Why Reading History Can Help Presidents Understand Stuff (Bigly)
President Donald J. Trump recently suggested that if statues of Robert E. Lee were taken it would set a precedent for the removal of the statues of other historical figures:
“Those people were also there, because they wanted to protest the taking down of a statue Robert E. Lee. So, excuse me, and you take a look at some of the groups and you see, and you’d know it if you were honest reporters, which in many cases you’re not. Many of those people were there to protest the taking down of the statue of Robert E. Lee. So this week, it’s Robert E. Lee, I noticed that Stonewall Jackson’s coming down. I wonder, is it George Washington next week? And is it Thomas Jefferson the week after. You know, you really do have to ask yourself, where does it stop?”
I am kind of a Presidential history buff, and I just happen to have read quite a few books on George Washington. When President Trump made his statement, it reminded me immediately of several passages from a book I read several years ago called “His Excellency” (about George Washington) written by the Pulitzer-Prize winning Historian Joseph J. Ellis (Vintage Books, 2004).
President Trump was absolutely correct that George Washington was a slave owner, but his history with slavery was much more progressive than almost ANY of his contemporaries (certainly more than Thomas Jefferson).
George Washington’s Evolution On The Slavery Question
In 1785, President Washington received a letter from a Virginia Quaker named Robert Pleasants on the subject of emancipation. Mr. Pleasants felt (even in 1785) that George Washington could become subject to exactly this kind of historical judgment on his failure to emancipate:
“For not withstanding thou art now receiving the tribute of praise from a grateful people, the time is coming when all actions shall be weighed in equal balance, and undergo an impartial explanation. How sad would it be to read then to read that the great hero of American independence, the destroyer of tyranny and oppression, had failed the final test by holding a number of People in absolute slavery, who were by nature equally entitled to freedom as himself (Ellis, p.161).”
I suppose what Mr. Pleasants was suggesting is that people who hold slaves risk having their statues dismantled for good reason? Too soon for statue lovers? Just saying.
Anyway, George Washington moved progressively on the issue of slavery throughout his later years (certainly more than Thomas Jefferson). Washington accepted free blacks into the Continental Army in 1775 and commanded a racially integrated army for almost eight years. In 1779 General Washington supported a John Laurens proposal for arming and emancipating 3,000 slaves in South Carolina. When General Lafayette suggested a proposal for gradual emancipation in Virginia in 1783, Washington said that he would be happy to join Lafayette in “such laudable a work (Ellis, p.163).” In 1786 Washington wrote the following to Robert Morris:
“I can only say that there is not a man living who wishes more than I do, to see a plan adopted for the abolition of it <slavery> — but there is only one proper and effectual mode by which it can be accomplished, & that is by Legislative authority (Ellis, p.163).”
Just a few months later, Washington refused to accept slaves as a form of payment for a debt. In 1779 he told his property manager at Mount Vernon to prepare for ending the use of slave labor if the war ended favorably (although at this point, his plan was to sell and not to emancipate his slaves). In 1794 he wrote the following to Tobias Lear:
“I have another motive (for cutting back on his property holdings) which makes me earnestly wish for an accomplishment of these things, it is indeed more powerful than all the rest, namely to liberate a certain species of property which I possess, very repugnantly to my own feelings (Ellis, p.257).”
Here is what President Washington wrote into his will:
“…it is my Will & desire that all the slaves which I hold in my own right, shall receive their freedom…I do hereby expressly forbid the Sale, or transportation out of the said Commonwealth of any slave I may die possessed of, under any pretense whatsoever (Ellis, p.263).
He also did not suggest that his slaves should be emancipated and left to their own devices, he insisted old and infirm should be fed and comfortably clothed for the rest of their lives by his heirs. And that all young slaves should be supported until they were 25 years old. He insisted his personal servant Billy Lee should receive an annuity and room and board for the rest of his life.
Conclusions
My point is not to exonerate George Washington as much as introduce the idea that President Washington was more conflicted about owning slaves hundreds of years ago then President Trump is about exclusively denouncing white supremacist violence today.
It is certainly possible, and seems like it would be simple, for President Trump to say that “while we oppose all the violence on both the left and on the right, violence in the name of bigotry, white nationalism, or racism is particularly odious and an offense to this nation and to its primary values.”
I believe that Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson are important parts of our history, and that the story of this country would be incomplete without including the story of the Civil War. But, I also believe that the ‘celebration’ of Lee and Jackson should never be presented in solely heroic terms.
At no time should the story or monuments to either of these ‘gentlemen’ be presented absent contextual information about the South that they were both fighting to the death to preserve.
Last but not least, I am surprised at the lack of historical knowledge President Trump exposes on a regular basis (see his Twitter celebratory comments about how Andrew Jackson would have foreclosed the need for a Civil War, technically true but at the cost of not emancipating the slaves). Thomas Jefferson was a happy and often cruel slave owner who fathered children with his slaves while George Washington was profoundly aware of the profound contradiction between the spirit of the American revolution and the ‘ethics’ of human bondage. Virtually any historian on earth could fact check and explain the vast difference between Jefferson and Washington on the slavery question and all of them would be flattered to help out the President of the United States, one wonders why he wouldn’t want to ask?
Also, in case you were swayed by that email that was circulating, you actually can be against General Lee and for General Washington, they were differences big enough to drive a truck (carrying a statue) through on the question of slavery.
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Josh is a 100% reader-funded blogger and freelance writer. Please consider following him on Twitter, throwing some money into his hat on Patreon, or adding his blog OnPirateSatellite to your feeds.
