George Washington and Modern America: What Would He Think of the USA in 2025?
In 1796, George Washington stepped away from power and warned his young country about dangers he believed could destroy it from within: factionalism, sectional hatred, foreign entanglements, and the erosion of republican virtue. The United States was fragile, experimental, and still unsure it would last.
Fast forward to the USA in 2025. It is a global superpower with 330 million people, a vast military, nuclear weapons, sprawling cities, social media echo chambers, and bitter partisan division. Yet the same Constitution Washington helped bring to life still structures government, and his name is invoked in arguments from gun rights to foreign policy.
This raises a sharp question: what might George Washington make of modern America and the USA in 2025?
This article explores that question in three layers. First, it sets out what is known about Washington’s beliefs and the late 18th-century world he inhabited. Then it examines how those ideas map uneasily onto a 21st-century democracy grappling with polarisation, inequality, and challenges to institutional trust. Finally, it considers why revisiting Washington’s warnings may still matter for debates over power, liberty, and national unity today.
Key Points
George Washington and modern America are linked by a continuous constitutional tradition, but separated by profound changes in society, technology, and global power.
Washington’s core priorities included national unity, republican self-government, limited but effective federal authority, and caution toward permanent foreign alliances.
He warned that political parties, sectional rivalries, and foreign interference could poison public life and weaken the Union.
The USA in 2025 faces intense partisan polarisation, low trust in Congress, and disputes over executive power, elections, and the role of the courts.
Any claim about what Washington would “think” now is speculative; it can only be grounded in his recorded actions and writings, not treated as fact.
Looking at 2025 through Washington’s lens highlights both the resilience of American institutions and the gap between founding ideals and current political practice.
Background
George Washington was born in 1732 in colonial Virginia and died in 1799, only a few years after leaving the presidency. He fought in the French and Indian War, led the Continental Army during the American Revolution, presided over the Constitutional Convention of 1787, and became the first president of the United States in 1789. His reputation as a reluctant but essential leader made him a unifying figure in a deeply divided new nation.
The United States he helped create was small and vulnerable. Thirteen states stretched along the Atlantic coast, with a population of under 4 million people, most living in rural communities. The federal government was new and contested; many Americans feared it would become too powerful, while others worried it was too weak to hold the Union together. Slavery was legal and entrenched in the economy, including at Washington’s own Mount Vernon estate. He owned enslaved people throughout his life, though his will provided for the emancipation of those he directly controlled after his wife’s death.
Washington’s Farewell Address in 1796 distilled his political fears and hopes. He urged Americans to see themselves first as one nation, not as warring regions. He warned that parties could inflame animosity and open the door to demagogues and foreign manipulation. He cautioned against “permanent alliances” with foreign powers, arguing that the new republic should avoid becoming entangled in European rivalries and focus on its own development.
At the same time, Washington believed in a stronger central government than many of his contemporaries. He supported the new Constitution, backed the creation of a national bank, and used federal force to suppress the Whiskey Rebellion, signaling that the government had both the right and the capacity to enforce its laws. His presidency helped define foreign policy as an executive responsibility and set precedents for a peaceful transfer of power.
The USA in 2025, by contrast, is an established federal republic with a vast bureaucracy, a global network of alliances, and a large standing military. It enjoys broad protections for civil liberties and political participation, but faces concerns about democratic backsliding, partisan gridlock, and declining trust in institutions such as Congress and the courts. Surveys show that many Americans are deeply worried about corruption, the cost of living, and the health of their democracy itself.
Any attempt to bridge these two worlds must start from this contrast: the fragile, experimental republic of Washington’s time versus the powerful yet anxious democracy of 2025.
Analysis
Core Beliefs and Priorities
Washington’s political outlook grew out of war, revolution, and compromise. Several themes stand out in his recorded views.
First, he valued national unity above almost all else. The Union, for him, was the foundation of independence, prosperity, and liberty. He feared that regional identities—North versus South, East versus West—could fracture the country and invite foreign powers to exploit the divisions.
Second, he believed in republican government rooted in virtue. Citizens, and especially leaders, were expected to exercise self-restraint, resist personal ambition, and put the public good above factional advantage. He saw public office as a temporary trust, not a permanent entitlement.
Third, he was wary of political parties. Washington accepted that disagreement was inevitable, but he saw organised parties as dangerous engines of passion and revenge that might seize control of government and bend it to narrow interests. His Farewell Address describes “the spirit of party” as especially alarming in a system based on popular elections, where it could inflame the public and weaken government.
Fourth, he advocated caution in foreign policy. His neutrality proclamation during the wars of the French Revolution was controversial, but he defended it as necessary to keep the United States out of conflicts that did not serve its interests. He believed in trade and peaceful engagement, but thought permanent political alliances could drag the young republic into unnecessary wars and compromise its independence.
Finally, Washington’s own life exposed a stark contradiction: his commitment to liberty existed alongside his participation in slavery. This tension is central to any modern assessment of his legacy. While his will took steps toward emancipation within his household, he did not challenge the institution on a national scale.
Power, Institutions, and Society Then and Now
The institutional landscape Washington helped shape differs sharply from that of 2025.
In his era, the federal government had limited administrative capacity. There was no vast welfare state, no national income tax, no regulatory agencies overseeing finance, environment, or workplace safety. The military was small in peacetime. Most political disputes revolved around tariffs, banking, land, and foreign treaties.
Modern America has a far more expansive federal role. The government collects large-scale taxes, operates major social programs, and regulates everything from air quality to digital privacy. The president commands a permanent global military presence; emergency powers and executive orders have grown in importance, prompting debates over whether the executive branch has accumulated too much authority at the expense of Congress.
Society has also transformed. Washington’s political community largely excluded women, enslaved people, most free Black Americans, and many without property. Today, universal adult suffrage, civil rights law, and mass education have broadened participation, even as disparities in wealth, race, and geography continue to shape access to power.
Against this backdrop, it is reasonable to imagine Washington being both impressed and unsettled. He might see the survival of the constitutional framework, the scale of national unity, and the expansion of rights as remarkable achievements. At the same time, he might view the size of the federal bureaucracy, the global reach of the military, and the intensity of partisan conflict as warning signs that the balance between liberty, order, and virtue has shifted in ways he feared.
Parallels With Today’s Debates
Several of Washington’s recurring themes echo strongly in 2025.
His concern about parties and faction resonates with current polarisation. Modern America is dominated by two large parties locked in fierce competition, often treating politics as a zero-sum struggle where compromise is seen as weakness. Media ecosystems and social networks can amplify outrage, reward extreme positions, and inflame mistrust between citizens.
Washington’s warnings about foreign influence also feel familiar. He feared that foreign powers would use propaganda, money, and intrigue to sway American politics and exploit internal divisions. Contemporary debates about election interference, disinformation campaigns, and the influence of foreign state and non-state actors can be read as modern versions of the danger he highlighted.
His insistence on unity over sectionalism has analogues in disputes between states and the federal government, urban and rural America, and different cultural regions. Tensions over federal mandates, state autonomy, and regional identities often reopen arguments about where sovereignty should lie in a federal system.
Finally, his focus on character and virtue in leadership remains relevant. Many Americans in 2025 express concern that public life rewards self-promotion, personal enrichment, and partisan loyalty more than integrity or competence. Washington’s example of stepping down voluntarily after two terms is frequently invoked as a model of restraint.
Where the Past Clashes With the Present
At the same time, there are areas where Washington’s world and 2025 America collide rather than align.
Modern expectations of equality and rights would confront his own participation in slavery. If transported into 2025, he would encounter a society that publicly condemns slavery, at least in law, and recognises it as a fundamental violation of human rights. How he would respond to that judgment is unknowable, but any attempt to claim him as a straightforward moral guide for the present must reckon with this history.
His suspicion of permanent alliances would sit awkwardly with a world where the United States anchors longstanding defence pacts and international institutions. He might question whether a republic can remain independent in its judgment while tied so closely to the security of other states, even as supporters of these alliances see them as essential to stability.
Washington also feared large standing armies as threats to liberty. In 2025, the United States maintains one of the world’s largest militaries with a global footprint. Some might argue that civilian control, professional norms, and institutional checks answer his concerns. Others might see the scale of military power and defence spending as exactly the kind of structural risk he had in mind.
Speculation about his reactions must remain cautious. It is possible to anchor scenarios in his recorded preferences and choices, but not to turn him into an uncomplicated advocate for any present-day political camp.
Why This Matters
Revisiting George Washington and modern America in 2025 is not an exercise in nostalgia. It illuminates recurring dilemmas in a long-running experiment in self-government.
His warnings about faction, foreign interference, and the fragility of republican liberty speak to current anxieties about polarisation, disinformation, and the erosion of democratic norms. They remind readers that bitter parties and sectional rivalries are not new problems, but ones the founders themselves saw as potentially fatal.
His life also highlights the gap between ideals and practice. The same leader who spoke about liberty led a nation that tolerated and depended on slavery. That tension remains central to modern debates about the meaning of the founding, the legitimacy of institutions, and how historical figures should be remembered.
For citizens and policymakers, the Washington lens can sharpen questions rather than provide easy answers. How much partisanship can a republic tolerate before it turns destructive? What balance between national security and liberty is acceptable in a world of permanent crisis and rapid technology? How should a powerful state relate to allies and rivals without losing its independence of judgment?
These are not 18th-century issues; they sit at the heart of contemporary struggles over elections, legislation, and foreign policy.
Real-World Impact
The influence of Washington’s ideas can be felt, often indirectly, in everyday life.
In one town, a local civics group might organise public readings of the Farewell Address around national holidays, using it as a starting point to discuss civility and disagreement in school board meetings and community debates. The text can serve as a shared reference point even for people with opposing views.
In classrooms, teachers introduce Washington’s presidency alongside discussions of modern elections and peaceful transfers of power. Students compare his decision to step down voluntarily with modern debates about term limits, executive authority, and the risks of leaders who refuse to accept defeat.
In campaign speeches and online arguments, political actors invoke the “founders” to justify everything from strict non-interventionism to expansive global leadership. Sometimes Washington is cited selectively, his warnings against parties or alliances deployed to support a particular modern agenda. Understanding his full context can help citizens weigh such claims more critically.
Even in policy discussions over budgets, taxation, and defence, echoes of the founding era appear. Arguments about the proper size of the federal government, the level of military spending, and the balance between state and federal power often appeal—explicitly or not—to rival interpretations of what Washington and his contemporaries intended.
These examples show how a figure from the 18th century still frames choices made by households, schools, activists, and lawmakers in 2025, even when they do not realise it.
Conclusion
Imagining what George Washington would think of the USA in 2025 brings together two very different worlds. On one side stands a small, agrarian republic fighting for survival; on the other, a vast, urbanised superpower facing global competition, digital disruption, and internal strain.
The continuities are striking. The Constitution he helped establish still structures government. Elections still change leaders without formal coups. The language of liberty, union, and self-government still carries weight, even when contested.
The contrasts are just as sharp. The scale of federal power, the reach of the military, the depth of partisan division, and the transformation of social norms go far beyond anything Washington could have imagined. His warnings about parties, foreign entanglements, and sectionalism feel eerily modern, yet his own entanglement with slavery and limited vision of political inclusion remind readers that the founding era cannot be romanticised.
Used carefully, the Washington lens offers a way to clarify present debates rather than to end them. It encourages citizens to ask whether current practices strengthen or erode the conditions for republican liberty he valued: unity without uniformity, power checked by virtue, and independence guarded against both foreign and domestic threats.
The next years will test how resilient those conditions remain. Signals to watch include the health of electoral processes, levels of trust in institutions, the tone of political competition, and the ability of leaders and citizens to place long-term constitutional stability above short-term partisan gain.
These reflections are interpretive and speculative, offering a modern lens on historical ideas rather than asserting definitive claims
