus, he had to learn how to be a commander and train from the best.
Washington participated in a following British campaign against the French, but not as a commanding officer, but as an aide. He wanted to see how a seasoned military leader conducted himself in the various mechanisms of war.
And then – it happened.
The officer ,General Edward Braddock, fell in battle. British troops panicked. If Washington had done nothing, the French would’ve utterly massacred them, so he used the skills he had learned to order a hasty retreat, saving his army in the process. Whew!
But still, Washington was done with war and dying (I mean, he started it), so he resigned and decided to enter into politics. If you combine his enormous wealth with his military fame, you got a leader that people are willing to vote for. Winning popular support from both popular farmers and wealthy landowners, Washington was elected to the Virginia House of Burgesses in 1758.
While he was part of the house, he began to realize that many of British policies, including the Stamp Act and the Townshend Acts, were actively hurting the colonies. He soon would become one of the leading organizers of the resistance against colonial rule.
At the Continental Congress, Washington was pretty much the only guy who wore a military suit to the convention and with his popularity and well-recorded military experience, they decided Washington was best fit to become Commander-in-chief.
Now, unlike many believe, Washington was not a master strategist. In all honesty, he had really no idea how to run a military campaign. He lost battle after battle to the British, and he was continuously forced to retreat, and then retreat, and then retreat again. But this was expected.
But one thing Washington was good at was rallying the troops. He knew how to get them excited and rallied up for a military campaign. He would use guerilla warfare and other unconventional tactics. He would strike when they were weak. Although the British were winning, he would deny them the satisfaction of real progress.
My personal favorite example of this was in December 1776. Hessian mercenaries working for Britain assumed that they wouldn’t fight on Christmas day, and so, they spent the day relaxing, partying, and getting drunk. However, Washington knew this, and, realizing the mercenaries were temporarily distracted, swooped in for the kill at the Battle of Trenton and then retreated into the fog before reinforcements could arrive. Just wonderful!
Anyways, these tactics would prove effective. After the British lost the Battle of Yorktown in 1781, they pulled out of the 13 colonies and the Ohio Territory, granting them independence as a new nation – the United States of America.
Washington’s Administration
Once again, Washington was tired of war and dying, so he retired and just wanted to live out his days at Mount Vernon with his family. Despite speculation and even encouragement from his associates that Washington would take control of the government and establish a monarchy or military dictatorship, Washington left governance up to the Continental Congress, trusting they could take care of the country – but they couldn’t.
See, the problem with the congress was that there was no sole or central executive to lead the government. Therefore, there was no centralization of power, and the result was complete and utter chaos – from wars between states to massive populist uprisings. They needed one person to lead the country – and what better man than the man who had achieved this country’s independence: George Washington.
Now, Washington didn’t actually want to become president, but everyone basically forced him into doing it. He was elected unanimously and basically given a blank check to define the presidency. Most presidential traditions to this day were established by President Washington and his administration.
And yes, there were political parties, even back then. While Washington officially wasn’t a member of either party, if he was forced to pick, he would almost certainly pick the Federalists, who advocated for a strong central government, loose interpretation of the Constitution, a national bank, high tariffs & taxation to boost Northern manufacturing, and favoring Britain in foreign affairs over France.
The Federalists were much more pragmatic than their opposition, the Democratic Republicans. (Ironically, the Federalists comprised northern states, and the Democratic Republicans southern states, a sort of precursor to the Civil War.) The Federalists believed that average citizens would be easily corrupted by power and would end up electing tyrannical dictators who would feed them misinformation, which they would believe. Thus, it was the role of the rich aristocracy to ensure and keep democracy alive. This was a long-term system with careful planning that the nation owes its deep survival to.
Washington and the Federalists would try to isolate the US from global affairs while making sure that the nation stood in its wealth and prosperity. They wanted to make sure that this democracy would last for centuries and would not just be a blip in time that would eventually lead to anarchic chaos. Other key actions by the administration would be to forge beneficial relations with Britain, establish a national bank, create the Supreme Court as a sort of third branch of government, and reform and expand the military.
Obviously, almost all of these policies are exactly what the Federalists wanted. The founder and leader of the Federalist Party was Alexander Hamilton, who grew immense power within the administration. However, anti-Federalists, led by Thomas Jefferson, would end up breaking away and forming their own opposition party, the Democratic Republicans.
Now, it’s worth noting that Washington opposed the creation of political parties because he saw them as divisive. However, it was most likely inevitable, as parties make sure that your ideas (Hamilton’s and Jefferson’s) will stay and will not get forgotten. Basically, they were a way to ensure that the ideas of these two would stay on.
The media was very pro-Democratic Republican. They not only directed their attacks toward Alexander Hamilton but toward Washington himself for allying with Hamilton over Jefferson. They accused Washington of coercing Jefferson to resign when in reality, Jefferson resigned because of his own corruption scandals. They called Washington a dictator, a traitor to the country, and even a pro-British puppet. (Damn!) The stress of these constant media accusations was so rough on Washington that he decided to not pursue a third term.
This partisan division even spilled into foreign policy. When the French Revolution broke out in 1789, many wanted the US to back the French Republicans because they stood for the same ideals of democracy and equality. However, it was the French kingdom who had backed the revolutionaries during the American Revolution, and they were the single greatest reason why the Americans won the war. When France asked the US to pay them back its debt, and the US said no, France spiraled into revolution after a bread famine. The same king who had been single handedly responsible for the independence of America had just been executed. Also, military officers who had participated in the American War for Independence on the American side were also executed!
Federalists recognized that these French revolutionaries were not the same kingdom that had aided the US. These revolutionaries had not broken away and formed their own country; instead, they violently executed their king and queen and instilled a reign of terror on the population by beheading anyone they didn’t agree with. This did not represent American values at all! Yet, the radical Democratic Republicans supported them. When Washington rejected a proposed alliance between the US and France against Britain based on ideology, France prepared for war with America. (Wow, that escalated fast!)
But Washington also had to deal with another crisis, right here at home. Native Americans in the Northwest Territory, which Britain had guaranteed to the US in the Treaty of Paris, began to rebel against the Americans. War erupted between the two, and, under Washington’s orders, many Native American villages were completely burned to the ground, and women, men, and children were massacred, so much so that Washington was nicknamed “The Butcher” by Native American tribes. This brought the Native Americans to the negotiating table, in which they signed the Treaty of Greenville in 1794. Basically, the US annexed 3/4ths of Native American land, and in exchange, the US would give … blankets? (Yeah, that’s right!)
In conclusion, Washington’s administration set the precedents for which modern American governance has continued to this day. In his Farewell Address, Washington warned of increasing political polarization, advocating against the creation of political parties and against forming alliances and getting entangled and dragged up in foreign wars. Both of these pieces of advice have been broken, and the result has been pretty catastrophic to this country.
John Adams Administration
John Adams was Washington’s vice president, and at first, he was not supposed to be the Federalist nominee in 1796. Hamilton intended to run for president, but his reputation was tarnished by papers releasing of him confessing to adultery with Maria Reynolds, often considered the first major sex scandal in American history. Hamilton then selected Adams, who won the election in a landslide.
Adams continued the work of Washington and the Federalists as president, both domestically and abroad. Adams continued to build up the military in case we had to go to war with France, but fortunately we didn’t. Instead, Adams and the French engaged in a series of minor skirmishes known as the Quasi War before Napoleon came to power in France and negotiated peace with Adams.
Adams openly realized that if he started a war with France, it likely would’ve guaranteed him re-election. He would’ve been able to bring the Federalist Party together under a single banner of fighting France. It would’ve united the country against the pro-French opposition of the Democratic Republicans.
On the other hand, America was now just a new country, and while the United States might’ve won the war, it would’ve left us exhausted and vulnerable to foreign dominance, maybe perhaps by Britain.
Adams put petty politics over the nation when he made the decision not to go to war with France, but he would eventually regret that decision, as America, his America, Washington’s America, would now undergo its first radical change.
History Explained 