Sublime

In conceiving of the state as a generational compact, de Gaulle was echoing Edmund Burke, who defined society as ‘a partnership . . . between those who are living, those who are dead, and those who are to be born.’[69]

Summarizing in the Constitutional Convention the ends that would be served by this proposed upper house of Congress, Madison said they were “first to protect the people against their rulers; secondly to protect the people against the transient impressions into which they themselves might be led.”

Such was Washington’s new preeminence that when the gathering chose seven members to attend the Second Continental Congress, Washington was the second one named, ahead of Patrick Henry and superseded only by Peyton Randolph. The vote was overwhelming, as he received 106 of 108 votes cast. On the same day, as if struck by a sudden premonition of

At a time when black education was feared as a threat to white supremacy, Washington ordered that the young slaves, before being freed, should “ be taught to read and write and to be brought up to some useful occupation.”19 He also provided a fund to care for slaves too sick or aged to enjoy the sudden fruits of freedom. Unlike Jefferson,

Federalists profited from the disastrous turn in Republicans’ fortunes produced by the XYZ Affair. France claimed the right to seize and confiscate British cargo aboard American ships; Adams promptly pushed through measures to protect American shipping and strengthen coastal defenses. In late April he signed legislation creating the Navy Department

the very simple reason that when he is at the head of the Government he has but little power, but little wealth, and but little glory to share amongst his friends; and his influence in the State is too small for the success or the ruin of a faction to depend upon the elevation of an individual to power.