Farewell to America… (Part One)

Now that we are headed into another electoral process with the upcoming Presidential elections at term end of President Obama, I decided to look in to what a political party is supposed to be and what it is supposed to do for America and her people.

Traditionally, a political party is an organized political group of members who seek to attain and maintain the political purposes of its governing body.  Originally, with the signing of the Declaration of Independence and ratification of the U.S. Constitution into law, the purpose of politics in America was to first attain and then maintain political power for America within the establishment of her independent governmental system thereby removing America and her peoples from the rule of England and her King.

In nonpartisan elections, each candidate is eligible for office on his or her own merits. In nonpartisan legislatures, there are no typically formal party alignments within the legislature. The administration of George Washington and the first few sessions of the US Congress were nonpartisan. Washington also warned against political parties during his Farewell Address.

I found it interesting to read that the administration of George Washington and the first few sessions of the U.S. Congress were nonpartisan.  George Washington’s Farewell Address was written to “The People of the United States” near the end of his second term as President of the United States.

George Washington summarized his zeal in establishing and maintaining the purpose and ideals of the union of the States through the U.S. Constitution as a non-partisan document with these statements from his Farewell Speech:

Excerpts from George Washington’s Farwell Speech in italics:

“Interwoven in our Constitutional purpose is the love of liberty with every ligament of your hearts, no recommendation of mine is necessary to fortify or confirm the attachment.”

“The unity of Government, which constitutes you one people, is also now dear to you. It is justly so; for it is a main pillar in the edifice of your real independence, the support of your tranquility at home, your peace abroad; of your safety; of your prosperity; of that very Liberty, which you so highly prize. But as it is easy to foresee, that, from different causes and from different quarters, much pains will be taken, many artifices employed, to weaken in your minds the conviction of this truth; as this is the point in your political fortress against which the batteries of internal and external enemies will be most constantly and actively (though often covertly and insidiously) directed, it is of infinite moment, that you should properly estimate the immense value of your national Union to your collective and individual happiness; that you should cherish a cordial, habitual, and immovable attachment to it; accustoming yourselves to think and speak of it as of the Palladium of your political safety and prosperity; watching for its preservation with jealous anxiety; discountenancing whatever may suggest even a suspicion, that it can in any event be abandoned; and indignantly frowning upon the first dawning of every attempt to alienate any portion of our country from the rest, or to enfeeble the sacred ties which now link together the various parts.”