US Presidency
1925

That is what it was when John Adams conceived the great strategy of calling a man of the South to the chief command. A more provincial man might have dreamed of Massachusetts, aided by the other colonies, taking and holding the lead and garnering the lion's share of glory. But Adams was planning in terms of a nation, not of provinces; and Washington had for years been writing of Our Country. So Washington put on his uniform in testimony of his readiness for whatever might happen, and Adams, after some period of misgivings, set about convincing the delegates from New England and the middle Colonies that there must be a nation, and a national army, with a Commander in Chief, and that must be Washington. It was a stroke of political genius that Adams, soul of Puritanic idealism, should have moved the adoption of the army by Congress and the selection of Washington as commander in chief. The selection was made without a dissenting vote, though it is not true to say that Washington was unanimously preferred.