George Washington
George Washington (February 22, 1732 [O.S. February 11, 1731]– December 14, 1799) served as the first President of the United States from 1789 to 1797 and as the commander of the Continental Army in the American Revolutionary War from 1775 to 1783. Because of his significant role in the revolution and in the formation of the United States, he is often revered by Americans as the "Father of Our Country".The Continental Congress appointed Washington commander-in-chief of the American revolutionary forces in 1775. The following year, he forced the British out of Boston, lost New York City, and crossed the Delaware River in New Jersey, defeating the surprised enemy units later that year. Because of his strategy, Revolutionary forces captured the two main British combat armies at Saratoga and Yorktown. Negotiating with Congress, the colonial states, and French allies, he held together a tenuous army and a fragile nation amid the threats of disintegration and failure. Following the end of the war in 1783, King George III asked what Washington would do next and was told of rumors that he would return to his farm; this prompted the king to state, "If he does that, he will be the greatest man in the world." Washington did return to private life and retired to his plantation at Mount Vernon.
He presided over the Philadelphia Convention that drafted the United States Constitution in 1787 because of general dissatisfaction with the Articles of Confederation. Washington became President of the United States in 1789 and established many of the customs and usages of the new government's executive department. He sought to create a nation capable of surviving in a world torn asunder by war between Britain and France. His unilateral Proclamation of Neutrality of 1793 provided a basis for avoiding any involvement in foreign conflicts. He supported plans to build a strong central government by funding the national debt, implementing an effective tax system, and creating a national bank. Washington avoided the temptation of war and a decade of peace with Britain began with the Jay Treaty in 1795; he used his prestige to get it ratified over intense opposition from the Jeffersonians. Although never officially joining the Federalist Party, he supported its programs and was its inspirational leader. Washington's farewell address was a primer on republican virtue and a stern warning against partisanship, sectionalism, and involvement in foreign wars. He was awarded the first Congressional Gold Medal with the Thanks of Congress in 1776.
Washington died in 1799. Henry Lee, delivering the funeral oration, declared Washington "first in war, first in peace, and first in the hearts of his countrymen". Historical scholars consistently rank him as one of the greatest United States presidents.
Early life
George Washington was born on February 22, 1732 the first child of Augustine Washington and his second wife, Mary Ball Washington, on their Pope's Creek Estate near present-day Colonial Beach in Westmoreland County, Virginia. His father had four children by his first wife, Jane Butler: two died young, but two sons survived (Lawrence, born circa 1718, and Augustine, born circa 1720), making George the third son, but very much younger. Moving to Ferry Farm in Stafford County at age six, George was educated in the home by his father and eldest brother. Washington's ancestors were from Sulgrave, England. His great-grandfather, John Washington, immigrated to Virginia in 1657. The growth of tobacco as a commodity in Virginia could be measured by the number of slaves imported to cultivate it. When Washington was born, the population of the colony was 50 percent black, mostly people enslaved in the African diaspora.
In his youth, Washington worked as a surveyor, and acquired what would become invaluable knowledge of the terrain around his native Colony of Virginia. His eldest brother's marriage into the powerful Fairfax family gained young George the patronage of Thomas Fairfax, 6th Lord Fairfax of Cameron and the Proprietor of the Northern Neck, which encompassed some five million acres. In late July 1749, immediately following the establishment of the town of Alexandria, Virginia along the Potomac River, 17-year old George was commissioned as the first Surveyor of the newly created Culpeper County, Virginia in the interior of the colony. This appointment was undoubtedly secured at the behest of Lord Fairfax and his cousin (and resident land agent) William Fairfax of Belvoir, who sat on the Governor's Council.
Career
Washington embarked upon a career as a planter, which historians defined as those who held 20 or more slaves. In 1748, he was invited to help survey Lord Fairfax's lands west of the Blue Ridge. In 1749, he was appointed to his first public office, surveyor of newly created Culpeper County. Through his half-brother, Lawrence Washington, he became interested in the Ohio Company, which aimed to exploit Western lands. In 1751, George and his half-brother traveled to Barbados, staying at Bush Hill House, hoping for an improvement in Lawrence's tuberculosis. This was the only time George Washington traveled outside what is now the United States. After Lawrence's death in 1752, George inherited part of his estate and took over some of Lawrence's duties as adjutant of the colony.
In late 1752, Virginia's newly arrived Governor, Robert Dinwiddie, divided command of the militia into four regions and George applied for one of the commands, his only qualifications being his zeal and being the younger brother of the former adjutant. Washington was appointed a district adjutant general in the Virginia militia in 1752, which appointed him Major Washington at the age of 20. He was charged with training the militia in the quarter assigned to him. At age 21, in Fredericksburg, Washington became a Master Mason in the organization of Freemasons, a fraternal organization that was a lifelong influence.
In December 1753, Washington was asked by Governor Dinwiddie to carry a British ultimatum to the French Canadians on the Ohio frontier. Washington assessed French military strength and intentions, and delivered the message to the French Canadians at Fort Le Boeuf in present-day Waterford, Pennsylvania. The message, which went unheeded, called for the French Canadians to abandon their development of the Ohio country. The two colonial powers were heading toward worldwide conflict. Washington's report on the affair was widely read on both sides of the Atlantic.
French and Indian War (Seven Years War)
In 1754, Dinwiddie commissioned Washington a Lieutenant Colonel and ordered him to lead an expedition to Fort Duquesne to drive out the French Canadians. With his American Indian allies led by Tanacharison, Washington and his troops ambushed a French Canadian scouting party of some 30 men, led by Joseph Coulon de Jumonville. A larger and better-positioned French Canadian and Indian force overwhelmed Washington and his troops at Fort Necessity, resulting in Washington's only military surrender. The terms of surrender included a statement that Washington had assassinated Jumonville after the ambush. Washington could not read French, and, unaware of what it said, signed his name. Released by the French Canadians, Washington returned to Virginia, where he was cleared of blame for the defeat, but resigned because he did not like the new arrangement of the Virginia Militia.
In 1755, Washington was an aide to British General Edward Braddock on the ill-fated Monongahela expedition. This was a major effort to retake the Ohio Country. While Braddock was killed and the expedition ended in disaster, Washington distinguished himself as the Hero of the Monongahela. While Washington's role during the battle has been debated, biographer Joseph Ellis asserts that Washington rode back and forth across the battlefield, rallying the remnant of the British and Virginian forces to a retreat. Subsequent to this action, Washington was given a difficult frontier command in the Virginia mountains, and was rewarded by being promoted to colonel and named commander of all Virginia forces.
In 1758, Washington participated as a Brigadier General in the Forbes expedition that prompted French evacuation of Fort Duquesne, and British establishment of Pittsburgh. Later that year, Washington resigned from active military service and spent the next sixteen years as a Virginia planter and politician.
Militia versus regular army
As a colonial militia officer, albeit a high ranking one, Washington was acutely conscious of the disparity between officers in the militia and the regular British Army establishment. His eldest brother Lawrence had been fortunate to be awarded a commission in the British Army, as "Captain in a Regiment of Foot", in summer 1740, when the British Army raised a new regiment (the 61st Foot, known as Gooch's American Regiment) in the colonies, for service in the West Indies during the War of Jenkins' Ear. Each colony was allowed to appoint its own company officers—the captains and lieutenants—and Colonel William Blakeney distributed signed commissions to the various governors. Fifteen years later, when General Braddock arrived in Virginia in 1755 with two regiments of regulars (the 44th and 48th Foot), Washington sought to obtain a commission, but none were available for purchase. Rather than serve as a militia lieutenant colonel, where he would be outranked by more junior officers in the regulars, Washington chose to serve in a private capacity as aide-de-camp to the general; as an aide, he could command British regulars. Following Braddock's defeat, the British Parliament decided in November 1755 to create a new Royal American Regiment of Foot—later renamed King's Royal Rifle Corps. Unlike the earlier "American Regiment" of 1740–42, all of the officers were recruited in England and Europe in early 1756.
Between the wars: Mount Vernon
A mezzotint of Martha Dandridge Custis, based on a 1757 portrait by John Wollaston.
On January 6, 1759, Washington married the widow Martha Dandridge Custis. Surviving letters suggest that he may have been in love at the time with Sally Fairfax, the wife of a friend. Some historians believe George and Martha were distantly related.
Nevertheless, George and Martha made a good marriage, and together raised her two children from her previous marriage, John Parke Custis and Martha Parke Custis, affectionately called "Jackie" and "Patsy" by the family. Later the Washingtons raised two of Mrs. Washington's grandchildren, Eleanor Parke Custis and George Washington Parke Custis. George and Martha never had any children together — his earlier bout with smallpox (possibly followed by tuberculosis) may have made him sterile. The newlywed couple moved to Mount Vernon, near Alexandria, where he took up the life of a planter and political figure.
Washington's marriage to Martha, a wealthy widow, greatly increased his property holdings and social standing. He acquired one-third of the 18,000 acre (73 km²) Custis estate upon his marriage, and managed the remainder on behalf of Martha's children. He frequently bought additional land in his own name. In addition, he was granted land in what is now West Virginia as a bounty for his service in the French and Indian War. By 1775, Washington had doubled the size of Mount Vernon to 6,500 acres (26 km2), and had increased the slave population there to more than 100 persons. As a respected military hero and large landowner, he held local office and was elected to the Virginia provincial legislature, the House of Burgesses, beginning in 1758.
Washington enlarged the mansion at Mount Vernon after his marriage.
Washington lived an aristocratic lifestyle—fox hunting was a favorite leisure activity. Like most Virginia planters, he imported luxuries and other goods from England and paid for them by exporting his tobacco crop. Extravagant spending and the unpredictability of the tobacco market meant that many Virginia planters of Washington's day were losing money. (Thomas Jefferson, for example, would die deeply in debt.)
Washington began to pull himself out of debt by diversification. By 1766, he had switched Mount Vernon's primary cash crop from tobacco to wheat, a crop that could be sold in America, and diversified operations to include flour milling, fishing, horse breeding, spinning, and weaving. Patsy Custis's death in 1773 from epilepsy enabled Washington to pay off his British creditors, since half of her inheritance passed to him.
The earliest known portrait of Washington, painted in 1772 by Charles Willson Peale, showing Washington in uniform as colonel of the Virginia Regiment.
During these years, Washington concentrated on his business activities and remained somewhat aloof from politics. Although he expressed opposition to the 1765 Stamp Act, the first direct tax on the colonies, he did not take a leading role in the growing colonial resistance until after protests of the Townshend Acts (enacted in 1767) had become widespread. In May 1769, Washington introduced a proposal drafted by his friend George Mason, which called for Virginia to boycott English goods until the Acts were repealed. Parliament repealed the Townshend Acts in 1770, and, for Washington at least, the crisis had passed. However, Washington regarded the passage of the Intolerable Acts in 1774 as "an Invasion of our Rights and Privileges". In July 1774, he chaired the meeting at which the "Fairfax Resolves" were adopted, which called for, among other things, the convening of a Continental Congress. In August, Washington attended the First Virginia Convention, where he was selected as a delegate to the First Continental Congress.
Presidency of George Washington
The Electoral College elected Washington unanimously in 1789, and again in the 1792 election; he remains the only president to have received 100 percent of the electoral votes. At his inauguration, he insisted on having Barbados Rum served. John Adams was elected vice president. Washington took the oath of office as the first President under the Constitution for the United States of America on April 30, 1789, at Federal Hall in New York City although, at first, he had not wanted the position.
The 1st United States Congress voted to pay Washington a salary of $25,000 a year—a large sum in 1789. Washington, already wealthy, declined the salary, since he valued his image as a selfless public servant. At the urging of Congress, however, he ultimately accepted the payment, to avoid setting a precedent whereby the presidency would be perceived as limited only to independently wealthy individuals who could serve without any salary. Washington attended carefully to the pomp and ceremony of office, making sure that the titles and trappings were suitably republican and never emulated European royal courts. To that end, he preferred the title "Mr. President" to the more majestic names suggested.
Washington proved an able administrator. An excellent delegator and judge of talent and character, he held regular cabinet meetings to debate issues before making a final decision. In handling routine tasks, he was "systematic, orderly, energetic, solicitous of the opinion of others but decisive, intent upon general goals and the consistency of particular actions with them."
Washington reluctantly served a second term as president. He refused to run for a third, establishing the customary policy of a maximum of two terms for a president, which later became law by the 22nd Amendment to the Constitution.
Domestic issues
Washington was not a member of any political party and hoped that they would not be formed, fearing conflict and stagnation. His closest advisors formed two factions, setting the framework for the future First Party System. Secretary of Treasury Alexander Hamilton had bold plans to establish the national credit and build a financially powerful nation, and formed the basis of the Federalist Party. Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson, founder of the Jeffersonian Republicans, strenuously opposed Hamilton's agenda, but Washington favored Hamilton over Jefferson.
The Residence Act of 1790, which Washington signed, authorized the President to select the specific location of the permanent seat of the government, which would be located along the Potomac River. The Act authorized the President to appoint three commissioners to survey and acquire property for this seat. Washington personally oversaw this effort throughout his term in office. In 1791, the commissioners named the permanent seat of government "The City of Washington in the Territory of Columbia" to honor Washington. In 1800, the Territory of Columbia became the District of Columbia when the federal government moved to the site according to the provisions of the Residence Act.
In 1791, Congress imposed an excise on distilled spirits, which led to protests in frontier districts, especially Pennsylvania. By 1794, after Washington ordered the protesters to appear in U.S. district court, the protests turned into full-scale riots known as the Whiskey Rebellion. The federal army was too small to be used, so Washington invoked the Militia Act of 1792 to summon the militias of Pennsylvania, Virginia, and several other states. The governors sent the troops and Washington took command, marching into the rebellious districts. There was no fighting, but Washington's forceful action proved the new government could protect itself. It also was one of only two times that a sitting President would personally command the military in the field. These events marked the first time under the new constitution that the federal government used strong military force to exert authority over the states and citizens.
Foreign affairs
In 1793, the revolutionary government of France sent diplomat Edmond-Charles Genêt, called "Citizen Genêt," to America. Genêt issued letters of marque and reprisal to American ships so they could capture British merchant ships. He attempted to turn popular sentiment towards American involvement in the French war against Britain by creating a network of Democratic-Republican Societies in major cities. Washington rejected this interference in domestic affairs, demanded the French government recall Genêt, and denounced his societies.
Hamilton and Washington designed the Jay Treaty to normalize trade relations with Britain, remove them from western forts, and resolve financial debts left over from the Revolution. John Jay negotiated and signed the treaty on November 19, 1794. The Jeffersonians supported France and strongly attacked the treaty. Washington and Hamilton, however, mobilized public opinion and won ratification by the Senate by emphasizing Washington's support. The British agreed to depart their forts around the Great Lakes, the Canadian-U.S. boundary was adjusted, numerous pre-Revolutionary debts were liquidated, and the British opened their West Indies colonies to American trade. Most importantly, the treaty delayed war with Britain and instead brought a decade of prosperous trade with that country. This angered the French and became a central issue in political debates.
Farewell Address
Washington's Farewell Address (issued as a public letter in 1796) was one of the most influential statements of American political values. Drafted primarily by Washington himself, with help from Hamilton, it gives advice on the necessity and importance of national union, the value of the Constitution and the rule of law, the evils of political parties, and the proper virtues of a republican people. While he declined suggested versions that would have included statements that morality required a "divinely authoritative religion," he called morality "a necessary spring of popular government". He said, "Whatever may be conceded to the influence of refined education on minds of peculiar structure, reason and experience both forbid us to expect that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle."
Washington's public political address warned against foreign influence in domestic affairs and American meddling in European affairs. He warned against bitter partisanship in domestic politics and called for men to move beyond partisanship and serve the common good. He warned against 'permanent alliances with any portion of the foreign world', saying the United States must concentrate primarily on American interests. He counseled friendship and commerce with all nations, but warned against involvement in European wars and entering into long-term "entangling" alliances. The address quickly set American values regarding religion and foreign affairs.
Retirement and death
After retiring from the presidency in March 1797, Washington returned to Mount Vernon with a profound sense of relief. He devoted much time to farming.
On July 4, 1798, Washington was commissioned by President John Adams to be lieutenant general and Commander-in-chief of the armies raised or to be raised for service in a prospective war with France. He served as the senior officer of the United States Army between July 13, 1798, and December 14, 1799. He participated in the planning for a Provisional Army to meet any emergency that might arise, but did not take the field.
On December 12, 1799, Washington spent several hours inspecting his farms on horseback, in snow and later hail and freezing rain. He sat down to dine that evening without changing his wet clothes. The next morning, he awoke with a bad cold, fever, and a throat infection called quinsy that turned into acute laryngitis and pneumonia. Washington died on the evening of December 14, 1799, at his home aged 67, while attended by Dr. James Craik, one of his closest friends, Dr. Gustavus Richard Brown, Dr. Elisha C. Dick, and Tobias Lear V, Washington's personal secretary. Lear would record the account in his journal, writing that Washington's last words were "'Tis well." Modern doctors believe that Washington died largely because of his treatment, which included calomel and bloodletting, resulting in a combination of shock from the loss of five pints of blood, as well as asphyxia and dehydration.
Throughout the world, men and women were saddened by Washington's death. Napoleon I ordered ten days of mourning throughout France; in the United States, thousands wore mourning clothes for months. To protect their privacy, Martha Washington burned the correspondence between her husband and herself following his death. Only three letters between the couple have survived.
Interment and new tomb
On December 18, 1799, a funeral was held at Mount Vernon, and Washington was interred in a tomb on the estate.
Congress passed a joint resolution to construct a marble monument in the United States Capitol for his body, supported by Martha. In December 1800, the United States House passed an appropriations bill for $200,000 to build the mausoleum, which was to be a pyramid that had a base 100 feet (30 m) square. Southern opposition to the plan defeated the measure because they felt it was best to have his body remain at Mount Vernon.
In 1831, for the centennial of his birth, a new tomb was constructed to receive his remains. That year, an attempt was made to steal the body of Washington, but proved to be unsuccessful. Despite this, a joint Congressional committee in early 1832 debated the removal of Washington's body from Mount Vernon to a crypt in the Capitol, built by Charles Bullfinch in the 1820s. Yet again, Southern opposition proved very intense, antagonized by an ever-growing rift between North and South. Congressman Wiley Thompson of Georgia expressed the fear of Southerners when he said:
"Remove the remains of our venerated Washington from their association with the remains of his consort and his ancestors, from Mount Vernon and from his native State, and deposit them in this capitol, and then let a severance of the Union occur, and behold the remains of Washington on a shore foreign to his native soil."
This ended any talk of the movement of his remains, and he was moved to the new tomb that was constructed there on October 7, 1837, presented by John Struthers of Philadelphia. After the ceremony, the inner vault's door was closed and the key was thrown into the Potomac.
Administration, Cabinet and Supreme Court appointments
The Washington Cabinet
Office Name Term
President George Washington 1789–1797
Vice President John Adams 1789–1797
Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson 1790–1793
Edmund Randolph 1794–1795
Timothy Pickering 1795–1797
Secretary of Treasury Alexander Hamilton 1789–1795
Oliver Wolcott, Jr. 1795–1797
Secretary of War Henry Knox 1789–1794
Timothy Pickering 1794–1795
James McHenry 1796–1797
Attorney General Edmund Randolph 1789–1794
William Bradford 1794–1795
Charles Lee 1795–1797
Portrait of George Washington by Gilbert Stuart
Legacy
Representative Henry Lee, a Revolutionary War comrade and father of the Civil War general Robert E. Lee, famously eulogized Washington as follows:
First in war, first in peace, and first in the hearts of his countrymen, he was second to none in humble and enduring scenes of private life. Pious, just, humane, temperate, and sincere; uniform, dignified, and commanding; his example was as edifying to all around him as were the effects of that example lasting...Correct throughout, vice shuddered in his presence and virtue always felt his fostering hand. The purity of his private character gave effulgence to his public virtues...Such was the man for whom our nation mourns.
Lee's words set the standard by which Washington's overwhelming reputation was impressed upon the American memory. Washington set many precedents for the national government and the presidency in particular.
As early as 1778, Washington was lauded as the "Father of His Country".
During the United States Bicentennial year, George Washington was posthumously appointed to the grade of General of the Armies of the United States by the congressional joint resolution Public Law 94-479 passed on January 19, 1976, with an effective appointment date of July 4, 1976. This restored Washington's position as the highest-ranking military officer in U.S. history.
Monuments and memorials
Today, Washington's face and image are often used as national symbols of the United States, along with the icons such as the flag and great seal. Perhaps the most prominent commemoration of his legacy is the use of his image on the one-dollar bill and the quarter-dollar coin. Washington, together with Theodore Roosevelt, Thomas Jefferson, and Abraham Lincoln, is depicted in stone at the Mount Rushmore Memorial. The Washington Monument, one of the most well known American landmarks, was built in his honor. The George Washington Masonic National Memorial in Alexandria, Virginia, constructed entirely with voluntary contributions from members of the Masonic Fraternity, was also built in his honor.
Equestrian statue (1860, Clark Mills) in Washington Circle, Washington, D.C.
Many things have been named in honor of Washington. Washington's name became that of the nation's capital, Washington, D.C., one of two capitals across the globe to be named after an American president (the other is Monrovia, Liberia). The state of Washington is the only state to be named after an American (Maryland, Virginia, the Carolinas, and Georgia are all named in honor of British monarchs, and Pennsylvania and Delaware after British subjects). George Washington University and Washington University in St. Louis were named for him, as was Washington and Lee University (once Washington Academy), which was renamed due to Washington’s large endowment in 1796. Countless American cities and towns feature a Washington Street among their thoroughfares.
There is even a statue of Washington in London, the capital of his enemies. Based on Jean Antoine Houdon's marble statue in Richmond, Virginia, it was given to the British Nation in 1921 by the Commonwealth of Virginia. It stands in front of the National Gallery at Trafalgar Square. It has been claimed that the soil on which the statue stands also comes from America since Washington is reported to have said that he would never stand on English ground.
Washington and slavery
The slave trade continued throughout George Washington’s life. On the death of his father in 1743, the 11-year-old inherited 10 slaves. At the time of his marriage to Martha Custis in 1759, he personally owned at least 36 (and the widow's third of her first husband's estate brought at least 85 "dower slaves" to Mount Vernon). Using his wife's great wealth he bought land, tripling the size of the plantation, and additional slaves to farm it. By 1774, he paid taxes on 135 slaves (this does not include the "dowers"). The last record of a slave purchase by him was in 1772, although he later received some slaves in repayment of debts. Washington also used white indentured servants.
Before the American Revolution, Washington expressed no moral reservations about slavery, but in 1786, Washington wrote to Robert Morris, saying, "There is not a man living who wishes more sincerely than I do, to see a plan adopted for the abolition of slavery."[70] In 1778, he wrote to his manager at Mount Vernon that he wished "to get quit of negroes". Maintaining a large, and increasingly elderly, slave population at Mount Vernon was not economically profitable. Washington could not legally sell the "dower slaves," however, and because these slaves had long intermarried with his own slaves, he could not sell his slaves without breaking up families.[71]
As president, Washington brought seven slaves to New York City in 1789 to work in the first presidential household– Oney Judge, Moll, Giles, Paris, Austin, Christopher Sheels, and William Lee. Following the transfer of the national capital to Philadelphia in 1790, he brought nine slaves to work in the President's House– Oney Judge, Moll, Giles, Paris, Austin, Christopher Sheels, Hercules, Richmond, and Joe (Richardson).[72] Oney Judge and Hercules escaped to freedom from Philadelphia, and there were foiled escape attempts from Mount Vernon by Richmond and Christopher Sheels.
Pennsylvania had begun an abolition of slavery in 1780, and prohibited nonresidents from holding slaves in the state longer than six months. If held beyond that period, the state's Gradual Abolition Act[73] gave those slaves the power to free themselves. Washington argued (privately) that his presence in Pennsylvania was solely a consequence of Philadelphia's being the temporary seat of the federal government, and that the state law should not apply to him. On the advice of his attorney general, Edmund Randolph, he systematically rotated the President's House slaves in and out of the state to prevent their establishing a six-month continuous residency. This rotation was itself a violation of the Pennsylvania law, but the President's actions were not challenged.
The Fugitive Slave Act of 1793[74] established the legal mechanism by which a slaveholder could recover his property, a right guaranteed by the Fugitive Slave Clause of the U.S. Constitution (Article IV, Section 2). Passed overwhelmingly by Congress and signed into law by Washington, the 1793 Act made assisting an escaped slave a federal crime, overruled all state and local laws giving escaped slaves sanctuary, and allowed slave catchers into every U.S. state and territory.
Washington was the only prominent, slaveholding Founding Father who emancipated his slaves. His actions were influenced by his close relationship with Marquis de La Fayette. He did not free his slaves in his lifetime, however, but included a provision in his will to free his slaves upon the death of his wife. At the time of his death, there were 317 slaves at Mount Vernon– 123 owned by Washington, 154 "dower slaves," and 40 rented from a neighbor.
Martha Washington bequeathed the one slave she owned outright– Elisha– to her grandson George Washington Parke Custis. Following her death in 1802, her grandchildren inherited the dower slaves.
It has been argued that Washington did not speak out publicly against slavery, because he did not wish to create a split in the new republic, with an issue that was sensitive and divisive. Even if Washington had opposed the Fugitive Slave Act of 1793, his veto probably would have been overridden. (The Senate vote was not recorded, but the House passed it overwhelmingly, 47 to 8.)
On March 4, 1850, the possibility of Southern Secession over the issue of slavery, eventually deferred by the Compromise of 1850, arose. The prominent Southern leader John C. Calhoun invoked Washington's memory in support of the Southern cause, saying, "The illustrious Southerner whose mortal remains repose on the western bank of the Potomac was one of us - a slave-holder and a planter"
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