After the Revolution America started off strong. With a new Constitution and President George Washington, this fledgling government was to become a world leader. Can it continue? Or as Benjamin Franklin advised: “We have a Republic—if you can keep it.”

George Washington reminded the citizens that it was up to them to build a prosperous and grand country. Americans had to decide for themselves according to Washington how to build on what they had achieved. “At this auspicious period, the United States came into being as a Nation . . . . and if their Citizens should not be free and happy, the fault will be entirely their own.”

With the war now over and having won it, the Americans would now decide for themselves whether they were to be “respectable and prosperous, or contemptable [sic] and miserable as a Nation.”

The Rule of Law would be the foundation for our prosperity and respect. The very meaning and structure of our Constitution embody this principle. This principle is the bedrock concept of the meaning of our legal and political system.

No individual, city, or state should be above the Rule of Law.