As the capital`s magnificent cherry blossoms begin to burst into bloom along the Tidal Basin, they conjure up one of America`s enduring stories, the saga of George Washington and the cherry tree.
Because legend has it that George could not tell a lie, it all turned out well for the father of our country. But it could have been disastrous if he had played by the rules of modern politics.
Suppose, for example, that after chopping down the cherry tree with his trusty little hatchet, George had followed the example of Bill Clinton in the current presidential race.
Confronted about this deed, he might not have owned up immediately. ”I have never knowingly cut down a cherry tree with an ax,” the Clinton-like George might well have said.
This would have served to fend off questioning for a while, but the observed fact of a dead tree and tell-tale wood chips on the ground would always leave doubt about whether he did or didn`t.
And so the cherry-tree story would hound him for years wherever he went. Did he or didn`t he? He would give the same answer, and add that even if he had killed the helpless, valuable plant in the prime of its life, it should not disqualify him to be president.
The image of Slick George would have arisen. Martha would rally to his side, saying that her husband respected the environment and especially a tree that produced fruit for one of his favorite desserts, cherry tart, which she did not stay home to make for him, but had sent in.
Finally, it would occur to critics to be more specific with their questioning. A tough New York journalist would ask, ”Could it have been that you used a hatchet and not an ax to chop down the tree?”
”Yes, I did,” he would say, ”but I only did it once and I didn`t enjoy it. I have never used a hatchet to chop down a cherry tree since.” And why didn`t he just tell the whole truth earlier? ”Why, no one asked me the right question,” he would say.
On the other hand, if George had been Jerry Brown, he certainly would have handled the cherry-tree incident quite differently. He would have used it aggressively in public life to show that his devotion to truth went all the way back to his youth.
He would have described how, upon being confronted with the fact of the chopped-down tree, he confessed freely and willingly, thereby leading him down a non-corrupt path as a general and as a public servant.
Little would the people know that it was all an invention, that George had discovered the cherry-tree incident in a book proposal about him by Parson Mason Weems, and decided to mold himself into the shape of the central character, a faultless prig who became president.
It`s not entirely implausible. According to Washington biographer Henry Cabot Lodge, Parson Weems was the sort of man given to making up stories out of whole cloth. ”He was simply a man destitute of historical sense, training, or morals, and ready to take the slenderest fact and work it up for the purposes of the market . . . .” He not only made up anecdotes, but he plagiarized them, to sell his story.
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In other words, he possessed all the qualities of the modern political consultant.
A Jerry Brown-like George Washington probably would have loved to have had Parson Weems as his image-maker. After all, Brown appears to have patterned himself on a fictional anti-Establishment presidential candidate outlined in a book proposal three years ago by his consultant, Patrick Caddell.
Parson Weems` biography of Washington came out shortly after the first president`s death, and depicted a humorless, uninteresting hero who could do no wrong-much in the way public-relations people try to present their bosses in Washington.
It did not square with real George Washington, but the myth-maker`s storytelling ability spread this image far and wide after Washington`s death. Only in a later edition did the cherry-tree incident appear.
Luckily for us, the real George was a man of integrity, dignity and honor who saw no reason to invent, dissemble or exploit his position in order to become the first president. He didn`t need a new image every minute. He didn`t need a hatchet, either, an essential tool in modern campaigns.
All he had was stature, earned the hard way over the years.