Farewell Addresses by US Presidents and Other Notable Leaders : Parting Words Before the Political Afterlife.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Vile, John R., author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Presidents--United States.

Presidents.

Farewell speeches.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (295 pages)

Edition:

1st ed.

Distribution:

New York : Bloomsbury Publishing (US), 2026.

Place of Publication:

London : Bloomsbury Academic, 2026.

System Details:

text file rdaft

Summary:

This volume compiles and analyzes the 12 formal U.S. presidential farewell addresses, situating them within the context of biblical, classical, and other literary antecedents.

Contents:

Cover

Half Title

Title

Copyright

Dedication

Contents

Figures

Preface

Introduction

1 Biblical, Classical, Literary, and English Precedents for Presidential and Other American Farewell Addresses

Old Testament Valedictories

Moses: "Choose life, that both thou and thy seed may live"

Joshua: "But as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord"

Ruth: "Thy people shall be my people"

David: "To walk in his ways, to keep his statutes, and his commandments, and his judgments, and his testimonies"

Mattathias: "Take heed to the commandments of the law"

Greek and Roman Valedictories

Socrates: "The best, the wisest, and the most just"

Others

New Testament Valedictories

Jesus: "And, lo, I am with you always"

Stephen: "Lord, do not hold this sin against them"

Paul: "I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith"

Other Valedictories

Muhammad: "I know not whether after this year I shall ever be amongst you again"

Shakespeare: "We are such stuff as dreams are made of"

Charles I: "I must tell you that their liberty and freedom consists in having of government"

Algernon Sidney and Other Whig Martyrs: "We live in an age that maketh truth pass for treason"

Analysis

2 The Theoretical Foundations of Presidential and Other American Farewell Addresses

The Farewell Address as Ritual

The Farewell Address as an Extraconstitutional Development

The Uniqueness of Distinct Executive Terms

The Farewell Speech as a Recognition of Political Death

Last Words, Dying Declarations, and Last Lectures

The Farewell as a Form of Good Sportsmanship

Farewell Addresses as a Way of Transcending Partisanship

Domestic and Foreign Policies

3 Collective Farewells from Five Puritans, a Quaker, and Two American Revolutionaries

The Puritans.

John Cotton: "As soone as Gods Ordinances cease, your security ceaseth likewise

but if God plant his Ordinances among you, feare not, he will maintaine them"

John Winthrop: "We must consider that we shall be as a city upon a hill, the eyes of the all people are upon us"

Thomas Hooker: "Come out of all evill sinfull pleasures and practices"

William Hooke: "These relations, civill, nautrall, spirituall"

Jonathan Edwards: "A contentious people will be a miserable people"

Calls for Independence

Thomas Paine's Common Sense : "'Tis Time to Part"

The Declaration of Independence as a Farewell Address: "Enemies in War, in Peace Friends"

4 Farewells from George Washington and Other Founding Fathers

A Time of Transition

Benjamin Franklin: "I expect no better and … I am not sure that it is not the best"

George Washington

Washington's Newburgh Address: "I have grown not only gray but almost blind in the service of my country"

Washington Says Goodbye to Military Life

Washington's Circular Letter to the States: "The foundation of our Empire was not laid in the gloomy age of ignorance and superstition"

Washington's Speech to Congress: "I retire from the great theatre of action"

Washington's Presidential Farewell Address: "The benign influence of good laws under a free government"

Washington's Last Will and Testament: "It is my Will &amp

desire that all the Slaves which I hold in my own right, shall receive their freedom"

Other Founding Fathers

Thomas Jefferson: "The mass of mankind has not been born with saddles on their backs"

James Madison: Let "the Union of the States be cherished and perpetual"

5 Farewells of Andrew Jackson and Andrew Johnson

6 Senatorial and Other Civil War-Related Farewells.

Frederick Douglass' Farewell to the British People: "Liberty under a monarchy is better than despotism under a democracy"

The Martyrdom of John Brown: "I submit, so let it be done"

The American Civil War

Aaron Burr's Farewell to the Senate: "He had no injuries to complain of"

Threats to the Union

Robert Toombs: "The Union, sir, is dissolved"

Senator Albert G. Brown: "Our duty . . . no longer permits us to take an active part in the proceedings of this body"

David L. Yulee: "I retire . . . in willing loyalty to the mandate of my State"

Stephen Mallory: "We know that you cannot conquer us"

Clement C. Clay and Benjamin Fitzpatrick: "Sir, are we looked upon more or less than men?"

Jefferson Davis: "Secession . . . is to be justified on the basis that the States are sovereign"

Alfred Iverson: "The Rubicon is passed"

John Slidell: "You will find us ready to meet you with the outstretched hand of fellowship or the mailed panoply of war"

Judah P. Benjamin: "Patriotism as high-spirited as ever adorned the American Senate"

Coda

Abraham Lincoln's Farewell to Springfield: "A task before me greater than that which rested upon Washington"

Parting Words from Civil War Generals

Robert E. Lee's Farewell: "The satisfaction that proceeds from a consciousness of duty faithfully performed"

Ulysses S. Grant: The freedman "should be considered as having as good a right to remain here as any other class of our citizens"

7 Cold War Farewells: MacArthur, Truman, and Eisenhower

Douglas MacArthur

Farewell to Congress: "Old soldiers never die

they just fade away"

Farewell to West Point: "When I cross the river, my last conscious thoughts will be of the Corps, and the Corps, and the Corps. I bid you farewell"

Harry S. Truman: "A deep and abiding faith in the destiny of free men".

Dwight D. Eisenhower

Farewell to the American Soldier: "No one can have a more worthy comrade and loyal friend than the American soldier"

Eisenhower's Presidential Farewell Address: "We face a hostile ideology-global in scope, atheistic in character, ruthless in purpose, and insidious in method"

8 Courageous, Tragic, and Ignominious Farewells: The Cause Is Greater Than the Individual

Theodore Roosevelt: "It takes more than that to kill a Bull Moose!"

Alben Barkley: "A servant in the house of the Lord"

John F. Kennedy

Kennedy's Farewell to Massachusetts: "We shall be a city upon a hill-the eyes of all people are upon us"

Kennedy's Prepared Speech at Dallas Trade Mart: "The watchmen on the walls of freedom"

Kennedy's Prepared Speech to the Democratic State Committee: "This land we love shall lead all mankind into a new frontier of peace and abundance"

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.: "Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord"

Robert F. Kennedy: "To tame the savageness of man and make gentle the life of this world"

From Assassination to Resignation

Vice President Spiro Agnew: "The Government at Washington does live. It lives in the pages of our Constitution and in the hearts of our citizens and there it will, always be safe"

President Richard M. Nixon

Nixon's Formal Resignation Speech: "I have never been a quitter … But as President, I must put the interest of America first"

Speech to Staff: "Only if you have been in the deepest valley can you ever know how magnificent it is to be on the highest mountain"

Sarah Palin: "Don't explain: Your friends don't need it and your enemies won't believe you anyway"

Rudy Giuliani: "The test of your Americanism was not your family tree

the test of your Americanism was how much you believed in America".

Al Franken: "I may be resigning my seat, but I am not giving up my voice"

Andrew Cuomo: "Because as we say, it's not about me, it's about we"

9 Farewells Before, During, and After the Reagan Revolution: Carter, Reagan, Clinton, and George W. Bush

Jimmy Carter: "Life is nuclear survival

liberty is human rights

the pursuit of happiness is a planet whose resources are devoted to the physical and spiritual nourishment of its inhabitants"

Reagan's Farewell: "We did it. We weren't just marking time. We made a difference. We made the city stronger, we made the city freer, and we left her in good hands"

Reagan's Second Farewell: "When the Lord calls me home … I will leave with the greatest love for this country of ours and eternal optimism for its future"

Bill Clinton: "More idealistic, more full of hope than the day I arrived, and more confident than ever that America's best days lie ahead"

George W. Bush: "If America does not lead the cause of freedom, that cause will not be led"

10 Modern Presidential Farewells in Other Venues: Johnson, Ford, and George H. W. Bush

Lyndon B. Johnson: "Now it is time to leave"

Gerald R. Ford: "May our third century be illuminated by liberty and blessed with brotherhood"

George Herbert Walker Bush: "You are beginning your service to country, and I am nearing the end of mine"

11 The Obama, Trump, and Biden Farewells

Barack H. Obama: Faith that was "written into our founding documents … whispered by slaves and abolitionists … sung by immigrants and homesteaders and those who marched for justice

reaffirmed by those who planted flags from foreign battlefields to the su

Donald Trump: "Our allegiance is not to the special interests corporations or global entities, it's to our children, our citizens, and to our nation itself".

Joe Biden: "I revere this office, but I love my country more".

ISBN:

979-82-16-38772-5

979-82-16-38770-1

OCLC:

1574806834