HISTORIC SPEECHES
GEORGE WASHINGTON
First Inaugural Address
New York
April 30, 1789
Fellow-Citizens of the Senate and of the
House of Representatives:
Among the vicissitudes incident to life no event could
have filled me with greater anxieties than that of which
the notification was transmitted by your order, and received
on the 14th day of the present month. On the one hand,
I was summoned by my Country, whose voice I can never hear
but with veneration and love, from a retreat which I had
chosen with the fondest predilection, and, in my flattering
hopes, with an immutable decision, as the asylum of my
declining years--a retreat which was rendered every day
more necessary as well as more dear to me by the addition
of habit to inclination, and of frequent interruptions
in my health to the gradual waste committed on it by time.
On the other hand, the magnitude and difficulty of the
trust to which the voice of my country called me, being
sufficient to awaken in the wisest and most experienced
of her citizens a distrustful scrutiny into his qualifications,
could not but overwhelm with despondence one who (inheriting
inferior endowments from nature and unpracticed in the
duties of civil administration) ought to be peculiarly
conscious of his own deficiencies. In this conflict of
emotions all I dare aver is that it has been my faithful
study to collect my duty from a just appreciation of every
circumstance by which it might be affected. All I dare
hope is that if, in executing this task, I have been too
much swayed by a grateful remembrance of former instances,
or by an affectionate sensibility to this transcendent
proof of the confidence of my fellow-citizens, and have
thence too little consulted my incapacity as well as disinclination
for the weighty and untried cares before me, my error will
be palliated by the motives which mislead me, and its consequences
be judged by my country with some share of the partiality
in which they originated.
Such being the impressions under which I have, in obedience
to the public summons, repaired to the present station,
it would be peculiarly improper to omit in this first official
act my fervent supplications to that Almighty Being who
rules over the universe, who presides in the councils of
nations, and whose providential aids can supply every human
defect, that His benediction may consecrate to the liberties
and happiness of the people of the United States a Government
instituted by themselves for these essential purposes,
and may enable every instrument employed in its administration
to execute with success the functions allotted to his charge.
In tendering this homage to the Great Author of every public
and private good, I assure myself that it expresses your
sentiments not less than my own, nor those of my fellow-
citizens at large less than either. No people can be bound
to acknowledge and adore the Invisible Hand which conducts
the affairs of men more than those of the United States.
Every step by which they have advanced to the character
of an independent nation seems to have been distinguished
by some token of providential agency; and in the important
revolution just accomplished in the system of their united
government the tranquil deliberations and voluntary consent
of so many distinct communities from which the event has
resulted can not be compared with the means by which most
governments have been established without some return of
pious gratitude, along with an humble anticipation of the
future blessings which the past seem to presage. These
reflections, arising out of the present crisis, have forced
themselves too strongly on my mind to be suppressed. You
will join with me, I trust, in thinking that there are
none under the influence of which the proceedings of a
new and free government can more auspiciously commence.
By the article establishing
the executive department it is made the duty of the President "to recommend to
your consideration such measures as he shall judge necessary
and expedient." The circumstances under which I now
meet you will acquit me from entering into that subject
further than to refer to the great constitutional charter
under which you are assembled, and which, in defining your
powers, designates the objects to which your attention
is to be given. It will be more consistent with those circumstances,
and far more congenial with the feelings which actuate
me, to substitute, in place of a recommendation of particular
measures, the tribute that is due to the talents, the rectitude,
and the patriotism which adorn the characters selected
to devise and adopt them. In these honorable qualifications
I behold the surest pledges that as on one side no local
prejudices or attachments, no separate views nor party
animosities, will misdirect the comprehensive and equal
eye which ought to watch over this great assemblage of
communities and interests, so, on another, that the foundation
of our national policy will be laid in the pure and immutable
principles of private morality, and the preeminence of
free government be exemplified by all the attributes which
can win the affections of its citizens and command the
respect of the world. I dwell on this prospect with every
satisfaction which an ardent love for my country can inspire,
since there is no truth more thoroughly established than
that there exists in the economy and course of nature an
indissoluble union between virtue and happiness; between
duty and advantage; between the genuine maxims of an honest
and magnanimous policy and the solid rewards of public
prosperity and felicity; since we ought to be no less persuaded
that the propitious smiles of Heaven can never be expected
on a nation that disregards the eternal rules of order
and right which Heaven itself has ordained; and since the
preservation of the sacred fire of liberty and the destiny
of the republican model of government are justly considered,
perhaps, as deeply, as finally, staked on the experiment
entrusted to the hands of the American people.
Besides the ordinary objects submitted to your care, it
will remain with your judgment to decide how far an exercise
of the occasional power delegated by the fifth article
of the Constitution is rendered expedient at the present
juncture by the nature of objections which have been urged
against the system, or by the degree of inquietude which
has given birth to them. Instead of undertaking particular
recommendations on this subject, in which I could be guided
by no lights derived from official opportunities, I shall
again give way to my entire confidence in your discernment
and pursuit of the public good; for I assure myself that
whilst you carefully avoid every alteration which might
endanger the benefits of an united and effective government,
or which ought to await the future lessons of experience,
a reverence for the characteristic rights of freemen and
a regard for the public harmony will sufficiently influence
your deliberations on the question how far the former can
be impregnably fortified or the latter be safely and advantageously
promoted.
To the foregoing observations I have one to add, which
will be most properly addressed to the House of Representatives.
It concerns myself, and will therefore be as brief as possible.
When I was first honored with a call into the service of
my country, then on the eve of an arduous struggle for
its liberties, the light in which I contemplated my duty
required that I should renounce every pecuniary compensation.
From this resolution I have in no instance departed; and
being still under the impressions which produced it, I
must decline as inapplicable to myself any share in the
personal emoluments which may be indispensably included
in a permanent provision for the executive department,
and must accordingly pray that the pecuniary estimates
for the station in which I am placed may during my continuance
in it be limited to such actual expenditures as the public
good may be thought to require.
Having thus imparted to you my sentiments as they have
been awakened by the occasion which brings us together,
I shall take my present leave; but not without resorting
once more to the benign Parent of the Human Race in humble
supplication that, since He has been pleased to favor the
American people with opportunities for deliberating in
perfect tranquillity, and dispositions for deciding with
unparalleled unanimity on a form of government for the
security of their union and the advancement of their happiness,
so His divine blessing may be equally conspicuous in the
enlarged views, the temperate consultations, and the wise
measures on which the success of this Government must depend.
<< Go
Back