Posts Tagged ‘George Washington’
US Presidents who expanded the 13 colonies territory…
Not before the 20th century, few people in Europe knew who was the President of the US, and much less the US citizens. Not before the advent of TV in the 1950’s did the world knew about the role of the US President and his newly acquired power…
1. George Washington (1789-97), first elected executive chief, expanded the territory in the North-West by opening up Ohio for colonization in 1794. He dispatched 3 incursions deep 240 km inland to tame Indian resistance, without declaring war or asking approval of Congress. Waging war was a prime prerogative of Congress.
2. Thomas Jefferson (1801-09), third President, purchased the Louisiana Territory from Napoleon Bonaparte in 1803. This territory included all the States where the Mississippi River passes through. The mischievous story is that England extended the loan to the US for the purchase in order to get the French out of the American continent. Napoleon was preparing to invade England and needed funding…
That loan came with a heavy price: Alexander Hamilton convinced Jefferson to sign on the monopoly of the Rothschild family of England to print US paper money and eventually have control the expansion of the internal US market.
The second calamity attached to this monopoly is that England invaded the US in 1814 in order to pressure Congress to extend this license for 24 years…
The third catastrophe was that England (through the Bank Of US) cut-off credits to the settlers in Ohio and the North-West Territory and plunged the US in a deep financial crisis in 1819.
Jefferson was the first president to engage militarily outside the American continent: He ordered his “navy” to bombard Alger (current capital of Algeria) in order to punish its Pasha from attacking US commercial ships, taking the few women as concubine and selling the prettier ones to the Ottoman Sultan..
3. Andrew Jackson during President James Madison (1809-17) is elected militia chief of Tennessee and became a national hero during the 1812 war against England. The British troops entered the Capital of Washington DC and burned it.
He defeated the Indian Creeks before saving New Orleans from the British siege in January 1815.
Jackson confronted the Indian Seminole and colonized Spanish Florida. This non-declared offensive war, not approved by Congress, expanded the US territories to the east of Mississippi.
Jackson becomes governor of Florida in 1821. By 1823, he is a federal senator.
4. James Polk (1845-49) ran his election campaign under the need to annex Texas and Oregon. He ordered General Zachary Taylor to deploy the troops to the Rio Grande, 200 km south inside the Mexican borders. The treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo of 1848 gives the USA an additional 1.4 million square meters in the south-west, from Texas to the Pacific Ocean
5. Andrew Johnson (1865-69) purchased Alaska for US$ 7.2 million ($116 million in 2012 dollars)
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The Alaska Purchase was the acquisition of Russian America by the United States from the Russian Empire in the year 1867 by a treaty ratified by the U.S. Senate.
Russia, fearing a war with Britain that would allow the British to seize Alaska, wanted to sell. Russia’s major role had been getting Native Alaskans to hunt for furs, and missionary work to convert them to Christianity.
The United States added 586,412 square miles (1,518,800 km2) of new territory.
Reactions to the purchase in the United States were mixed, with opponents calling it “Seward’s Folly”, feeling that U.S. Secretary of State William H. Seward, the primary American negotiator, got the worst of the bargain. George Pomutz was also involved in the Alaska purchase.
Originally organized as the Department of Alaska, the area was successively the District of Alaska and the Alaska Territory before becoming the modern state of Alaska upon being admitted to the Union as a state in 1959.
(From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia)
6. Benjamin Harrison (1889-93) overthrow of the Kingdom of Hawaii (a coup d’état) on January 17, 1893), Anti-monarchical insurgents within the Kingdom of Hawaii, composed largely of United States citizens, engineered the overthrow of its native monarch, Queen Lili’uokalani.
Hawaii was initially reconstituted as an independent republic, but the ultimate goal of the revolutionaries was the annexation of the islands to the United States, which was finally accomplished in 1898. (Read note 1)
7. William McKinley (1897-1901). On April 25, 1898 President McKinley declare war against Spain for lame excuses and conquer Cuba, the Philippines, Porto Rico, Guam…
8. Theodore Roosevelt (1901-09) participated in the war in Cuba against colonialist Spain in 1898, leading his “Rough Riders” cavalry regiment. When he became president, his conquered Panama, which was part of Columbia in Latin America, in order to open up the Panama Canal. Theodore Roosevelt was the first president who crossed the borders during his tenure and inaugurated the Panama Canal https://adonis49.wordpress.com/2012/02/10/the-panama-canal-challenges-glory-and-infamies/
He was also the first president to mediate between powerful nations such as when Japan totally destroyed the Russian Pacific fleet in 1905.
Note 1: Timeline of US military operations https://adonis49.wordpress.com/2013/09/19/timeline-of-united-states-military-operations-since-1775/
Note 2: On July 6, 1846, U.S. Secretary of State John C. Calhoun, on behalf of President Tyler, afforded formal recognition of Hawaiian independence. The Hawaiian Kingdom entered into treaties with the major nations of the world and established over 90 legations and consulates in multiple seaports and cities.[4] On the signing of the Bayonet Constitution in 1887 the threat began to be realized.
Note 3: Manifest Destiny of the USA? https://adonis49.wordpress.com/2008/09/21/the-manifest-destiny-of-america-and-its-long-term-consequences/
How George Washington filled a few loopholes in the initial Constitution…
Posted on: January 8, 2014
How George Washington filled a few loopholes in the initial Constitution…
In the previous post on how George Washington was elected first President https://adonis49.wordpress.com/2014/01/05/how-george-washington-was-elected-in-his-first-executive-functions-part-3/ we wrote:
“The ceremony of investiture is done in the Federal Hall at the angle of Wall Street and Broad street.
At noon, Robert Livingston, the chancellor of New York administers the Presidential oath.
This ceremony institutes two precedents that were not covered by the Constitution:
1. Washington swore with right hand on the Bible
2. And concludes “May God assists me“
George Washington had to create the Presidential functions from scratch. He was allocated a limited budget of 16% of the $639,000 spared for the executive branch that was newly provided for in the Constitution.
Washington is supported by a dozen assistants, about 1,000 tax collectors, and 700 military personnel.
He nominated Alexander Hamilton (his right hand during the revolution) for the Treasury, Henry Knox for the department of war, Thomas Jefferson for foreign affairs, Samuel Osgood as Post Master, and Edmund Randolph as Attorney General.
The Constitution didn’t provide for a cabinet of ministers and the heads of department barely met.
Philadelphia was the temporary Capital for the Confederated colonies, and on July 1790, Congress decided for a permanent Capital to the new Federal Constitution. Maryland and Virginia ceded a portion of their lands to erect the capital from the ground up, which was later named Washington DC. The essential building in that Capital will be operational to host the President a decade later.
In August 1789, the Senate refused to provide recommendations concerning a treaty with the Indians in the North-West and Washington decided since then to bypass Congress during the negotiation phase of any treaty.
On June 1790, Washington, bypassing Congress, dispatched 3 incursions against the Indians, 240 km inside Ohio, without declaring war to tame the Indian resistance and opened up the North-West territories for colonization on August 1794.
Alexander Hamilton created a national bank in 1791.
In 1791, Washington traveled for 2 months in the southern States, accompanied by journalists. Washington relied on James Madison to value the executive function, initiated prepared ceremonies, and organized bi-weekly meetings with ordinary citizens to impress his position.
Internal conflicts between Hamilton and Jefferson took Washington and Congress by surprise, and the Constitution had no provisions for such instances among heads of departments. Jefferson issued the daily National Gazette and formed the Republican-Democrat political group in order to oppose the Federalists of Hamilton.
Because of worsening foreign wars in Europe, Washington decided to run for another term of 4 years and obtained in 1793 132 out of 136 votes of the Grand Electors. The Constitution didn’t discuss the number of terms a President can seek. Since Washington and Jefferson refused to run for a third term, it became a custom for Presidents not to try for a third term.
Only Franklin Roosevelt (1933-45) ran for 4 terms before the Constitution was amended for only 2 terms.
In April 1793, Washington accepted the letter of credential of the French ambassador “citizen Genet” without consulting Congress, which was not in session.
On April 22, he proclaimed the neutrality of America in the French/English conflict, a decision that cancelled the treaty of alliance of 1778 with the French, and the legislative branch had to approve this “proclamation” a posteriori.
Madison replied to Hamilton under the pseudo-name of Helvidius that grabbing the double power of deciding on and leading wars by the executive is the beginning of tyranny.
Under Washington, the effective of the military was multiplied by 7.
In 1796, Washington created a first by refusing to divulge to Congress secret documents relative to the Jay treaty with England on the ground of “State security interests“… What were so secret in that treaty?
Thomas Jefferson resigned as head of foreign affairs department in 1794 on the ground that only France can play a counter power to England. He was proven right since British troops invaded the US and burned the new capital Washington DC in order to pressure the US government to renew the monopoly for printing US money by the Rothschild family of England…
The anti-federalists accuse Washington and Hamilton for their close ties with England, and the opposition press suggest that Washington has black blood and may have been an agent to England during the war of independence…
By Sept. 19, 1796, Washington let know that he will not seek a third term. He returned to Mount Vernon on March 4, 1797 and dies on Dec. 14, 1799.
Mason Weems published in 1800 a biography of George Washington, which was re-edited 20 times within 2 decades.
Note: How the-rothschild-family-Controlled the printing-of-the-dollars/https://adonis49.wordpress.com/2012/06/10/privately-owned-federal-reserve-bank-how-the-rothschild-family-controlled-the-printing-of-the-dollars/
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