Washington’s long shadow over presidency finally lifting?

 Washington’s long shadow over presidency finally lifting?

Maybe it wasn’t so fortunate for American presidential politics that first president George Washington was so perfect for the role he kicked off 234 years this April 30th. Revolutionary War hero and nearly universally respected, Washington so looked and acted the part that his first VP John Adams suggested kinglike titles “His Elective Majesty”, “His Mightiness”, and even “His Highness, the President of the United States of America and the Protector of their Liberties”.

Washington demurred. ‘President’ suited George just fine. He served the presidency with unblemished distinction for 8 years, even proclaiming and setting precedent, enacted in law 2 centuries later, that no president should be elected more than twice. He’s enshrined on the quarter and dollar, has the highest monument in the land, gave his name to our capitol. Countless schools, cities and streets named after him. His first name even became the title of a political magazine published by JFK Jr. American historians consistently rank him second best president to Abraham Lincoln. Washington achieved almost kinglike reverence in a country that eschewed monarchy.

Therein lies the problem that has haunted America ever since. We so revere the presidency that we’ve treated nearly all Washington’s successors with the respect, distinction and honor that few truly deserve. It has become so dysfunctional that the Justice Department created a bizarre rule that a sitting president cannot be indicted. Does any other democracy give a Get Out of Jail Card to their elected leaders?

That reverence was carried over to former presidents in 1974 when President Gerald Ford granted a full pardon to newly resigned President Nixon as being too disruptive to the American political system. Doing so, Ford reasoned, was necessary to get America over “its long national nightmare”. Alas, Ford simply perpetuated America’s political nightmare that sitting and former presidents are above the law.

If George Washington could return from his tomb at Mount Vernon he’s occupied for the past 224 years, I believe he’s flash a smile with those wooden teeth. If asked, he might offer “Bout time you listened to me that presidents are not gods or kings. We’re all mortal and none of us are above the law. I can now go back to my tomb and rest easy.”