-Caveat Lector-
>From www.antiwar.com/orig/history1.html
> Editorial Note: Today in History
>
>
>
> September 17, 1999
>
> On this day in 1787, the United States Constitution was signed by a majority of
> the 55 delegates to the Constitutional Convention, in Philadelphia. How the
> Founders would have been horrified by the federal monstrosity that has succeeded
> their labors: a federal government that has been bloated, out of all proportion,
> beyond their wildest imaginings. Also on this day, in 1796, President George
> Washington – having declined a third term – issued his Farewell Address in
> Philadelphia. That historic speech is as relevant today as the day it was
> written and delivered – perhaps it is even more relevant. For today, America
> reigns over a vast empire far more powerful than that lorded over by King George
> III – and the danger to our republic has never been greater. We seem to have
> forgotten the advice left to us by the Father of our country, and sorely need
> reminding. And so here is a portion of Washington's Farewell Address for the
> delectation of our readers, who may or may not be familiar with its sage advice.
>
> Observe good faith and justice toward all nations. Cultivate peace and harmony
> with all. Religion and morality enjoin this conduct. And can it be that good
> policy does not equally enjoin it? It will be worthy of a free, enlightened, and
> at no distant period a great nation to give to mankind the magnanimous and too
> novel example of a people always guided by an exalted justice and benevolence.
> Who can doubt that in the course of time and things the fruits of such a plan
> would richly repay any temporary advantage which might be lost by a steady
> adherence to it? Can it be that Providence has not connected the permanent
> felicity of a nation with its virtue? The experiment, at least, is recommended
> by every sentiment which enobles human nature. Alas! is it rendered impossible
> by its vices?
>
> In the execution of such a plan nothing is more essential than that permanent,
> inveterate antipathies against particular nations and passionate attachments for
> others should be excluded, and that in place of them just and amicable feelings
> toward all should be cultivated. The nation which indulges toward another an
> habitual hatred or an habitual fondness is in some degree a slave. It is a slave
> to its animosity or to its affection, either of which is sufficient to lead it
> astray from its duty and its interest. Antipathy in one nation against another
> disposes each more readily to offer insult and injury, to lay hold of slight
> causes of umbrage, and to be haughty and intractable when accidental or trifling
> occasions of dispute occur.
>
> So, likewise, a passionate attachment of one nation for another produces a
> variety of evils. Sympathy for the favorite nation, facilitating the illusion of
> an imaginary common interest in cases where no real common interest exists, and
> infusing into one the enmities of the other, betrays the former into a
> participation in the quarrels and wars of the latter without adequate inducement
> or justification. It leads also to concessions to the favorite nation of
> privileges denied to others, which is apt doubly to injure the nation making the
> concessions by unnecessarily parting with what ought to have been retained, and
> by exciting jealousy, ill will, and a disposition to retaliate in the parties
> from whom equal privileges are withheld; and it gives to ambitious, corrupted,
> or deluded citizens (who devote themselves to the favorite nation) facility to
> betray or sacrifice the interests of their own country without odium, sometimes
> even with popularity, gilding with the appearances of a virtuous sense of
> obligation, a commendable deference for public opinion, or a laudable zeal for
> public good the base or foolish compliances of ambition, corruption, or
> infatuation.
>
> Against the insidious wiles of foreign influence (I conjure you to believe me,
> fellow citizens) the jealousy of a free people ought to be constantly awake,
> since history and experience prove that foreign influence is one of the most
> baneful foes of republican government. But that jealousy, to be useful, must be
> impartial, else it becomes the instrument of the very influence to be avoided,
> instead of a defense against it. 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.
>
> The great rule of conduct for us in regard to foreign nations is, in extending
> our commercial relations to have with them as little political connection as
> possible. So far as we have already formed engagements let them be fulfilled
> with perfect good faith. Here let us stop.
>
> Europe has a set of primary interests which to us have none or a very remote
> relation. Hence she must be engaged in frequent controversies, the causes of
> which are essentially foreign to our concerns. Hence, therefore, it must be
> unwise in us to implicate ourselves by artificial ties in the ordinary
> vicissitudes of her politics or the ordinary combinations and collisions of her
> friendships or enmities.
>
> Our detached and distant situation invites and enables us to pursue a different
> course. If we remain one people, under an efficient government, the period is
> not far off when we may defy material injury from external annoyance; when we
> may take such an attitude as will cause the neutrality we may at any time
> resolve upon to be scrupulously respected; when belligerent nations, under the
> impossibility of making acquisitions upon us, will not lightly hazard the giving
> us provocation; when we may choose peace or war, as our interest, guided by
> justice, shall counsel.
>
> Why forego the advantages of so peculiar a situation? Why quit our own to stand
> upon foreign ground? Why, by interweaving our destiny with that of any part of
> Europe, entangle our peace and prosperity in the toils of European ambition,
> rivalship, interest, humor, or caprice?
>
> It is our true policy to steer clear of permanent alliances with any portion of
> the foreign world, so far, I mean, as we are now at liberty to do it; for let me
> not be understood as capable of patronizing infidelity to existing engagements.
> I hold the maxim no less applicable to public than to private affairs that
> honesty is always the best policy. I repeat, therefore, let those engagements be
> observed in their genuine sense. But in my opinion it is unnecessary and would
> be unwise to extend them.
>
> Taking care always to keep ourselves by suitable establishments on a respectable
> defensive posture, we may safely trust to temporary alliances for extraordinary
> emergencies.
>
> Harmony, liberal intercourse with all nations are recommended by policy,
> humanity, and interest. But even our commercial policy should hold an equal and
> impartial hand, neither seeking nor granting exclusive favors or preferences;
> consulting the natural course of things; diffusing and diversifying by gentle
> means the streams of commerce, but forcing nothing; establishing with powers so
> disposed, in order to give trade a stable course, to define the rights of our
> merchants, and to enable the Government to support them, conventional rules of
> intercourse, the best that present circumstances and mutual opinion will permit,
> but temporary and liable to be from time to time abandoned or varied as
> experience and circumstances shall dictate; constantly keeping in view that it
> is folly in one nation to look for disinterested favors from another; that it
> must pay with a portion of its independence for whatever it may accept under
> that character; that by such acceptance it may place itself in the condition of
> having given equivalents for nominal favors, and yet being reproached with
> ingratitude for not giving more. There can be no greater error than to expect or
> calculate upon real favors from nation to nation. It is an illusion which
> experience must cure, which a just pride ought to discard.
>
>
>
> ~ George Washington
> September 17, 1787
A<>E<>R
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The only real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking
new landscapes but in having new eyes. -Marcel Proust
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"Believe nothing, no matter where you read it, or who said
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A merely fallen enemy may rise again, but the reconciled
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German Writer (1759-1805)
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