George Washington

George Washington commanded the Continental Army during the American Revolution and became the first president of the United States in 1789. His military reputation and participation in the Constitutional Convention gave him unusual authority as the new federal government took shape. He served two terms before returning to Mount Vernon in 1797, establishing an example of voluntary retirement that his successors generally followed until Franklin D. Roosevelt. Washington was also a Virginia plantation owner who enslaved people throughout his adult life. ¹

War between revolutionary France and Britain threatened American shipping and divided Washington’s advisers. In 1793 he declared American neutrality, although the United States remained bound to France by treaties dating from the Revolution. His administration resisted efforts by the French minister Edmond-Charles Genêt to organize privateers and military expeditions from American territory. Washington sought room for the republic to trade and consolidate its independence without entering a European war. ²

Jay’s Treaty with Britain, signed in 1794, arranged the evacuation of British posts in the Northwest, created procedures for settling debts and other disputes, and secured limited commercial concessions. It provoked fierce opposition among Americans who considered it too favorable to Britain. A separate agreement with Spain in 1795 opened navigation on the Mississippi and access to New Orleans while settling the southern boundary. These negotiations connected diplomacy directly to western settlement and Atlantic commerce. ²

At home, Washington backed Alexander Hamilton’s financial program, including federal assumption of state debts and a national bank. He used militia forces to suppress resistance to the whiskey excise, asserting federal tax authority. His administration also waged war against Native nations in the Ohio country, where American expansion displaced Indigenous communities. His Farewell Address warned against intense party divisions and permanent foreign attachments; the contested policies of his own presidency had already helped produce the first national party system. ³