To it we owe the grotesque and wholly imaginary stories of young Washington and the cherry tree, the planting of lettuce by his father to prove to the boy the designs of Providence, and other anecdotes that make that intensely human founder of the American Nation an impossible and intolerable prig.
Beveridge critiques the fictional anecdotes popularized by Weems in his portrayal of Washington.
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The Alien and Sedition Laws were, they asserted, the beginning of monarchy, the foundation of absolutism.
Washington was the soul of the American cause.
Would they abandon their posts as judges, and the interests of millions committed to them, to serve the purposes of a single individual?
In argument and reasoning he was the equal if not the superior of Madison himself; and his grim personality made the meek one of Madison seem tender in comparison.
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