1776 All-Stars: George Washington Was a Model of Restraint
America's first president helped establish the tradition of military submission to civilian authority.
This is part of 1776 All-Stars, a series about Reason's favorite American Founders. Read more here.
In the final days of the American Revolution, Continental Army soldiers gathered in Newburgh, New York, to demand that Congress fund their back pay and promised pensions. Anonymous letters circulating among the troops suggested that they might refuse to disband, and might even overthrow Congress, if their benefits weren't forthcoming.
Some of the generals and politicians egging the soldiers on hoped that George Washington would take up his men's cause and in doing so replace a weak Congress with a powerful new federal government. Instead, Washington ended the mutiny with a few words and some brilliant political showmanship.
In the middle of an address to the restive soldiers in which he urged them to respect Congress, the aged general conspicuously reached into his pocket for his glasses.
"Gentlemen, you will permit me to put on my spectacles, for I have not only grown gray but almost blind in the service of my country," he said to the assembled soldiers. There wasn't a dry eye left in the house after that.
The so-called Newburgh conspiracy collapsed instantly. American history did not begin with a military coup; instead, Washington gave the new nation a powerful image of republican self-restraint and a tradition of military submission to civilian authority.
That's a lot to accomplish just by putting on one's glasses.
Libertarians can certainly find much to criticize in George Washington. At the beginning of the War of Independence, some wanted to use voluntary militias to fight the redcoats. Washington demanded instead that we stand up a European-style army, which in turn necessitated European-style martial discipline, taxes, and inflation. After the war, he agitated for replacing the decentralized government established by the Articles of Confederation with a stronger federal government with its own robust powers to tax. As the first president under the new Constitution, Washington was hardly a small-government man. He supported a permanent standing army and put down a tax revolt at the point of a sword.
Despite all that, the highlights of Washington's military and political career show him time and again walking away from power when he had every opportunity to seize or retain it. The Newburgh conspiracy is a prime example.
Washington sympathized with his soldiers' demands. But he could not abide the mutineers' call to "never sheath your sword…until you have obtained full and ample justice." Instead, he impressed upon the troops the necessity of trusting the slow, frustrating process of representative government.
"Like all other large bodies, where there is a variety of different interests to reconcile, [Congress'] deliberations are slow," he told the soldiers. "Why then should we distrust them? And, in consequence of that distrust, adopt measures which may cast a shade over that glory which has been so justly acquired."
Washington continued to defer to Congress as president, even when it dawdled on funding the canals and national university he favored. "Motives of delicacy," he said, prevented him from influencing the legislative process too much.
And then, after two terms in office, Washington retired, although he easily could have stayed in office until death and set the horrible precedent of a lifetime presidency.
Washington's restraint is remarkable when compared to the conduct of other revolutionary leaders. It's a lot easier to try to take the path of Cromwell or Napoleon.
It's remarkable too when considered in light of Washington's own ambitious character. You don't go from a member of the modest gentry on the imperial periphery to the richest, most powerful man in the continent-sized country you helped found without some drive.
Nor was the man afraid of a little self-promotion. When the Second Continental Congress convened, Washington made sure to show up in his militia uniform to provide a not-so-subtle hint about who he thought should be in charge of a new continental army.
Washington was nevertheless willing to sacrifice his ego to preserve the proper functioning of representative government and the natural rights that it protected.
This attitude feels particularly alien here in 2026. Neither the current occupant of the White House nor the "no justice, no peace" crowd protesting him seems willing to sacrifice any short-term partisan advantage, even if that comes with serious long-term costs. The president is no longer a humble civil servant but the center of our political system.
But 250 years on, we still live in an America where the military listens dutifully to presidents who come and go every four to eight years. That fact suggests the best parts of Washington's legacy are also the most enduring.
