Continuing the smiles of heaven

As we go through the primary and general election process this year, it may help us to look back at the standard by which all other presidents are measured: George Washington.

Washington set the standard in so many ways.

One is the inaugural address which he gave on April 30, 1789.

There is nothing in our Constitution that says the president shall give an inaugural address, just that the president will take the oath of office. Washington, though, was very cognizant that he was the first elected leader of the first true democracy ever in the history of the world. And so he decided to take his oath of office in the presence of the people’s elected representatives, along with a public statement of commitment and thanks to God.

President Washington began his first term in office by saying: “[I]t would be peculiarly improper to omit, in this first official act, my fervent supplications to that Almighty Being, who rules over the universe, who presides in the councils of nations, and whose providential aids can supply every human defect, that His benediction may consecrate to the liberties and happiness of the people of the United States a govern-ment instituted by themselves for these essential purposes, and may enable every instrument employed in its administration to execute with success the functions allotted to His charge.

“In tendering this homage to the great Author of every public and private good, I assure myself that it expresses your sentiments not less than my own. No people can be bound to acknowledge and adore the Invisible Hand, which conducts the affairs of men, more than the people of the United States. Every step, by which they have advanced to the character of an independent nation, seems to have been distinguished by some token of Providential agency.”

Washington continued his address by pronouncing to the people and to the world a commitment that our nation’s policies would be in fidelity to the moral principles which God Himself has ordained: “[T]he foundations of our national policy will be laid in the pure and immutable principles of private morality and the preeminence of a free government be exemplified by all the attributes, which can win the affections of its citizens, and command the respect of the world.  We ought to be no less persuaded that the propitious smiles of Heaven can never be expected on a nation that disregards the eternal rules of order and right, which Heaven itself has ordained.”

At that time, when a president wrote an inaugural address, the Senate and the House would respond back to him.

Our first Senate wrote back to Washington: “We are with you, unavoidably led to acknowledge and adore the Great Arbiter of the Universe by whom empires rise and fall.  We feel, sir, the force and acknowledge the justice of the observation that the foundation of national policy should be laid in private morality. If individuals be not influenced by moral principles, it is in vain to look for public virtue.”

The House of Representatives wrote essentially the same thing: “feel with you the strongest obligations to adore the Invisible Hand which has led the American people through so many difficulties and to seek the only sure means of preserving and recommending the precious deposit in a system of legis-lation founded on the principles of an honest policy and directed by the spirit of a diffusive patriotism. We join with you in our fervent supplication for the blessings of heaven on our country.”

Well, that’s how we began. Ever since then, all of the presidents have stood on Washington’s solid foundation by also acknowledging God in their inaugural addresses, and asking for His continued blessing on us as a nation.

This year it is up to us — we the people — to choose the person who is most likely to remain faithful to that tradition and to our nation’s commitment to be faithful to God.
Our national security depends upon it.

J. Michael Sharman is an independent columnist who practices law in Culpeper. His column appears Tuesday in the Star-Exponent.