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Farewell Speech Samples

Farewell Address

George Washington, 1796

George Washington had been the obvious choice to be the first president of the United States, and

indeed, many people had supported ratification of the Constitution on the assumption that Washington

would be the head of the new government. By all measures, Washington proved himself a capable, even

a great, president, helping to shape the new government and leading the country skillfully through several

crises, both foreign and domestic.

Washington, like many of his contemporaries, did not understand or believe in political parties, and saw

them as fractious agencies subversive of domestic tranquility. When political parties began forming during

his administration, and in direct response to some of his policies, he failed to comprehend that parties

would be the chief device through which the American people would debate and resolve major public

issues. It was his fear of what parties would do to the nation that led Washington to draft his Farewell

Address.

The two parties that developed in the early 1790s were the Federalists, who supported the economic and

foreign policies of the Washington administration, and the Jeffersonian Republicans, who in large

measure opposed them. The Federalists backed Secretary of the Treasury Alexander Hamilton's plan for

a central bank and a tariff and tax policy that would promote domestic manufacturing; the Jeffersonians

opposed the strong government inherent in the Hamiltonian plan, and favored farmers as opposed to

manufacturers. In foreign affairs, both sides wanted the United States to remain neutral in the growing

controversies between Great Britain and France, but the Federalists favored the English and the

Jeffersonians the French. The Address derived at least in part from Washington's fear that party

factionalism would drag the United States into this fray.

Two-thirds of the Address is devoted to domestic matters and the rise of political parties, and Washington

set out his vision of what would make the United States a truly great nation. He called for men to put

aside party and unite for the common good, an "American character" wholly free of foreign attachments.

The United States must concentrate only on American interests, and while the country ought to be friendly

and open its commerce to all nations, it should avoid becoming involved in foreign wars. Contrary to some

opinion, Washington did not call for isolation, only the avoidance of entangling alliances. While he called

for maintenance of the treaty with France signed during the American Revolution, the problems created

by that treaty ought to be clear. The United States must "act for ourselves and not for others."

The Address quickly entered the realm of revealed truth. It was for decades read annually in Congress; it

was printed in children's primers, engraved on watches and woven into tapestries. Many Americans,

especially in subsequent generations, accepted Washington's advice as gospel, and in any debate

between neutrality and involvement in foreign issues would invoke the message as dispositive of all

questions. Not until 1949, in fact, would the United States again sign a treaty of alliance with a foreign

nation.

For further reading: Burton I. Kaufman, ed., Washington's Farewell Address: The View from the 20th

Century (1969); Paul A. Varg, Foreign Policies of the Founding Fathers (1963); Alexander De Conde,

Entangling Alliances (1958).

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....

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 toward 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....

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.... Interwoven as is the love

of liberty with every ligament of your hearts, no recommendation of mine is necessary to fortify

or confirm the attachment.

The unity of government which constitutes you one people is also now dear to you. It is justly so,

for it is a main pillar in the edifice of your real independence, the support of your tranquility at

home, your peace abroad, of your safety, of your prosperity, of that very liberty which you so

highly prize. But as it is easy to foresee that from different causes and from different quarters

much pains will be taken, many artifices employed, to weaken in your minds the conviction of

this truth, as this is the point in your political fortress against which the batteries of internal and

external enemies will be most constantly and actively (though often covertly and insidiously)

directed, it is of infinite moment that you should properly estimate the immense value of your

national union to your collective and individual happiness; that you should cherish a cordial,

habitual, and immovable attachment to it; accustoming yourselves to think and speak of it as of

the palladium of your political safety and prosperity; watching for its preservation with jealous

anxiety; discountenancing whatever may suggest even a suspicion that it can in any event be

abandoned, and indignantly frowning upon the first dawning of every attempt to alienate any

portion of our country from the rest or to enfeeble the sacred ties which now link together the

various parts.

For this you have every inducement of sympathy and interest. Citizens by birth or choice of a

common country, that country has a right to concentrate your affections. The name of American,

which belongs to you in your national capacity, must always exalt the just pride of patriotism

more than any appellation derived from local discriminations. With slight shades of difference,

you have the same religion, manners, habits, and political principles. You have in a common

cause fought and triumphed together. The independence and liberty you possess are the work of

joint councils and joint efforts, of common dangers, sufferings, and successes.

But these considerations, however powerfully they address themselves to your sensibility, are

greatly outweighed by those which apply more immediately to your interest. Here every portion

of our country finds the most commanding motives for carefully guarding and preserving the

union of the whole.

The North, in an unrestrained intercourse with the South, protected by the equal laws of a

common government, finds in the productions of the latter great additional resources of maritime

and commercial enterprise and precious materials of manufacturing industry. The South, in the

same intercourse, benefiting by the same agency of the North, sees its agriculture grow and its

commerce expand. Turning partly into its own channels the seamen of the North, it finds its

particular navigation invigorated; and while it contributes in different ways to nourish and

increase the general mass of the national navigation, it looks forward to the protection of a

maritime strength to which itself is unequally adapted. The East, in a like intercourse with the

West, already finds, and in the progressive improvement of interior communications by land and

water will more and more find, a valuable vent for the commodities which it brings from abroad

or manufactures at home. The West derives from the East supplies requisite to its growth and

comfort, and what is perhaps of still greater consequence, it must of necessity owe the secure

enjoyment of indispensable outlets for its own productions to the weight, influence, and the

future maritime strength of the Atlantic side of the Union, directed by an indissoluble community

of interest as one nation. Any other tenure by which the West can hold this essential advantage,

whether derived from its own separate strength or from an apostate and unnatural connection

with any foreign power, must be intrinsically precarious.

While, then, every part of our country thus feels an immediate and particular interest in union, all

the parts combined cannot fail to find in the united mass of means and efforts greater strength,

greater resource, proportionably greater security from external danger, a less frequent

interruption of their peace by foreign nations, and what is of inestimable value, they must derive

from union an exemption from those broils and wars between themselves which so frequently

afflict neighboring countries not tied together by the same governments, which their own

rivalships alone would be sufficient to produce, but which opposite foreign alliances,

attachments, and intrigues would stimulate and embitter. Hence, likewise, they will avoid the

necessity of those overgrown military establishments which, under any form of government, are

inauspicious to liberty, and which are to be regarded as particularly hostile to republican liberty.

In this sense it is that your union ought to be considered as a main prop of your liberty, and that

the love of the one ought to endear to you the preservation of the other....

Is there a doubt whether a common government can embrace so large a sphere? Let experience

solve it. To listen to mere speculation in such a case were criminal. It is well worth a fair and full

experiment. With such powerful and obvious motives to union affecting all parts of our country,

while experience shall not have demonstrated its impracticability, there will always be reason to

distrust the patriotism of those who in any quarter may endeavor to weaken its bands.

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. One of the

expedients of party to acquire influence within particular districts is to misrepresent the opinions

and aims of other districts. You can not shield yourselves too much against the jealousies and

heartburnings which spring from these misrepresentations; they tend to render alien to each other

those who ought to be bound together by fraternal affection....

To the efficacy and permanency of your union a government for the whole is indispensable. No

alliances, however strict, between the parts can be an adequate substitute. They must inevitably

experience the infractions and interruptions which all alliances in all times have experienced.

Sensible of this momentous truth, you have improved upon your first essay by the adoption of a

Constitution of Government better calculated than your former for an intimate union and for the

efficacious management of your common concerns. This Government, the offspring of our own

choice, uninfluenced and unawed, adopted upon full investigation and mature deliberation,

completely free in its principles, in the distribution of its powers, uniting security with energy,

and containing within itself a provision for its own amendment, has a just claim to your

confidence and your support. Respect for its authority, compliance with its laws, acquiescence in

its measures, are duties enjoined by the fundamental maxims of true liberty. The basis of our

political systems is the right of the people to make and to alter their constitutions of government.

But the constitution which at any time exists till changed by an explicit and authentic act of the

whole people is sacredly obligatory upon all. 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....

Toward the preservation of your Government and the permanency of your present happy state, it

is requisite not only that you steadily discountenance irregular oppositions to its acknowledged

authority, but also that you resist with care the spirit of innovation upon its principles, however

specious the pretexts. One method of assault may be to effect in the forms of the Constitution

alterations which will impair the energy of the system, and thus to undermine what can not be

directly overthrown. In all the changes to which you may be invited remember that time and

habit are at least as necessary to fix the true character of governments as of other human

institutions; that experience is the surest standard by which to test the real tendency of the

existing constitution of a country; that facility in changes upon the credit of mere hypothesis and

opinion exposes to perpetual change, from the endless variety of hypothesis and opinion; and

remember especially that for the efficient management of your common interests in a country so

extensive as ours a government of as much vigor as is consistent with the perfect security of

liberty is indispensable. Liberty itself will find in such a government, with powers properly

distributed and adjusted, its surest guardian. It is, indeed, little else than a name where the

government is too feeble to withstand the enterprises of faction, to con-fine each member of the

society within the limits prescribed by the laws, and to maintain all in the secure and tranquil

enjoyment of the rights of person and property.

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 exists under different shapes in all governments, more or less stifled,

controlled, or repressed; but in those of the popular form it is seen in its greatest rankness and is

truly their worst enemy....

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. Thus the policy and the will of one country are subjected to the policy and will of

another.

There is an opinion that 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 a 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 intrusted 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. 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.

Whatever may be conceded to the influence of refined education on minds of peculiar structure,

reason and experience both forbid us to expect that national morality can prevail in exclusion of

religious principle.

It is substantially true that virtue or morality is a necessary spring of popular government. The

rule indeed extends with more or less force to every species of free government. Who that is a

sincere friend to it can look with indifference upon attempts to shake the foundation of the

fabric? Promote, then, as an object of primary importance, institutions for the general diffusion

of knowledge. In proportion as the structure of a government gives force to public opinion, it is

essential that public opinion should be enlightened.

As a very important source of strength and security, cherish public credit. One method of

preserving it is to use it as sparingly as possible, avoiding occasions of expense by cultivating

peace, but remembering also that timely disbursements to prepare for danger frequently prevent

much greater disbursements to repel it; avoiding likewise the accumulation of debt, not only by

shunning occasions of expense, but by vigorous exertions in time of peace to discharge the debts

which unavoidable wars have occasioned, not ungenerously throwing upon posterity the burthen

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. And can it be that good policy does not equally enjoin

it? It will be worthy of a free, enlightened, and at no distant period a great nation to give to

mankind the magnanimous and too novel example of a people always guided by an exalted

justice and benevolence. Who can doubt that in the course of time and things the fruits of such a

plan would richly repay any temporary advantages which might be lost by a steady adherence to

it? Can it be that Providence has not connected the permanent felicity of a nation with its virtue?

The experiment, at least, is recommended by every sentiment which ennobles human nature.

Alas! is it rendered impossible by its vices?

In the execution of such a plan nothing is more essential than that permanent, inveterate

antipathies against particular nations and passionate attachments for others should be excluded,

and that in place of them just and amicable feelings toward all should be cultivated. The nation

which indulges toward another an habitual hatred or an habitual fondness is in some degree a

slave. It is a slave to its animosity or to its affection, either of which is sufficient to lead it astray

from its duty and its interest. Antipathy in one nation against another disposes each more readily

to offer insult and injury, to lay hold of slight causes of umbrage, and to be haughty and

intractable when accidental or trifling occasions of dispute occur.

So, likewise, a passionate attachment of one nation for another produces a variety of evils.

Sympathy for the favorite nation, facilitating the illusion of an imaginary common interest in

cases where no real common interest exists, and infusing into one the enmities of the other,

betrays the former into a participation in the quarrels and wars of the latter without adequate

inducement or justification. It leads also to concessions to the favorite nation of privileges denied

to others, which is apt doubly to injure the nation making the concessions by unnecessarily

parting with what ought to have been retained, and by exciting jealousy, ill will, and a disposition

to retaliate in the parties from whom equal privileges are withheld; and it gives to ambitious,

corrupted, or deluded citizens (who devote themselves to the favorite nation) facility to betray or

sacrifice the interests of their own country without odium, sometimes even with popularity,

gilding with the appearances of a virtuous sense of obligation, a commendable deference for

public opinion, or a laudable zeal for public good the base or foolish compliances of ambition,

corruption, or infatuation....

Against the insidious wiles of foreign influence (I conjure you to believe me, fellow-citizens) the

jealousy of a free people ought to be constantly awake, since history and experience prove that

foreign influence is one of the most baneful foes of republican government. But that jealousy, to

be useful, must be impartial, else it becomes the instrument of the very influence to be avoided,

instead of a defense against it. Excessive partiality for one foreign nation and excessive dislike of

another cause those whom they actuate to see danger only on one side, and serve to veil and even

second the arts of influence on the other. Real patriots who may resist the intrigues of the favorite

are liable to become suspected and odious, while its tools and dupes usurp the applause and

confidence of the people to surrender their interests.

The great rule of conduct for us in regard to foreign nations is, in extending our commercial

relations to have with them as little political connection as possible. So far as we have already

formed engagements let them be fulfilled with perfect good faith. Here let us stop.

Europe has a set of primary interests which to us have none or a very remote relation. Hence she

must be engaged in frequent controversies, the causes of which are essentially foreign to our

concerns. Hence, therefore, it must be unwise in us to implicate ourselves by artificial ties in the

ordinary vicissitudes of her politics or the ordinary combinations and collisions of her

friendships or enmities.

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; when belligerent

nations, under the impossibility of making acquisitions upon us, will not lightly hazard the giving

us provocation; when we may choose peace or war, as our interest, guided by justice, shall

counsel.

Why forego the advantages of so peculiar a situation? Why quit our own to stand upon foreign

ground? Why, by interweaving our destiny with that of any part of Europe, entangle our peace

and prosperity in the toils of European ambition, rivalship, interest, humor, or caprice?

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

far, I mean, as we are now at liberty to do it, for let me not be understood as capable of

patronizing infidelity to existing engagements. I hold the maxim no less applicable to public than

to private affairs that honesty is always the best policy. I repeat, therefore, let those engagements

be observed in their genuine sense. But in my opinion it is unnecessary and would be unwise to

extend them.

Taking care always to keep ourselves by suitable establishments on a respectable defensive

posture, we may safely trust to temporary alliances for extraordinary emergencies.

Harmony, liberal intercourse with all nations are recommended by policy, humanity, and interest.

But even our commercial policy should hold an equal and impartial hand, neither seeking nor

granting exclusive favors or preferences; consulting the natural course of things; diffusing and

diversifying by gentle means the streams of commerce, but forcing nothing; establishing with

powers so disposed, in order to give trade a stable course, to define the rights of our merchants,

and to enable the Government to support them, conventional rules of intercourse, the best that

present circumstances and mutual opinion will permit, but temporary and liable to be from time

to time abandoned or varied as experience and circumstances shall dictate; constantly keeping in

view that it is folly in one nation to look for disinterested favors from another; that it must pay

with a portion of its independence for whatever it may accept under that character; that by such

acceptance it may place itself in the condition of having given equivalents for nominal favors,

and yet of being reproached with ingratitude for not giving more. 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....

Though in reviewing the incidents of my Administration I am unconscious of intentional error, I

am nevertheless too sensible of my 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 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.

Source: J.D. Richardson, ed., Compilation of Messages and Papers of the Presidents, vol.1 (1907), 213.

Reading for Purpose

Identify the two main points Washington is making in this address, citing excerpts from the text to illustrate your

point. Explain how both of these issues relate to the present day and argue whether Washington’s advice is still

applicable to current situations. You may do this in sentence or chart form.