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Experience the Life
: Politics
: Washington's Inaugural Address
New York City, 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.
Washington's 2nd Inaugural Address
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