The only explanation is to repeat that we were still colonists in all but name and allegiance, and it was Washington's task not only to establish a dignified and independent policy of his own abroad, but to beat down colonial politics at home.
Lodge discusses the challenges faced by Washington in establishing an independent American policy.
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It was a difficult thing for men who had been born colonists to rise to a sense of national opportunities, but Washington passed at a single step from being a Virginian to being an American, and in so doing he stood alone.
He accomplished this great labor more successfully by honest and lawful methods than if he had taken the path of the strong-handed savior of society, and his work in this field did more for the welfare of his country than all his battles.
He never by any chance bored the American people.
There are people to-day, not many luckily, whose families have been here for two hundred and fifty years, and who are as utterly un-American as it is possible to be, while there are others, whose fathers were immigrants, who are as…