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Subject Area: War and Peace
Topic: The American Revolution and Constitution

TO ALEXANDER HAMILTON. - George Washington, The Writings of George Washington, vol. X (1782-1785) [1891]

Edition used:

The Writings of George Washington, collected and edited by Worthington Chauncey Ford (New York and London: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1890). Vol. X (1782-1785).

Part of: The Writings of George Washington, 14 vols.

About Liberty Fund:

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TO ALEXANDER HAMILTON.

Sir:

Dear Sir,

Very painfull Sensations are excited in my mind by your Letter of the 27th of Febry.1 It is impossible for me to express to you the Regret with which I received the Information it contains.

* * * I read your private letter of the 25th with pain, and contemplated the picture it had drawn with astonishment and horror. But I will yet hope for the best. The idea of redress by force is too chimerical to have had a place in the imagination of any serious mind in this army; but there is no telling what unhappy disturbances may result from distress, and distrust of justice, and as far as the fears and jealousies of the army are alive, I hope no resolution will be come to for disbanding or separating the lines till the accts. are liquidated. You may rely upon it, Sir, that unhappy consequences would follow the attempt. The suspicions of the officers are afloat, notwithstanding the resolutions which have passed on both sides. Any act, therefore, which can be construed with an attempt to separate them before the accts. are settled will convey the most unfavorable ideas of the rectitude of Congress—whether well or ill founded, the consequences will be the same.

I have often reflected, with much solicitude upon the disagreeableness of your Situation and the Negligence of the Several States, in not enabling you to do that Justice to the public Creditors, which their Demands require. I wish the step you have taken may sound the Alarm to their inmost Souls, and rouse them to a just Sense of their own Interest, honor, and Credit. But I must confess to you, that I have my fears. For as danger becomes further removed from them, their feelings seem to be more callous to those noble Sentiments, with which I could wish to see them inspired. Mutual Jealousies, local prejudices, and misapprehensions have taken such deep Root, as will not easily be removed.

I will now, in strict confidence, mention a matter which may be useful for you to be informed of. It is that some men (and leading ones too) in this army, are beginning to entertain suspicions that Congress, or some members of it, regardless of the past sufferings and present distress, maugre the justice which is due to them, and the returns which a grateful people should make to men who certainly have contributed more than any other class to the establishment of Independency, are to be made use of as mere puppets to establish continental funds, and that rather than not succeed in this measure, or weaken their ground, they would make a sacrifice of the army and all its interests.

Notwithstanding the Embarrassments which you have experienced, I was in hopes that you would have continued your Efforts to the close of the War, at least; but if your Resolutions are absolutely fixed, I assure you I consider the Event as one of the most unfortunate that could have fallen upon the States, and most sincerely deprecate the sad consequences which I fear will follow. The Army, I am sure, at the same Time that they entertain the highest sense of your Exertions will lament the step you are obliged to take, as a most unfortunate Circumstance to them. I am &c.

I have two reasons for mentioning this matter to you. The one is, that the army (considering the irritable state it is in, its sufferings and composition) is a dangerous instrument to play with; the other, that every possible means consistent with their own views (which certainly are moderate) should be essayed, to get it disbanded without delay. I might add a third: it is, that the Financier is suspected to be at the bottom of this scheme. If sentiments of this sort should become general, their operation will be opposed to this plan; at the same time that it would increase the present discontents. Upon the whole, disband the army as soon as possible, but consult the wishes of it, which really are moderate in the mode, and perfectly compatible with the honor, dignity and justice which is due from the country to it. I am, &c.