George Washington’s Godly Warning Against All Political Parties
Read the original Substack article here
https://substack.com/@andelinadell/note/p-188809902?utm_source=notes-share-action&r=1vnl12
I must preface this article by saying I used to be a member of the GOP.
I am now very outspoken about political parties and will speak my mind about the corruption in all of them. I am an independent through and through. I am not a member of any political party, and I believe we should have none at all.
Political parties, by their very nature, divide Americans and concentrate power in the hands of a few.
Recent events in Salt Lake County make this painfully clear. The Salt Lake County GOP chair has removed duly elected Precinct Committee Officers (PCOs), grassroots representatives chosen directly by their neighbors in local caucuses and elections. This is not an isolated internal matter. It is living proof of what George Washington warned would happen when the “spirit of party” takes hold.
In his Farewell Address of September 19, 1796, the Father of Our Country gave one of the most solemn warnings in American history. He spoke not as a partisan, but as a man who had fought a revolution to secure God-given rights and who feared that factions would destroy the republic he helped create. Here are Washington’s own words that describe exactly what we are seeing:
“All obstructions to the execution of the laws, all combinations and associations, under whatever plausible character, with the real design to direct, control, counteract, or awe the regular deliberation and action of the constituted authorities, are destructive of this fundamental principle, and of fatal tendency. They serve to organize faction, to give it an artificial and extraordinary force; to put, in the place of the delegated will of the nation, the will of a party, often a small but artful and enterprising minority of the community…
However combinations or associations of the above description may now and then answer popular ends, they are likely, in the course of time and things, to become potent engines, by which cunning, ambitious, and unprincipled men will be enabled to subvert the power of the people and to usurp for themselves the reins of government, destroying afterwards the very engines which have lifted them to unjust dominion.”
I know the words of our Founding Fathers can sometimes feel heavy. So here’s exactly what Washington is saying in plain, everyday language:
Any group or organization, no matter how nice or reasonable it sounds on the surface, that tries to interfere with, boss around, block, or intimidate the people we actually elected to run the government is attacking the very heart of our system and will eventually destroy it.
These groups organize factions (today we call them political parties). They pump them up with fake, super-charged power. Then they replace what the whole country voted for, the will of the people, with the agenda of just one party. And often it’s not even most of the people in that party, it’s a small, clever, ambitious little clique that knows how to work the system.
Sure, sometimes these groups might actually help with a popular cause in the short term. But over time, they almost always turn into powerful machines. Then, sneaky, power-hungry, completely unprincipled people use those machines to steal real power away from the citizens. They take over the government for themselves. And once they’re in charge, they destroy the very groups and rules that helped them climb to the top.
When a party chair removes elected precinct officers, the “delegated will of the people” (your elected representatives) is replaced by the will of a small group at the top. Washington called this the “baneful effects of the spirit of party” and declared it “truly their worst enemy” in any popular government.
The Anti-Federalists — Patrick Henry, George Mason, and the authors of the Anti-Federalist Papers — warned that any concentrated power, even under the banner of a party, would eventually be captured by ambitious elites and used to override the sovereignty of local communities and free individuals. They insisted on a Bill of Rights to protect natural liberties from distant or self-appointed authorities. What we see today inside party structures is a microcosm of that very threat: power being stripped from the grassroots level (We The People) and centralized in the hands of a few.
Our rights do not come from parties, chairmen, or any human institution. The very document that Washington defended with his life — the Declaration of Independence — proclaims that “we are endowed by our Creator with certain unalienable Rights.” These natural rights include the God-given authority to choose our own representatives and to govern ourselves through consent. But I, Leslie Williams, would dare say it differently: When we give our rights and allegiances to a party, we give away our natural rights — including the God-given authority to choose our own representatives and to govern ourselves through consent.
Washington rooted his entire warning in faith and virtue. Right after speaking on parties, he declared:
“Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable supports. In vain would that man claim the tribute of patriotism, who should labor to subvert these great pillars of human happiness… And let us with caution indulge the supposition that morality can be maintained without religion.”
He also asked where the security for life, property, and liberty would be if “the sense of religious obligation desert the oaths” of those in power. Party purges driven by revenge, jealousy, and control, the very passions Washington said led to “frightful despotism,” destroy the moral foundation that is essential for any free society to endure.
When a county party chair removes people who were elected by their own neighbors in precinct meetings, that’s exactly what Washington was talking about. A small group at the top is overriding the will of the regular voters who chose those PCOs. The “potent engine” (the party) that was supposed to serve the people is now being used to silence them and concentrate power in the hands of a few.
Washington’s final counsel was clear: “It is the interest and duty of a wise people to discourage and restrain the spirit of party by force of public opinion.” Because I believe parties themselves are incompatible with true liberty, I urge every American, regardless of past affiliations, to reject this divisive system entirely. Washington wasn’t against people having different opinions; he was against letting organized parties turn into machines that steal power from everyday citizens. This is why I believe we shouldn’t have parties at all. They don’t protect liberty; they slowly replace it with the rule of whichever clever insiders control the machine at the moment.
They divide “We The People” against each other, left versus right, instead of focusing on what is actually the problem: the overreach of governmental powers. Let us return to the Anti-Federalist vision of local self-rule, the natural rights endowed by our Creator, and the godly virtue that alone can sustain a free republic.
The Salt Lake County events are not an exception; they are the rule when parties are allowed to operate. The only lasting solution is to heed President Washington and move beyond parties altogether, so that the will of the people, not the will of any faction, truly governs.
May God bless the people of Utah and all the people of these United States of America.
Leslie Williams
National Secretary Independent American Patriots
Owner www.THEPAMPHLET.net
