Washington's+Farewell+Address

__**GEORGE WASHINGTON’S FAREWELL ADDRESS **__

Friends and Fellow-Citizens:

 The period for a new election of a citizen to administer the Executive Government of the United States being not far distant...it appears to me proper... that I should now apprise you of the resolution I have formed to decline being considered among the number of those out of whom a choice is to be made.... Here, perhaps, I ought to stop. But a solicitude for your welfare which can not end with my life, and the apprehension of danger natural to that solicitude, urge me on an occasion like the present to offer to your solemn contemplation and to recommend to your frequent review some sentiments which are the result of much reflection, of no inconsiderable observation, and which appear to me all important to permanency of your felicity as a people.... In contemplating the causes which may disturb our union it occurs as matter of serious concern that any ground should have been furnished for characterizing parties by geographical discriminations--Northern and Southern, Atlantic and Western -- whence designing men may endeavor to excite a belief that there is a real difference of local interests and views....

 No alliances, however strict, between the parts can be an adequate substitute. The basis of our political systems is the right of the people to make and to alter their constitutions of government...The very idea of the power and the right of the people to establish government presupposes the duty of every individual to obey the established government.... I have already intimated to you the danger of parties in the State, with particular reference to the founding of them on geographical discriminations. Let me now take a more comprehensive view, and warn you in the most solemn manner against the baneful effects of the spirit of party generally.

 This spirit, unfortunately, is inseparable from our nature, having its root in the strongest passions of the human mind....It serves always to distract the public councils and enfeeble the public administration. It agitates the community with ill- founded jealousies and false alarms; kindles the animosity of one part against another; foments occasionally riot and insurrection. It opens the door to foreign influence and corruption, which finds a facilitated access to the government itself through the channels of party passion.... It is important, likewise, that the habits of thinking in a free country should inspire caution in those entrusted with its administration to confine themselves within their respective constitutional spheres, avoiding in the exercise of the powers of one department to encroach upon another. The spirit of encroachment tends to consolidate the powers of all the departments in one, and thus to create, whatever the form of government, a real despotism.... If in the opinion of the people the distribution or modification of the constitutional powers be in any particular wrong, let it be corrected by an amendment in the way which the Constitution designates....

 Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable supports.... And let us with caution indulge the supposition that morality can be maintained without religion....Reason and experience both forbid us to expect that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle.... As a very important source of strength and security, cherish public credit....avoiding likewise the accumulation of debt...not ungenerously throwing upon posterity the burden which we ourselves ought to bear....Observe good faith and justice toward all nations. Cultivate peace and harmony with all. Religion and morality enjoin this conduct.... The great rule of conduct for us in regard to foreign nations is...to have with them as little political connection as possible....

 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.... It is our true policy to steer clear of permanent alliances with any portion of the foreign world.... 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....

 Relying on its kindness in this as in other things, and actuated by that fervent love toward it which is so natural to a man who views in it the native soil of himself and his progenitors for several generations, I anticipate with pleasing expectation that retreat in which I promise myself to realize without alloy the sweet enjoyment of partaking in the midst of my fellow- citizens the benign influence of good laws under a free government -- the ever-favorite object of my heart, and the happy reward, as I trust, of our mutual cares, labors, and dangers.