I have already intimated to you the danger of parties in the state, with particular reference to the founding of them on geographical
discriminations.
Let me now take a more comprehensive view and warn you in the
most solemn manner against the baneful effects of the spirit of
party, generally. This spirit, unfortunately, is inseparable from our
nature, having its root in the strongest passions of the human mind.
It exists under different shapes in all governments, more or less
stifled, controlled, or repressed; but in those of the popular form it
is seen in its greatest rankness and is truly their worst enemy.
-- President George Washington, "Farewell Address" (1796)
A historian might use this excerpt as evidence in support of the view that President
Washington