Nick’s Reviews > An Imperfect God: George Washington, His Slaves, and the Creation of America > Status Update

Washington...stated that the single most important objective was guaranteeing the continuation of the Union: "In all our deliberations on this subject we kept steadily in our view, that which appears to us the greatest interest of every true American, the consolidation of our Union, in which is involved our prosperity, felicity, safety, perhaps our national existence."

But the planters regarded the preservation of slavery as the bedrock of their postwar society and economy. If the United States had won independence but put slavery on the road to extinction, then they would have lost the war. The planters were prepared to see their region fall to the British before they would arm three thousand slaves.

Thus in the first months of the war in Massachusetts, blacks had spontaneously joined the patriot cause; left to itself, the army had integrated sponntaneously. Change was occurring on its own without a formal policy imposing or urging it. The natural movement was towards freedom. Washington and other leaders would have to act to stifle this movement.

The horse-breaking story reflects the attributes of the Virginia gentleman: it is mainly to take risks; but when things go wrong you admit responsibility and accept the consequences. The ideal mam has pride, willfulness, boisterous passions — all contained and controlled.

The force of his commands makes it clear that within his own family Washington was entirely alone in his thinking about slavery. He expected that the emancipation would come as a shock to his family and, moreover, he expected them to resist it. Washington was positioning himself as the protector of his slaves.