"THE GREATEST MAN IN THE WORLD":

George Washington saved America's Constitution (NEIL REYNOLDS, 7/04/11, Globe and Mail)

When Washington died in 1799, he bequeathed three extraordinary precedents. He had declined a crown. He had declined office for life. And he had declined aristocratic titles (although people, for a time, did call him “Excellency”).

The Constitution was a glorious thing – in part, because Washington epitomized the spirit of it. Without the restraint of America’s first president and commander-in-chief, the Constitution could have been, as many constitutions are, mere pieces of paper. It’s interesting to note that Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin cited Roosevelt’s example last year when he was asked whether he would return for another term (or terms) as president.

Though the U.S. inherited the great injustice of slavery from its colonial past, it became a beacon of freedom and liberty for a widely enslaved world. By 2010, the World Forum on Democracy could document 120 functioning democracies (with 58 per cent of the world’s population – more than 3.5 billion people), with many more evidently still to come.

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