The Guardian And Evening Star, with which is incorporated the West Coast Times WEDNESDAY, SEPT. 14, 1932. GEORGE WASHINGTON.

Hokitika Guardian, 14 September 1932, Page 4

The Guardian And Evening Star, with which is incorporated the West Coast Times WEDNESDAY, SEPT. 14, 1932. GEORGE WASHINGTON.

A celebration of the 200th. anniversary of the birthday of George Washington''was- held at S-ulgrave Manor, England, and the American. Ambassador, Mr. A Mellon-, was present on the occasion. A pleasing reference was made to the beauties of the English countryside, such as Wachington’s - ancestors knew, and those memories they carried to Virginia and as far as possible reproduced them there with the standards of conduct ftnd something of the mode of living which tliey had known in England. All these things had an influence on the course of events greater perhaps than could be reulisbldi at this distance of time and space. Hut they could feel certain that Sulgnavo and the* influence emlana.ting from \it lielped to compose the back-ground from wliich emerged in time that greatest of all Americans, George Washington, Who more than any other man, not only gave Americans their country, hut invested it with the form of government and .stability in its early years that enabled it to become a nation. WVhingtmds task was not an easy one. The War of Independence had been v, m with difficulty, and its successful outcome had been due in large measure ti his own unfaltering courage and loyalty and the loyalty

land confidence in which he held his little army together in the face of ! dangers and hardships. But after in- ; dependence had 'been achieved the hardest task of all was still ahead. The war had created 13 sovereign and independent States, each jealous r the other and of their own pi "relatives. Unless they were tied together

in ,a.!-st< ng and indissoluble union the war had been fought in' vain. Washington saw clearly the dangers involved and also the I price that must be paid for. union. He knew, as every realist must know, that union could not be based-on sentiment, hut must be based on" mutual self-interest and subject to mo revision tat the will of its members. Otherwise there could be no' real union, but merely an alliance which might disappear at the first strain placed on it. In carrying out the policy granting statehood he showed for the first time how Colonial dependencies could be given citizenship on terms of absolute equality with the rest of the country. By doing so he proved that a democracy could expand into a great empire in a manner consistent with its beliefs in self-government, and that it could at the sante time and within its own boundaries create 4 great free trade area, which had been Amekiaa's real aourrea' of strength throughout its history. He did rot seek to make America self-contained, but with Hamilton worked out a policy of encouraging manufactures at home and the exchange of products with nil. 11l matters of foreign policy, Washington urged independence without isolation and co-operation without alliances. Hie risked, and almost smashed for a. time, his popnlarity in order to keep his country at peace until it could have time in which to 'y become a nation strong enough to resist world currents. On/e of his chief concerns was the establishment of the public credit. He strongly supported Hamilton in his plan for the assumption, of the d/eibts owed hv the States both to dornestic and foreign creditors. The success of that plan assured also the success of the union itself. Washington all ways saw things in their larger aspects and in their true relation each • to' the other. Hie based his public as well as his private life on the simple principle that honesty ip the best policy for a nation no less thfen for an individual. The deep impress of his life on his own country and the world was dito not to his military genius, nor to his great ability as a statesman! great !as those were, and sound .as his judgment had proved to His hold on his own generation and all generations that had come after him had been due to his sheer force of character, which made him, as a great American writor had said, “apart- from Independence itself ~the greatest legacy that has come to us from those troubled years in which Amerldai was born,"