Kevin, thank you for your reply. For me, George Washington remains the
exemplar, the maximum leader. The more you study him, in almost any aspect,
the more you have to admire him. In researching Washington as an
emancipator, I was astonished to find how deeply biographers and historians
had buried that aspect of his life and career. It just didn't fit with the
received wisdom that slavery was "just the accepted system," unchallenged, a
venerable practice enshrined in law, sanctioned by the Bible, and carried
out as much as possible on a humane basis. Washington's views and actions
don't fit that grid at all--"they don't compute." We like to think that
"they didn't know any better; we can't judge them." But if you look at what
Washington did and contended against, you find that he was not fighting
against ignorance and indifference, but against profit. The modern analogy I
use is: getting Thomas Jefferson to give up slavery is like getting Dick
Cheney to quit pumping oil.

Henry Wiencek