President Washington's Farewell Address

Floor Speech

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Mr. HILL of Arkansas. Mr. Speaker, I am honored to rise today with my colleagues to lead the House of Representatives in reading President George Washington's farewell address.

Having just celebrated the 294th birthday of our indispensable first President, this is a fitting tribute as we celebrate the 250th year of our Nation's creation.

The farewell address is a remarkable document. Published in the American Daily Advertiser on September 19, 1796, it was never delivered in person, but it was widely read and remains one of the most important documents in American history.

President Washington completed his two terms as our indispensable first President. He was first in war, first in peace, and first in the hearts of his countrymen.

Every step of the way, he viewed his actions through the lens of the precedent it would set for the Presidency and for future Presidents: his dress, his decorum, his relationship with Congress, his decisions about his Cabinet, and his approach to executive decisionmaking.

In this address, you will see clearly that he ended his extraordinary public career on a high note.

The practice of reading the farewell address began in a joint session of Congress on February 22, 1862, during the darkest days of the Civil War.

The Senate revived the ceremonial reading in 1888, and each year since 1896, the Senate has observed George Washington's birthday in February by selecting a Senator, alternating parties, to read the 7,641-word statement in their legislative session. This year, fittingly, in this year of America250, our semiquincentennial, it was Senator Tim Kaine of Virginia.

The House revived the ceremonial reading in 1889 and continued intermittently until 1933, after which it became an annual fixture in until 1979.

Today, Mr. Speaker, my colleagues and I are delighted to return this tradition to the House floor accompanied by our handsome portrait of our first President by John Vanderlyn that has hung here in the House Chamber since the 1830s.

Mr. 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, and the time actually arrived when your thoughts must be employed in designating the person who is to be clothed with that important trust, it appears to me proper, especially as it may conduce to a more distinct expression of the public voice, 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.

``I beg you, at the same time, to do me the justice to be assured that this resolution has not been taken without a strict regard to all the considerations appertaining to the relation which binds a dutiful citizen to his country--and that, in withdrawing the tender of service which silence in my situation might imply, I am influenced by no diminution of zeal for your future interest, no deficiency of grateful respect for your past kindness; but am supported by a full conviction that the step is compatible with both.

``The acceptance of, and continuance hitherto in, the office to which your suffrages have twice called me, have been a uniform sacrifice of inclination to the opinion of duty and to a deference for what appeared to be your desire. I constantly hoped that it would have been much earlier in my power, consistently with motives which I was not at liberty to disregard, to return to that retirement from which I had been reluctantly drawn. The strength of my inclination to do this, previous to the last election, had even led to the preparation of an address to declare it to you; but mature reflection on the then perplexed and critical posture of our affairs with foreign nations, and the unanimous advice of persons entitled to my confidence, impelled me to abandon the idea.

``I rejoice that the state of your concerns, external as well as internal, no longer renders the pursuit of inclination incompatible with the sentiment of duty or propriety, and am persuaded whatever partiality may be retained for my services, that in the present circumstances of our country, you will not disapprove my determination to retire.

``The impressions with which I first undertook the arduous trust were explained on the proper occasion. In the discharge of this trust, I will only say that I have, with good intentions, contributed towards the organization and administration of the government, the best exertions of which a very fallible judgment was capable. Not unconscious in the outset of the inferiority of my qualifications, experience in my own eyes, perhaps still more in the eyes of others, has strengthened the motives to diffidence of myself; and every day the increasing weight of years admonishes me more and more that the shade of retirement is as necessary to me as it will be welcome. Satisfied that if any circumstances have given peculiar value to my services, they were temporary, I have the consolation to believe, that while choice and prudence invite me to quit the political scene, patriotism does not forbid it.''

Mr. Speaker, I now yield to the distinguished gentleman from Utah (Mr. Kennedy) to continue our reading.

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Mr. HILL of Arkansas. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Utah for his participation.

He is the distinguished former Lieutenant Governor of the Commonwealth of Virginia.
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Mr. HILL of Arkansas. ``This spirit, unfortunately, is inseparable from our nature, having its root in the strongest passions of the human mind. . . . [B]ut, in those of the popular form, it is seen in its greatest rankness and is truly their worst enemy.

``The alternate domination of one faction over another, sharpened by the spirit of revenge natural to party dissension, which in different ages and countries has perpetrated the most horrid enormities, is itself a frightful despotism. But this leads at length to a more formal and permanent despotism. The disorders and miseries which result gradually incline the minds of men to seek security and repose in the absolute power of an individual; and sooner or later the chief of some prevailing faction, more able or more fortunate than his competitors, turns this disposition to the purposes of his own elevation on the ruins of public liberty.

``Without looking forward to an extremity of this kind (which nevertheless ought not to be entirely out of sight) the common and continual mischiefs of the spirit of party are sufficient to make it the interest and the duty of a wise people to discourage and restrain it.

``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 find a facilitated access to the government itself through the channels of party passions. Thus the policy and the will of one country are subjected to the policy and will of another.

``There is an opinion that the parties in free countries are useful checks upon the administration of the government and serve to keep alive the spirit of liberty. This within certain limits is probably true--and in governments of a monarchical cast patriotism may look with indulgence, if not with favor, upon the spirit of party. But in those of the popular character, in governments purely elective, it is a spirit not to be encouraged. From their natural tendency, it is certain there will always be enough of that spirit for every salutary purpose. And there being constant danger of excess, the effort ought to be, by force of public opinion, to mitigate and assuage it. A fire not to be quenched, it demands a uniform vigilance to prevent its bursting into flame, lest instead of warming it should consume.

``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. A just estimate of that love of power and proneness to abuse it which predominates in the human heart is sufficient to satisfy us of the truth of this position. The necessity of reciprocal checks in the exercise of political power, by dividing and distributing it into different depositories and constituting each the guardian of the public weal against invasions by the others, has been evinced by experiments ancient and modern, some of them in our country and under our own eyes. To preserve them must be as necessary as to institute them. 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. But let there be no change by usurpation; for though this, in one instance, may be the instrument of good, it is the customary weapon by which free governments are destroyed. The precedent must always greatly overbalance in permanent evil any partial or transient benefit which the use can at any time yield.

``Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable supports. In vain would that man claim the tribute of patriotism who should labor to subvert these great pillars of human happiness, these firmest props of the duties of men and citizens. The mere politician, equally with the pious man, ought to respect and to cherish them. A volume could not trace all their connections with private and public felicity. Let it simply be asked where is the security for property, for reputation, for life, if the sense of religious obligation desert the oaths, which are the instruments of investigation in courts of justice? And let us with caution indulge the supposition that morality can be maintained without religion.

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Mr. HILL of Arkansas. ``In relation to the still subsisting war in Europe, my proclamation of the 22d of April 1793 is the index to my plan. Sanctioned by your approving voice and by that of your representatives in both houses of Congress, the spirit of that measure has continually governed me, uninfluenced by any attempts to deter or divert me from it.

``After deliberate examination with the aid of the best lights I could obtain, I was well satisfied that our country, under all the circumstances of the case, had a right to take--and was bound in duty and interest, to take--a neutral position. Having taken it, I determined, as far as I should depend upon me, to maintain it with moderation, perseverance, and firmness.

``The considerations which respect the right to hold this conduct it is not necessary on this occasion to detail. I will only observe that, according to my understanding of the matter, that right, so far from being denied by any of the belligerent powers, has been virtually admitted by all.

``The duty of holding a neutral conduct may be inferred, without anything more, from the obligation which justice and humanity impose on every nation, in cases in which it is free to act, to maintain inviolate the relations of peace and amity towards other nations.

``The inducements of interest for observing that conduct will best be referred to your own reflections and experience. With me, a predominant motive has been to endeavor to gain time to our country to settle and mature its yet recent institutions and to progress without interruption to that degree of strength and consistency which is necessary to give it, humanly speaking, the command of its own fortunes.

``Though in reviewing the incidents of my administration I am unconscious of intentional error. I am nevertheless too sensible of my own defects not to think it probable that I may have committed many errors. Whatever they may be, I fervently beseech the Almighty to avert or mitigate the evils to which they may tend. I shall also carry with me the hope that my country will never cease to view them with indulgence and that, after forty-five years of my life dedicated to its service with an upright zeal, the faults of incompetent abilities will be consigned to oblivion, as myself must soon be to the mansions of rest.

``Relying on its kindness in this as in other things, and actuated by that fervent love towards 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.''

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleagues, Mike Kennedy of Utah, Don Beyer of Virginia, and Ben Cline of Virginia, for joining me in this renewal of tradition in this, our semiquincentennial year, of reading George Washington's Farewell Address.

Indeed, as that Member of the very first Congress from Virginia, American Revolutionary War hero Light-Horse Harry Lee, said at George Washington's eulogy, he was, in fact, ``First in war, first in peace, and first in the hearts of his countrymen.''

I give my thanks also to Speaker Johnson and the Republican vice chairman, Blake Moore, for allowing us to use this time on the House floor.

I encourage all of our citizens to participate in America's 250th birthday in this year of 2026 as we celebrate on July Fourth the signing and publication of our Declaration of Independence from July Fourth, 1776.

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