45 wants to maintain power, now that he's had a sniff of what he can really do with it. But he needs numbers, and numbers are what he doesn't have.
He's also discussed declaring martial law with those who are particularly dismissive of real, legitimate law. It may still happen, or he may still try; there are more than two weeks left in his term and all other tactics have been proven futile. But the military has declared itself immune to domestic politics, though it may actually have to declare it again.
There was once someone who could have declared martial law in the United States. He really did have the support of the military. In fact, it begged him to do so and take over the fledgling, weak, relatively unstructured country, loosely run (if that's what you want to call it) by a wandering, timid Congress.
The military really did want George Washington to become the emperor of America. It approached him when he first discussed stepping down from his position as Commander-in-Chief of the Continental Army, shortly after it pulled off one of the all-time great upsets in history and defeated, or perhaps more to the point wore out, the British Army and won independence.
It had to be tempting. Washington was nearly the victim of a cabal inside his own command. It couldn't have been surprising; he lost more battles than he won. Most of the time, American forces were. undermanned, undertrained, underequipped, and certainly underpaid; in a forerunner to another revolution that didn't work, many of the soldiers who called themselves "minutemen" were just as likely first, to defend their home states but nobody else's, and second, to return to their homes the minute after their services weren't directly required.
Before the decisive battle of the war, the Siege of Yorktown, Washington knew he had to pull off a victory (carefully and luckily coordinating with French help, including using French francs as soldiers' salaries) or he would face mass terminations of enlistments and, most likely, the thinning of his revolutionary force to a skeleton crew. After that, the war could be easily lost.
In short, though he had all the trappings of power, he had next to none for much of the war. He twisted in the wind while Congress dithered and printed almost worthless money for his troops. Indeed, it could all but stiff countless creditors who had lent money to the effort. But Washington's unshakeable belief in the cause was a tremendous inspiration. Without him, the revolution would certainly have failed.
When it had ended, he just wanted to return to his plantation of Mount Vernon. The offer, in fact a plea, from his comrades-in-arms, who stood personally loyal to him (in circumstances far worse and more challenging than anything 45 has ever faced, and certainly more noble), had to be ultimately flattering. And they would stand behind it and him because they had discipline, spirit and weapons.
It is difficult to overestimate the esteem that the country had for Washington. He was cheered wherever he went. After the war, he was feted at countless dinners and celebrations. He took it all in stride. It never overwhelmed him.
That's because winning a war is one thing, self-governance is quite another. He never lost sight of what, in the end, the overwhelming majority of his countrymen wanted: A genuine government that they could operate.
But the central government was weak. The squabbling Congress had no courts to solve problems. It had no executive to commandeer resources. It had no foreign policy to speak of. And there was no national currency that could be guaranteed with any backing, and the Continental soldiers, having performed their duties successfully, were bitter. The headaches were endless.
Since Washington seemed highly ethical (which he was, but selectively; he still had slaves and his will passed them along to his wife when he died, though they were to be freed when she did), and had withstood the most challenging of circumstances, the soldiers figured that it naturally could fall to him to rule the country and work these things out. So at Newburgh, New York, on March 15 (the Ides of March, no less), 1783, some officers of the Continental Army (in what is now known as the Newburgh Conspiracy; there's some debate as to just how serious it might have gotten) approached Washington on kind of a fishing expedition to find out if, in the event of a mutiny that had been discussed in some circles, he might be willing to lead what would amount to be a coup d'etat and become the overall leader of the country by force of arms.
But in a nine-page speech, Washington said no. He reminded them of the ideals for which they had fought, and knew that if he caved to their request, the whole thing could be lost in an instant. With ultimate power just a step from his hands, he refused it. Of all his contributions to our nation, this may have been his greatest; the self-control and wisdom to understand that democracy works only if power is distributed, not hoarded. 45, his horrible successor, can't possibly understand such attitudes.
Congress muddled along under the Articles of Confederation, a set of voluntarily enforceable rules to guarantee little more than a place to meet and talk things over. Fearful of centralized power they couldn't trust, the Americans stripped nearly all power from the government they could concoct. Its drawbacks were almost immediately evident.
Washington would not totally withdraw from national affairs, as we now know. Mount Vernon was the meeting place for representatives from Maryland and Virginia in 1785, trying to figure out who would govern trade on the Potomac River, which divided the two states but which both utilized thoroughly. The conclusion reached was clear: the government needed a process and a structure to deal with such conflicts. It had none.
That led to the 1787 convention in Philadelphia, now called the Constitutional Convention, which no one anticipated would be so momentous when it first convened. Once everyone got in the room and talked it over, though, the more everyone realized it was time to tear up the Articles and start over.
Washington, as the selected president of the meeting, wisely did not lend his opinions to it for he knew he was too popular; debates would swiftly conclude short of their needed airing if he weighed in (once again, the wisdom of self-control). But the delegates knew that there would be arguments, they would be fierce, and that a steady hand had to keep them from exploding into disrepair. Who best to keep the meeting going than the one man who kept the revolution going?
The document derived from the compromises (which we forget had to happen, disappointing as some of them were and still are, in order for the Constitution to even exist) provided a path forward. Nobody liked all of it, but everybody thought it was better than what they previously had to live with.
(I used to tell my history students that the governmental plans were like Goldilocks and the Three Bears: The first porridge, British rule, was too hot; the second, under the Articles, was too cold; and the third, checks and balances plus federalism in the Constitution, was just right. A little simplistic, but it worked.)
Who better to be the first president of the republic than Washington, the hero of the revolution? Who better to put the new but untested document into action? Ironically, the soldiers got what they wanted, but at a downwind distance six years later: Washington as a national leader, sure, but as an elected one, the right kind of one, one that had the ultimate legitimacy.
That kind of power, power that flowed ultimately from the people, is power Washington could accept. He would establish other legacies we still depend on--the Cabinet; the usage of state militias to enforce federal law (which 45 might claim, see above, but cannot justify it, because nobody's breaking any laws); and a voluntary two-term limit on the presidency, now guaranteed by the 22nd Amendment (and which 45 has hinted that he would somehow like to overturn).
The latter was vital, for it demonstrated that government could be legitimate and still change hands, and that a president need not serve until he died. The country could go on without him. No one person can possibly be that indispensable, though 45 would like us to believe he is.
45's presidency has made us dig deep to preserve democracy, and that effort will be on display very soon. But we have what he need: a flexible document with a tradition of reverence and workability; a majority of a national polity that woke up to that fact just in time; and an original leader who set the tone and who understood power and its potential for abuse. Even now, George Washington shows us the way.
Be well. Be careful. Wear a mask. One more day closer to a vaccine. With some luck, I'll see you down the road.
Mister Mark
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