GEORGE WASHINGTON: THE INDISPENSABLE MAN

Saturday marked the actual birthday of our first president, George Washington.  While he was certainly not a perfect man he was definitely "the indispensable man" of the Founding and he may very well have been the perfect president.  He "was the directing spirit without which there would have been no independence, no Union, no Constitution, and no Republic," as Calvin Coolidge said of Washington in 1927. 

George Washington set the tone for what the American presidency should be. That's why he was "first in war, first in peace, and first in the hearts of his countrymen."

All future Presidents should take their inspiration from Washington's leadership in foreign policy, in upholding the rule of law, and - especially now - in understanding the vital importance of religion and religious liberty. Washington knew that religion and morality are essential to creating the conditions for decent politics. "Where," he asked, "is the security for property, for reputation, for life, if the sense of religious obligation desert the oaths which are the instruments of investigation in courts of justice?"

To match his deep devotion to his own religious faith, Washington had a firm understanding of religious liberty. He knew and appreciated that freedom allows religion, in the form of morality and through the teachings of religion, to exercise an unprecedented influence over private and public opinion. Religious liberty shapes mores, cultivates virtues, and provides an independent source of moral reasoning and authority.

In his letter to the Newport Hebrew congregation - at the time the largest community of Jewish families in America - Washington grounded America's religious and civil liberties in natural rights, and not mere toleration.

Likewise, Washington also confronted the limits of religious liberty. In one letter, he praised the Quakers for being good citizens but criticized their pacifism: "Your principles and conduct are well known to me; and it is doing the people called Quakers no more than justice to say, that (except their declining to share with others the burden of the common defense) there is no denomination among us, who are more exemplary and useful citizens."

Yet Washington ended his letter assuring them of his "wish and desire that the laws may always be as extensively accommodated" to their practice.  Such an accommodation upholds the rule of law and religious liberty, because it allows men and women of religious faith to follow the law and their faith.

In his letter to the Quakers, Washington explained that government is instituted to "protect the persons and consciences of men from oppression." Further, it was the duty of rulers "not only to abstain from [oppression] themselves, but, according to their stations, to prevent it in others."

Sadly, Washington's advice has too often been ignored and religious freedom is increasingly under attack from the Left.  But in honor of his legacy we must never stop defending the Constitution and our religious freedom.  We owe it to the Father of our country and all those who have sacrificed to secure those freedoms.