The next step was to remove every obstacle which
fettered the march of American settlement; and for this he rolled
back the Indian tribes, patiently negotiated with Spain until the
Mississippi was opened, and at great personal sacrifice and trial
signed the Jay treaty, and obtained the surrender of the British
posts. When Washington went out of office, the way was open to the
western movement; the dangers of disintegration by reason of foreign
intrigues on the frontier were removed; peace had been maintained; and
the national sentiment had had opportunity for rapid growth. France
had discovered that, although she had been our ally, we were not her
dependants; other nations had been brought to perceive that the United
States meant to have a foreign policy all its own; and the American
people were taught that their first duty was to be Americans and
nothing else. There is no need to comment on or to praise the
greatness of a policy with such objects and results as these. The mere
summary is enough, and it speaks for itself and for its author in a
way which makes words needless.
CHAPTER V
WASHINGTON AS A PARTY MAN
Washington was not chosen to office by a political party; he
considered parties to be perilous things, and he entered the
presidency determined to have nothing to do with them. Yet, as has
already been pointed out, he took the members of his cabinet entirely
from one of the two parties which then existed, and which had been
produced by the divisions over the Constitution and its adoption.
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