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Mount Vernon To Right Wingers: You're Not Welcome Here
Ben Frumin | February 17, 2010, 12:35PM
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A lot's been made of the conservative signing later today of "The Mount Vernon Statement" -- the right's "restatement of Constitutional conservatism."
But it turns out that not only is today's signing taking place several miles away from the actual Mount Vernon -- 4.4 miles by car, by our count -- but conservatives asked to sign their declaration at the real Mount Vernon, and were denied.
Melissa Wood, media relations manager for Mount Vernon, tells us that the conservative group "did make a formal request to use Mount Vernon for this announcement. The request by the Mount Vernon Statement group was denied due to Mount Vernon's events policy."
George Washington's Mount Vernon Estate is owned and maintained in trust for the people of the United States by the Mount Vernon Ladies' Association of the Union, a private, non-profit organization. The Association permits outside organizations, companies, or groups to host special events and meetings on the Estate in approved locations. Political, fund-raising, and personal events including, but not limited to, weddings, christenings, bar/bat mitzvahs, or birthday parties, are not permitted.
An exception, Wood noted, has been made in the past for presidents. Former President George W. Bush, for instance, was welcomed at Mount Vernon.
"For the president, we feel that George Washington would have hosted them here," Wood said.
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Brownbagger
February 17, 2010 12:58 PM
Bravo! Life's little victories. Well done, Ladies.
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IowaKid
February 17, 2010 1:31 PM in reply to Brownbagger
Agree.... Love your brown bag
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Brownbagger
February 17, 2010 2:01 PM in reply to IowaKid
Gracia mille.
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lousgirl84
February 17, 2010 4:48 PM in reply to Brownbagger
parla italiano???
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Brownbagger
February 18, 2010 9:17 AM in reply to lousgirl84
Un po
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Wellstone6
February 17, 2010 12:59 PM
Good move.
They would have needed an immediate counting of the silverware after the teabaggers left.
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ericf
February 17, 2010 1:13 PM
So the Mount Vernon declaration wasn't even at Mount Vernon. How iconic.
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Grinder
February 17, 2010 1:24 PM
Why Mount Vernon to begin with? Actually, George Washington was a bit of a "liberal" in his time, since he was a Federalist and followed Alexander Hamilton's thinking about having a strong federal goverment, especially through the creation of a national economy, rather than the state-centered economies, which almost let us to the brink of collapse in the 1780s.
It's always interesting to me that Republicans/conservatives who talk so much about American history and "upholding" it really don't know a damn thing about it.
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EnnuiDivine
February 17, 2010 1:30 PM in reply to Grinder
Such as the lionizing of Paine and Jefferson as "founders of a Christian nation". They weren't. Deists, sure. But theocrats? Far from it. Look no further than article 11 of the 1805 Treaty of Tripoli:
"As the Government of the United States of America is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion,—as it has in itself no character of enmity against the laws, religion, or tranquility, of Mussulmen,—and as the said States never entered into any war or act of hostility against any Mahometan nation, it is declared by the parties that no pretext arising from religious opinions shall ever produce an interruption of the harmony existing between the two countries."
And the founding fathers weren't the freedom-for-all do-gooders the current crop of "conservatives" makes them out to be. Sure, Washington had freed slaves. His own slaves. On his deathbed. It was written into the constitution that non-whites weren't people. Not whole ones, anyway.
It's been a lasting legacy of American conservatism, I guess.
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Brownbagger
February 17, 2010 2:08 PM in reply to EnnuiDivine
Not those Founding Fathers, silly. They mean the real ones, Reagan, Nixon, McCarthy.
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JNagarya
February 17, 2010 8:59 PM in reply to Brownbagger
Founding, or Foundling?
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Shutterbug-J
February 17, 2010 2:42 PM in reply to EnnuiDivine
I would be careful to try to portray the actual truth and that is very complicated.
Jefferson and Payne and some others were deists- that doesn't mean atheists. Deism is a form of theism. When Payne writes his supposedly athiest pamphlet "The Age of Reason" he writes that he believes a divine creator put the moon in it's orbit and created this universe. It might rub you and me the wrong way as old earth creationism but they had fewer scientific triumphs and explanations to understand the world. The lived in a universe exponentially smaller and younger than what we can see with hubbell or even the evolutionary tree. That said Payne also bashes the life out of literalist believers and says the god of the bible one of the worst monsters ever in that pamphlet. And this is from someone who knows the bible like the back of his hand and used biblical citations in previous pamphlets to argue that kings were a burden and punishment.
I think the treaty of Tripoli is pretty weak evidence. It was not negotiated from a position of strength and was quickly violated. In the treaty we were also paying tribute and kissing the ass of what was essentially a criminal state, we learned quickly we couldn't do that.
I think the religion of the american revolution and the founding fathers was better informed by the Protestant reformation in England. The founding fathers were less than three generations from England's glorious revolution and just about a hundred years removed from the commonwealth of Oliver Cromwell. I think most of the founding fathers were sick of religious wars and fanatics. Ideas like freedom of the press, freedom from unreasonable search and seizure, the right to remain silent, being secure in one's person, freedom of assembly, and lastly freedom of religion were all ideas proposed by radicals, levelers, and nonconformists in in the wars of religion and adopted by our founding fathers to end the horrors they had seen or knew from their recent history.
I personally believe freedom of religion includes a huge helping of freedom from religion. I sure you do as well. If you want to defend your freedom from religion you might want to get some more substantial arguments on you side. The theocrats are not stupid and they are digging everyday for evidence on their side. We need to remember the actual horrors and injustice of the theocratic states early american sought so hard to escaped from.
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slb
February 17, 2010 2:42 PM in reply to EnnuiDivine
Actually, no it is not. The text you are talking about reads (my bolding):
Free blacks were counted the same as free whites. (Note that this has nothing to do with the right to vote or to any other right, only in how people were counted for purposes of allocation of representation and taxation.) The "other persons" subject to the three-fifths formulation were slaves. Perhaps that is a small distinction, but do note that the only reference made to race or ethnicity is to Indians.
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slb
February 17, 2010 2:45 PM in reply to slb
Sorry, I meant to quote the statement I was responding to. It was, "It was written into the constitution that non-whites weren't people. Not whole ones, anyway."
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slb
February 17, 2010 2:33 PM in reply to Grinder
Because they are trying to co-opt all of the Revolutionary-era symbolism. Doesn't matter that GW himself probably would have tossed them out on their ears; if they can co-opt the symbolism, it's as good as getting his endorsement.
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slb
February 17, 2010 8:56 PM in reply to slb
It occurs to me that glomming onto George Washington as their secular saint and claiming to be the inheritors of his political philosophy is exactly what the Confederacy did...
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MarinCat
February 17, 2010 1:50 PM
How Constitutionally conservative: A non-profit org following their laws. It goes w/o saying that Newtie and all his Dumbass cons see a charitable org and they go all criminal.
Anyway: some one unpack the provenance of their name "Mount Vernon Ladies' Association of the Union". Esp the "Union" part.
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slb
February 17, 2010 2:48 PM in reply to MarinCat
You might start here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mount_Vernon_Ladies%27_Association
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mike from Arlington
February 17, 2010 2:07 PM
Wonder if they called it The Woodbridge Statement
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ClosetLuddite
February 17, 2010 4:59 PM in reply to mike from Arlington
Lorton might be more appropriate... They closed the prison though didn't they...
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NobleCommentDecider
February 17, 2010 2:17 PM
Great moments in Conservative History -why don't they sign it where Bush read that kid's book while America was under attack on 9/11 and call it The Statement Almost as Important as the Pet Goat Book!
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Brownbagger
February 17, 2010 2:34 PM in reply to NobleCommentDecider
Subtitle: Another Time When We Pissed Our Pants
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expat46
February 17, 2010 11:26 PM
Beautiful! "The Almost Mount Vernon Document"
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EdA
February 17, 2010 11:47 PM
As George Washington made eminently clear in his famous "To Bigotry No Sanction" proclamation, he explicitly rejected the idea that the U.S. is a "Christian nation." Indeed, as the first sentence of the extract below states, rejection of the many types of bigotry that self-declared "conservatives" embrace is an "example of an enlarged and LIBERAL policy: a policy worthy of imitation." [emphasis added]
But then, compared to Ed Meese and Grover "Drown New Orleans in a Bathtub" Norquist, what would George Washington know about the thought processes of the Founding Fathers?
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 fig tree, 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.
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Tosh
April 28, 2010 9:32 PM
Why Mount Vernon to begin with? Actually, George Washington was a bit of a "liberal" in his time, since he was a Federalist and followed Alexander Hamilton's thinking about having a strong federal goverment, especially through the creation of a national economy, rather than the state-centered economies, which almost let us to the brink of collapse in the 1780s.
It's always interesting to me that Republicans/conservatives who talk so much about American history and "upholding" it really don't know a damn thing about it.
m65 kamagra
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