Washington [302]
It was the first and only time Washington ever confronted a hostile assembly of his own officers. Mounting the podium, he drew out his prepared remarks, written on nine long sheets covered with exclamation points and dashes for pauses, revealing the strong sense of cadence he gave to his speeches. He began by chastising the officers for improper conduct in calling an irregular meeting and disputed that Congress was indifferent to their plight, stressing the need for making dispassionate decisions. Then, with considerable agility, he cast aside the stern tone and stressed his personal bond with his fellow officers, speaking as a man as well as a general and building rhetorical force through repetition:
If my conduct heretofore has not evinced to you that I have been a faithful friend to the army, my declaration of it at this time w[oul]d be equally unavailing and improper. But as I was among the first who embarked in the cause of our common country. As I have never left your side one moment, but when called from you on public duty. As I have been the constant companion and witness of your distresses and not among the last to feel and acknowledge your merits . . . it can scarcely be supposed at this late stage of the war that I am indifferent to [your] interests.54
Instead of elevating himself above his men, Washington portrayed himself as their friend and peer.
Having softened them up with personal history, he delivered an impassioned appeal to their deep-seated patriotism. The idea floated by the anonymous pamphleteer that they should take up arms against their country “has something so shocking in it that humanity revolts at the idea. My God! What can this writer have in view by recommending such measures? Can he be a friend to the army? Can he be a friend to this country? Rather, is he not an insidious foe? Some emissary, perhaps, from New York, plotting the ruin of both by sowing the seeds of discord and separation between the civil and military powers of the continent?”55
He pleaded with them to oppose any man “who wickedly attempts to open the floodgates of civil discord and deluge our rising empire in blood.”56 Give Congress a chance to address your grievances, he implored the officers, saying he would do everything in his power to help them. Then, in ringing tones, he said that if they trusted Congress to take action, “you will, by the dignity of your conduct, afford occasion for posterity to say, when speaking of the glorious example you have exhibited to mankind, ‘Had this day been wanting, the world had never seen the last stage of perfection to which human nature is capable of attaining.’”57
It was an exemplary performance from a man uncomfortable with public speaking. He had castigated his officers but also lifted them to a higher plane, reawakening a sense of their exalted role in the Revolution and reminding them that illegal action would tarnish that grand legacy. For all his eloquence, Washington achieved his greatest impact with a small symbolic gesture. To reassure the men of congressional good faith, he read aloud a letter from Congressman Joseph Jones of Virginia and tripped over the first few sentences because he couldn’t discern the words. Then he pulled out his new spectacles, shocking his fellow officers: they had never seen him wearing glasses. “Gentlemen, you must pardon me,” he said. “I have grown gray in your service and now find myself growing blind.”58 These poignant words exerted a powerful influence. Washington at fifty-one was much older and more haggard than the young planter who had taken charge of the Continental Army in 1775. The disarming gesture of putting on the glasses moved the officers to tears as they recalled the legendary sacrifices he had made for his country. When he left the hall moments later, the threatened mutiny had ended,