by Ron Chernow
The first attorney general, Edmund Randolph, thirty-six, was a handsome young man descended from one of Virginia’s blue-ribbon families and well known to Washington. The son of a Tory father who had fled to England, he had graduated from William and Mary and studied law. He had even handled legal matters for Washington, who had chosen him partly because of his “habits of intimacy with him.”30 As Virginia governor, Randolph had led the state delegation to the Constitutional Convention but balked at signing the resulting document, only to switch positions during the Virginia Ratifying Convention, where he proved “a very able and elegant speaker,” according to Bushrod Washington.31 As a cabinet member, Randolph chafed at his subordinate position. The attorney general oversaw no department, causing him to gripe about his “mongrel” status.32 So little was expected of the first attorney general that he was encouraged to take outside clients to supplement his modest $1,500 salary. Jefferson faulted Randolph as a weak, wavering man, calling him “the poorest chameleon I ever saw, having no color of his own and reflecting that nearest him.”33
The Constitution was especially vague about the judiciary, which left a good deal to congressional discretion. The document did not specify the number of Supreme Court justices, so the Judiciary Act of 1789 set them at six; it also established thirteen district courts and three circuit courts. To balance federal and state power, each circuit court blended two Supreme Court justices, riding the circuit, with a district court judge selected from the particular state in which the trial was held. For Supreme Court justices, the need to “ride circuit” twice yearly was the most onerous part of their job, a lonesome task that could consume weeks or months. In the absence of federal courthouses, circuit courts met in government buildings or roadside taverns. Having to travel backcountry roads and sleep in squalid inns further detracted from judicial prestige. Such was the misery of riding circuit that several of Washington’s judicial selections declined for that reason, prompting a high turnover in the Supreme Court’s early years. In early April 1790 Washington inquired whether the justices had any problems to report, and in September they returned a lengthy list of objections. They were especially upset with having to ride circuit, noting that it created an untenable legal situation, since they might have to rule as Supreme Court justices on appeals of cases they had tried in those very courts.
In no area did Washington exert more painstaking effort than in selecting judges, for he regarded the judicial branch as “that department which must be considered as the keystone of our political fabric,” as he told Jay in October 1789.34 Once the Judiciary Act passed in late September 1789, he nominated Jay as chief justice along with five associate judges from five different states, establishing regional diversity as an important criterion in such appointments. In stark contrast to the acrimonious hearings in later American history, the six justices breezed through the Senate confirmation process in forty-eight hours, their selection sparking little debate. Also without apparent protest, Washington named a large batch of district judges, U.S. attorneys, and marshals. In all, George Washington would appoint a record eleven justices to the Supreme Court.
As secretary of foreign affairs under the Articles of Confederation, John Jay kept warm the seat at the State Department until Jefferson arrived in New York. Washington felt palpable affection for Jay, confiding to him late in the war, “I entertain the friendly sentiments toward you, which I have ever experienced since our first acquaintance.”35 In sending along his commission as chief justice, Washington appended an enthusiastic note: “It is with singular pleasure that I address you as Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States.”36 Prematurely balding, John Jay was a lean man with a pale, ascetic face, an aquiline nose, a melancholy air, and a wary look in his piercing, intelligent eyes. He had not handled a legal case in more than a decade and his skills had grown rusty, but Washington wanted a well-known national figure whose reputation transcended legal expertise. While Washington widened the distance between the presidency and the Senate, he at first narrowed it between the presidency and the Supreme Court, soliciting Jay’s viewpoint on an eclectic array of issues ranging from the national debt, Indian affairs, and the census to counterfeit coins, postal roads, and inspection of beef exports.
On February 1, 1790, the Supreme Court held its inaugural meeting in the Merchants Exchange on Broad Street, with four justices present; its first session lasted only ten days. When Associate Justice William Cushing arrived in a British-style judicial wig, he was jeered in the streets and had to return to his residence for a more pedestrian wig. In the beginning, the Court lacked the majesty it would later attain and often seemed like an institution in search of a mission. Because of the newness of the federal judiciary, appeals had yet to percolate up from lower courts, resulting in little work at first. The Court’s early procedures now seem quaintly antiquated. Instead of issuing written opinions, justices handed them down verbally from the bench without an official reporter to record decisions.
WASHINGTON’S ACCOMPLISHMENTS as president were no less groundbreaking than his deeds in the Continental Army. It is a grave error to think of George Washington as a noble figurehead presiding over a group of prima donnas who performed the real work of government. As a former commander in chief, he was accustomed to a chain of command and delegating important duties, but he was also accustomed to having the final say. As president, he enjoyed unparalleled power without being autocratic. He set out less to implement a revolutionary agenda than to construct a sturdy, well-run government, and in the process he performed many revolutionary acts.
Starting from scratch, Washington introduced procedures that made his government a model of smooth efficiency. Based on the fleeting mention in the Constitution that he could request written opinions from department heads, he created an impressive flow of paperwork. Jefferson noted that he would forward them letters he received that fell within their bailiwick, then asked to peruse their replies. They would gather up daily bundles of papers for his approval. Although this briefly delayed replies, Jefferson explained, “it produced [for] us in return the benefit of his sanction for every act we did.”37 This paper flow also meant that Washington was “always in accurate possession of all facts and proceedings in every part of the Union and . . . formed a central point for the different branches; preserved a unity of object and action among them,” and enabled him to assume personal responsibility for all decisions.38 Besides giving him a spacious view of the executive branch, this practice also kept his cabinet members on a tight leash. Jefferson noted that, however open-minded Washington was in asking for opinions, he took umbrage when offered unsolicited advice—the technique of someone who wanted to set the agenda and remain in control.
Among his department heads, Washington encouraged the free, creative interplay of ideas, setting a cordial tone of collegiality. He prized efficiency and close attention to detail and insisted that everybody make duplicate or even triplicate copies of letters, demanding clarity in everything. Once he upbraided an American diplomat in Europe by saying, “I will complain not only of your not writing, but of your writing so illegibly that I am half a day deciphering one page and then guess at much of it.”39 He wanted to be able to sit at leisure and compare conflicting arguments. Through his tolerant attitude, he created a protective canopy under which subordinates could argue freely, but once decisions were made, he wanted the administration to speak with one voice. Understanding the intellectual isolation of the presidency, he made sure that people didn’t simply flatter him. He told Henry Lee, “A frank communication of the truth . . . respecting the public mind would be ever received as the highest testimony of respect and attachment.”40 Washington grew as a leader because he engaged in searching self-criticism. “I can bear to hear of imputed or real errors,” he once wrote. “The man who wishes to stand well in the opinion of others must do this, because he is thereby enabled to correct his faults or remove prejudices which are imbibed against him.”41 The one thing Washington could no
t abide was when people published criticisms of him without first giving him a chance to respond privately.
As in other walks of life, Washington exhibited to a clockwork order in his daily routine and employed his time economically. There is poetic justice in the fact that when the capital shifted to Philadelphia, he often stopped at his watchmaker on his daily constitutionals. One British diplomat observed of Washington that “his time is regularly divided into certain portions and the business allotted to any one portion strictly adhered to.”42 When he settled upon weekly levees, Tobias Lear noted that they would allow “a sufficient time for dispatching the business of the office” and give “dignity to the president by not obliging him to expose himself every day to impertinent and curious intruders.”43
Many people observed that President Washington spoke slowly and took time to make decisions, letting plans ripen before enacting them. Politics gave him more time to deliberate than did warfare, and he made fewer mistakes as president than as a general on the battlefield. To Catharine Macaulay Graham, he summed up his executive style: “Much was to be done by prudence, much by conciliation, much by firmness.”44 Hamilton concurred that the president “consulted much, pondered much; resolved slowly, resolved surely.”45 By delaying decisions, he made sure that his better judgment prevailed over his temper. At the same time, once decisions were made, they “were seldom, if ever, to be shaken,” wrote John Marshall.46 Jefferson agreed, saying that Washington’s mind was “slow in operation, being little aided by invention or imagination, but sure in conclusion.”47 Once a decision was made, Washington seldom retreated unless fresh evidence radically altered his view. “Perhaps the strongest feature in his character was prudence,” Jefferson wrote, “never acting until every circumstance, every consideration, was maturely weighed; refraining if he saw a doubt but, when once decided, going through with his purpose whatever obstacles opposed.”48 Jefferson did not rank Washington as a first-rate intellect on the order of a Newton, Bacon, or Locke, but he admitted that “no judgment was ever sounder.”49 Well aware of his own executive style, Washington once instructed a cabinet member “to deliberate maturely, but to execute promptly and vigorously.”50
Washington was a perceptive man who, behind his polite facade, was unmatched at taking the measure of people. People did not always realize how observant he was. “His eyes retire inward . . . and have nothing of fire or animation or openness in their expression,” said Edward Thornton, a young British diplomat, who added that Washington “possesses the two great requisites of a statesman, the faculty of concealing his own sentiments, and of discovering those of other men.”51 Washington once advised his adopted grandson that “where there is no occasion for expressing an opinion, it is best to be silent, for there is nothing more certain than that it is at all times more easy to make enemies than friends.”52 Washington’s seemingly veiled eyes were penetrating, and Gouverneur Morris credited him with a cool, unblinking perspicacity: “He beheld not only the affairs that were passing around, but those also in which he was personally engaged, with the coolness of an unconcerned spectator.”53
A taciturn man, Washington never issued opinions promiscuously. A disciplined politician, he never had to retract things uttered in a thoughtless moment. “Never be agitated by more than a decent warmth and offer your sentiments with modest diffidence,” he told his nephew Bushrod, noting that “opinions thus given are listened to with more attention than when delivered in a dictatorial style.”54 He worried about committing an error more than missing a brilliant stroke. Washington also hated boasting. Bishop William White of Pennsylvania observed, “It has occasionally occurred to me when in his company, that if a stranger to his person were present, he would never have known from anything said by the president that he was conscious of having distinguished himself in the eyes of the world.”55
For all his many admirable traits, Washington was never a warm, cozy, or folksy figure. As a man of moderation, he delivered praise sparingly and feared that excess familiarity with subordinates might weaken their performance. He kept people slightly off balance, guessing and vying for his favor. He managed relations with colleagues through subtle hints and gestures, and they learned to decipher his subliminal messages with accuracy. He had powerful ways of communicating his likes and dislikes, through subtle gradations of tone. With strangers or acquaintances, he addressed letters to “Sir.” As he warmed up, he wrote to them as “Dear Sir,” and when he grew very close, they were favored with “My Dear Sir.” He was no less artful in closing letters. If he went from signing “Humble Obedient Servant” to “Affectionate Obedient Servant,” the recipient had made a major leap forward in his emotions. Washington expressed displeasure with people less often with open rebukes than with the silent treatment, a sudden chill in the air, and a reversion to curt, businesslike communications.
Another politician would have been intoxicated by the idolatry Washington received. But through it all he maintained a striking personal stability and never let hero worship go to his head. The country was probably lucky that he was somewhat wearied by all the attention. There was cunning in Washington’s nature but no low scheming. He never reneged on promises and was seldom duplicitous or underhanded. He respected the public, did not provoke people needlessly, and vowed at the time of his inauguration “that no man shou[ld] ever charge me justly with deception,” as he told James McHenry.56 When asked for advice on how to navigate “the dark and thorny path of politics,” he said he could “only repeat what I have formerly told my countrymen in a very serious manner ‘that honesty will be found, on every experiment, the best policy.’”57 The charge of elitism against Washington can easily be overstated, for he immensely respected public opinion. When Madison later compared Washington and Adams as presidents, he contrasted their sensitivity to the public mood. Washington, he said, was always “scrutinizing into the public opinion and ready to follow where he could not lead it,” while Adams was “insulting it by the most adverse sentiments and pursuits.”58
Perhaps no president has tried so persistently to set an example of good conduct. He grew agitated whenever people gave him gifts, lest it be thought he was accepting bribes. When David Humphreys sent him elegant shoe buckles, he protested: “Presents . . . to me are of all things the most painful; but when I am so well satisfied of the motives which dictated yours, my scruples are removed.”59 It would have been easy for him to turn into a demagogue. Instead he tried hard to float high above all partisan considerations. In September 1792 he grew incensed at reports that he had supported the candidacy of John Francis Mercer for a Virginia congressional seat. Washington sent Mercer an indignant letter, pointing out that his interference in congressional elections would be “highly improper, as the people ought to be entirely at liberty to choose whom they pleased to represent them in Congress.”60 In such incidents Washington showed that he was forever on guard against the abuse of his presidential powers.
When Washington was sworn into office, North Carolina and Rhode Island had not yet embraced the Constitution and stood apart from the new Union. A major stumbling block was the absence of a bill of rights attached to the Constitution. At the time of the Constitutional Convention, Washington deemed a bill of rights superfluous on the grounds that American citizens would retain all rights that they did not expressly renounce in the document. During the ratifying conventions, he worried that opponents would seek to subvert the new political system by “attempting premature amendments.”61 When David Humphreys drafted Washington’s original inaugural speech, Washington still worried that agitation for a bill of rights was a political ruse being exploited by antifederalist forces. One surviving fragment of the undelivered speech says: “I will barely suggest whether it would not be the part of prudent men to observe [the Constitution] fully in movement before they undertook to make such alterations as might prevent a fair experiment of its effects?”62
A critical convert to adopting a bill of rights was James Madison, who had initiall
y opposed the idea. While running for Congress in a strongly antifederalist district in Virginia, he had been forced to emphasize his commitment to such amendments. As he informed Washington in January 1789, “It has been very industriously inculcated that I am dogmatically attached to the constitution in every clause, syllable, and letter, and therefore not a single amendment will be promoted by my vote, either from conviction or a spirit of accommodation.”63 In retrospect, it seems ironic that Madison should have been accused of irremediable hostility toward the amendments that came to be so gloriously associated with his name. He became convinced that a bill of rights was necessary to shore up support for the Constitution among hostile and wavering elements alike.
In defending the Constitution, Washington had often invoked its amendment powers to appease critics. After the inauguration, Madison showed him a dozen amendments he had drafted; after being whittled down to ten, they were to achieve renown as the Bill of Rights. Encountering heavy resistance in the new Congress, Madison asked Washington for a show of support for the amendments and elicited from him an all-important letter in late May 1789. While some of the proposed amendments, Washington wrote, “are importantly necessary,” others were needed “to quiet the fears of some respectable characters and well meaning men. Upon the whole, therefore . . . they have my wishes for a favorable reception in both houses.”64 This letter helped to break the logjam in Congress. “Without Washington’s help,” writes Stuart Leibiger, “Madison’s crusade for what has become a constitutional cornerstone would have been hopeless.”65 Washington’s involvement was all the more notable in that he normally hesitated to meddle in the legislative process.
