Washington was worth $525 million in 2010 dollars yet had to borrow money to get to his inauguration

[NNN0LHI]

http://www.uticaod.com/news/x430730479/Romney-would-rank-among-richest-presidents-ever

<snip>He couldn't top George Washington who, with nearly 60,000 acres and more than 300 slaves, is considered the big daddy of presidential wealth. After that, it gets complicated, depending how you rate Thomas Jefferson's plantation, Herbert Hoover's millions from mining or John F. Kennedy's share of the vast family fortune, as well as the finer points of factors like inflation adjustment. snip

Research by 24/7 Wall St., a news and analysis website, estimated Washington's wealth at the equivalent of $525 million in 2010 dollars.

Yet Washington had to borrow money to pay for his trip to New York for his inauguration in 1789, according to Dennis Pogue, vice president for preservation at Mount Vernon, Washington's Virginia estate. His money was tied up in land, reaping only a modest cash income after farm expenses. snip

A few former chief executives died in debt, including Thomas Jefferson, ranked in a Forbes study as the third-wealthiest president.

[DontTreadOnMe]

1. Washington owned 60,000 acres...

...most of them filled with trees. It was not developed land. And the land that was used for farming was not that profitable.

So this comparison to 2011 dollars is stupid... they are counting each acre of land at a huge value to make this calculation.

[pscot]

3. It was also in the Ohio Valley

and had squatters homesteading on it.GW battled for years trying to establish possession. I don't think he ever made much money off it. He was land poor. It's like valuing the Dutch purchase of Manahatta in present dollars.

[Joe Shlabotnik]

2. Some things never change.

1%'ers always use someone else's money. Never use, or let alone risk their own. Because they can.

[exboyfil]

4. Actually Washington stands above the other southern founding fathers

He recognized the evil and slavery and worked to free his slaves on his death (this is complicated by the fact that many slaves tied to his holdings were not actually his but were owned by Martha's children). In this area he was far past Jeffereson who espoused many noble ideas but continued to pursue a life of leisure on the backs of his slaves. All the southern planter founding fathers seemed to have a spending problem. One thing that cost Washington a great deal of money was the necessity to host anyone who came to visit him. This led to big bucks being spent by him.

Washington actually tried for a rational and fair Indian policy, but he was powerless to prevent what actually ended up happening (just like the British could not hold the American colonists back either). The lust for land and the ability to occupy it from a sparse native population was too great.

Many of the things these founding fathers did in the light of modern ethics would be considered criminal. There is no doubt that they used the power of their offices/positions to enrich themselves.

When I read about them the whole person needs to be considered. They were not demigods just men and women with many noble ideas and actions but also had flaws. One of my personal heroes - Alexander Hamilton - had something like a desire to establish a nobility in the U.S. based upon birth. This was fought by the more populist (populist being white male in this case) southern planter class (the ones who owned and supported slaves). I frankly think we could use individuals of the caliber of a Washington, Franklin, Jeffereson, Hamilton, and Adams now in our leadership positions.

[Joe Shlabotnik]

5. good reply.

Thanks. Thoughtful and well reasoned and clearly you have better grasp of Washington-era history than I do. But he was still a 1%er, and no doubt, felt an heir of superiority to his subordinates.

[provis99]

6. well spoken.

too many people on DU seem to uncritically accept Jefferson as a liberal icon, and neglect what Washington and Hamilton were all about.

Much of US history has been written by Southern historians in sympathy with the political values of the southern plantation owners, and this has ruined the way American history is taught. It's like how Roman history was written by rich patrician aristocrats, so the populist politicians and the plebians always come off looking bad.

[jsmirman]

7. Didn't Jefferson try to free his slaves on his death?

I thought I recalled being critical that, with the exception of his cook, he waited until then; I also think he failed in even the after-the-fact styled manumission of his slaves, as many of them were sold to pay off his debts.

Is this not correct?

[exboyfil]

8. His stated intent was to free his slaves

except you made no adjustment to his lifestyle to ensure that it would happen. In that he was the consumate hypocrit. Washington went through money, but his spending was nothing like Jeffersons. Washikngton went to considerable effort to free his slaves. Of course he did not have to provide for natural children, and Martha's first husband had quite a pile that was left to her children.

I admire many things about Thomas Jeffereson, but like I said before they all had feet of clay and should not be worshipped. We can learn from their lives and that study will hopefully make us better people. I particularly admire Jefferson's commintment to enlightmentment thinking in particular as to how it related to natural science. I think he was a derivative philosopher of John Locke, but he admirably applied those principles with the notable exceptions of the slaves, native Americans, and women.

At the end of the day Washington was a superior executive and Jeffereson was a superior thinker. I personally think that Hamilton and of course Washington were the best executives, while Jefferson, Adams, and Madison were the great thinkers of the age (of course Franklin should be included in the mix).

If Hamilton had kept it in his pants, he could very easily have been spoken of in the same breath as Washington.