With the election primaries coming soon, our thoughts turn to the issue of leadership and the meaning of greatness. How do we find great leaders? Are they still possible to find?

Happy Birthday

February 22, 2008
Rabbi Seymour Rossel

Daniel Shays was a veteran of the Revolutionary War. But the tax that was imposed on him and his fellow citizens in western Massachusetts looked to him like the ugly days of the British Stamp Act. The result, in 1786 was Shays Rebellion, a popular uprising against the loose confederation that existed under the Articles of Confederation. Shays Rebellion never really got off the ground. Faulty execution caused the rebels to lose the opening attack, many were caught and imprisoned, some were sentenced to hang, then pardoned, and by 1788 a general amnesty was declared that freed and forgave the rebels.

On November 13, 1787, Thomas Jefferson wrote an often-quoted letter, saying,

A little rebellion now and then is a good thing. ... God forbid we should ever be twenty years without such a rebellion. ... What country can preserve its liberties, if its rulers are not warned from time to time, that this people preserve the spirit of resistance? ... The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time, with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is its natural manure.

Jefferson wrote these famous lines before the French Revolution. He might have expressed a different opinion after watching the tragic barbarism of those rebels and their dispassionate guillotine.

An older, wiser man watched from the shadows. After the revolution, Washington had opposed a strong central government, but Shays Rebellion frightened him, changed his mind, and brought him out of retirement. Determined to preserve liberty, he presided over the 1786 Philadelphia convention that resulted in the Constitution of the United States. As the delegates discussed the office of chief executive, all eyes focused on the tall General in his straight-back chair. It was axiomatic, a God-given truth, that no one but Washington could become the first President of the United States. To this day, he remains the only President elected unanimously, gaining 100% of the electoral college vote both in 1789 and in 1792. He stood above all the Founding Fathers, alone upon the mountaintop.

Now, if George was like Moses on the mountain, his Joshua was the younger Alexander Hamilton. The new administration inherited the debt for the Revolutionary War from the thirteen states. In 1791, wanting to pay down this debt, Hamilton convinced Congress to tax distilled spirits and carriages. He conceived his tax "as a measure of social discipline," hoping it would "advance and secure the power of the new federal government."

Unfortunately, the tax was unfair. It offered discounts to large distilleries while forcing small family distillers to pay full fare. Again, the trouble arose in the west where protest meetings finally gave rise to open rebellion. The first shots in the Whiskey Rebellion were fired in western Pennsylvania in 1794. Resistance spread erratically along the frontier as tax collectors were pursued, threatened, even tarred and feathered. As the rebellion gained momentum, the city of Pittsburgh itself was threatened.

Washington was as astonished as Moses coming down the mountain. Could the people he loved wish to overturn everything he had helped them achieve? The Whiskey Rebellion was his Golden Calf, his betrayal by the populace. He called up the militia of Pennsylvania, Virginia, and several other states.

He and Hamilton, and Revolutionary War hero General "Lighthorse Harry" Lee, rode at the head of nearly 13,000 men, a larger force than Washington had ever commanded during the Revolutionary War. But the militia he commanded were western soldiers riding against western rebels. Would they remain steadfast? Did Moses ask himself the same question as he brought loyal Israelites to his side to punish those Israelites who had worshipped the Golden Calf? Would Israelites fight Israelites if Moses asked them? Would westerners fight westerners if Washington asked them? In each case, the future depended on the answer.

In Moses' case, the outcome was violent: Three thousand rebels were put to death before Moses begged God to forgive the rest. Washington was luckier. Somehow the western militia could not manage to locate any of the actual leaders of the Whiskey Rebellion but they showed their good faith by rounding up twenty likely suspects. The twenty were imprisoned: one died in prison, two were convicted of treason and sentenced to death, but Washington pardoned them on the grounds that one was a "simpleton," and the other was "insane."

Everyone seemed satisfied with the outcome. The militia had evidently hoodwinked Washington and Hamilton, while winking at their rebel brothers and rounding up just enough ne'er do wells. The real rebel leaders removed themselves to the territories of Kentucky and Tennessee where the tax collectors could not reach them and where they found they could make a better product from corn. The invention of bourbon was a direct result of the Whiskey Rebellion.

For their part, by turning out the militia, Washington and Hamilton garnered new respect for the federal government. From now on, any attempt to change laws would have to be made in through courts and legislation.

As it turned out, the hated whiskey tax was never enforced outside of Western Pennsylvania and was not collected with much success even there. Dying with a whimper, it was repealed in 1803.

For Washington himself, the Whiskey Rebellion marked his last ride at the head of American troops. Though there was no battle and no definitive reprisal, his very presence made the point. He was again atop the mountain, widely celebrated for his masterly performance. Like Moses in this week's portion, Washington used the rebellion to ensure his role as the elemental leader of his time and to model leadership for all times.

Today, February 22, is Washington's birthday. He would be two hundred and seventy-six this year. I would be inviting him up here to the bimah so we could bless him by singing Shehecheiyanu in his honor. Instead, we are the ones who are blessed by him, just as we are blessed by Moses. Great leaders are rare, but when they emerge, they purify us through their lives. Jefferson was mistaken when he said that "The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time, with the blood of patriots and tyrants." The truth is that the tree of liberty is like the Tree of Life, it depends on those few wise leaders who are great of spirit and arise always when they are most needed. Happy birthday, George, may we live to see the likes of you again. And let us say: Amen.