In June 1775, Congress commissioned George Washington to take command of the Continental Army in besieging the British in Boston. The command kept him away from Mount Vernon for more than 8 years. By 1785 Washington had concluded that reform was essential, he wrote to James Madison, what we need is an Energetic Constitution. In 1787 Washington ended his self-imposed retirement and traveled to Philadelphia to attend convention assembled to recommend changes to the articles of Confederation. George Washington was unanimously chosen to preside over the Constitutional Convention. He wWrote” My wish is that the convention may adopt no temporizing expedients but probe the defects of the Constitution to the bottom and provide a radical cure.” Once
