The future scientist and diplomat was born in 1706 into the family of a craftsman. He was the 15th child, and his parents had no money for his education. Therefore, Franklin independently studied chemistry, mathematics, physics and ancient languages. In 1724 he moved to London to become familiar with the printing business. Returning to Philadelphia, the young man published the Pennsylvania Gazette. Franklin also came up with the idea of creating the first public library in the colonies.
The range of scientific interests of the future founding father of the United States was wide: he studied the Gulf Stream and atmospheric electricity, invented bifocal glasses, a rocking chair and a small stove for the home. For writing scientific works, Franklin was recognized as a member of the Royal Scientific Society of England, as well as the St. Petersburg Academy of Sciences. Benjamin became one of the first American Freemasons. He was known to the general public for his aphorisms: “don’t put off until tomorrow what you can do today,” “time is money,” “laziness, like rust, eats away faster than labor wears out.” Franklin also gave practical advice on saving money: “Spend one penny less than you earn.”
Benjamin Franklin died at the age of 85. More than 20 thousand people attended his funeral.
Jefferson headed the committee that drafted the Declaration of Independence. After two days of discussions, part of the text that dealt with criticism of the slave trade was removed from his draft. It is noteworthy that the politician opposed slave labor, but used it on his plantations; he inherited 2,750 acres of land from his father. And here is a record from contemporaries about working conditions in his workshop: “Locked in a stuffy, smoky workshop, the boys minted 5-10 thousand nails a day, which in 1796 brought Jefferson 2 thousand dollars in total income. At the time, his nail factory competed with the state penitentiary.”
In 1779, Thomas Jefferson became governor of Virginia, and in 1785 he went to France as ambassador. Four years later, he served as Secretary of State under President George Washington. In 1801 he was elected head of state.
A brilliant lawyer who became famous for his trial in 1770. English soldiers who were accused of killing five townspeople in Boston turned to him for protection. Despite enormous public pressure and risks to his reputation, Adams took on this case. The man had a talent for speaking; the audience listened to him in complete silence. He won the case, six soldiers were acquitted.
John Adams co-created the US Constitution in 1787 and became vice president in 1789. On March 4, 1797, he was elected head of state (at the same time, Adams himself did not participate in the election campaign; instead of public speaking and fighting for votes, he sat at home). His presidency was marred by diplomatic conflict that led to an undeclared war at sea between the United States and the French Republic in 1798–1800. It was under Adams that the White House was built. The President was criticized for his lack of decisive action in the conflict between the Federalist and Democratic-Republican parties.
John Adams. (wikipedia.org)
After the end of his presidential term, the “founding father” left big politics. He died on July 4, 1826. On the same day, his main opponent, Thomas Jefferson, died.
Alexander Hamilton became US Secretary of the Treasury in the first American government. On his initiative, the National Bank was created. During the financial crisis of 1792, when securities lost a quarter of their value, Hamilton ordered the issuance of $150,000 to purchase government bonds. In addition, he proposed offering loans secured by American debt securities. It took the Finance Minister just over a month to stabilize the market.
Hamilton was known for his incisive pamphlets. Because of them, the politician died. In July 1804, he was mortally wounded in a duel with Vice President Aaron Burr and died the next day, six months shy of his 50th birthday.
In 1789, Jay became the first Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court, and in 1795 he was elected governor of New York.
The politician did not seek re-election for a second term. He moved out of town and took up farming. John Jay died in May 1829 at the age of 83.
James Madison studied at a private school, after which he entered the prestigious Princeton University (then the College of New Jersey). In 1775, he headed the Committee of Safety in Orange County, and two years later became a member of the Governor's Council of Virginia. In 1785 he proposed a bill on freedom of religion. He became the author of a series of articles in defense of the Constitution, the purpose of which was to ratify the document in the states. In March 1809, Madison assumed the presidency. In 1810, he ordered a ban on the entry of British ships into American ports. In the same year, he initiated the expansion of West Florida, which at that time belonged to Spain. In 1812, a devastating war with Great Britain began for the United States.
After his resignation, Madison settled in Virginia. He died at the age of 85.
Material from Wikipedia - the free encyclopedia
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The large group of "Founding Fathers" is divided into two key subgroups: the delegates who signed the Declaration of Independence in 1776, and the framers of the US Constitution in 1787 (additionally including the delegates who signed the Articles of Confederation. Until the end of the 19th century, they were referred to as the "Founders" USA" or as "USA Fathers".
Some historians use the term "Founding Fathers" to refer to a larger group of individuals, including not only the signers of the founding documents, but also the people who participated in the formation of the United States of America as politicians, lawyers, statesmen, soldiers, diplomats, or ordinary citizens.
Historian Richard Morris in 1973 identified the following seven key Founding Fathers: John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, Alexander Hamilton, John Jay, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, and George Washington. Three of them (Hamilton, Madison and Jay) are the authors of the Federalist Papers - 85 articles supporting the ratification of the US Constitution.
| № | Portrait | Name | Characteristic |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Adams, John John Adams | Second President of the United States | |
| 2 | Washington, George George Washington | First President and Commander-in-Chief of American forces during the Revolutionary War | |
| 3 | Hamilton Alexander Hamilton | Federalist Party leader and distinguished constitutional lawyer and philosopher | |
| 4 | Jay John Jay | First Chief Justice of the United States, diplomat | |
| 5 | Jefferson, Thomas Thomas Jefferson | Author of the Declaration of Independence, third President of the United States | |
| 6 | Madison, James James Madison | Fourth President of the United States, creator of the US Constitution | |
| 7 | Franklin Benjamin Franklin | Scientist and politician, one of the ideologists of the American Revolution |
President of the Continental Congress: Peyton Randolph.
Nathaniel Folsom and John Sullivan.
John Adams, Samuel Adams, Thomas Cushing and Robert Paine.
Stephen Hopkins and Samuel Ward.
Strength Dean, Eliphalet Dyer and Roger Sherman.
John Alsop, Simon Boerum, James Duane, William Floyd, John Jay, Philip Livingston, Isaac Low and Henry Wiesner.
Stephen Crane, John De Hart, James Kinsey, William Livingston and Richard Smith
Edward Biddle, John Dickinson, Joseph Galloway, Charles Humphreys, Thomas Mifflin, John Morton and George Ross.
Thomas McKean, George Post and Caesar Rodney.
Samuel Chase, Thomas Johnson, Jr., William Paca, and Matthew Tillman.
Richard Bland, Benjamin Harrison, Patrick Henry Jr., Richard Henry Lee, Edmund Pendleton and George Washington.
Richard Caswell. Joseph Hughes and William Hooper.
Christopher Gadsden, Thomas Lynch, Henry Middleton, Edward Rutledge and John Rutledge.
Abraham Baldwin
Richard Bassett
Guncrete Bedford, Jr.
John Blair
William Blount
David Brearly
Jacob Broome
Piers Butler
Daniel Carroll
George Clymer
Jonathan Dayton
John Dickinson
William Malo
Thomas Fitzsimons
Benjamin Franklin
Nikolai Gilman
Nathaniel Gorham
Alexander Hamilton
Jared Ingersoll
William Jackson, Secretary (certifying)
Daniel Thomas Jennifer
William Samuel Johnson
Rufus King
John Langdon
William Livingston
James Madison
James McHenry
Thomas Mifflin
Governor Morris
Robert Morris
William Paterson
Charles Pinckney
John Rutledge
Roger Sherman
Richard Dobbs Spaight
George Washington (President of the Convention)
Hugh Williamson
James Wilson
Delegates who left the Convention without signing
William Richardson Davy
Oliver Ellsworth
William Houston
William Houstoun
John Lansing, Jr.
Alexander Martin
Luther Martin
James McClurg
John Francis Mercer
William Pierce
Caleb Strong
George Wythe
Robert Yates
Congress delegates who refused to sign
Elbridge Jerry
George Mason
Edmund Randolph
The following individuals are also mentioned in reliable sources as having the right to be called the Founding Fathers of the United States:
Abigail Smith Adams (wife and mother of US presidents).
Ethan Allen (military and political leader in Vermont).
Richard Allen (African-American bishop).
John Bertram (botanist, horticulturist and explorer).
Egbert Benson (New York politician).
Richard Bland (delegate to the Continental Congress from Virginia).
Elias Baudinot (delegate to the Continental Congress from New Jersey).
Aaron Burr (US Vice President under Thomas Jefferson).
George Rogers Clark (Army General).
George Clinton (Governor of New York and Vice President of the United States).
Lin Cox (economist in the Continental Congress).
Albert Gallatin (politician and Secretary of the Treasury).
Horatio Gates (Army General).
Nathaniel Greene (Army General).
Nathan Hale (captured an American soldier in 1776).
James Iredell (defender of the Constitution, judge).
John Paul Jones (Navy Captain).
Henry Knox (Army General, first US Secretary of War).
Tadeusz Kosciuszko (Polish army general).
Gilbert Lafayette (General of the French Army).
Henry Lee III (officer and governor of Virginia).
Robert Livingston (first US Foreign Secretary).
William Maclay (Pennsylvania, politician and US senator).
Dolley Madison (wife of James Madison).
John Marshall (fourth Chief Justice of the United States).
Philip Mazai (Italian doctor, merchant).
James Monroe (fifth US President).
Daniel Morgan (military hero and member of the House of Representatives from Virginia).
James Otis Jr. (lawyer, politician and journalist).
Thomas Paine ("Godfather of the USA").
Andrew Pickens (Army General and Congressman).
Timothy Pickering (US Secretary of State).
Israel Putnam (Army General).
Comte de Rochambeau (French army general).
Thomas Sumter (South Carolina military hero and congressman).
Guym Solomon (financier and spy for the Continental Army).
Friedrich Wilhelm von Steuben (American general of Prussian origin).
John Borlaise Warren (British admiral and diplomat).
Anthony Wayne (army general and politician).
Noah Webster (writer, encyclopedist and educator).
Thomas Want (banker).
Payne Wingate (oldest survivor, Continental Congress).
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The glow of the first fire that started on September 2nd was watched from different roads by fleeing residents and retreating troops with different feelings.
That night the Rostovs' train stood in Mytishchi, twenty miles from Moscow. On September 1, they left so late, the road was so cluttered with carts and troops, so many things had been forgotten, for which people had been sent, that that night it was decided to spend the night five miles outside Moscow. The next morning we set off late, and again there were so many stops that we only got to Bolshie Mytishchi. At ten o'clock the gentlemen of the Rostovs and the wounded who were traveling with them all settled in the courtyards and huts of the large village. The people, the Rostovs' coachmen and the wounded's orderlies, having removed the gentlemen, had dinner, fed the horses and went out onto the porch.
In the next hut lay Raevsky’s wounded adjutant, with a broken hand, and the terrible pain he felt made him moan pitifully, without ceasing, and these groans sounded terribly in the autumn darkness of the night. On the first night, this adjutant spent the night in the same courtyard in which the Rostovs stood. The Countess said that she could not close her eyes from this groan, and in Mytishchi she moved to a worse hut just to be away from this wounded man.
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33\34. Founding Fathers of the USA.
Paine on State and Law
Thomas Paine (1737-1809) is one of the most radical representatives of the democratic political and legal ideology of the Revolutionary War period. Later than its other representatives, having joined the liberation movement of the colonies (Paine in 1774, i.e. on the eve of the War of Independence, moved from England to North America), he was the first among them in 1775 in the article “Serious Thought” to raise the question of separation of the colonies from England and the creation of an independent state. In his pamphlet "Common Sense" - his most famous work - he showed the imperfection of the political system of England and proposed the name of the state that the colonists should form - "United States of America". The ideas of this pamphlet were reflected in the Declaration of Independence of the United States, authored by T. Jefferson. After the outbreak of the revolution in France, Paine published the work "Rights of Man", in which he defended the democratic rights and freedoms proclaimed in the French Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen of 1789.
Like many other representatives of the natural law theory of that time, Paine distinguished between natural and civil rights of man." The former are inherent in him by nature, "by the right of his existence." To them Paine included the right to happiness, freedom of conscience, freedom of speech. These are the rights of man possessed in a state of nature, which, according to Paine, was a historical fact (here he is close to Locke) and which, in his opinion, was still preserved among the North American Indians.
With the formation of society and the state, people transferred part of their natural rights to the “common fund”. This is how civil rights arise that belong to a person as a member of society. These are the rights that a person is not able to protect with his own power. Paine also included the right of ownership among them - an acquired right, not a natural one.
Like Rousseau, Paine believed that in the state of nature there was no private property in land—land was “the common property of the human race.” Private property appears with the transition to agriculture, and also as a result of “underpayment of workers.” Along with it, a division of people into rich and poor arises. By nature, all people are equal in their rights, and the division into rich and poor is a consequence of the emergence of private property (for Paine's ideological opponent A. Hamilton, the division into rich and poor has a natural origin).
Back in 1775, Paine was one of the first in North America to speak out against slavery and demand the emancipation of slaves.
The state, according to Paine, arises after the unification of people into society, because united people are not able to maintain justice in their relations among themselves. It is created by people according to a social contract - the only possible way to form a state. Therefore, the supreme power in the state must belong to the people themselves. From this idea of popular sovereignty, Paine deduces the right of the people to establish or destroy any form of government - the right of the people to revolt and revolution. With the same ideas of popular sovereignty and the right to revolution, Paine substantiated the admissibility and necessity of separating the colonies from England and forming their own independent state.
Analyzing the forms of the state, Paine distinguished between “old” (monarchical) and “new” (republican) forms. The basis of this one. The classification is based on the principles of education (government - inheritance or election. Paine sharply criticized the political system of England and pre-revolutionary France. He called government based on the transfer of power by inheritance “the most unjust and imperfect of all systems of government.” Without any legal basis , such a power is inevitably tyrannical, usurping popular sovereignty.
Republican government, according to Paine's ideas, should be based on the principle of popular representation. It is “a government instituted in the interests of the community and carried on in its interests, both individual and collective.” Since it is based on popular sovereignty, the supreme power must be vested in the legislative body, elected on the basis of universal suffrage as the realization of the natural equality of people.
From these positions, Paine criticized the US Constitution of 1787, during the period of which he was in Europe. Thus, in enshrining the system of “checks and balances” in the Constitution, he rightly saw the influence of Montesquieu’s theory of separation of powers, with which he did not agree. He also saw a drawback of the Constitution in the creation of a bicameral legislative body, formed on the basis of the qualified suffrage that existed in the states. In his opinion, the term of office of senators was too long (six years). He preferred a collegial one to the sole head of the executive branch (president), provided for by the Constitution. He also objected to giving the president the right of veto, and to the irremovability of judges, who, he believed, should be re-elected and be responsible to the people. Finally, Paine argued that each generation should determine for itself what was in its best interest and therefore have the right to change the Constitution.
Paine's political views expressed democratic and revolutionary tendencies in the liberation movement of the colonists and the interests of the broadest strata. They had a tremendous impact on the course and outcome of the War of Independence. Moreover, they influenced the liberation movement in Latin America against Spanish colonial rule and even “crossed” the Atlantic Ocean and in Paine’s homeland, England, they contributed to the formation of the political ideology of the Chartist movement with its demands for universal suffrage and annual parliamentary elections.
§ 3. Political and legal views of T. Jefferson
The political views of Thomas Jefferson (1743 - 1826) were close to those of Paine. Like Paine, Jefferson accepted the natural law doctrine in its most radical and democratic interpretation. Hence the closeness of his political and legal views to the ideas of Rousseau. True, before the start of the Revolutionary War, Jefferson hoped for a peaceful resolution of the conflict with England and was influenced by Montesquieu's theory of separation of powers. But this did not stop him from subsequently criticizing the US Constitution of 1787, which perceived the separation of powers as a system of “checks and balances” and gave the president the opportunity to be re-elected an unlimited number of times and thereby, according to Jefferson, turn into a lifelong monarch. He considered the absence of a Bill of Rights, especially freedom of speech, press, and religion, to be a big drawback of the Constitution.
The radical and democratic interpretation of the natural law concept was manifested in Jefferson's idea of the social contract as the basis of the structure of society, giving all its participants the right to constitute state power. From here the idea of popular sovereignty and equality of citizens in political, including voting, rights flowed logically.
Jefferson criticized capitalism, which was gaining strength in the United States, leading to the ruin and impoverishment of large sections of the population. However, he considered the main cause of these disasters to be the development of large-scale capitalist production and idealized small farming. His ideal was a democratic republic of free and equal farmers. This ideal was utopian, but Jefferson's active promotion of it played a major role in attracting the broad masses of the colonies to active participation in the War of Independence.
Even more important was the fact that Jefferson was the author of the draft Declaration of Independence - a constitutional document that, based on the democratic and revolutionary interpretation of natural law doctrine, substantiated the legality of the separation of the colonies from England and their formation of an independent state.
A break with religious ideas about state power, still characteristic of that era (mention of the creator God is made in passing in the Declaration and does not change anything in its content), and natural law argumentation, popular sovereignty and the right to revolution, protection of individual freedom and rights citizens - all this made the Declaration of Independence the outstanding theoretical and political document of its time. We should not forget that feudal-absolutist tyranny still reigned on the continent of Europe in those years, and the English monarchy tried to maintain its dominance in the North American colonies using practically feudal-absolutist means.
To Jefferson, as the author of the Declaration, “these truths are evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.” The natural equality of people proclaimed in the preamble of the Declaration was directly opposed to the class privileges inherited from feudalism, and inalienable rights to feudal lawlessness. These ideas also had a specific practical and political meaning in the struggle against the British colonialists, who denied the equality of colonists with the residents of the metropolis and encroached on the rights of the colonists.
The list of inalienable rights named in the Declaration does not include the right of property contained, as noted, in the Declaration of Rights of the First Continental Congress. The absence of this most important, sacred right for bourgeois society is explained by the influence of Paine, who in American historical literature was sometimes called the author of the Declaration of Independence, although he himself clearly indicated that its author was Jefferson (it was said above that Paine considered the right of property to be an acquired right and, therefore, not related to inalienable human rights). It is necessary to keep in mind another, practically no less important, political circumstance. When drafting the Declaration, Jefferson took into account that as the conflict between the colonists and England intensified, their ideas about freedom and property became increasingly fused. After all, the source of the conflict lay primarily in England’s encroachments on the material interests of the colonists. It was these attacks that helped the colonists realize that they were not free. The colonists saw their freedom in the unhindered development of property; The main thing for them was not abstract theoretical freedom from foreign power, but practical freedom that ensured their material interests. Therefore, freedom as a natural and inalienable right was seen by the colonists (and Jefferson had to take this into account) as a guarantee of freedom of property. In practice, freedom in the Declaration of Independence included the right to freely use and dispose of one’s material goods, i.e. right to property.
Government, Jefferson wrote in the Declaration of Independence, is created by the people to protect the natural rights of man, and the power of government derives from the consent of the people to obey it. Consistently developing the idea of popular sovereignty, Jefferson concludes that due to this origin of government power (created by the people) and such a condition of its existence (the consent of the people), the people have the right to change or destroy the existing form of government (the existing government), which is the “duty and right” of the people overthrow of a government bent on despotism. The right to revolution is thus justified, and convincingly justified.
Further, the Declaration of Independence contains 27 points accusing the English king of striving for despotism, which gives grounds to proclaim in the Declaration “in the name and authority of the good people of our colonies” the separation of the colonies from England (the overthrow of a government striving for despotism is the right to revolution) and the formation of independent U.S.A.
To characterize Jefferson's political views, it is important to pay attention to the fact that in the draft Declaration of Independence he compiled there were not 27, but 28 points of accusation against the English king. The clause, which did not make it into the final text of the Declaration as a result of strong objections from the planters of the southern colonies, condemned the slavery of blacks that flourished in the southern colonies. Jefferson was convinced that it was contrary to human nature and the natural rights of people and accused the English king of “capturing people and enslaving them in another hemisphere, and often they died a terrible death, unable to withstand transportation.”
Jefferson entered the history of political thought and the history of modern times as a whole as the author of the Declaration of Independence of the United States. The significance of the Declaration is not only that it proclaimed the formation of the United States, but even more so in the proclamation of the most advanced political and legal ideas and ideas at that time. The ideas of the Declaration and of Jefferson himself had and continue to influence political life in the United States.
§ 4. A. Hamilton’s views on state and law
Alexander Hamilton (1757-1804) was one of the most prominent political figures of the US founding period, whose theoretical views and practical activities had a decisive influence on the content of the US Constitution of 1787.
During the period of immediate preparation of the Constitution, and especially after its adoption, a sharp political struggle broke out in the country between federalists and anti-federalists. Externally, the basis for the split into these political groups was the attitude towards the federal form of government of the United States intended by the Constitution.
Hamilton was one of the most influential Federalist leaders who believed that the federal structure overcomes the weakness of the confederal organization of the United States, enshrined in the Articles of Confederation of 1781. Only a strong central government, in their opinion, is capable of creating a strong state and preventing the further development of the democratic movement of the masses, increased after the victory in the Revolutionary War. A federation, Hamilton argued, would be a barrier against internal strife and popular uprising.
The Federalists actually represented the interests of the large commercial and industrial bourgeoisie and planters. The Anti-Federalists expressed the aspirations of the poor and disadvantaged sections of the population - farmers, small entrepreneurs and traders, wage workers.
Hamilton's political positions were determined in the period preceding the War of Independence, when he advocated a peaceful resolution of the conflict, a compromise with England. His theoretical views completely coincided with this position. They were formed under the decisive influence of the theory of separation of powers of Montesquieu, who, as is known, was greatly impressed by the constitutional structure of the English monarchy. Hamilton considered this device to be the basis of the US Constitution.
However, the logic of the liberation struggle of the colonies forced Hamilton to recognize the possibility of a republican system. But he considered the creation of a strong presidential power, not much different from the power of a constitutional monarch, to be a prerequisite for this. The president, in his opinion, should be elected for life and have broad powers, including the ability to control the representative body of the legislative branch, which, under pressure from voters, can make “arbitrary decisions.” The same idea was contained in Hamilton's proposal to make ministers appointed by the president practically not responsible to parliament.
He envisioned the parliament itself as bicameral, created on the basis of suffrage with a high property qualification. The division of people into rich and poor, and accordingly into enlightened and unenlightened, capable and incapable of managing the affairs of society, is, according to Hamilton, of natural origin and irremovable. The rich and, therefore, the enlightened by their very nature have the right to be represented in the highest organs of state. Only they are capable of ensuring the stability of the political system, because any changes in it will not give them anything good. Giving the people the opportunity to actively participate in state affairs will inevitably lead to mistakes and delusions due to the irrationality and fickleness of the masses and thereby weaken the state.
Not all of Hamilton's ideas were accepted by the US Constitution (president for life, qualified suffrage). But both the general thrust and most of Hamilton's specific proposals were adopted by the Constitutional Convention. In this regard, it should be noted that of the 55 members of the Constitutional Convention, only 8 participated in the adoption of the Declaration of Independence. Therefore, it is clear that the Convention supported Hamilton, who even objected to the inclusion of a Bill of Rights in the text of the Constitution, although such bills were already contained in the constitutions of the founding states of the United States.
Modern America has its uncanonized saints. These are the so-called Founding Fathers - those people who played a key role in the founding and establishment of American statehood, winning independence and creating the principles of a new political system. They founded the modern USA. The largest American cities are named after them, their portraits are depicted on banknotes, they are still spoken of with reverence, and their phrases are so fond of being quoted by American high-ranking figures. Who created America as we know it today?
Washington
However, he was a very controversial person.
George was born into the family of a small landowner in Virginia, a classic American colony where slavery flourished and Indians and blacks were not recognized as people. He grew up in the family of a slave owner and, naturally, had a slave-owning mentality. At the age of 24, Washington married a wealthy middle-aged widow, receiving as a dowry 17 thousand acres of land, 300 slaves and a mansion in Williamsburg.
George soon significantly increased the income of his estate and became one of the richest landowners in Virginia. It is easy to guess that the father of American democracy managed to achieve this thanks to slave labor. By the time Washington was elected president, he was one of the richest men in the country. By the way, he is generally one of the richest US presidents in history. Washington's fortune (plantations, real estate, etc.) today can be valued at $900 million.
The enterprising Washington also successfully moved up the career (military and political) ladder: with the rank of colonel, he actively participated in military operations against the French, British, and Indians who laid claim to their lands.
Washington, together with like-minded people Thomas Jefferson and Patrick Henry, created the first liberal political technologies. For example, he organized an association in Virginia to boycott British goods. American leaders still actively use similar methods; in particular, what is called sanctions today.
In June 1775, Washington was unanimously elected commander in chief of the Continental Army. It was this army that coped with the task of total conquest of the Indians, their forced assimilation or forced relocation to reservations. Between 1775 and 1890 alone, according to the US Census Bureau, more than 40 wars occurred, and these were wars primarily against civilians.
After Washington, 58 volumes of letters remained, and this does not include public speeches. On paper, the first US president advocated “fair treatment of the indigenous population,” relied on their “ability to assimilate,” and even personally talked with the leaders of Indian tribes. But as soon as the tribe started talking about “its own identity or territories,” the peace-loving Washington gave orders: “Destroy!”, “Eradicate!”
As a smart politician, George understood that his soldiers, who, as a rule, were immigrant colonists, would not fight for the idea. They need new lands and money - this is what American patriotism was originally built on. Therefore, Washington and Congress, in the event of victory, for example, over Britain, promised each soldier 50 acres of land.
The war with England for independence was sometimes strange. “Often, the soldiers of Washington’s army did not even fight for the land; their commander in chief simply sent troops to “stake out” the land for his private company. For example, the soldiers went, built a house on the land and “staked out” the land,” says Dmitry Mikheev, a former senior researcher at the US Hudson Institute for Strategic Studies. “The new Americans are nouveau riche: greedy, unprincipled, dishonest. They did not consider Indians to be people. And Washington commanded this parade of nouveau riche. He burned dozens of villages. Cleared the territory. He exterminated the Indians without bothering. Ostensibly acting in the interests of European settlers,” continues Mikheev.
Next, the scientist reveals another secret of Washington, which is not written about in American history textbooks: “When Washington had already become president, when the Constitution had already been adopted (freedom, democracy, the human right to personal happiness), the settlers who fought in his army (the Irish , Scots), did not receive any land! He didn't keep his promise!
It’s easy to guess who owned the occupied territories after the war - 500 thousand acres of land came into the personal possession of George Washington himself. Theoretically, he should have fulfilled his promise and settled 10 thousand migrants there for free, but he chose to resell the land to them at 30 times the market value.
To Washington's credit, he freed all of his slaves because he despised slavery. But this does not mean disdain for money. Money and power are a completely different matter.
Modern historians are increasingly writing about the “uncontrolled power of Washington.” And here again we should remember the policy of double standards. On the one hand, Washington and his associates preached equality, democracy, and freedom guaranteed by the Constitution. On the other hand, in fact, this man created a central government that suppressed riots, destroyed dissenters, and conquered the continent.
Washington's merit is considered to be the founding of the capital of the United States, a city named in his honor. It is worth saying that, like most leaders of the United States, George was a Freemason, a member of Alexandria Lodge No. 22. Therefore, the design of the city was carried out according to the Masonic type: so that the streets, wide diagonal avenues, squares and avenues remained open to view the monumental structures of Masonic significance, the creation of which was supervised by Washington's close friend and adviser, a member of the Order of the Knights Templar, architect Pierre Charles Lenfante. Thanks to its special architecture and symbolism, today Washington is called the most Masonic city on earth.
The first president of the United States was imbued with Masonic ideas. His funeral in 1799 was held according to strict rites: the coffin was covered with a Masonic apron, each of the Masons present threw an acacia branch into the grave, symbolizing rebirth.
By the way, in the history of the United States there have been 13 Masonic presidents, starting with Washington and ending with Truman, whose huge photographic portrait in a Masonic apron and with a trowel in his hand now hangs on the wall of the fourth floor of the White House. Harry Truman is captured at the very moment when he made the decision to bomb Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945.
Jefferson
This person is also interesting and extremely contradictory in all respects. In him, like no one else, a talented philosopher, a liberal, a humanist and a cold-blooded slave owner, a prudent entrepreneur, and a convinced Freemason miraculously coexisted.
Studying his thoughts and activities, one can come to the conclusion that he considered equality, freedom and fraternity the prerogative of people only of the “first category”. And all the rest are nothing more than upright walking animals. Here, for example, is a quote about blacks from his book “Notes on the State of Virginia”: “Their life consists more of sensations than of thoughts. This also includes their desire to sleep when they are not working or having fun. An animal whose body is at rest and which does not think must, of course, tend to sleep. Regarding memory, intelligence and imagination, it seems to me that in memory they are equal to whites, in intelligence they are significantly inferior. I think it is hardly possible to find a black person who can understand the works of Euclid. Their imagination is dull, tasteless and abnormal... They excrete less through the kidneys and more through the skin, which gives them a very strong and unpleasant odor. Because of this increased sweating, they are better adapted to heat and worse adapted to cold than whites.”
But, despite such views, at the beginning of his political career, Jefferson loved to talk about the abolition of slavery and even inserted a clause about its abolition into the Declaration. But he soon deleted it. As his contemporary, writer and priest Moncur Convey wrote about the father of American independence, “never before had a man achieved such fame for what he did not do.”
A hereditary slave owner, the third president of the United States, a fighter for democracy and equality, Thomas Jefferson during his lifetime owned 600 slaves, not counting servants, and plantations comparable in size to a city. In the American school history textbook, in the section “Thomas Jefferson: Fighter for Freedom and Human Rights,” it is said: “In his industrial hive there was no discord or insult: there was not the slightest trace of discord on the black, shining faces of the slaves who worked under the direction of their master. traces of discontent... Women sang while they worked, and grown-up children made nails at their leisure, without overwork and for the sake of pleasure.”
Now let's take a look at the Farm Book, written by Jefferson himself: “Child slaves under the age of 10 serve as nannies, from 10 to 16 years old boys make nails, girls spin, at the age of 16 they go to work in the fields or begin learn a craft."
And now quotes from eyewitness accounts: “Locked in a stuffy, smoky workshop, the boys minted 5-10 thousand nails a day, which in 1796 brought Jefferson $2 thousand in total income. At the time, his nail factory competed with the state penitentiary.”
The politician's son-in-law, Randolph, in one report told Jefferson that the black boys who made nails, "the work is going very well, because the children are being whipped."
Once, for a fight in the workshop, an American humanist sold a slave boy to the southern plantations to intimidate other children, in Jefferson’s own words, “as if death itself had taken him.”
After Jefferson's death, his beloved slave, blacksmith Joseph Fossett, was granted freedom by will, but his entire family - his wife and seven children - remained enslaved. Soon they were resold to other owners; Fossett only managed to buy back his wife. The unfortunate Joseph worked at the anvil for ten years to earn money to ransom his children, but even after saving money, he could not do this: the new owners of his children changed their minds about selling them. The family was never reunited. In 1898, already a free man, the 83-year-old son of a blacksmith, Peter Fossett, recalled: “I will never forget when they put me on the auction platform and sold me like a horse.”
It’s funny to remember another philosophical work of this president, which he modestly titled “Jefferson’s Bible.” Its main character, named Jesus, is a clever man, a manager who has created a grandiose corporation called “Christianity” from scratch. Well, in addition to the “Bible,” there is another unique commandment of this founding father to his followers: “Carrot and stick are good, but not enough, other methods of control are needed.”
It was Jefferson who created the original institution of informants from among free citizens on his estates. For little money (20–50 cents per month), these people had to observe the movements of slaves, their conversations, actions and report their observations to the overseers. Thanks to such informants, with their appearance not a single slave ran away from Jefferson, and if someone managed to steal something (a nail or clothing), the loss was immediately found, and the thief was punished. Thus, the world's first network of secret informants was created, which was later called the “second level of intelligence services” in the United States and has proven itself to be excellent.
And here is what Dmitry Mikheev, a former senior researcher at the US Hudson Institute for Strategic Studies, already mentioned here, says about Jefferson: “The essence of Jefferson’s activities is hypocrisy and lies. He himself wrote laws prohibiting interracial mixing. Even if there is one drop of African blood, you are already a Negro! Even if you are blonde."
Already being the President of the United States, having a respectable wife (who was his second cousin) and six children, Jefferson actively cohabited with a mulatto slave, who also gave him six offspring.
Franklin and Hamilton
Benjamin Franklin is the only one of the Founding Fathers who affixed his signature to all three of the most important documents that to this day form the basis of the statehood of the United States: the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution and the Treaty of Versailles of 1783.
Writer, diplomat, active member of the Masonic order and philosopher, Franklin became the spiritual leader of the new American nation in the second half of the 18th century and the first half of the 19th. But, based on his own views, spirituality is always inextricably linked with material gain. It is not surprising that the portrait of Benjamin Franklin is depicted on the hundred dollar bill - his descendants valued him so highly. And by the way, it was Franklin who coined the phrase “time is money.”
Franklin developed the theoretical basis for American statehood, but his young follower Alexander Hamilton put materialist ideas into practice. The “Grey Cardinal”, Secretary of the Treasury under two American presidents (Washington and Adams), Alexander Hamilton was also included in the canonical seven Founding Fathers of the United States.
Hamilton fought throughout his life for a centralized federal state with strong presidential power. He spoke loudly about militaristic plans, advocated imperial policies in Latin America and participation in European affairs. We can say that it was Hamilton who laid all the foundations of modern American statehood: the US Army, the National Bank, the institution of the presidency, the federal character of the state.
By the way, this man deserves admiration not only for his strength of thought, but also for his strength of spirit. Unlike most politicians, who enjoyed complete impunity, Hamilton paid for his ideas with his life. In 1804, during the election campaign for governor of New York, Alexander Hamilton sharply and harshly criticized his political opponent and ideological enemy Aaron Burr. Unable to withstand the attacks, Burr challenged Hamilton to a duel. After the command “To the barrier!” was sounded, Burr fired, but Hamilton deliberately did not fire. In his suicide note, he wrote: “My religious and moral principles are strongly against the practice of dueling. To be forced to shed the blood of a human being in a private fight prohibited by law will cause me pain.” Burr's shot was fatal for Hamilton, but it also ingloriously ended Burr's own political career.
However, the lives of many American leaders ended tragically. And in this regard, we should remember the so-called “presidential curse”, or “Tecumseh’s curse”.
According to legend, in the 18th century, the Indian leader Tecumseh, deceived by white colonists, said a prayer while dying. He asked the gods that every American leader (president) elected in a year evenly divisible by 20 would die or be assassinated before the end of his term of leadership (presidential powers).
Incredibly, the curse worked clearly right up to the seventh generation. The first to die, just a month after his inauguration, was American President William Henry Harrison (who took about 12 thousand square kilometers of land from the Indians). Following him, all presidents elected or re-elected in a year divisible by 20 died in office (either by their own death or from an assassin's bullet). Namely: Abraham Lincoln, James Garfield, William McKinley, Warren Harding, Franklin Roosevelt and John Kennedy. The curse was broken on Reagan.
