Our Favorite Quotes

[hoytedow]

Originally Posted by troy2000

All Conestoga's were covered wagons, but not all covered wagons were Conestoga's. And Conestoga's weren't called prairie wagons; in fact the term didn't even exist during Washington's time. Conestoga's were heavy, rockered, somewhat boat-shaped freight wagons, used by professional freighters. They were not what most settlers rolled across the plains in.

Prairie wagons, more commonly known as prairie schooners, were smaller and lighter--they took two to four oxen, instead of the 8 to 12 that Conestoga's took. They were flat and boxy, and in fact were often just reworked and beefed-up farm wagons.

I repeat: there were no settlers rolling across the prairies in Washington's time to begin with, so the term prairie wagon couldn't exist. No one in his time ever said '99 99/100's percent pure' either, or 'safe and sane.' That quote is a complete joke--and my guess is that it was deliberately written as one, to see how many gullible idiots would swallow it as real. It would make as much sense to see a quote from Washington about Gatling guns or driver's licenses, California redwoods or illegal immigration.

And people back then might have called Kentucky 'the West,' but they sure as hell never called it 'the Prairie.'


prairie schooner
 
–noun
a type of covered wagon, similar to but smaller than the Conestoga wagon, used by pioneers in crossing the prairies and plains of North America.

Origin:
1835–45

http://dictionary.mwh.reference.com/...airie+schooner

I googled prairie wagon and conestoga came up. Actually read the link before bashing. Ohio has prairies too.

http://www.ohioprairie.org/id31.htm

[KnottyBuoyz]

"Money can't buy you happiness but it can buy you a yacht large enough to pull up right alongside it"...............David Lee Roth

[troy2000]

Originally Posted by hoytedow

I googled prairie wagon and conestoga came up. Actually read the link before bashing. Ohio has prairies too.

http://www.ohioprairie.org/id31.htm

Hoyt, how many times must I say this: the term prairie wagon coming out of Washington's mouth is an anachronism. The term didn't exist until well into the 1800's.

There was no mass movement to the prairies yet, and it would never have occurred to Washington to mention prairies in the same breath as settlers; the settlers of his day were contending with rivers and mountains.

The extended quote also mentions Pilgrims, another term Washington wouldn't have used; most people would have had no idea who he was talking about. That word didn't come into popular usage as a reference to the New England settlers until the 1820's.

Furthermore, the 'Liberty Teeth Speech' is passed off as part of Washington's second address to Congress. Here's a copy of the real address; read the friggen thing. Not a word of it is in there; it's complete bs.

http://millercenter.org/scripps/arch...es/detail/3449

I'm not sure why you're even trying to defend such an obvious forgery, unless you're doing it just to be contrary. But as an active gun owner, I run into this sort of nonsense a whole lot. Here's a compendium of phony speeches that gun owners like to get stirred up about--from Washington, Hitler, Janet Reno and Sarah Brady. There are plenty more out there; I've even seen people claim that Jim Brady personally owned machine guns.

http://stason.org/TULARC/society/pro...oo-Good-T.html

[troy2000]

Originally Posted by hoytedow

I googled prairie wagon and conestoga came up. Actually read the link before bashing. Ohio has prairies too.

http://www.ohioprairie.org/id31.htm

Perhaps you should read your own links before 'bashing.'

In that entire Wikipedia article on Conestoga wagons that you linked to, there isn't a single reference to a prairie wagon. As a matter of fact, it ends like this:

The term "Conestoga wagon" refers specifically to this type of vehicle; it is not a generic term for "covered wagon." The wagons used in the westward expansion of the United States were, for the most part, ordinary farm wagons fitted with canvas covers.

Conestoga's were specifically freight wagons, used mostly by freighters. They were neither affordable nor practical for the average settler to own; they were the 18-wheelers of their day. Prairie schooners, on the other hand, were more like the family pickup or farm truck that was pressed into service for the move west.

In the early days of the westward expansion (when the distances were shorter), settlers did sometimes hire space on Conestogas to transport their most treasured possessions--like someone today might ship their furniture, then drive to their new home.

[hoytedow]

Originally Posted by troy2000

Hoyt, how many times must I say this: the term prairie wagon coming out of Washington's mouth is an anachronism. The term didn't exist until well into the 1800's.

There was no mass movement to the prairies yet, and it would never have occurred to Washington to mention prairies in the same breath as settlers; the settlers of his day were contending with rivers and mountains.

The extended quote also mentions Pilgrims, another term Washington wouldn't have used; most people would have had no idea who he was talking about. That word didn't come into popular usage as a reference to the New England settlers until the 1820's.

Furthermore, the 'Liberty Teeth Speech' is passed off as part of Washington's second address to Congress. Here's a copy of the real address; read the friggen thing. Not a word of it is in there; it's complete bs.

http://millercenter.org/scripps/arch...es/detail/3449

I'm not sure why you're even trying to defend such an obvious forgery, unless you're doing it just to be contrary. But as an active gun owner, I run into this sort of nonsense a whole lot. Here's a compendium of phony speeches that gun owners like to get stirred up about--from Washington, Hitler, Janet Reno and Sarah Brady. There are plenty more out there; I've even seen people claim that Jim Brady personally owned machine guns.

http://stason.org/TULARC/society/pro...oo-Good-T.html

American pioneers to the Northwest Territory

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


Jump to: navigation, search
American pioneers to the Northwest Territory
Plaque commemorating the first permanent settlement of the new United States of America in the Northwest TerritoryParticipantsPioneers and veterans of the American Revolutionary WarLocationNorthwest Territory, the area later to become Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, and Wisconsin, as well as the northeastern part of MinnesotaDateApril 7, 1788 (1788-04-07)ResultFounding of the first permanent American settlement of the Northwest Territory at Marietta within the area to become OhioAmerican pioneers to the Northwest Territory included soldiers of the Revolution and members of the Ohio Company of Associates. During 1788 these pioneers to the Ohio Country established Marietta, Ohio as the first permanent American settlement of the new United States in the Northwest Territory, and opened the westward expansion of the new country. General George Washington commented about these pioneers: “I know many of the settlers personally, and there never were men better calculated to promote the welfare of such a community

[troy2000]

Originally Posted by hoytedow

American pioneers to the Northwest Territory

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


Jump to: navigation, search
American pioneers to the Northwest Territory
Plaque commemorating the first permanent settlement of the new United States of America in the Northwest TerritoryParticipantsPioneers and veterans of the American Revolutionary WarLocationNorthwest Territory, the area later to become Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, and Wisconsin, as well as the northeastern part of MinnesotaDateApril 7, 1788 (1788-04-07)ResultFounding of the first permanent American settlement of the Northwest Territory at Marietta within the area to become OhioAmerican pioneers to the Northwest Territory included soldiers of the Revolution and members of the Ohio Company of Associates. During 1788 these pioneers to the Ohio Country established Marietta, Ohio as the first permanent American settlement of the new United States in the Northwest Territory, and opened the westward expansion of the new country. General George Washington commented about these pioneers: “I know many of the settlers personally, and there never were men better calculated to promote the welfare of such a community

What's your point? Marrietta is in the Alleghenies, on the eastern border of Ohio. It isn't anywhere near any prairies; those are farther west. And since it was founded on the banks of the Ohio River, I can pretty well guarantee it saw a lot more flatboats than Conestoga wagons in Washington's time--and no 'prairie wagons' at all.

Give it up, Hoyt. Conestoga wagons, prairie schooners and covered wagon travel in general are subjects I've been familiar with for years--and you're trying to keep up by googling.

[hoytedow]

WASHINGTON'S INAUGURAL ADDRESS
OF 1789


A Transcription

[April 30, 1789]
Fellow Citizens of the Senate and the House of Representatives.

Among the vicissitudes incident to life, no event could have filled me with greater anxieties than that of which the notification was transmitted by your order, and received on the fourteenth day of the present month. On the one hand, I was summoned by my Country, whose voice I can never hear but with veneration and love, from a retreat which I had chosen with the fondest predilection, and, in my flattering hopes, with an immutable decision, as the asylum of my declining years: a retreat which was rendered every day more necessary as well as more dear to me, by the addition of habit to inclination, and of frequent interruptions in my health to the gradual waste committed on it by time. On the other hand, the magnitude and difficulty of the trust to which the voice of my Country called me, being sufficient to awaken in the wisest and most experienced of her citizens, a distrustful scrutiny into his qualifications, could not but overwhelm with dispondence, one, who, inheriting inferior endowments from nature and unpractised in the duties of civil administration, ought to be peculiarly conscious of his own deficiencies. In this conflict of emotions, all I dare aver, is, that it has been my faithful study to collect my duty from a just appreciation of eve ry circumstance, by which it might be affected. All I dare hope, is, that, if in executing this task I have been too much swayed by a grateful remembrance of former instances, or by an affectionate sensibility to this transcendent proof, of the confidence of my fellow-citizens; and have thence too little consulted my incapacity as well as disinclination for the weighty and untried cares before me; my error will be palliated by the motives which misled me, and its consequences be judged by my Country, with some share of the partiality in which they originated.

Such being the impressions under which I have, in obedience to the public summons, repaired to the present station; it would be peculiarly improper to omit in this first official Act, my fervent supplications to that Almighty Being who rules over the Universe, who presides in the Councils of Nations, and whose providential aids can supply every human defect, that his benediction may consecrate to the liberties and happiness of the People of the United States, a Government instituted by themselves for these essential purposes: and may enable every instrument employed in its administration to execute with success, the functions allotted to his charge. In tendering this homage to the Great Author of every public and private good I assure myself that it expresses your sentiments not less than my own; nor those of my fellow-citizens at large, less than either. No People can be bound to acknowledge and adore the invisible hand, which conducts the Affairs of men more than the People of the United States. Every step, by which they have advanced to the character of an independent nation, seems to have been distinguished by some token of providential agency. And in the important revolution just accomplished in the system of their United Government, the tranquil deliberations and voluntary consent of so many distinct communities, from which the event has resulted, cannot be compared with the means by which most Governments have been established, without some return of pious gratitude along with an humble anticipation of the future blessings which the past seem to presage. These reflections, arising out of the present crisis, have forced themselves too strongly on my mind to be suppressed. You will join with me I trust in thinking, that there are none under the influence of which, the proceedings of a new and free Government can more auspiciously commence.

By the article establishing the Executive Department, it is made the duty of the President "to recommend to your consideration, such measures as he shall judge necessary and expedient." The circumstances under which I now meet you, will acquit me from entering into that subject, farther than to refer to the Great Constitutional Charter under which you are assembled; and which, in defining your powers, designates the objects to which your attention is to be given. It will be more consistent with those circumstances, and far more congenial with the feelings which actuate me, to substitute, in place of a recommendation of particular measures, the tribute that is due to the talents, the rectitude, and the patriotism which adorn the characters selected to devise and adopt them. In these honorable qualifications, I behold the surest pledges, that as on one side, no local prejudices, or attachments; no seperate views, nor party animosities, will misdirect the comprehensive and equal eye which ought to watch over this great assemblage of communities and interests: so, on another, that the foundations of our National policy will be laid in the pure and immutable principles of private morality; and the pre-eminence of a free Government, be exemplified by all the attributes which can win the affections of its Citizens, and command the respect of the world.

I dwell on this prospect with every satisfaction which an ardent love for my Country can inspire: since there is no truth more thoroughly established, than that there exists in the oeconomy and course of nature, an indissoluble union between virtue and happiness, between duty and advantage, between the genuine maxims of an honest and magnanimous policy, and the solid rewards of public prosperity and felicity: Since we ought to be no less persuaded that the propitious smiles of Heaven, can never be expected on a nation that disregards the eternal rules of order and right, which Heaven itself has ordained: And since the preservation of the sacred fire of liberty, and the destiny of the Republican model of Government, are justly considered as deeply, perhaps as finally staked, on the experiment entrusted to the hands of the American people.

Besides the ordinary objects submitted to your care, it will remain with your judgment to decide, how far an exercise of the occasional power delegated by the Fifth article of the Constitution is rendered expedient at the present juncture by the nature of objections which have been urged against the System, or by the degree of inquietude which has given birth to them. Instead of undertaking particular recommendations on this subject, in which I could be guided by no lights derived from official opportunities, I shall again give way to my entire confidence in your discernment and pursuit of the public good: For I assure myself that whilst you carefully avoid every alteration which might endanger the benefits of an United and effective Government, or wh ich ought to await the future lessons of experience; a reverence for the characteristic rights of freemen, and a regard for the public harmony, will sufficiently influence your deliberations on the question how far the former can be more impregnably fortified, or the latter be safely and advantageously promoted.

To the preceeding observations I have one to add, which will be most properly addressed to the House of Representatives. It concerns myself, and will therefore be as brief as possible. When I was first honoured with a call into the Service of my Country, then on the eve of an arduous struggle for its liberties, the light in which I contemplated my duty required that I should renounce every pecuniary compensation. From this resolution I have in no instance departed. And being still under the impressions which produced it, I must decline as inapplicable to myself, any share in the personal emoluments, which may be indispensably included in a permanent provision for the Executive Department; and must accordingly pray that the pecuniary estimates for the Station in which I am placed, may, during my continuance in it, be limited to such actual expenditures as the public good may be thought to require.

Having thus imported to you my sentiments, as they have been awakened by the occasion which brings us together, I shall take my present leave; but not without resorting once more to the benign parent of the human race, in humble supplication that since he has been pleased to favour the American people, with opportunities for deliberating in perfect tranquility, and dispositions for deciding with unparellelled unanimity on a form of Government, for the security of their Union, and the advancement of their happiness; so his divine blessing may be equally conspicuous in the enlarged views, the temperate consultations, and the wise measures on which the success of this Government must depend.


Washington's distinctive signature

This transcription was taken from the original document in the Records of the U.S. Senate, Record Group 46, in the National Archives.

[troy2000]

Washington wrote out all his official speeches completely beforehand, and read them aloud word-for-word; apparently he wasn't the most spontaneous and fiery of orators.

Can you imagine the guy who wrote 'a reverence for the characteristic rights of freemen, and a regard for the public harmony, will sufficiently influence your deliberations on the question how far the former can be more impregnably fortified, or the latter be safely and advantageously promoted...' also writing slangy-sounding stuff like '99 99/100 percent pure', or 'safe and sane gun owners'?

[hoytedow]

Second Annual Message
December 8, 1790




Location:

United States
Pennsylvania



Fellow-Citizens of the Senate and House of Representatives:

In meeting you again I feel much satisfaction in being able to repeat my congratulations on the favorable prospects which continue to distinguish our public affairs. The abundant fruits of another year have blessed our country with plenty and with the means of a flourishing commerce.

The progress of public credit is witnessed by a considerable rise of American stock abroad as well as at home, and the revenues allotted for this and other national purposes have been productive beyond the calculations by which they were regulated. This latter circumstance is the more pleasing, as it is not only a proof of the fertility of our resources, but as it assures us of a further increase of the national respectability and credit, and, let me add, as it bears an honorable testimony to the patriotism and integrity of the mercantile and marine part of our citizens. The punctuality of the former in discharging their engagements has been exemplary.

In conformity to the powers vested in me by acts of the last session, a loan of 3,000,000 florins, toward which some provisional measures had previously taken place, has been completed in Holland. As well the celerity with which it has been filled as the nature of the terms (considering the more than ordinary demand for borrowing created by the situation of Europe) give a reasonable hope that the further execution of those powers may proceed with advantage and success. The Secretary of the Treasury has my directions to communicate such further particulars as may be requisite for more precise information.

Since your last sessions I have received communications by which it appears that the district of Kentucky, at present a part of Virginia, has concurred in certain propositions contained in a law of that State, in consequence of which the district is to become a distinct member of the Union, in case the requisite sanction of Congress be added. For this sanction application is now made. I shall cause the papers on this very transaction to be laid before you.

The liberality and harmony with which it has been conducted will be found to do great honor to both the parties, and the sentiments of warm attachment to the Union and its present Government expressed by our fellow citizens of Kentucky can not fail to add an affectionate concern for their particular welfare to the great national impressions under which you will decide on the case submitted to you.

It has been heretofore known to Congress that frequent incursion have been made on our frontier settlements by certain banditti of Indians from the northwest side of the Ohio. These, with some of the tribes dwelling on and near the Wabash, have of late been particularly active in their depredations, and being emboldened by the impunity of their crimes and aided by such parts of the neighboring tribes as could be seduced to join in their hostilities or afford them a retreat for their prisoners and plunder, they have, instead of listening to the humane invitations and overtures made on the part of the United States, renewed their violences with fresh alacrity and greater effect. The lives of a number of valuable citizens have thus been sacrificed, and some of them under circumstances peculiarly shocking, whilst others have been carried into a deplorable captivity.

These aggravated provocations rendered it essential to the safety of the Western settlements that the aggressors should be made sensible that the Government of the Union is not less capable of punishing their crimes than it is disposed to respect their rights and reward their attachments. As this object could not be effected by defensive measures, it became necessary to put in force the act which empowers the President to call out the militia for the protection of the frontiers, and I have accordingly authorized an expedition in which the regular troops in that quarter are combined with such drafts of militia as were deemed sufficient. The event of the measure is yet unknown to me. The Secretary of War is directed to lay before you a statement of the information on which it is founded, as well as an estimate of the expense with which it will be attended.

The disturbed situation of Europe, and particularly the critical posture of the great maritime powers, whilst it ought to make us the more thankful for the general peace and security enjoyed by the United States, reminds us at the same time of the circumspection with which it becomes us to preserve these blessings. It requires also that we should not overlook the tendency of a war, and even of preparations for a war, among the nations most concerned in active commerce with this country to abridge the means, and thereby at least enhance the price, of transporting its valuable productions to their markets. I recommend it to your serious reflections how far and in what mode it may be expedient to guard against embarrassments from these contingencies by such encouragements to our own navigation as will render our commerce and agriculture less dependent on foreign bottoms, which may fail us in the very moments most interesting to both of these great objects. Our fisheries and the transportation of our own produce offer us abundant means for guarding ourselves against this evil.

Your attention seems to be not less due to that particular branch of our trade which belongs to the Mediterranean. So many circumstances unite in rendering the present state of it distressful to us that you will not think any deliberations misemployed which may lead to its relief and protection.

The laws you have already passed for the establishment of a judiciary system have opened the doors of justice to all descriptions of persons. You will consider in your wisdom whether improvements in that system may yet be made, and particularly whether an uniform process of execution on sentences issuing from the Federal courts be not desirable through all the States.

The patronage of our commerce, of our merchants and sea men, has called for the appointment of consuls in foreign countries. It seems expedient to regulate by law the exercise of that jurisdiction and those functions which are permitted them, either by express convention or by a friendly indulgence, in the places of their residence. The consular convention, too, with His Most Christian Majesty has stipulated in certain cases the aid of the national authority to his consuls established here. Some legislative provision is requisite to carry these stipulations into full effect.

The establishment of the militia, of a mint, of standards of weights and measures, of the post office and post roads are subjects which I presume you will resume of course, and which are abundantly urged by their own importance.

Gentlemen of the House of Representatives:

The sufficiency of the revenues you have established for the objects to which they are appropriated leaves no doubt that the residuary provisions will be commensurate to the other objects for which the public faith stands now pledged. Allow me, moreover, to hope that it will be a favorite policy with you, not merely to secure a payment of the interest of the debt funded, but as far and as fast as the growing resources of the country will permit to exonerate it of the principal itself. The appropriation you have made of the Western land explains your dispositions on this subject, and I am persuaded that the sooner that valuable fund can be made to contribute, along with the other means, to the actual reduction of the public debt the more salutary will the measure be to every public interest, as well as the more satisfactory to our constituents.

Gentlemen of the Senate and House of Representatives:

in pursuing the various and weighty business of the present session I indulge the fullest persuasion that your consultation will be equally marked with wisdom and animated by the love of your country. In whatever belongs to my duty you shall have all the cooperation which an undiminished zeal for its welfare can inspire. It will be happy for us both, and our best reward, if, by a successful administration of our respective trusts, we can make the established Government more and more instrumental in promoting the good of our fellow citizens, and more and more the object of their attachment and confidence.

GO. WASHINGTON

The Wabash River flows through Indiana which is west of Ohio.

[troy2000]

By the way, here's a very good quote about George Washington:

If I were to characterize George Washington's feelings toward his country, I should be less inclined than most people to stress what is called Washington's love of his country. What impresses me as far more important is what I should call Washington's respect for his country.
--Randolph G Adams

[troy2000]

Originally Posted by hoytedow

The Wabash River flows through Indiana which is west of Ohio.

I don't give a damn if it flows through the middle of Disneyland. Washington still never said a word about prairie wagons in his second address to Congress, or in any other speech.

Notice that Washington said the raiding Indians lived around the northwestern Wabash, not the settlers being raided.

The northwestern Wabash River area wasn't even settled by whites until the 1830's, Hoyt. Even the southern end of it, around the Little Wabash, didn't see any white settlers until around 1810 at the earliest--more than ten years after Washington's death.

[hoytedow]

My point was Washington knew about the prairies in western Ohio which were east of the Wabash.

[troy2000]

Originally Posted by hoytedow

My point was Washington knew about the prairies in western Ohio which were east of the Wabash.

So because Washington might have known there were prairies out there somewhere, he said, "The church, the plow, the prairie wagon, and citizen's firearms are indelibly related." Even though there weren't any settlers heading for those prairies yet, or even folks in wagons passing through.

Loosen your tie, Hoyt.....it's cutting off circulation to your brain.

"My friends, we live in the greatest nation in the history of the world.
I hope you'll join with me, as we try to change it." -- Barack Obama

[SheetWise]

"The kind of man who demands that government enforce his ideas is always the kind whose ideas are idiotic."


H.L. Mencken