Washington College Magazine
At Fall Convocation, Richard Brookhiser "Rules"
It has become a rite of passage at Washington College. The annual Fall Convocation is a chance for freshmen to start their road to independence—but not without some "rules" for the road. On August 25, the College honored Richard Brookhiser, Senior Editor at The National Review and author of several biographies of America's founders, with the honorary doctor of letters for his contribution to the understanding of our founding era, the early republic and its leaders.
"In the pantheon of founding fathers, George Washington is the most revered and the most enigmatic," said Tipson. "Richard Brookhiser, in Rediscovering George Washington, offers up a moral biography of the man as a worthy model for the nation to remember, appreciate, and emulate—his respect for others, his deliberate self-control, his courage and honor, his compulsion to follow through, and his use and relinquishment of power. Richard Brookhiser stands at the forefront of an early republic renaissance that appears to be gaining momentum."
Historian Richard Brookhiser, author of a moral biography of George Washington, received the honorary doctor of letters degree.
As President Baird Tipson looked upon a crowd of fresh and anxious faces, he had a message for new students and their families. College "takes courage and teaches the wisdom of experience."
He chose a baseball metaphor to drive home his point.
"Facing world class pitching means a lot of embarrassment, a lot of defeat, yet world-class baseball—and softball players too—know how to learn from defeat. So if you don't strike out once in a while during the time you are here, you're ducking the best pitches, the hard pitches. And our job is not to protect you; our job is to help you to deal with it, to get over the embarrassment, learn from your mistakes, and get back in the batter's box. That's what I mean by courage."
He also addressed the new Washington College parents.
"Parents, let your students take chances, make mistakes, explore new things, learn how to pick herself up and move on—although that might not be exactly what she had in mind. You are going to get frantic phone calls; you are going to hear tears on the other end of the line, frustration and maybe even rage. You're going to want to drive right down to Chestertown and fix it for them. The heart of my message is, 'Don't do it, stay home.' Your student needs the experience of working things out for himself."
Convocation could not conclude without some reference to our history, offered by an honored guest whose works look deeply into the lives, thoughts and motivations of America's revolutionary leaders.
Brookhiser, who edited an annotated edition of Washington's Rules of Civility—a book every freshman receives when entering the College— shared some of the wisdom that Washington sought to apply to his own life. Addressing an audience of 17- and 18-year-olds, Brookhiser noted that "you've already had more education than George Washington ever had."
"One of the ways he tried to organize his experience was this red book you've been given," he said. "They are rules of etiquette—they tell you how to walk, how to dress, how to talk, how to eat—but they are also exercises in attention—that is, attention to the people around you."
Ethan Zohn, winner of Survivor Africa, was the keynote speaker for freshman orientation. In his talk, "Character: The Ultimate Survivor Tool," Zohn told first-year students how he managed to win Survivor without compromising his values, and then went on to use his million-dollar winnings to establish an AIDS education program in Africa.
Washington's Rules reminds us others "have their feelings, they have their rights, and we have to think of those things when we say or do things."
He continued: "Now the Rules don't say that you can never disagree with anyone or you can never argue with anyone if you think they are wrong about something very important. George Washington was a politician, and he disagreed with other politicians all the time. He was a soldier and a revolutionary. But even politicians and soldiers have their own rules of civility. If we don't have them in politics, nothing could be debated or discussed."
Brookhiser also noted that the Rules are often about putting personal feelings aside for the sake of others and for the sake of a higher good.
According to today's cultural climate, "we're supposed to be in touch with our feelings. And we should be—but we shouldn't always express them. The Rule that states that most bluntly is Number 23, this about how you should behave toward criminals. Remember that criminals were often publicly punished in the 18th century. So Rule 23 says, 'When you see a crime punished, you may be inwardly pleased, but always show pity to the suffering offender.'
"The final point about the Rules is that they teach us that civility is related to civilization and politeness is the first form of politics," he said. "All these Rules are little things, but they add up to big things, because they are about our interactions with other people, and those are the foundations of government."
300 Washington Avenue, Chestertown, Maryland 21620 | 410-778-2800 | 800-422-1782