Washington: ‘I cannot pay a fine’

When it comes to U.S. history, George Washington comes off as a pretty OK guy:

  • When life gave him a cherry tree, he made firewood.
  • At his first opportunity, he chose to attack the French rather than accept their immediate surrender.
  • He managed to outright not lose to the British.
  • He kept our new nation afloat for its first eight years, then left office voluntarily.
  • He stole New York City property from the public library.

That’s right: Washington checked out a copy of The Law of Nations by Emer de Vattel on October 5, 1789 and never intended to return it. In fact, it was kept a guarded secret by–we presume–the Freemasons until The New York Daily News blew the lid off of this conspiracy.

After 221 years, $300,000 and a backlog of unknown length on the waiting list, Washington’s pet historians have finally coughed up a replacement copy for the library, presumably because Washington doodled boobs and penises in the margins of the original.