The Nexus Archive
Republican Statesmanship · Letter
Letter to the Hebrew Congregation at Newport
by George Washington · The Republic's First Example · American Founding, 1732-1799
Washington's powerful statement of religious liberty, equal citizenship, and the rejection of mere toleration.
- Beginner
- ~5 min read
- 1 chapter guide
- Public domain
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Before the text
Editor's Prelude
Liberty Without Permission
In August 1790, only months after Rhode Island joined the new United States, President George Washington visited Newport. Moses Seixas, warden of the city's Hebrew congregation, welcomed him with an address that remembered Jewish exclusion and praised a government promising liberty of conscience and equal citizenship.
A ceremonial welcome carries a question that cannot remain ceremonial: does a person’s freedom rest on a neighbor’s goodwill, or on a right that neither neighbor nor government grants as a favor? For a congregation recalling its exclusion from civic rights, the distinction reaches into ordinary security and belonging.
Washington is answering people who have already found words for their hopes. Their address belongs to the exchange, and its biblical language places a new political relationship beside an older history of danger, deliverance and obligation.
The opening pages
Letter to the Hebrew Congregation in Newport
[Newport, R.I., 18 August 1790]
Gentlemen.
While I receive, with much satisfaction, your Address replete with expressions of affection and esteem; I rejoice in the opportunity of assuring you, that I shall always retain a grateful remembrance of the cordial welcome I experienced in my visit to Newport, from all classes of Citizens.
The reflection on the days of difficulty and danger which are past is rendered the more sweet, from a consciousness that they are succeeded by days of uncommon prosperity and security. If we have wisdom to make the best use of the advantages with which we are now favored, we cannot fail, under the just administration of a good Government, to become a great and a happy people.
The Citizens of the United States of America have a right to applaud themselves for having given to mankind examples of an enlarged and liberal policy: a policy worthy of imitation. All possess alike liberty of conscience and immunities of citizenship It is now no more that toleration is spoken of, as if it was by the indulgence of one class of people, that another enjoyed the exercise of their inherent natural rights.
For happily the Government of the United States, which gives to bigotry no sanction, to persecution no assistance requires only that they who live under its protection should demean themselves as good citizens, in giving it on all occasions their effectual support.
It would be inconsistent with the frankness of my character not to avow that I am pleased with your favorable opinion of my Administration, and fervent wishes for my felicity. May the Children of the Stock of Abraham, who dwell in this land, continue to merit and enjoy the good will of the other Inhabitants; while every one shall sit in safety under his own vine and figtree, and there shall be none to make him afraid.
May the father of all mercies scatter light and not darkness in our paths, and make us all in our several vocations useful here, and in his own due time and way everlastingly happy.
Go: Washington
Chapter guides · 1
Letter to the Hebrew Congregation in Newport
Tolerance Gives Way to Right
Washington answers a minority congregation by rejecting the idea that its freedom depends on majority permission.
An answer in shared language
Washington replies to Moses Seixas and Newport's Hebrew congregation in language drawn partly from their own address. He distinguishes equal liberty of conscience from toleration, promises a government that sanctions neither bigotry nor persecution, and closes with a biblical image of neighbors living without fear.
Rights beyond indulgence
Tolerance leaves one group in the position of granting or withdrawing another's freedom. Washington instead describes religious exercise as an inherent natural right joined to the ordinary immunities and responsibilities of citizenship.
The congregation’s part in the promise
Seixas’s address supplies the language about bigotry and persecution that Washington takes up. Its memory of exclusion gives force to the reply: the congregation participates in stating what equal belonging should mean. Washington ends by wishing that Abraham’s descendants may enjoy their neighbors’ goodwill and that everyone may live safely under a vine and fig tree, without fear. His final prayer asks for light rather than darkness, useful lives, and everlasting happiness.
Questions readers ask
- How long does it take to read Letter to the Hebrew Congregation at Newport?
- About 5 min in total.
- How difficult is Letter to the Hebrew Congregation at Newport?
- Beginner. A short letter; about 5 minutes of reading.
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- How many chapter guides are there?
- One chapter guide, written by the Nexus editors; it opens in full here.
About George Washington
George Washington was commander of the Continental Army, presiding officer of the Constitutional Convention, and the first president of the United States. His importance lies not only in winning power, but in limiting it, defining the presidency, and making republican self-government credible.
“What does power look like when it chooses restraint?”
Washington gave the American republic its first model of executive power, military restraint, and peaceful legitimacy. He made the presidency powerful, but not kingly.
Source text: public domain. Chapter guides: original Nexus writing. Letter to the Hebrew Congregation at Newport is part of The Nexus Archive, guided Quests through the great works.