political party, were base forgeries, of English origin in a time of war.  His own view of this performance is given in a letter to Benjamin Walker, in which he said:  “Amongst other attempts, ... spurious letters, known at the time of their first publication (I believe in the year 1777) to be forgeries, are (or extracts from them) brought forward with the highest emblazoning of which they are susceptible, with a view to attach principles to me which every action of my life has given the lie to.  But that is no stumbling-block with the editors of these papers and their supporters.”

Two or three extracts from private letters will show how Washington regarded the course of the opposition, and the interpretation he put upon their attacks.  After sketching in a letter to David Stuart the general course of the hostilities toward his administration, he said:  “This not working so well as was expected, from a supposition that there was too much confidence in, and perhaps personal regard for, the present chief magistrate and his politics, the batteries have lately been leveled against him particularly and personally.  Although he is soon to become a private citizen, his opinions are knocked down, and his character reduced as low as they are capable of sinking it, even by resorting to absolute falsehoods.”  Again he said, just before leaving office:  “To misrepresent my motives, to reprobate my politics, and to weaken the confidence which has been reposed in my administration, are objects which cannot be relinquished by those who will be satisfied with nothing short of a change in our political system.”  He at least labored under no misapprehension after eight years of trial as to the position or purposes of the party which had fought him and his administration, and which had savagely denounced his measures at every step, and with ever-increasing violence.

Having defined the attitude of the opposition, we can now consider that of Washington himself after he had retired from office, and no longer felt restrained by the circumstances of his election to the presidency from openly declaring his views, or publicly identifying himself with a political party.  He rightly regarded the administration of Mr. Adams as a continuation of his own, and he gave to it a cordial support.  He was equally clear and determined in his distrust and dislike of the opposition.  Not long before leaving office he had written a letter to Jefferson, which, while it exonerated that gentleman from being the author of certain peculiarly malicious attacks, showed very plainly that the writer completely understood the position occupied by his former secretary.  It was a letter which must have been most unpleasant reading for the person to whom it was addressed.  A year later he wrote to John Nicholas in regard to Jefferson:  “Nothing short of the evidence you have adduced, corroborative of intimations which I had received long before through another channel, could have shaken my belief in the sincerity of a friendship which I had conceived was possessed for me by the person to whom you allude.”  There was no doubt in his mind now as to Jefferson’s conduct, and he knew at last that he had been his foe even when a member of his political household.