WASHINGTON'S BIRTHDAY EXERCISES

According to the College custom, Washington's Birthday was observed in Dartmouth Hall, with simple exercises. This observance has from year to year been most appropriate, and those who have attended have been repaid in hearing scholarly addresses of very unusual interest, from members of the faculty. The BI-MONTHLY regrets that the nearness of this observance to the date of publication makes it impossible to publish the addresses in full.

Professor J. K. Lord presided, and the speakers were: Professor F.A. Updyke of the Political Science Department, Mr. E. E. Day of the Economics Department, Professor C. D. Adams of the Greek Department.

Professor Updyke spoke upon "Washington and the Constitution," and said:

Writers of American history have been so impressed with the preeminent services and lofty character of Washington that they have been led, in many instances, to magnify those services and that character by drawing upon unauthentic sources, or up on their own mere inferences. Even such scholars as Bancroft and Fiske have not been free from such treatment of Washington. Both of these historians assign to Washington an influence in the Federal Convention of 1787 which the only available records of that convention not only fail to show, but which rather prove the comparatively inconspicuous part which Washington directly took in that convention.

However, discarding all statements concerning Washington, founded either upon unreliable sources, or upon the imagination of some ardent admirer, we still have a fund of historic data great enough to merit all the honor and esteem, which for more than a century have been bestowed upon him, whom we proudly call the first American." To him great credit is due, not only that the United States became an independent nation, but that it became a federal state, a real union of the states, and not a mere confederation.

Washington was among the first to see and point out the defects in the Articles of Confederation. In letters written as early as 1782 he set forth the need of a central government which should be able to make its will effective upon states and individuals. In correspondence with members in Congress and others he urged the importance of constitutional changes through a convention of the people.

At the close of the war Washington sent out two papers which, at the moment of his contemplated retirement from public service, he considered his last legacy to the American people. One of these papers was a circular letter addressed to the governors of all the states urging upon them the necessity of an "indissoluable union" of the states under one federal head.

The other document was his farewell address to the army, in which he made a similar appeal for a strong central government.

These papers were the beginnings of the various steps, which, under the influence of Washington, led up to the convention of 1787. There is abundant evidence to show that Washington was the leading, and most influential, spirit in securing the call of the Federal Convention.

Other than as the presiding officer of the convention Washington, apparently, exerted little influence in the actual formation of the constitution.

His greatest work in behalf of the constitution was done after the convention had completed its task. With all the wisdom and care that had been expended upon that wonderful document. the signers themselves had fears that it would never be adopted by the required number of states. That their fears were not realized was largely due to the personality of Washington. His name attached to the constitution added great weight and prestige. Further, with indefatigable zeal, he used every argument and every particle of influence he could command in winning friends for the constitution, particularly in those states where the result was in any way doubtful. His influence in Virgiania and Massachusetts was especially marked. As the ratification of these two states was pivotal in the success of the plan, the importance of Washington's services are at once apparent. Thus from its inception to its adoption, Washington bore a close relation to the constitution. It was his privilege, also, to aid in the setting up of the government under the constitution, and by his administration, to give the trend of interpretation to the constitution.

Speaking upon "Washington as a Patriotic Politician," Mr. Day said:

One of our standard dictionaries defines a politician as "one who concerns himself with public affairs not from patriotism but for his own profit or that of a party." But this sort of politician is a perverted type. Washington, the original and ideal office holder under our government, was actuated by no other motives save that of love of country.

In the first place Washington never sought office, but the office, however high and exalted, always sought Washington. To our first President, public life was at all times distasteful: he doubted his capacity for effective administrative work; he longed for nothing so much as for the quiet industry of his own Virginian estate.

But the sense of great personal sacrifice which he invariably felt in accepting public service did not lead him to turn a deaf ear upon the unmistakable voice of the people calling him to leadership. To Washington the idea of "noblesse oblige" was compelling and, accepting the great trust with all the reluctance which he felt, he promised the country an honest zeal and upright intentions. The errors of his government should be "errors of the head, not of the heart."

The administration of our first President was a type of honest civil service. His only preferment was that based upon experience and talent; impartiality, justice, and the public good were the only objects of his appointments; and any civil service reform of the present day can be nothing more than a journey back to originals.

In all his administrative problems, large and small, Washington absolutely subordinated all interests to that of the welfare and strength of our national government. He can hardly be called a man without a party, but he was a politician who saw party politics in, their proper perspective and held party organizations only justified in so far as they served national ends.

To epitomize Washington's political career is to speak the words "Political Idealism." Of the lesson of his life, we Dartmouth men have much to learn, for seldom have we set forth in bold characters the principles of independence in political thought or reform in political action. May the men of this generation make good the record of the College, and soon may it no longer be necessary to speak of "the Dartmouth man as a patriotic politician," but may it "follow as the day the night" that a Dartmouth man in public service is there from patriotic motives.

Professor Adams, making the closing address, on "National Principles and Policies viewed as an Inheritance from the Fathers" said in part:

In the anniversaries of great men and great events we come back to our higher national consciousness. The ordinary life of the nation passes on the level plane of routine tasks and problems. But there come crises when great problems must be solved by the application of great principles. The man who rises up to lead the nation in such a crisis becomes the great man of his time; in him the highest thoughts of his people find expression; and so the anniversary, of such a man and his deed becomes a reminder of the principles that guided the nation under his leadership. As later generations thus enter into the spirit and principles of the Fathers, the national life finds unity, in spite of the diversity of origin and tradition, and even of language, that tends to separate the people of a country like ours.

This continuity of the national life is a fact of the highest importance. A nation ought to realize and to cherish the idea that it has a distinct personality that does not change with the brief generations. A personality that is the expression of some great principle that was wrought into the life of the people by the Fathers, that is to be cherished by each generation of their sons, applied in ever broadening spheres of the national life,'and then transmitted to their sons as their most precious legacy and their most sacred trust. Policies change, constitutions may be and must be altered to meet changing conditions; but not so with national principles; least of all with the basic principle of the nation, the principle of liberty.

The greatest problems that we as a nation face today are problems of the application of our basic principle of liberty to the industrial freedom of the individual, to the personal emancipation of the citizen from the domination of self-appointed party leaders, and to the early and absolute freedom of the Asiatic people that for the time we hold in a relation that is irreconcilable with our principle of national liberty.